Rosamund Jacob

Rosamond Jacob (13 October 1888 – 11 October 1960) was an Irish writer and political activist. She was a lifelong activist for suffragist, republican and socialist causes and a writer of fiction.

Early life She was born to lapsed Quaker parents, Lewis Jacob and Henrietta Harvey, in Waterford, where she lived until 1920. Her parents' support for Irish Nationalism placed them at odds with the majority of the Quaker community in Waterford and resulted in isolation. Rosamond was educated in Quaker schools in Waterford and amongst other things through this became proficient in languages such as French and German.

Political activism Pre-War of Independence As a young adult Jacob become involved in organisations such as the Gaelic League, the Irish National League, and Inghinidhe na hÉireann, a dedicated women's radical nationalist organisation. She, along with her brother Tom, was a member of Sinn Féin from 1905, and it was Rosamond who opened the first branch of Sinn Féin in Waterford in 1906. It was that same year Rosamond became an Irish language speaker and writer, a language she'd go on to become fluent in. Jacob's time in the Gaelic League over time began to grate, however, as she began to find the Catholic atmosphere there stifling to her developing feminist and agonist beliefs. In 1908 she joined the Irish Women's Franchise League, created by her friend and fellow feminist Hanna Sheehy-Skeffington. It was during this time she shared a cell with Dorothy Macardle, now also firmly on the Republican side.

Between 1920 and 1927, Jacob was secretary of the Irishwomen's International League, which had begun life in 1916 as the Irish branch of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF). She and her colleague Lucy Kingston were the two Irish delegates to the Third International Women's Congress for Peace and Freedom in Vienna in 1921. She was among the organisers of the congress held in Dublin in 1926. It was also in 1926 that she followed De Valera and Countess Markievicz and their supporters out of Sinn Féin and into the Fianna Fáil party following a split over the policy of using Abstentionism against Dáil Éireann. In 1927 Jacob resigned as secretary of the Irish branch of the WILPF but went on to attend the organisation's congress in Prague in 1929 accompanied by Hanna Sheehy-Skeffington. She played a leading role in the political campaign to secure Ryan's freedom from Nationalist Spain, and later worked to defend his reputation after news of his death in Nazi Germany became known.

Writing Jacob's first novel, called Callaghan, was published in 1920. It had actually been written in 1915, however, it took Jacob five years to find a publisher willing to take a chance on her. Callaghan was published under the pseudonym of "F. Winthrop". The novel details a romantic relationship between a Protestant Suffragist and a Catholic Nationalist. Rosamond Jacob kept a diary almost all of her life, and there are 171 of these diaries among her literary and political papers held in the National Library of Ireland.

Published works Callaghan 1920 (as F. Winthrop) The Rise of the United Irishmen 1791-94 1927 The Troubled House 1938 The Rebel's Wife 1957 The Raven's Glen 1960

Biographies Lane, Dr Leeann (2010), Rosamond Jacob - Third Person Singular. UCD Press.