Winifred Horrabin

Winifred Horrabin, née Batho (9 September 1887 – 24 June 1971), was a British socialist activist and journalist.

Early life and education She was born in Sheffield, West Riding of Yorkshire, on 9 August 1887, daughter of Arthur John Batho, a postal telegraph clerk, and his wife Lilian, née Outram. She was the fourth of six children, three of whom died in infancy. The family were members of The Wicker Congregational Church. Her father died in May 1891, in Graaff-Reinet, South Africa, where he was seeking treatment for his tuberculosis.

Winifred began attending the Sheffield School of Art in 1907, where she met her future husband, the political activist, cartographer and cartoonist Frank Horrabin. She had a political awakening while a student, influenced by the South African socialist and feminist Olive Schreiner.

Career

1910s She and Horrabin married on 11 August 1911, and they moved to London the same year. In 1912 she delivered a paper, "Is Woman's Place the Home?", to the Fabian Society, arguing that the liberation of women from economic slavery depended on the destruction of private property. She and her husband were involved in the Central Labour College, and in 1913 Winifred set up a Women's League to focus on the education of female workers. asked for a separation in 1942 and they divorced in 1947. In her later years she compiled a collection of autobiographical essays, The Summer of a Dormouse, and wrote a novel, After Which War?, but did not publish them. Other unpublished works included a play, Victorian Love Story: Beloved Good, about Thomas Carlyle and his wife Jane, and a biography of Olive Schreiner. She died at her home in Dorking, Surrey, on 24 June 1971, and was cremated at Randall's Park crematorium, Leatherhead, on 30 June. Her papers are held by the University of Hull.