Yesterday was Anti-Slavery Day. According to the United Nations, an estimated 50 million people are in modern slavery around the world.
Here in Somerset, people have been fighting against the enslavement of human beings for centuries. I’d like to honour some women in Somerset who fought against slavery. Here are some quick facts about them.
Links to all books: linktr.ee/helenpugh
#OnThisDay, 19 Oct 1944, President Roosevelt announces Black women can join WAVES – the US Navy's women's service.
Lt Harriet Pickens and Ensign Frances Wills, pictured, become the first Black women officers a couple of months later.
#WomenInHistory #OTD #History #WomensHistory #WorldWar2 #AmericanHistory #Histodons
1/3
#OnThisDay, 18 Oct 1943, Elizabeth Devereux-Rochester returns to German-occupied France to work as a courier for the British Special Operations Executive. She operates for six months. The SOE supported the French resistance, and couriers carried messages and equipment about their network.
Before joining the SOE, she had run an escape line from France to Switzerland.
#WomenInHistory #OTD #History #WomensHistory #WorldWar2 #Histodons
#OnThisDay, 16 Oct 1869, Emily Gibson, Anna Lloyd, Louisa Lumsden, Isabella Townshend and Sarah Woodhead start as undergrads at Girton College in the UK – the first Cambridge University college for women.
- Elizabeth Parry, the first female convict to gain emancipation, instrumental in cultivating the colony's first successful crop.
- Sarah Dorset, who gave birth en route and settled on Norfolk Island.
- Mary Pardoe, mother to the youngest traveler on the journey.
These women played pivotal roles in shaping the early foundations of Australia's
#OnThisDay, 14 Oct 1586, Mary Queen of Scots finally consents to be tried for plotting the assassination of her cousin Elizabeth, Queen of England.
Mary faces a council of 36 noblemen whilst denied any legal counsel. She was found guilty, and executed the following year.
[image (c) @blimagesonline]
#WomenInHistory #OTD #History #WomensHistory #BritishHistory #Histodons
#OnThisDay, 13 Oct 1978, around 5,000 women march through Dublin protesting against rape and all forms of sexual assault.
#WomenInHistory #OTD #History #WomensHistory #IrishHistory #Histodons
#OnThisDay, 13 Oct 1975, Te Rarawa leader Whina Cooper brings around 5,000 marchers to the New Zealand Parliament to present a petition signed by 60,000 people protesting ongoing Māori land alienation.
#WomenInHistory #OTD #History #WomensHistory #NZHistory #Histodons
#OnThisDay, 12 Oct 1956, Marga Klompé is appointed Minister of Social Work. She is the first woman to be a cabinet Minister in the Netherlands government and is recognised as a key architect of the Dutch welfare state. [photos (c) Spaarnestad Photo ]
#WomenInHistory #OTD #History #WomensHistory #NLHistory #Histodons
Cutting deeper than usual this week on Deep Cuts in a Lovecraftian Vein, we look at Muriel E. Eddy's Selected Letters to the Editor—what she wrote about H. P. Lovecraft to newspapers and pulp magazines.
https://deepcuts.blog/2025/10/11/deeper-cut-muriel-e-eddys-selected-letters-to-the-editor/
#womeninhistory #womeninhorror #lovecraft #hplovecraft #letters
Helen Pugh
CarveHerName
gemsofindology
Bobby D.