Charlotte Brown Carmichael Stopes (née Carmichael; 5 February 1840 – 6 February 1929), also known as C. C. Stopes, was a British scholar, author, and campaigner for women's rights. She also published several books relating to the life and work of
William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's nation ...
. Her most successful publication was ''British Freewomen: Their Historical Privilege'' (published 1894), a book which influenced and inspired the early twentieth century
British women's suffrage movement. She married
Henry Stopes, a palaeontologist, brewer and engineer. They produced two daughters, the eldest of whom was
Marie Stopes
Marie Charlotte Carmichael Stopes (15 October 1880 – 2 October 1958) was a British author, palaeobotanist and campaigner for eugenics and women's rights. She made significant contributions to plant palaeontology and coal classification, ...
, known for her advocacy of birth control.
Early life
Charlotte Stopes was born in Edinburgh on 5 February 1840 to Christine Brown Graham Carmichael and James Ferrier Carmichael, a landscape painter, who died of tuberculosis when Stopes was fourteen. She had the desire to become a writer, devising stories for her brothers and sisters when she was a child and at twenty-one publishing a collection, ''Alice Errol and Other Tales''. On completing the only schooling a young woman could then receive, she took posts as a governess, one of the few careers available to her, throughout the 1860s and early 1870s.
University education
In 1865
Sarah Mair founded the Ladies' Edinburgh Debating Society, which published a regular writing journal, ''The Attempt''. Charlotte Carmichael had become a member by 1866 and published sundry pieces in ''The Attempt''. In a meeting of the society in 1867
Mary Crudelius
Mary Crudelius (née McLean) (23 February 1839 – 24 July 1877) was a British campaigner for women's education who lived in Leith, Edinburgh in the 1860s and 1870s, and was a supporter of women's suffrage. She was a founder of the Edinburgh ...
presented her initiative of creating classes for women at a university level under the auspices of the
Edinburgh Ladies' Educational Association. Charlotte Carmichael was present at the meeting. She pledged her willingness to attend such classes and guaranteed another twelve interested persons. The first classes began in 1868, taught by Professor
David Masson
David Mather Masson LLD DLitt (2 December 18226 October 1907), was a Scottish academic, supporter of women's suffrage, literary critic and historian.
Biography
He was born in Aberdeen, the son of William Masson, a stone-cutter, and his wi ...
, Professor of English Literature at Edinburgh University, 'at a time when the University was not open to women and courses were given to them privately by the male Professors'. Although women were not permitted to take a degree, she achieved the highest certificate then available to a female student, in subjects as diverse as literature, philosophy and science, achieving first class honours. In fact, she "was the first woman in Scotland to gain a Certificate of Arts". She used her education for the advancement of women and pursued scholarly interests in English Renaissance, particularly Shakespearean, literary history.
In 1876 Stopes went to
Glasgow
Glasgow ( ; sco, Glesca or ; gd, Glaschu ) is the most populous city in Scotland and the fourth-most populous city in the United Kingdom, as well as being the 27th largest city by population in Europe. In 2020, it had an estimated popul ...
to help the movement for women's higher education in that city. The trip coincided with a meeting of the
British Association for the Advancement of Science, which she attended, beginning her long connection with the association. It was at the Glasgow meeting that she met Henry Stopes, who, despite his being eleven years the younger, she would marry three years later.
Upper Norwood
After they were married on 3 June 1879, the Stopeses went on a honeymoon across Europe and the Near East, eventually visiting Egypt, before returning to Britain. Charlotte Stopes went to Edinburgh where her first daughter, Marie, was born in 1880. After reaching her husband in
Colchester
Colchester ( ) is a city in Essex, in the East of England. It had a population of 122,000 in 2011. The demonym is Colcestrian.
Colchester occupies the site of Camulodunum, the first major city in Roman Britain and its first capital. Colch ...
, his family home, they moved to London, where he had an active business. They settled in
Upper Norwood on the southern outskirts of the city, where her second daughter, Winnie, was born in 1884. Henry, being very busy with business, left Charlotte alone in their new house, where she was isolated from the sorts of intellectual life she had been used to. Her response was to organize meetings and classes, including a reading group, a logic workshop and a group focused on issues relating to women's emancipation.
Stopes became keenly interested in the
Victorian dress reform
Victorian dress reform was an objective of the Victorian dress reform movement (also known as the rational dress movement) of the middle and late Victorian era, led by various reformers who proposed, designed, and wore clothing considered more ...
and the need for comfortable clothes for women. She was a member of the ''Rational Dress Society'' and through her activity with the society in 1888–1889 gave rise to her identity as a feminist. At the British Association meeting in
Newcastle upon Tyne
Newcastle upon Tyne ( RP: , ), or simply Newcastle, is a city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England. The city is located on the River Tyne's northern bank and forms the largest part of the Tyneside built-up area. Newcastle is ...
in 1889, Stopes stunned the proceedings by organizing an impromptu session, where she introduced rational dress to a wide audience, her speech being noted in newspapers across Britain.
Stopes remained in Norwood until her husband's bankruptcy in 1892, when they were forced to sell the house. To escape the disaster, she took her daughters to Edinburgh, where she enrolled them at the newly formed girls' school,
St George's School, Edinburgh
St George's School is an independent girls' school situated in the Ravelston district of Edinburgh, Scotland, which was rated 'Excellent' by Education Scotland in its most recent inspection.
In 2018 the school celebrated the 130th anniversary o ...
. She also attempted to gain a retrospective degree, denied to her at the time of her studies, but she needed a further two courses not included in her certificate. These courses however clashed, so she could not do them in a single year and she abandoned the attempt, returning to London to take up lodgings in
Torrington Square
__NOTOC__
Torrington Square is a square in Bloomsbury, owned by the University of London, located in central London, England. Today it is a square in name only, most of the houses having been demolished by the university. The southern end of th ...
close to the
British Museum
The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...
, where she was able to better follow her Shakespearean research.
Activism
C.C. Stopes' study of British women's history proved to be the most popular and influential of her numerous publications. ''British Freewomen: Their Historical Privilege'' was published by Swan Sonnenschein in 1894. (The Sonnenschein Archive
Sonnenschein archivesare at Reading University.) It ran to several editions and was a key reference point for the British female suffrage movement.
Helen Blackburn
Helen Blackburn (25 May 1842 – 11 January 1903) was a feminist, writer and campaigner for women's rights, especially in the field of employment. Blackburn was an editor of the ''Englishwoman's Review'' magazine. She wrote books about women work ...
, who had supplied Stopes with notes from her own research to help the enterprise, purchased the whole first edition, many copies of which were sent copies to members of the
House of Commons
The House of Commons is the name for the elected lower house of the bicameral parliaments of the United Kingdom and Canada. In both of these countries, the Commons holds much more legislative power than the nominally upper house of parliament. T ...
. As Laura E Nym Mayhall observes that ''British Freewomen'' was 'perhaps the single most influential text in casting women's struggle for the vote within the radical narrative of loss, resistance and recovery' since Stopes' arguments, as outlined in successive editions of ''British Freewomen'', were frequently cited by 'suffragists of all stripes in making the case for women's suffrage in print, before crowds, and in the courtroom'. Stopes was a member of the
National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies
The National Union of Women Suffrage Societies (NUWSS), also known as the ''suffragists'' (not to be confused with the suffragettes) was an organisation founded in 1897 of women's suffrage societies around the United Kingdom. In 1919 it was ren ...
. She wrote pamphlets and spoke publicly in campaigns for women's rights.
Shakespearean scholarship
Her first book was ''The Bacon/Shakespeare Question'', published in 1888: refuting the popular speculation that
Francis Bacon
Francis Bacon, 1st Viscount St Alban (; 22 January 1561 – 9 April 1626), also known as Lord Verulam, was an English philosopher and statesman who served as Attorney General and Lord Chancellor of England. Bacon led the advancement of both ...
was the actual author of Shakespeare's plays. This was the first of several works of scholarship concerning Shakespeare and literature of his period. Her books in the field included ''Shakespeare's Family'' (1901), ''Shakespeare's Warwickshire Contemporaries'' (1907), ''William Hunnis and the Revels'' (1910), ''Burbage and Shakespeare's Stage'' (1913), ''The Seventeenth-Century Accounts of the Masters of the Revels'' (1922) and many published notes and articles. Stopes received the
Rose Mary Crawshay Prize from the
British Academy
The British Academy is the United Kingdom's national academy for the humanities and the social sciences.
It was established in 1902 and received its royal charter in the same year. It is now a fellowship of more than 1,000 leading scholars spa ...
in 1916 for her Shakespearian research, thirteen years before her death in February 1929.
According to Boas, on the day after Stopes died, ''
The Times
''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper '' The Sunday Times'' (f ...
'' published the following comment:
The Royal Society of Literature has lost a distinguished veteran among its Fellows, and the study of Shakespeare a brave and devoted servant.
Later life
For much of her later life Stopes had financial difficulties after her husband's bankruptcy (1892) and untimely death (1902). Though daughter Marie became independent when she won a scholarship and later was given a university position, Stopes still had a younger daughter, Winnie, to care for. Her financial difficulties were partly alleviated at the end of 1903 when she was awarded a government pension of £50 a year "in consideration of her literary work, especially in connection with the Elizabethan period". She was awarded another grant in 1907 by the Carnegie Trust, this time for £75 a year.
As a Shakespearean scholar her recognition continued to increase and in 1912 she was elected as an honorary member of the
Royal Society of Literature. In 1914 she became the founding member of a new ''Shakespeare Association'' which promoted Shakespearean scholarship through functions and lectures until 1922.
Charlotte Stopes died on 6 February 1929 in Worthing, Sussex at the age of 89, from bronchitis and cerebral thrombosis, and was buried at
Highgate Cemetery
Highgate Cemetery is a place of burial in north London, England. There are approximately 170,000 people buried in around 53,000 graves across the West and East Cemeteries. Highgate Cemetery is notable both for some of the people buried there as ...
. The date of birth on her grave is 6 February 1841.
Works by Charlotte Carmichael Stopes
![CCStopesDedication](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d2/CCStopesDedication.jpg)
* The Bacon/Shakespeare Question (London: T.G. Johnson, 1888).
* The Bacon/Shakespeare Question Answered (London: T.G. Johnson, 1889).
* British Freewomen: Their Historical Privilege (London: Swann Sonnenschein, 1894).
* Shakespeare's Warwickshire Contemporaries, (Stratford-upon-Avon Press, 1897; revised edition, 1907).
* Shakespeare's Family: a Record of the Ancestors and Descendants of William Shakespeare (London: Eliot Stock, 1901).
* The Sphere of 'Man' in Relation to that of 'Woman' in the Constitution (London: T Fisher Unwin, 1908).
* William Hunnis and the Revels of the Chapel Royal (London: Louvain; David Nutt, 1910).
* Burbage and Shakespeare's Stage (London: De La More Press, 1913).
* Shakespeare's Industry (London: Bell & Sons, 1916).
* The Life of Henry, Third Earl of Southampton (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1922).
Notes and references
References
Sources
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Further reading
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MS ADD 157€”Some of Stopes' research notes and correspondence in the
University College London
, mottoeng = Let all come who by merit deserve the most reward
, established =
, type = Public research university
, endowment = £143 million (2020)
, budget = ...
special collections.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Stopes, Charlotte Carmichael
1841 births
1929 deaths
Burials at Highgate Cemetery
Writers from Edinburgh
Scottish suffragists
Women of the Victorian era
19th-century Scottish women writers
Shakespearean scholars
Alumni of the University of Edinburgh