Mary Margaret Garman Campbell (1898–1979) was the eldest of seven sisters known for their glamorous,

bohemian Bohemian or Bohemians may refer to: *Anything of or relating to Bohemia Beer * National Bohemian, a brand brewed by Pabst * Bohemian, a brand of beer brewed by Molson Coors Culture and arts * Bohemianism, an unconventional lifestyle, origin ...

lifestyles and their many love affairs with famous artists, writers, and musicians of

interwar In the history of the 20th century, the interwar period lasted from 11 November 1918 to 1 September 1939 (20 years, 9 months, 21 days), the end of the First World War to the beginning of the Second World War. The interwar period was relativel ...

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

. She was a member of the

Bloomsbury Group The Bloomsbury Group—or Bloomsbury Set—was a group of associated English writers, intellectuals, philosophers and artists in the first half of the 20th century, including Virginia Woolf, John Maynard Keynes, E. M. Forster and Lytton Strac ...

and the wife of the radical

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...

poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator ( thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral or writte ...

Roy Campbell, who attacked the group in ''The Georgiad'' (1931), a response to his wife's

lesbian A lesbian is a Homosexuality, homosexual woman.Zimmerman, p. 453. The word is also used for women in relation to their sexual identity or sexual behavior, regardless of sexual orientation, or as an adjective to characterize or associate n ...

affair with

Vita Sackville-West Victoria Mary, Lady Nicolson, CH (née Sackville-West; 9 March 1892 – 2 June 1962), usually known as Vita Sackville-West, was an English author and garden designer. Sackville-West was a successful novelist, poet and journalist, as wel ...

Biography

Mary Margaret Garman was the eldest daughter of Walter Garman, a physician. She and her younger siblings grew up in the, "stately

Elizabethan The Elizabethan era is the epoch in the Tudor period of the history of England during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I (1558–1603). Historians often depict it as the golden age in English history. The symbol of Britannia (a female personifi ...

manor house A manor house was historically the main residence of the lord of the manor. The house formed the administrative centre of a manor in the European feudal system; within its great hall were held the lord's manorial courts, communal meals w ...

," of

Oakeswell Hall Wednesbury () is a market town in Sandwell in the county of West Midlands, England. It is located near the source of the River Tame. Historically part of Staffordshire in the Hundred of Offlow, at the 2011 Census the town had a population of 37 ...

Wednesbury Wednesbury () is a market town in Sandwell in the county of West Midlands, England. It is located near the source of the River Tame. Historically part of Staffordshire in the Hundred of Offlow, at the 2011 Census the town had a population of ...

, in the bleak surroundings of the

Black Country The Black Country is an area of the West Midlands county, England covering most of the Metropolitan Boroughs of Dudley, Sandwell and Walsall. Dudley and Tipton are generally considered to be the centre. It became industrialised during its ro ...

. Their childhood was a privileged one, "with the full retinue of governesses, nannies, parlor maids, and gardeners." Mary, "had a devoutly Anglican upbringing," and in her early teens fell hopelessly in love with the local vicar. But as she grew older, Mary rebelled against her parents by pilfering and selling household possessions for money to buy cigarettes, racy French novels, and tickets to the picture show. At the age of seventeen, Mary fell in madly love with the female art teacher at her

boarding school A boarding school is a school where pupils live within premises while being given formal instruction. The word "boarding" is used in the sense of "room and board", i.e. lodging and meals. As they have existed for many centuries, and now exten ...

, which

Joseph Pearce Joseph Pearce (born February 12, 1961), is an English-born American writer, and Director of the Center for Faith and Culture at Aquinas College in Nashville, Tennessee, before which he held positions at Thomas More College of Liberal Arts in ...

has described as, "the earliest indication of her latent

bisexuality Bisexuality is a romantic or sexual attraction or behavior toward both males and females, or to more than one gender. It may also be defined to include romantic or sexual attraction to people regardless of their sex or gender identity, whic ...

." Her younger sister, Kathleen, called Kitty, was her main accomplice. The daring duo also drank at the local miners' pub. When Mary and Kitty were 21 and 17 years old respectively, they ran away together and arrived in London penniless, where they set up house in a one-room studio at 13 Regent Square in Camden on the outskirts of

Bloomsbury Bloomsbury is a district in the West End of London. It is considered a fashionable residential area, and is the location of numerous cultural, intellectual, and educational institutions. Bloomsbury is home of the British Museum, the largest mus ...

. They lived in self-imposed poverty, surviving on the little money they earned as artists' models. The dazzlingly beautiful Garman sisters became prominent in London's artistic communities, including the bohemian Bloomsbury set. They frequented West End clubs such as the Gargoyle, the Harlequin and the Cave of the Golden Calf. Their circle of friends and acquaintances now numbered highbrows, Jews, poets, authors, painters, singers and ballerinas. In 1924 Mary married the destitute

n poet Roy Campbell, wearing black and a gold veil. Their scandalous marriage lasted until his death in 1957. They shared an outrageous lifestyle epitomized by his suspending her from a balcony in a failed attempt to intimidate her into wifely submission. Campbell recorded his love for Mary in poems and memoirs, describing her ironically as a combination of

Sappho Sappho (; el, Σαπφώ ''Sapphō'' ; Aeolic Greek ''Psápphō''; c. 630 – c. 570 BC) was an Archaic Greek poet from Eresos or Mytilene on the island of Lesbos. Sappho is known for her Greek lyric, lyric poetry, written to be sung while ...

and Saint Theresa. The infidelities of both parties included Mary's affair with

, which was commemorated in a series of sonnets by Vita and documented by

Virginia Woolf Adeline Virginia Woolf (; ; 25 January 1882 28 March 1941) was an English writer, considered one of the most important modernist 20th-century authors and a pioneer in the use of stream of consciousness as a narrative device. Woolf was born i ...

, an ousted lover, in her biography of Sackville-West. Absorbed in their wild world, Roy and Mary Campbell were negligent parents; recalls their daughter Anna: ''"We were never told how to sit at a table... or how important it was to change our knickers every so often."'' Connolly, Cressida. The Rare and the Beautiful: The Lives of the Garmans, p. 142. In the 1930s, Mary and Roy Campbell moved to the south of France among

Augustus John Augustus Edwin John (4 January 1878 – 31 October 1961) was a Welsh painter, draughtsman, and etcher. For a time he was considered the most important artist at work in Britain: Virginia Woolf remarked that by 1908 the era of John Singer Sarg ...

Aldous Huxley Aldous Leonard Huxley (26 July 1894 – 22 November 1963) was an English writer and philosopher. He wrote nearly 50 books, both novels and non-fiction works, as well as wide-ranging essays, narratives, and poems. Born into the prominent Huxley ...

, Sybille Bedford and

Nancy Cunard Nancy Clara Cunard (10 March 1896 – 17 March 1965) was a British writer, heiress and political activist. She was born into the British upper class, and devoted much of her life to fighting racism and fascism. She became a muse to some of the ...

, and later to Spain. She and her husband were received into the

Roman Catholic Church The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

. She was driving the car when her husband was killed in a road accident in 1957. She died in 1979.

Notes

References

*''The Rare and the Beautiful: The Lives of the Garmans''; by Cressida Connolly, Fourth Estate
Family Profile, book review and photographic images of Mary, Lorna and Kathleen
{{DEFAULTSORT:Garman, Mary 1898 births 1979 deaths People from Camden Town People from Walsall People from Wednesbury LGBT people from England Converts to Roman Catholicism LGBT Roman Catholics

Mary Garman Mary Margaret Garman Campbell (1898–1979) was the eldest of seven sisters known for their glamorous, bohemian lifestyles and their many love affairs with famous artists, writers, and musicians of interwar London. She was a member of the Bl ...

Biography

See also

Notes

References