Motivation and ramifications

Almost twenty years late, I watched Schindler's List last night. I wish I hadn't waited so long - there are so many powerful moments and ideas. One thing that fascinated me was motivation. I may have got it completely wrong, but Schindler seemed to change during the story. Initially motivated solely by the pursuit of money and pleasure, by the end of the story he had taken personal incredible risks to save the lives of people persecuted and tortured by the social group to which he belonged.

I'd love to find out what motivated Isabella to study medicine. Another Isabel, Isabel Hutton, took the same medical course as Isabella did a couple of years earlier and wrote a detailed account of it.

"It became tiresome," she wrote, "being asked by comparative strangers what made me decide to study medicine. To have enlightened them would have been to tell my life history, my ideals and my ambitions. At first I felt honour bound to try to explain what I hardly knew myself. ..... I learned to say flippantly, "To earn my living." This profoundly shocked but effectively silenced enquiries, for they seemed to want to hear something more revealing, romantic or hifalutin."

People had preconceived ideas of what might drive a young woman through years of study to becoming a doctor.

Like Schindler, this particular young lady did not meet those expectations.

She continues, "Practically all the women medical students of my time were prompted by a missionary spirit as well as a desire to succeed in their profession. Quite a number were the daughters of medical missionaries and had already dedicated themselves to the field; others - like myself - had realised the need for women doctors at home."

I wish there were more clues as to Isabella's drivers. And what were their consequences? Schindler's drivers led to the failure of his marriage and his businesses, but there were 6,000 descendants from the 'Schindler Jews' instead of nothing but names on memorials and Nazi death lists.

The funny things that memory holds

I was exploring an old house recently with an elderly lady who had also known Isabella. She wearied, so I steered her to a nearby sofa and we settled down to enjoy a magazine together. Eyes down to take in the reading matter, we simultaneously exclaimed, "That's Isabella's carpet."

It seemed odd that our brains had bothered to store such an apparently insignificant thing, and it intrigues me that we had both spent long enough gazing downwards, not conversing and not making eye-contact for the carpet to become engrained within our brains.

I recalled the carpet from childhood, when I was young enough to play on it. Had my companion played on it too? Had Isabella loved children, or did she just love patterned carpets?

My friend gave me this photo of Isabella from about 1922. Imagine my excitement - not only is she looking happy and glamorous, she's wearing a long string of beads.

Woman and Labour - Project Gutenberg

As I've said before, I'll read anything tangential to Isabella's story to get a feel for the times in which she lived. She kept no diary and left no letters, so I've been looking at what other people of the time wrote for insight.

There's a great project digitising and making downloadable versions of books that are out of copyright in the USA, Project Gutenberg. There are many fascinating books from the early years of the twentieth century freely available that would have taken days of hunting in inaccessible libraries to find before Gutenberg.

One I've been reading is by a South African, Olive Schreiner.

'Woman and Labour' is her re-write of a much researched book that was destroyed, I think, during fighting in the Boer War. I'd never have thought I'd enjoy reading an ancient feminist argument, but it's wonderful.

Isabella's story is only unusual because she was a woman. She was one of the first women to follow the trail hacked out by women of a slightly earlier generation. Women's emancipation - just like slaves - was a hot topic, and Olive explains her thinking on the topic, and that is what excites me in her book.

Here's a group of women who are still campaigning, re-enacting the costumes of the suffrage campaigners of 1911, such as Isabella would have seen. Although maybe the campaign is more fun.

The second strand

I've been reading anything at all vaguely connected with Isabella's story, so I was browsing the biography section in the library last week. 'Fathers and Sons', Richard Madeley - It was the blurb that begged me to examine the book. It claimed to be the story of the effects on subsequent generations of a traumatic event that took place in 1907. Ok, Isabella was a woman, but what's the difference in this context? Straight onto my pile it went.

In some ways I only needed to read the Preface where I came across this:

‘........ Fathers and sons, four generations strung together like beads on a twisting double helix of shared DNA. Utterly unalike when regarded from some angles; almost clone-like in their similarities when viewed from others.  

Climbers roped together through space and time, mostly barely conscious of distance twitches on the line, but sometimes pulled up sharp by a sudden unmistakeable tug from the past.’

I was hooked....off to Google. Was this just one author's imaginative idea? No. There were articles in scientific journals as well as Wikipedia. 

For example here: The beads and string of DNA | HudsonAlpha Institute for Biotechnology

'Envision DNA as a very long string, wrapped around millions of beads made of proteins. To regulate genes, cells use thousands of different proteins. 

Imagine the beads are made of thousands of combinations of different colors and designs.'

Electron micrographs show how the idea was born:

I'm well and truly hooked. I wanted a second strand to Isabella's string of beads, and now I've got it.

Swastika

The V and A experts pointed out to me something I had deliberately blanked: one of the sets of beads is woven to create a swastika. 

But of course, at the time of WW1, a swastika didn't have the connotations it has had since the Nazi party adopted it. 

A quick glance at Wikipedia revealed:

'The symbol appeared in many popular, non-political Western designs from the 1880s to the 1920s, with occasional use continuing into the 1930s.'

'By the early 20th century, it was widely used worldwide and was regarded as a symbol of good luck and success.'

There's a picture of Mathilde Moisant wearing a swastika emblem as a 'Good Luck' charm, as was common amongst early aviators.

I guess that now I need to find out what all the other patterns and symbols along the string of beads mean.

The Saga of the Beads continues

I've scoured the internet for information about woven beads, visited local bead shops, looked at bead books, and got nowhere, so I was very keen to follow up my discoveries at the Antiques Roadshow.

The Victoria and Albert Museum hold a monthly 'Opinions Day', so last week I boarded the coach for London to see what they could tell me. Antiques Roadshow had told me the beads were a woman's belt, but I wanted to know where and when was it made and was the idea that it had been carried by a German Prisoner of War viable?

Travelling so far, I decided to make a day of it and arrived hours before the Opinions sessions began. I wandered around looking for anything from 1887-1920ish, the early years of Isabella's life. And in the jewellery display cases, I saw it - a necklace made of beads in exactly the same way as Isabella's were.

Same length, same width, same bead size. Ok, this one had a more coherent design and pattern, the beads were brighter, but I couldn't expect Isabella's beads to be of museum quality. The label said the museum piece had been made in 1920 in Vienna and gave a proper designer's name. Oh yes, and it was true a necklace, a complete loop with a tassle on the end, not simply a string of beads. If Isabella's beads were broken, that would explain why it had been so hard to work out what they were.

I was confident now that I needed to visit the jewellery expert rather than a fashion specialist. It felt a little odd  being nodded past No Entry signs in a museum, up the stairs to the back offices. Signing in, the beads were taken away and I had to wait, watching the museum academics and researchers moving about, doing mundane things like getting cups of coffee rather than being erudite.

It wasn't long until two people emerged carrying my beads and a book. They were the most unlikely looking jewellery pundits - middle-aged, slender, stereo-typical academics, even the woman looked as if she had never worn a piece of jewellery in her life. But they were lovely, and incredibly helpful.

"You've found ours," they began. And they showed me their book, and quite happily agreed to Isabella's beads being earlier than theirs, quite happy that they were of German origin, and saw no reason to doubt the PoW story. 

And they assured me they were not broken. They were used as a slender scarf, and could be draped in all manner of ways. But what came next was even more exciting. They were explaining about the Arts and Crafts movement, Art Deco, Charles Rennie Mackintosh in Glasgow, secessionism in Vienna and Germany......and the woman suddenly said, "This would have been a statement piece of jewellery. The debate as to whether jewellery had to be made of precious metals and stones or could be simply a beautiful art object made of simple materials was as live then as it is now, and the woman who chose to wear this was making a statement. She was not wearing riches but beauty." (Well that's my paraphrase. I'm sure she didn't say that diamonds and such like weren't beautiful. That's reflects my own opinion.)

I asked what sort of woman might have owned them, wondering if that would give me a clue to the soldier. Had he been an officer or in the ranks? They were not sure. The beads might have been purchased, or she might have woven them herself, since beading was a skill cultivated by some young ladies. And if she made them herself, she must have had some time on her hands. I guess she couldn't have been poverty stricken.

I was suddenly given a real character, a girl who liked what I like, who chose to be different. I like that. 

My mind drifted.... If I was going to give a soldier something to take to war, I would not choose a string of glass beads. Maybe a Bible or a poem or card...but not glass beads. Too tricky and potentially dangerous. So it must have been a spontaneous gift. Maybe romance blossomed the night before the soldier left, he demanded something to remember her by. Or did she press them onto him? However it took place, it was a token of love and affection.

And then he gave them to Isabella. Hmm. What would I think about that if I was the girl? He gave away my gift! The happiest version I can imagine is that he was overwhelmingly grateful to Isabella for making him well enough to go back to his beloved girl, and it was the only remotely feminine thing he could lay his hands on. The less happy version, for the girl, is that he fell in love with Isabella.....

But I like happy endings.

Afterthought and diversion

Knowing that education was not always customary for women of that era, I glanced at this old book.

To my surprise, there was a sticker inside:

Jane Stenhouse, Isabella's aunt, her father's sister, had won a prize in 1871 for 'Excelling in English Writing...' from Leith Academy. But here's a mystery. Leith Academy is a very old school and still exists. It worked from this building, just across Leith Links from Isabella's home:

But it was a boys school, and the website says it didn't change its name to Leith Academy until 1888. How on earth did Jane get a prize from a school that did not take girls and did not exist? Were there open summer competitions, like cake baking, flower-arranging and such like and jane now a prize for the beauty of her hand-writing? Was it the school her brother attended? Or was there another girls' school called Leith Academy at that time which has nothing to do with the historic school? Somehow I can't imagine that.....I think it would have called itself 'Leith Academy for Girls' or 'Leith Academy for Young Ladies'......

Were they an enlightened family where women's education was valued? Or not?

Scholars

This was Isabella's school; an old house on a steep hill in the Georgian part of Edinburgh known as New Town.

To my eyes, the road reminds me of Bath.

Four storeys visible from the road, but look over the railings and there's not one but two basements:

From the back of the building, there are stunning views across the Firth of Forth.

A school that was a wonderful place for day-dreaming?

The view from the front was no less delightful; there were gardens where I can imagine crocodiles of little girls being taken for exercise of some sort or another.

How do I know this? How can I be sure?

When I arrived in Edinburgh, my first stop was the University Archive to look at the record of Isabella's medical studies. The first document recorded her matriculation - the qualifications that made her eligible to study for a degree. It said, 'School Education: 11 Abercromby Place'.

Each student's record was in different hand writing, so I was looking not at the work of a University administrator, but at a declaration by Isabella in her own hand writing. That gave me a thrill, I can tell you. But 11 Abercromby Place is a strange name for a school. Thankfully more help was available. 

I'd already been in touch with Irene Townsley, a family history researcher. She pointed me towards a street directory held in the Central Library. Off I went to look up 11 Abercromby Place. 'Miss Williamson,' said the directory. Well that wasn't very helpful. A dead end? 

Time for a ponder. Wandering into Waterstones, I spotted a book entitled 'Crême de la Crême', which claimed to be a study of girls' schools in Edinburgh. Being mean and stingy, I didn't buy it, but ordered it for study in the National Library of Scotland. A short wait and there it was for me to examine. 

Go to the back, search the index: Miss Williamson. p.32

"The 1901 census recorded 16 rooms in the house and six boarders from counties as far apart as Sutherland and Devon. One girl was born in India. The sister of another pupil helped Miss Williamson in class, and there were two resident governesses - one for music and the other teaching the language of her native France. Miss Williamson's old aunt lived among these young people, and the household was completed by a cook and two maids."

It reminds me of the school in the film of 'A Little Princess'. 

'Crême de la Crême' describes the development of the school, which thrived and grew under Miss Williamson's direction. In honour of the magnificent view of a particular church across the water, it was renamed St. Serf''s in the 1920s. How many successful students emerged in those early years? None of Isabella's sisters went to University. It would probably be hard to find out, because sadly the present incarnation of the school, Clifton Hall, has no record of their past pupils.

The census record only tells us of the people who actually lived in the school. What about day visitors? Isabella and her sisters were living in their parents home in the 1901 census, but they were all described as scholars. Were they day pupils? At what age did they begin attending the school? How many other such pupils were there? And how did they get to school? It was a couple of miles from home. Did they walk to school? Were they alone or accompanied by an adult? Which adult - their mother or a servant? Or did they go in a carriage?

And what did they learn apart from French and music? Isabella's University record says she had passed school examinations in the traditional subjects of English, Latin, Mathematics and French 1904, when she would have been 16 or 17 years old. And that was enough to get her into Medical School.

Starting from the beginning...and leaping forwards

What makes anyone choose one direction as opposed to another? Why does one person follow the customs of their cultural group and another choose to not to? I've been fascinated with why and how Isabella ended up going against the flow: what made her decide that the traditional path of marriage and child-rearing was not enough for her and gave her the motivation to train as a doctor?

What do the documents reveal? Birth certificates, census returns....

Born in 1887, Isabella was the first of the family, her birth certificate shows that she was born in Rosslyn Crescent, Leith. And you can see it on Google maps even if you can't get to Edinburgh.


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I was so excited when I found this out, I instantly searched a bit further. Lo and behold, her father's grain merchant business was only a few blocks away in Springfield Street. Not much commuting for him.

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The 1891 census confirms the address, but by 1901, they had moved to John's Place, not far away.


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Isabella lived there with her parents and her three sisters as well as Rose Clyne, a cook, kitchen maid and domestic, and Georgina Burns a house maid and domestic. 

While the 2011 census was taking place, I heard a play about some Edinburgh women who decided that if they didn't exist for the purposes of electing a government, they wouldn't exist for the purposes of being counted in the 1911 census. They hid and held secret parties to avoid the count. So imagine my excitement when I found that in 1911, only William, Janet and one of the girls, Bethia, were at home in John's Place. Were Isabella, Janetta and Ena amongst these activist women?

Hoping they were, I searched further for the sake of integrity. I was quite disappointed when I eventually found them. Janetta was in another house in Leith. Good social life? Sleep-over just like nowadays? But where were Isabella and Ena.....At last I tracked them down. They were in Newtown, where William's brother had a farm. So nothing thrilling that proved secret suffrage leanings, but evidence instead of family ties. Life instead of romantic dreams. But here's a teaser for next time: in the 1901 census, all the girls are described as Scholars. Where, why, how common was that at that time......

The marriage is announced between....

I've just checked online, and even today, marriage announcements often follow a standard format:

Mr. and Mrs. Bride's Parents

are proud to announce the marriage of their daughter

Her Name

to

Mr. Groom's Name

on Saturday, June 4th, 2011

I found the marriage announcement for Ena, Isabella's sister, first. A fortnight after Isabella's wedding, this notice appeared in the Scotsman for Ena's marriage to Tom.

Mind you, I guess it is a bit different. First: Location, date, then the reverend conducting the ceremony, the groom, identified by his parentage, then the bride, also identified by her parents.

When I eventually found the announcement of Isabella's wedding, I was excited. Hers was different, and choosing to do something differently, to go against the flow of tradition gives a clue to your motivation and personality, doesn't it?

Yes, first there's the date, then the location: granite built St. Giles, quiet in the midst of central Edinburgh.

Imagine Isabella and Hubert coming down the aisle on that October day....

But back to the announcement; they've kept the details of the reverend conducting the ceremony and putting Hubert first, but he is identified by his army title and regiment rather than by his parentage.

And as I looked further down the list of announcements for that day, I saw that there were lots of men choosing to identify themselves by their military positions. After all, it was 1919, and the War was very fresh.

And then comes Isabella, and this is the big difference; she is identified by her status as a doctor rather than as the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Stenhouse. Yay, I thought, I see a glimpse, an indication of her feminist leanings - she wants to be regarded on her own merits rather than simply as the child of her parents.

But then I found other distinctive announcements, and thought, "Oh, she's just following a different convention." But it did matter after all, these announcements were by male doctors, who placed their medical degree instead of their parentage. I think Isabella was saying, "I have done what they did, I am as good as they are, and I will tell the world about it." Not many women would have been able to tell the papers to put that little 'M.B., Ch.B (Edin)' in their marriage announcements that year. I can't find where the figure is but I think there were only about 1300 women doctors on  the Medical Register in 1919.

Magic carpet

Somewhere in the flat where Isabella came to live, she stored her beads.  Who knows if she ever looked at them? But there was one reminder of those long ago days that she passed every day, for in her hall there was a rug. A boring rug patterned in shades of brown. It had short, scratchy fur and a photograph of her late husband gazed down at it.

If photographs could talk, what would he have said? Because he was credited with having damaged that rug by slicing it with his sword while he was cutting the wedding cake.

Well, why cut a cake with a sword? It obviously wasn't a good idea, since it had made such a mess of the rug. He'd left a great grey patch where the pile was so short the rug was almost bald. Did the fluff get into the cake? And where was the cake when the sword missed it so dramatically?

How about a magic carpet ride back in time to October 1919, when Isabella married Hubert? She was back in Scotland after her adventures, a truly romantic ending to a long journey.

Untold stories

Tonight there's a programme on television where celebrities are going to discover the histories of their military ancestors. They'll hear tales they never heard before.

"They didn't talk about it," seems to be what older people say of those they knew who had served in WW1.

I've started re-reading 'Forbidden Zone', a book by Mary Borden drawn from her experience of running hospitals near the Front Line in France. I found it in the Wellcome Library bookshop, sat down with a coffee to read it and didn't move till I'd finished. I guess the fact that it left me speechless reflects its indescribable content.

 "To those who find these impressions confused, I would say that they are fragments of a great confusion. Any attempt to reduce them to order would require artifice on my part and would falsify them. To those on the other hand who find them unbearably plain, I would say that I have blurred the bare horror of facts and softened the reality in spite of myself, not because I wished to do so, but because I was incapable of a nearer approach to the truth," she writes.

She dedicates the book to the poilus (wounded French soldiers) who "know not only everything that is contained in it, but all the rest that can never be written."

Like these others, Isabella doesn't seem to have spoken to anyone about her war service or her medical career. She stopped practising in the mid-30s. But 50 years later, when she died, her son and daughter had to write to the Medical Directory to inform them of Isabella's death. 'Doctors submit their contact details for inclusion in this publication in a voluntary basis,' states the website.

If that was me, it would represent a latent pride in my achievements, a longing for them not to be forgotten. Of course it may be more likely that she forgot to tell them to take her name off, but I'd far rather imagine her pride carrying on right to her frail old age.

Question: What dictates the things we keep silent about? 

Unzip a banana

Isabella's sense of humour, remembered by a grand-daughter:

Antiques Roadshow

"Why the Antiques Roadshow?" you may ask. Well, the beads are difficult to categorise. Mostly glass, but some metal, they are not clearly anything. Beading may have been a favourite pastime among Victorian young ladies (although I'd have to check that), but these beads don't make anything....they're neither brooch nor earrings, nor set into a dress or gloves. There is no obvious way into their story.

I've hovered between different opinions. Might the soldier might have made them himself, maybe as part of post-operative therapy? Maybe they're a sampler? But then he'd need to have been exceedingly skilful, and well acquainted with traditional designs and the possibilities of pattern. Maybe he was a fine craftsman in civilian life?

Or were they treasure from home he carried in his pocket, a talisman of love from his sweetheart/wife/mother? If so, how did they survive the battle in which he was wounded and captured and ended up under Isabella's care?

I searched the internet and discovered interesting facts such as that Czechoslovakia had a thriving bead manufacturing industry, but I got no further in uncovering the mystery of Isabella's beads.

I emailed the Victoria and Albert museum, uncertain which department to try. Did they count as glass, or jewellery? Where was the authority who could enlighten me? No luck, nobody knew. A definitive blank.

So it's been at the back of my mind that the Antiques Roadshow, with its panel of experts covering every possible area, might be a way forward.

And it was a wonderful day. An hour's drive from Welsh mountains to English elegance and the immense queue at Cheltenham Town Hall. Innumerable anonymous recyclable bags hid the treasures; there was no possibility of peering at other people's precious possessions. But I've never been in such an enjoyable queue. It took nearly three hours to get to the front and find out which expert to queue for, but, thanks to my lovely friends Tash and Julie from Breaking Barriers, it didn't drag.

And what did the experts say about Isabella's beads? They liked them, thought them delightful and very fine and saw no reason to doubt the story. "But what are they," I asked. "They're a belt," Hilary Kay pronounced, "A lady's belt, and the soldier would have carried it in his pocket as a keepsake."

Tick, I'd thought of that one.

"Could he not have made it as he recuperated?"

"No, soldiers did do crafts after being wounded, but they would never have had the resources to make something like this."

So I had my answer, but then more questions were raised. Another expert kept raving about their Art Deco look, "Just right for all those flappers in the twenties," he stated. "But it was earlier than that," I contradicted him.......but doubts began to seep into my mind.

Maybe they were just a random piece of Isabella's twenties wardrobe? Maybe they never came from a soldier at all? But no, if that was the case why on earth would Isabella have placed them lovingly with her medical instruments? I'll stick with the soldier story.

But how about a few more ponderings? Who was the soldier? If the beads are fairly fine, maybe he was an officer from some wealthy family rather than someone from the ranks. And who was the woman whose memory he valued so highly. And what had Isabella done to render him so grateful that he parted with the beads?

But then again, maybe he didn't part with them during his illness and captivity, but bought them specially for Isabella and sent them over to her after the war, in which case they might be Art Deco after all?

But at least now I know the string of beads is a belt, I can go back to the V&A, and try their costume department this time. How old is this belt? Where was it made? Who would have worn it, on what occasions.......there's a date in my diary for June.

Question: Why does the answer to one question so often lead to another.

Blind

I've been blind. I'm getting ready to take the beads to the Antiques Roadshow in Cheltenham in the hope of finding out a bit more. Thought I'd better pop a photo in - thought, they'd like one that's packaged old - thought, better protect this; slid it into a plastic wallet....and whoops, I've owned it for about 40 years and never looked on the back. There it was:

"Ena - with love.

Xmas 1913"

I own the copy of the photo Isabella gave her sister Ena a month after their father died. Gulp.

The Context

"Why are you so obsessed with an old string of beads with no apparent function?" you may ask.

The beads are fascinating, but it's their context that intrigues me. And there are two clues. All I remember of the occasion when Isabella gave them to me was that she said they were given to her by a grateful German prisoner of war. That's what caught my imagination, this crossing of twin boundaries - the one between enemies and the other between genders.

But did I make that up, invent myself a story? Why should a German prisoner of war be grateful to her? I can't remember anything else of that day, although she gave me the second clue at the same time. She gave me her medical instruments. For Isabella had been a doctor and she had served in France, Malta and Egypt during the First World War.

And that is the tale I've been tracing - who was this barrier crossing Isabella, and where did her beads come from?

The beads

Isabella's beads aren't strung as a necklace, earrings or brooch. They're not woven as a bracelet, belt or bag. They are simply a long strip, nine beads wide. Heavy, some of glass, some of metal and gloriously coloured, each bead is tinier than the smallest seed beads in craft shops now. And they simply make a long strip. Nothing more complicated than that. Each end is folded over rather than attached to a jewellery finding.

And although they are strung on coarse, age-faded thread, they have evidently been made by a skilful craftsperson. Intricate, classic patterns trace their way along the thread, picked out in carefully chosen colours and separated by looser stretches. A tantalising delight.

African Queen

This blog is likely to be a bit of a puzzle to start with. I mean, what connection might the old film "African Queen" have with Isabella's beads? For me, enough to make me stop watching and come to write this post. The answer is, I never knew that in 1914 there was a German East Africa. And, I promise, that really may link in with Isabella's beads.

Isabella's beads

Isabella gave me the string of beads 40 years ago. I've always treasured them and thought that one day I'd do something with them. But 18 months ago I was chatting with some friends, and it became clear that the moment had arrived. The time was ripe and I had to get out and uncover the story of Isabella's beads.

I've trekked up and down to museums and libraries in London, visited even more diverse places in Edinburgh, downloaded material from the internet, read books and papers, watched films and documentaries, joined forums and followed up as many leads as I can in an effort to track down the story of the beads.

I'm not there yet, but the trail has been fascinating and thought provoking. Now, I've got to go back and see what I've found out, work out what the story is so far.....and carry on hunting.

But I don't want to carry on alone, as if I was preparing a university dissertation; I've set up this blog because I'd prefer to share the discoveries and ideas, and inviting other people to join in and comment. The wisdom of many will make the story fuller.

Question: What makes time ripe?