Bessie Rayner Parkes

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Standard Name: Parkes, Bessie Rayner
Birth Name: Elizabeth Rayner Parkes
Nickname: Bessie
Married Name: Elizabeth Rayner Belloc
Bessie Rayner Parkes (later Belloc) , a late nineteenth-century feminist, focused her writings especially on issues relating to women's work. During her life she published a collection of miscellaneous essays, a collection of vignettes, numerous articles in periodicals, a travel book, and political treatises. Though her feminist writings have been better recognized, her passion was poetry. She published a lengthy philosophical poem in addition to three volumes of poems, some of which were later compiled into a collection.

Connections

Connections Author name Sort descending Excerpt
Friends, Associates Emilie Barrington
Emilie Wilson (later EB ) and Emily Faithfull were inseparable
Westwater, Martha. The Wilson Sisters. Ohio University Press.
115
friends until they fell out just before Emilie was married. Westwater suggests that they may have been introduced by Bessie Parkes , whose father,...
Friends, Associates Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon
Barbara Leigh Smith was introduced to George Eliot by Bessie Rayner Parkes ; they soon became close.
Herstein, Sheila R. A Mid-Victorian Feminist: Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon. Yale University Press.
106
Cultural formation Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon
Barbara Leigh Smith , Christina Rossetti , Elizabeth Siddal , Bessie Rayner Parkes , Anna Mary Howitt , and Mary Howitt conducted a series of seances at the Hermitage, the Howitt family home.
Herstein, Sheila R. A Mid-Victorian Feminist: Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon. Yale University Press.
97
Friends, Associates Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon
Of her diverse network of friends, BLSB wrote to an aunt in 1857, I am one of the cracked people of the world, and I like to herd with the cracked such as A.M.H. [...
Occupation Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon
At about this time she painted her finest water-colour, a large painting of the plain of Blidah in Algiers, showing honey-coloured sand, sparsely covered with grey olive trees, blue cacti, and alfa [sic]...
politics Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon
At the meeting the female members of the first Married Women's Property Committee confirmed the text of BLSB 's parliamentary petition and planned for a signature crusade and then for the presentation of the petition...
Cultural formation Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon
By December 1860 BLSB was sufficiently interested in Roman Catholicism (to which Bessie Rayner Parkes later converted) to write about her interest to George Eliot , who responded with sympathy but a clear statement of...
politics Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon
Isa Craig , Emily Davies , Bessie Parkes , Jessie Boucherett , and Elizabeth Garrett were members of the committee. Later on Clementia Taylor joined it too.
Herstein, Sheila R. A Mid-Victorian Feminist: Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon. Yale University Press.
154-5
Health Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon
Her friend Bessie Rayner Parkes was alarmed at her appearance.
Lowndes, Marie Belloc. I, Too, Have Lived in Arcadia. Macmillan.
4
Friends, Associates Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon
In May 1869 George Eliot recorded in her diary Bodichon's steady friendship at the time when G. H. Lewes 's son Thornie was dying of tuberculosis of the spine. Bodichon visited twice a week and...
Friends, Associates Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon
Bessie Rayner Parkes ' family took a sea-side house at Hastings next to Barbara Leigh Smith 's family.
Travel Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon
Barbara Leigh Smith and Bessie Rayner Parkes travelled throughout Europe without a chaperone, visiting Belgium, Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.
Herstein, Sheila R. A Mid-Victorian Feminist: Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon. Yale University Press.
56-7
Friends, Associates Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon
Barbara Leigh Smith (later BLSB ) and Bessie Rayner Parkes met Dr Elizabeth Blackwell , then the western world's only qualified female physician.
Herstein, Sheila R. A Mid-Victorian Feminist: Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon. Yale University Press.
58-9
politics Jessie Boucherett
JB and Bessie Rayner Parkes delivered papers at the Congress of the Social Science Association at Bradford, addressing issues relating to women's employment.
Stone, James S. Emily Faithfull: Victorian Champion of Women’s Rights. P. D. Meany.
47
Friends, Associates Jessie Boucherett
Partly through her membership of the Kensington Society (a social and political discussion group of about fifty women inaugurated in 1865), JB broadened her acquaintance with significant members of the feminist movement, including Frances Power Cobbe

Timeline

8 June 1847: A Factory Act, also known as The Ten Hours...

Building item

8 June 1847

A Factory Act, also known as The Ten Hours Act, restricted the length of British women's and teenagers' working day in textile factories to ten hours.

December 1855: Barbara Leigh Smith, later Bodichon, founded...

National or international item

December 1855

Barbara Leigh Smith , later Bodichon, founded the Married Women's Property Committee (sometimes called the Women's Committee) to draw up a petition for a married women's property bill.

February 1856: The Waverley Journal: For the Cultivation...

Writing climate item

February 1856

The Waverley Journal: For the Cultivation of the Honourable, the Progressive and the Beautiful, began fortnightly publication, advertising itself as Edited and published by Ladies.
Harrison, Royden et al. The Warwick Guide to British Labour Periodicals, 1790-1970: A Check List. Harvester Press.
589

February 1858: Bessie Rayner Parkes described to George...

Building item

February 1858

Bessie Rayner Parkes described to George Eliot , in a letter, the limited company established by the Langham Place group to support The English Woman's Journal.

February 1858: Bessie Rayner Parkes described to George...

Building item

February 1858

Bessie Rayner Parkes described to George Eliot , in a letter, the limited company established by the Langham Place group to support The English Woman's Journal.

March 1858: The English Woman's Journal, a monthly magazine...

Women writers item

March 1858

The English Woman's Journal, a monthly magazine on the theory and practice of organised feminism, began publication in London, with financial support from Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon and others, under the editorship of...

7 July 1859: The first meeting of the Society for Promoting...

Building item

7 July 1859

The first meeting of the Society for Promoting the Employment of Women was held in London; founding members included Anna Jameson , Emily Faithfull , Jessie Boucherett , Adelaide Procter , Bessie Rayner Parkes , Isa Craig , and Sarah Lewin .

October 1859: The Society for Promoting the Employment...

National or international item

October 1859

Late 1859: The offices of The English Woman's Journal...

Women writers item

Late 1859

The offices of The English Woman's Journal moved from Cavendish Square to 19 Langham Place, where a ladies' club was also planned.

September 1860: Emily Faithfull and Bessie Rayner Parkes...

Writing climate item

September 1860

Emily Faithfull and Bessie Rayner Parkes spoke on the employment of women in printing trades at the fourth annual conference of the National Association for the Promotion of Social Science held in Glasgow.

1861: Maria Rye established the Female Middle Class...

National or international item

1861

Maria Rye established the Female Middle Class Emigration Society in response to the scarcity of jobs in England for girls and women.

August 1864: The English Woman's Journal, a practical...

Building item

August 1864

The English Woman's Journal, a practical and theoretical source of organized feminism from London, merged into The Alexandra Magazine and English Woman's Journal.

18 August 1882: The Married Women's Property Act gave women...

National or international item

18 August 1882

The Married Women's Property Act gave women the right to all the property they earned or acquired before or during marriage.

Texts

Parkes, Bessie Rayner. A Passing World. Ward and Downey, 1897.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner. “A Review of the Last Six Years”. Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon and the Langham Place Group, edited by Candida Ann Lacey, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1986, pp. 215-22.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner. “A Review of the Last Six Years”. Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon and the Langham Group, edited by Candida Ann Lacey, 2nd edition, Routledge, 2001, pp. 215-22.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner. Ballads and Songs. Bell and Daldy, 1863.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner et al., editors. English Woman’s Journal. English Woman’s Journal Company.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner. Essays on Woman’s Work. Alexander Strahan, 1865.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner. Essays on Woman’s Work. Cambridge University Press, 2010, http://www.cambridge.org/series/sSeries.asp?code=CLOR.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner. Gabriel. J. Chapman, 1856.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner. Historic Nuns. Duckworth, 1898.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner. In a Walled Garden. Ward and Downey, 1895.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner. In a Walled Garden. Ward and Downey, 1896.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner. “In a Walled Garden, 1895”. Indiana University: Victorian Women Writers Project.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner. In Fifty Years. Sands, 1904.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner, and Mary Merryweather. “Introduction”. Experience of Factory Life, 3rdrd ed, E. Faithfull, 1862.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner. “Isa Craig and the Prize Poem on Burns”. English Woman’s Journal, Vol.
2
, No. 12, pp. 417-20.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner. La belle France. Strahan, 1868.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner. Peoples of the World. Cassell, Petter and Galpin, 1870.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner. Poems. J. Chapman, 1852.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner. Remarks on the Education of Girls. J. Chapman, 1854.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner. Remarks on the Education of Girls. Cambridge University Press, 2010, http://www.cambridge.org/series/sSeries.asp?code=CLOR.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner. Summer Sketches and Other Poems. J. Chapman, 1854.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner. The Flowing Tide. Sands, 1900.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner, and Anne Leigh Smith. The History of Our Cat Aspasia. 1856.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner. “The Poems of Adelaide Anne Procter”. The Month, Vol.
4
, pp. 79-88.
Parkes, Bessie Rayner. The Problems of the Feminist Periodical: Letter to Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon.