Georgina Battiscombe (21 November 1905 – 26 February 2006) was a British biographer, specialising mainly in lives from the

Victorian era In the history of the United Kingdom and the British Empire, the Victorian era was the period of Queen Victoria's reign, from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. The era followed the Georgian period and preceded the Edwa ...

. She was born Esther Georgina Harwood, the elder daughter of George Harwood, a former clergyman, Liberal

Member of Parliament A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members o ...

for his home town of

Bolton Bolton (, locally ) is a large town in Greater Manchester in North West England, formerly a part of Lancashire. A former mill town, Bolton has been a production centre for textiles since Flemish weavers settled in the area in the 14th ...

, master cotton spinner, and an author and barrister. Her family had a political bent; her maternal grandfather, Sir Alfred Hopkinson, KC (the first Vice-Chancellor of

Manchester University , mottoeng = Knowledge, Wisdom, Humanity , established = 2004 – University of Manchester Predecessor institutions: 1956 – UMIST (as university college; university 1994) 1904 – Victoria University of Manchester 1880 – Victoria Univer ...

), three uncles, and her stepfather, John Murray (Principal of the University College of the South West of England, Exeter), all became MPs. She was educated at St Michael's School, Oxford, and at

Lady Margaret Hall Lady Margaret Hall (LMH) is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England, located on the banks of the River Cherwell at Norham Gardens in north Oxford and adjacent to the University Parks. The college is more form ...

, and once considered a political career herself. In 1932 she married Christopher Battiscombe (d.1964), a lieutenant-colonel in the

Grenadier Guards "Shamed be whoever thinks ill of it." , colors = , colors_label = , march = Slow: " Scipio" , mascot = , equipment = , equipment ...

. For a time they lived in Zanzibar, where Colonel Battiscombe was Secretary to the Sultan. They then lived at Durham before moving to the Henry III Tower at

Windsor Castle Windsor Castle is a royal residence at Windsor in the English county of Berkshire. It is strongly associated with the English and succeeding British royal family, and embodies almost a millennium of architectural history. The original c ...

as Colonel Battiscombe became honorary secretary of the Society of the Friends of St George's from 1958 to 1960. Her best known books were biographies of the Victorian romantic novelist

Charlotte Mary Yonge Charlotte Mary Yonge (1823–1901) was an English novelist, who wrote in the service of the church. Her abundant books helped to spread the influence of the Oxford Movement and show her keen interest in matters of public health and sanitation. ...

(1943);

Catherine Gladstone Catherine Gladstone (; 6 January 1812 – 14 June 1900) was the wife of British statesman William Ewart Gladstone for 59 years, from 1839 until his death in 1898. Early life and family Glynne was the daughter of Sir Stephen Glynne, 8th Bar ...

, the wife of Prime Minister

William Ewart Gladstone William Ewart Gladstone ( ; 29 December 1809 – 19 May 1898) was a British statesman and Liberal politician. In a career lasting over 60 years, he served for 12 years as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, spread over four non-con ...

(1956); English churchman

John Keble John Keble (25 April 1792 – 29 March 1866) was an English Anglican priest and poet who was one of the leaders of the Oxford Movement. Keble College, Oxford, was named after him. Early life Keble was born on 25 April 1792 in Fairford, Glouces ...

(1963); and

Alexandra of Denmark Alexandra of Denmark (Alexandra Caroline Marie Charlotte Louise Julia; 1 December 1844 – 20 November 1925) was Queen of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Empress of India, from 22 January 1901 to 6 May 1910 as the wife of ...

(1969). The biography of Keble was awarded the

James Tait Black Memorial Prize The James Tait Black Memorial Prizes are literary prizes awarded for literature written in the English language. They, along with the Hawthornden Prize, are Britain's oldest literary awards. Based at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland, Uni ...

. One of the reasons Battiscombe wrote about Queen Alexandra was that she and Alexandra both had the same form of deafness,

otosclerosis Otosclerosis is a condition of the middle ear where portions of the dense enchondral layer of the bony labyrinth remodel into one or more lesions of irregularly-laid spongy bone. As the lesions reach the stapes the bone is resorbed, then har ...

. Battiscombe was very deaf for a large part of her life, until surgery and a hearing aid corrected this. She said that her experience gave her "some understanding of Alexandra's predicament". Battiscombe thought that many royal biographies are factually incorrect, and that "so often the unfortunate royalties do not even receive common politeness from those who write about them". Battiscombe also wrote biographies of

Christina Rossetti Christina Georgina Rossetti (5 December 1830 – 29 December 1894) was an English writer of romantic, devotional and children's poems, including " Goblin Market" and "Remember". She also wrote the words of two Christmas carols well known in Bri ...

(1965) and

Shaftesbury Shaftesbury () is a town and civil parish in Dorset, England. It is situated on the A30 road, west of Salisbury, near the border with Wiltshire. It is the only significant hilltop settlement in Dorset, being built about above sea level on a ...

(1974), and her other titles include ''Two on Safari'' (1946); ''English Picnics'' (1949); ''Reluctant Pioneer: The Life of Elizabeth Wordsworth'' (1978); ''The Spencers of Althorp'' (1984); and ''Winter Song'', a book of

poem Poetry (derived from the Greek '' poiesis'', "making"), also called verse, is a form of literature that uses aesthetic and often rhythmic qualities of language − such as phonaesthetics, sound symbolism, and metre − to evoke meaning ...

s (1992). Battiscombe became a Fellow of the

Royal Society of Literature The Royal Society of Literature (RSL) is a learned society founded in 1820, by King George IV, to "reward literary merit and excite literary talent". A charity that represents the voice of literature in the UK, the RSL has about 600 Fellows, ele ...

in 1964. She died in 2006, aged 100.

References

External links

Obituary in ''The Guardian''

Obituary in ''The Times''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Battiscombe, Georgina 1905 births 2006 deaths British biographers British centenarians Fellows of the Royal Society of Literature James Tait Black Memorial Prize recipients 20th-century biographers Women centenarians Alumni of Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford