Personal Life

Personal Life is about the lives (and loves) of queer people in history. It is made both to document their lives but also to encourage people to research queer history themselves and promote curiousity

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Elizabeth O'Farrell & Sheila Grenan

Elizabeth O'Farrell (1883–1957) was a nurse and Irish nationalist who played a significant role in the struggle for Irish independence. O'Farrell famously delivered the surrender of the Irish rebels to the British during the Easter Rising in 1916. She lived with Sheila Grenan (1883– 1972), a fellow nationalist and activist, and many historians think their relationship was romantic.. They are buried together in Glasnevin Cemetary.

You might have heard the tale about nurse Elizabeth O’Farrell’s feet. O’Farrell is famous because she brought Pádraig Pearse’s surrender note from Moore Street to the British army as the Easter Rising fizzled out. Later, her feet were airbrushed out of photos to show Pearse surrendering alone. History books these days highlight her role. But few of them acknowledge that she was gay. For some time, there has been a push to paint back into history women like O’Farrell (and their feet). Now though, as the centenary approaches, it seems there’s also an effort to acknowledge that some of these women were gay.

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amy Dillwyn
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Katherine Mansfield & Maata Mahupuku

Katherine Mansfield (1888–1923) was a renowned modernist writer of short stories from New Zealand, known for her innovative approach to characterisation and narrative technique. Her tumultuous relationship with Maata Mahupuku (1890–1952), a Māori woman, inspired many of her stories. Their relationship, which lasted until Mansfield's death from tuberculosis at the age of 34, has been the subject of analysis and speculation.

Through her friendship with Katherine Mansfield, Maata (Martha) Mahupuku's name has become known in New Zealand literary circles, but little so far has been recorded of her life. She was born in Greytown, Wairarapa, on 10 April 1890, the daughter of Emily Sexton and her husband, Richard (Tiki) William Mahupuku, a sheepfarmer of Longbush. Richard was the son of Wiremu Hikawera Mahupuku and nephew of Hāmuera Tamahau Mahupuku, prominent and wealthy leaders of Ngāti Parera and Ngāti Hikawera hapū of Ngāti Kahungunu. Maata can scarcely have known her father for he died in September 1893. Two years later her mother married again, her second husband being Nathaniel Grace, a sheepfarmer of Gladstone. Maata's half-brother, John, was born in November 1895...

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Katherine Mansfield was born Kathleen Mansfield Beauchamp in Wellington, New Zealand, on October 14, 1888. Innovative, accessible, and psychologically acute, Mansfield’s numerous short stories pioneered the genre’s shape in the 20th century. Her fiction, poetry, journals, and letters cover an array of subjects: the difficulties and ambivalences of families and sexuality, the fragility and vulnerability of relationships, the complexities and insensitivities of the rising middle classes, the social consequences of war, and overwhelmingly the attempt to extract whatever beauty and vitality one can from mundane and increasingly difficult experience...

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amy Dillwyn
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Florence Nightingale

Florence Nightingale (1820–1910), was a famous social reformer from the Victorian era. What most people don't know is that she had intamite relationships with women. which many think to be romantic. In a letter to a friend, Nightingale wrote, "I have lived and slept in the same beds with English Countesses and Prussian farm women. No woman has excited among women more than I have." These relationships with women have been documented and studied by historians and her sexuality is continuosly being debated.

The memory of Florence Nightingale still ripples throughout Europe and North America. Documents about her life remain and uphold her legacy; in many ways, she has become something of a mythological figure. Even in life, there was merchandise relating to her, but it’s taken on a new life in books, valentines, and even colouring pages. She’s remembered as a no-nonsense feminist icon, a tender motherly figure, the founding of modern-day nursing, and even the hero of nursery rhymes. Less discussed in the possibility that she was a lesbian and/or asexual.

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ay Dillwyn
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Elizabeth Amy Dillwyn

Elizabeth Amy Dillwyn (1845–1935) was a Welsh writer who was known for her interest in social justice. Her work often explored themes of same-sex desire and gender nonconformity. Her most famous novel, ‘The Rebecca Rioter,’ features a protagonist who goes against traditional gender and class roles and engages in a romantic relationship with another woman. Dillwyn often worn traditionally masculine clothes and was know for using a pipe, something women at the time never did.

Amy Dillwyn was born on 16 May 1845 into a wealthy and distinguished Swansea family, the daughter of Lewis Llewelyn Dillwyn and Elizabeth (Bessie) Dillwyn (née De La Beche). Her father was a scientist, industrialist and long-serving Liberal MP for Swansea who campaigned for Disestablishment in Wales. Her mother reputedly contributed to the designs of the Cambrian Pottery owned by her husband. Amy Dillwyn's uncle was John Dillwyn-Llewelyn of Penllergare [sic] who, along with his wife Emma Thomasina Talbot, his sister Mary Dillwyn and his daughter, Amy's cousin, Theresa Story Maskelyne, was a pioneer of early photography. Her grandfathers were the naturalist Lewis Weston Dillwyn and geologist Henry De La Beche. On the Dillwyn side, the family were originally Quakers and her great-grandfather was William Dillwyn, the anti-slavery campaigner from Pennsylvania, USA.

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amy Dillwyn

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Tove Jansson

Tove Jansson (1914-2001) was a Swedish-Finn artist best known for creating the Moomin series of children's books. She lived most of her life as a queer person, in a time when being openly gay was heavily stigmatized. She had multiple relationships with women, including her life partner, Tuulikki Pietilä. Jansson's queerness and experiences influenced her art and writing, which often explored themes of identity, love, and belonging.

In 1955, Tove Jansson asked Tuulikki Pietilä to dance. They had sat all night around the gramophone together, guarding it whilst they played their records so that nobody could change the music. But Pietilä said no: same-sex relationships were still illegal in Finland — and would be until 1971 — and – the threat of judgement from peers and colleagues was intense. Queer people know well the hollow of panic, deep in the gut, when you think that your disguises may have failed. It is why, historically, we have avoided large displays of affection; why our histories take the form of private letters, fragments hidden inside books and diaries. The story of Tove and Tuulikki is no different; soon after she refused to dance, Tuulikki sent Tove a card with a cat, fat and striped, hand-drawn on the front. A code that meant: I am thinking of you. After telephone calls over the holidays, Tove finally set off to Tuulikki’s studio. It was March, and snowing, when she walked over; the streets were dark and the fat flakes fell in drifts that made the roads shine. When she got there, the studio warm and light like a ship’s cabin at sea, they drank wine and played French records.

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amy Dillwyn