Joan Beauchamp
Encyclopedia
Joan Beauchamp was a prominent anti-World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

 campaigner, suffragette
Suffragette
"Suffragette" is a term coined by the Daily Mail newspaper as a derogatory label for members of the late 19th and early 20th century movement for women's suffrage in the United Kingdom, in particular members of the Women's Social and Political Union...

 and co-founder of the Communist Party of Great Britain
Communist Party of Great Britain
The Communist Party of Great Britain was the largest communist party in Great Britain, although it never became a mass party like those in France and Italy. It existed from 1920 to 1991.-Formation:...

.

Childhood

She was born in 1890 into a farming family in Midsomer Norton
Midsomer Norton
Midsomer Norton is a town near the Mendip Hills in Somerset, England, south-west of Bath, north-east of Wells, north-west of Frome, and south-east of Bristol. It has a population of 10,458. Along with Radstock and Westfield it used to be part of the conurbation and large civil parish of Norton...

 in Somerset
Somerset
The ceremonial and non-metropolitan county of Somerset in South West England borders Bristol and Gloucestershire to the north, Wiltshire to the east, Dorset to the south-east, and Devon to the south-west. It is partly bounded to the north and west by the Bristol Channel and the estuary of the...

. She was the sister of Kay Beauchamp
Kay Beauchamp
Kay Beauchamp was a leading light in the Communist Party of Great Britain in the 1920s. She helped found the Daily Worker and was a local councillor in Finsbury.-Biography:...

, who went on to become a fellow founder member of the Communist Party of Great Britain
Communist Party of Great Britain
The Communist Party of Great Britain was the largest communist party in Great Britain, although it never became a mass party like those in France and Italy. It existed from 1920 to 1991.-Formation:...

.

Early Adult Life

During the First World War, Beauchamp became active in the No Conscription Fellowship (NCF). The NCF was established to help and give advice to the estimated 16,000 pacifists and socialists who refused to join the military and fight. In 1920 she received a ten-day prison sentence for her anti-war activities.

She was one of the founders and a lifelong member of the Communist Party of Great Britain
Communist Party of Great Britain
The Communist Party of Great Britain was the largest communist party in Great Britain, although it never became a mass party like those in France and Italy. It existed from 1920 to 1991.-Formation:...

 and an associate of suffragette Sylvia Pankhurst
Sylvia Pankhurst
Estelle Sylvia Pankhurst was an English campaigner for the suffragist movement in the United Kingdom. She was for a time a prominent left communist who then devoted herself to the cause of anti-fascism.-Early life:...

. She was regarded as one of the suffragette movement’s most militant members.

She was one of the first women graduates of the University of London
University of London
-20th century:Shortly after 6 Burlington Gardens was vacated, the University went through a period of rapid expansion. Bedford College, Royal Holloway and the London School of Economics all joined in 1900, Regent's Park College, which had affiliated in 1841 became an official divinity school of the...

. She married Harry Thompson, a lawyer and colleague from her time in NCF. They had two sons, Robin (born 1924), and Brian, both of whom became notable trade union lawyers.

Later life

Beauchamp went on to be a journalist in London. During the Second World War
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

 she received severe injuries from a German flying bomb.

She provided support to her husband’s law firm which caters only for trade unions and their members. Beauchamp's husband Harry Thompson died in 1947.
She died in 1964.

Books written by Joan Beauchamp

  • Poems of revolt : a twentieth century anthology chosen by Joan Beauchamp (1924)
  • Agriculture in Soviet Russia (1931)
  • Women who Work (1937)
  • Soviet Russia, A syllabus for study courses (1943)
  • Scientific socialism

See also

  • Matilda Joslyn Gage
    Matilda Joslyn Gage
    Matilda Electa Joslyn Gage was a suffragist, a Native American activist, an abolitionist, a freethinker, and a prolific author, who was "born with a hatred of oppression".-Early activities:...

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