"However I don't expect to be 'protected' from owning and controlling my own property, choosing a partner, be prevented from seeing my own children should he so decide and the myriad of other things women were 'protected' from by men in your mythical Golden Age"

"I don't know any men who would want to do that. That's my point. You can't blame ALL men for the few bad ones."

Lizzie I'm not talking about a few 'bad' folks here I'm describing the lot of all 'protected' women in the UK before the end of the 19thC


Sorry for the thread drift and lack of drums but for Lizzie's information and to put the ongoing movement for equality in work, education etc into perspective......


Traditionally, women lost all rights to own property or exercise contract rights after marriage; before marriage, such rights usually belonged not to the woman, but to her father.

Prior to the Married Women's Property Act 1884 married women were classed as 'femmes covert' and a woman's personal property was transferred automatically to her husband on marriage

During their 'coverture' women had no legal testamentary rights at all in relation to real estate. Any personal property of a woman which she had before the marriage, or acquired after the marriage, became her husband's absolutely, and as such, he had the right to leave it by will.
Only with her husband's permission could a wife make a will leaving personal property - even if it had been hers before her marriage. Moreover, his consent only applied to a particular will and this consent had to be strictly proved. His consent could be revoked even after her death. The only exception to this was her right to make a will leaving her 'paraphernalia' - clothing and personal ornaments.

Of course anyone familiar with Jane Austin like yourself would have come across this situation in literature.

The accepted reasoning was that the career for women was marriage.

"To get ready for courtship and marriage a girl was groomed like a racehorse, the qualities a young Victorian gentlewoman needed, were to be innocent, virtuous, biddable, dutiful and be ignorant of intellectual opinion.

Whether married or single all Victorian gentlewomen were expected to be weak and helpless, a fragile delicate flower incapable of making decisions beyond selecting the menu"

During this era if a wife separated from her husband she had no rights of access to see her children whatever the cause of the separation
A divorced woman had no chance of acceptance in society again.

The first wave of feminism focused on education, employment and marital law; one of the causes they vigorously pursued became the Married Women's Property Committee of 1855 they collected 26,000 signatures to change the law for all women married or single.

Another example of 'some women wanting to get their way'

As always some women were not always supportive of each other's efforts, and often distanced themselves from these pioneer feminists. but nevertheless reaped the benefits of the Married Women's Property Act 1884 as you now have the right to your children Lizzie!