Dora Russell
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Dora Black (1894 - 1986), the wife of the legendary philosopher Bertrand Russell, led a life worthy of note. A hard-edged feminist and social campaigner, she at first rejected Russell's offer of marriage as she thought marriage was a restriction on women’s liberty. She was also a sexual pioneer, believing marriage to be no reason not to sleep with whoever she pleased.
Born to a liberal father, Black had opportunities in education and won a scholarship to Girton College, Cambridge at which she received a first class honours degree in modern languages.
She met Bertrand Russell in 1916 and the pair began a sexual relationship, which led to Black's initial rejection of marriage. She joined Russell in several social campaigns, including his campaign against military conscription in World War I.
Black and Russell visited Russia in 1920, soon after the Bolshevik revolution. Russell was unimpressed by Lenin but Black, like many English socialists at the time, saw a vision of a future ideal civilisation. The pair also visited China.
Upon their return to England, Black married Russell but was uneasy with what she thought was a betrayal of feminist principles. They soon had their first child, John Russell (1921).
In 1923, Dora Russell campaigned passionately for birth control, joining influential figures such as H.G. Wells and Maynard Keynes in founding the Workers' Birth Control Group. She also campaigned in the Labour Party for birth-control clinics with little success.
Black and Bertrand founded a school in 1927 called Beacon Hill School in which they tried to teach children to leave behind primitive superstitions and irrational views of previous generations. Black expressed her views on education in a book called In Defence Of Children.
Russell left Black for one of his students after Black had had two children with journalist, Griffin Barry. She ran the Beacon Hill School on her own until World War II.
After the war, Black became an advocate of the peace movement and was one of the founder members of the CND, in which she joined with other prominent leftists (Bertrand Russell, J.B. Priestley, Michael Foot, Victor Gollancz etc) in campaigning for worldwide nuclear disarmament.