Ruth Mary Cavendish-Bentinck born Ruth Mary St Maur was a Moroccan-born British aristocrat, suffragist and socialist. Her library was the basis for what is now the Women's Library.
Early life
Bentinck was born in Tangier in 1867. Her father was the aristocrat Ferdinand Seymour, Earl St. Maur, while her mother, Rosina Elizabeth Swan, was a maid. Her father was the son and heir of Edward, 12th Duke of Somerset and his wife, Georgiana Sheridan. Her parents brought her to England, where they had a son, Harold St. Maur, but her father died in 1869 and they never married. She and her brother were brought up by her paternal grandparents after her mother married again and her stepfather died. Her illegitimacy was a problem during her childhood but this was balanced by the education and care that her de facto parents gave her. They also gave her their surname. When her grandmother died she was left £80,000.
Political involvement
In 1909, she joined the Women's Social and Political Union. This was a militant organisation who believed in "Deeds not Words". Bentinck did wear a sandwich board but unlike many of its members she was never arrested. She wrote The Point Of Honour: A Correspondence On Aristocracy And Socialism in 1909. The third key event in 1909 was founding a library that was to become in time the Women's Library. In 1912, Bentinck and Florence Gertrude de Fonblanque organised a suffrage demonstration that involved women dressed in brown, green and white walking from Edinburgh to London. The "Brown Women" gathered signatures for a petition and national attention. The following year de Fonblanque and Bentick decided to set up the Qui Vive Corps. The idea was that these brown, green and white uniformed volunteers would appear at suffrage events organised by any organisation. It was intended that these would attend any suffrage inspired event. The Qui Vive Corps were involved in campaigning among the miners for the Labour Party in Derbyshire and Staffordshire. The reason for their support for Labour was because the suffragettes objected to the Liberal Party's policy of not supporting women's suffrage. In 1913, she was involved with the Northern Men's Federation for Women's Suffrage which she was helping to organise. In 1918, her library was given to the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies although Bentinck still took a strong interest. The library is considered her most important legacy. The NUWSS gave the library to the Women's Library in 1931. Her collection is considered to be the core of what is now the important Women's Library.
