Josephine Butler

When Josephine Butler died in 1906, she was declared by Millicent Fawcett to have been 'the most distinguished Englishwoman of the nineteenth century'. With impassioned speeches and fiery writing, Butler's campaigns for women's rights shook Victorian society to its core and became a force for change that has shaped modern Britain.

As well as campaigning for women's suffrage and for married women's property rights she was a tireless advocate of women's access to higher education and of equality in the workplace. Her greatest achievement was to change social attitudes to women and children forced into prostitution, and to expose the sex-trafficking business - both of which resulted in new, more humane legislation.

But how did the physically frail wife of a schoolmaster become a leading social reformer? In this brief introduction Jane Robinson explores Butler's fascinating life and describes how her progressive politics, her anger at injustice and her passionate Christianity combined to create a vibrant legacy that lasts to this day.

“'This is an important book about a social reformer of the Victorian era in danger of being forgotten. . . . A story of a woman who defied what was expected of her to make a difference - told in a wonderfully engaging way.'”

‘This is an important book about a social reformer of the Victorian era in danger of being forgotten. . . . A story of a woman who defied what was expected of her to make a difference – told in a wonderfully engaging way.’ Helen Pankhurst
‘Josephine Butler challenged the contempt levelled at women who sold sex, and the unjust laws passed and enforced by men to punish them. Sharp, authoritative and eye-opening.’ Helen Lewis
‘A brilliantly readable account of the remarkable Josephine Butler, who turned the Victorian patriarchy on its head and changed the world for women at immense personal cost. If there is a canon of feminist heroines, Butler should be right at the top.' Daisy Goodwin

Jane Robinson is a British social historian specialising in the study of women pioneers. A Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society and an Honorary Senior Associate of Somerville College, Oxford, her recent books include Bluestockings: The Remarkable Story of the First Women to Fight for an Education (Penguin, 2010), A Force to be Reckoned With: A History of the Women's Institute (Virago, 2011), In the Family Way: Illegitimacy Between the Great War and the Swinging Sixties (Viking, 2015), Hearts And Minds: The Untold Story of the Great Pilgrimage and How Women Won the Vote (Doubleday, 2018) and Ladies Can’t Climb Ladders: The Pioneering Adventures of the First Professional Women (Doubleday, 2020).

When Josephine Butler died in 1906, she was declared by Millicent Fawcett to have been 'the most distinguished Englishwoman of the nineteenth century'. With impassioned speeches and fiery writing, Butler's campaigns for women's rights shook Victorian society to its core and became a force for change that has shaped modern Britain. As well as campaigning for women's suffrage and for married women's property rights she was a tireless advocate of women's access to higher education and of equality in the workplace. Her greatest achievement was to change social attitudes to women and children forced into prostitution, and to expose the sex-trafficking business - both of which resulted in new, more humane legislation. But how did the physically frail wife of a schoolmaster become a leading social reformer? In this brief introduction Jane Robinson explores Butler's fascinating life and describes how her progressive politics, her anger at injustice and her passionate Christianity combined to create a vibrant legacy that lasts to this day.

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