Radical Roots Frances Power Cobbe

Radical Roots for #LGBTHistoryMonth ❤️✊🐭🏳️‍🌈

Frances Power Cobbe – Irish animal rights activist, feminist, writer and social reformer.

Born into a wealthy Dublin family in 1822, Cobbe fell in love with Welsh sculptor Mary Lloyd and spent much of her life living in Wales – writing and campaigning for social reforms.

Cobbe set up the world’s first organisation dedicated to stopping vivisection (testing on animals) and was a prominent leader of the women’s suffrage movement in Britain. Her writings include ‘On the Pursuits of Women’ (1863), ‘Criminals, Idiots, Women and Minors’ (1869) and ‘Scientific Spirit of the Age’ (1888).

Cobbe discovered Unitarianism as a young adult and became a well-known writer, thinker and preacher in the Unitarian movement. She was particularly involved in the Unitarian congregation in Aberystwyth.

In 1896, Mary Lloyd died, leaving Frances heartbroken after a 30 year relationship. Cobbe herself died in 1904 and the couple are buried together at St Illtud Church, Llanelltyd.

Find out more about Frances in the book ‘Unitarian Women: A Legacy Of Dissent’: https://www.unitarian.org.uk/shop/unitarian-women/