December 4

/

Women peacemakers born today

  • 1769 Elizabeth Coltman Heyrick born Leicester, England (d. 1831). Quaker pacifist; ex-army wife; radical pamphleteer; pioneering abolitionist; founder of women's reform groups; prison reformer; opponent of capital punishment and animal abuse.

  • 1864 Edith Cavell born Swardeson, Norfolk, England (executed St. Gilles, Belgium, 1915). Nurse; executed by Germans for helping escape of Allied soldiers.

  • 1864 Selina Cooper born Callington, Cornwall (d. 1946). Leading British suffragist; labor organizer; opposed both World Wars and draft; organizer Women's Peace Crusade, WILPF.

  • 1919 Stella Cornelius born Sydney, Australia (d. 2011). Australian promoter of peace and conflict resolution; UN Peace Messenger; raised peace activist daughter Helena Cornelius. Founded Peace and Conflict Resolution Program of UN Association of Australia (UNAA), 1973; helped establish Media Peace Awards, 1978; founded Conflict Resolution Network, 1986, National Consultative Committee on Peace and Disarmament, 1986, and Macquarie University Centre for Conflict Resolution, 1988. Nobel Peace Prize nominee, 2005.

  • 1928 Hebe de Bonafini born La Plata, Argentina. Co-founder of Mothers of Plaza del Mayo protesting disappearances; opposed US imperialism, saying Sept. 11 was result of US bombing Yugoslavia and Afghanistan.

  • 1956 Margaret Arach Orech born Lira, Uganda. Lost leg to landmine, 1998; Founding Director, Uganda Landmine Survivors Association (ULSA), 2001. Ambassador for Nobel Prize organization International Campaign to Ban Landmines; Joan Kroc Woman Peacemaker, 2014.

  • 1986 Rosa Lund born Copenhagen, Denmark. Red-Green member Danish Parliament, 2011-15; teacher; participated in Freedom Flotilla III for Gaza, 2015.

Women's peacemaking on this day

  • 1916 Direct action by suffragists unrolling banner in Congress, interrupted President's speech.

  • 1922 Appointment of first female career diplomat Lucille Atchison.

  • 1990 Betsy Corner arrested in Colrain, MA for entering her home after the IRS seized it for outstanding tax debts.

  • 2003 Mexican Deputy Foreign Minister Carmen Moreno Toscano appointed UN Director of International Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women.

  • 2007 Code Pink protesters Benjamin and Berry arrested Lahore, India.

  • 2011 Uzbek woman Gulsumoy Abdujalilova committed suicide rather than kill for the state.