Tuckwell, Gertrude (1861–1951)

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Tuckwell, Gertrude (1861–1951)

English trade unionist. Born Gertrude Mary Tuckwell in Oxford, England, in 1861; died in 1951; dau. of a parson who was master of New College School.

Following a 7-year stint teaching in elementary schools in London (1885–93), became secretary to her aunt, Lady Emily Dilke (1893); served as president of Women's Trade Union League (1904–1921); led crusades against white lead poisoning and organized the Sweated Goods Exhibition (1906), spurring the Trade Boards Act of 1909; was the 1st woman justice of the peace for County of London (1920); founded the maternal Mortality Committee (1927); was president of the Women Sanitary Inspectors and the National Association of Probation Officers; and sat on the Central Committee on Women's Training and Employment; also published The State and its Children (1894), Women in Industry (1908), and (with Stephen Gwynn) a biography of Sir Charles Wentworth Dilke (1917).