People Australia

Lesbia Venner Harford, nee Keogh (1891-1927) factory worker, trade union official and poet

Birth: 9 April 1891 at Brighton, Melbourne, daughter of native-born parents Edmund Joseph (Joe) Keogh (1867-1945), a financial agent, later, farmer, and Helen Beatrice (Nellie), née Moore (1868-1951). Marriage:  23 November 1920 in Sydney to Patrick John O’Flaghartie Fingal (Pat) Harford (1895-1974), a fellow IWW member, boot clicker and artist, born at Glengariffe, Cork, Ireland. Death: 5 July 1927, in hospital at Fitzroy, Melbourne. Religion: raised as a Catholic; buried in Methodist cemetery, Boroondara, Victoria. 

• Her parents separated about 1900 and her father moved to Western Australia, where he became a boundary rider and was a camel driver when he enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force in February 1917.
• Brought up with her three siblings by her mother, Lesbia was educated at Clifton, the Brigidine convent at Glen Iris, and Mary's Mount, the Loreto convent at Ballarat, then graduated LLB from the University of Melbourne in 1916.
• Rebelling against her family’s Catholicism, she became an active working class advocate, an opponent of conscription and a member of the Industrial Workers of the World. She joined the Victorian Socialist Party with her brother Esmond and they were associated with Frederick Sinclaire’s Free Religious Fellowship until Esmond, too, enlisted in the AIF in November 1914. A second brother, Gerald Basil Venner Keogh (1898-1962) also enlisted in the AIF — in March 1917.
• Taking work in a clothing factory in 1918, Lesbia was the first woman president of the Victorian branch of the Federated Clothing Trades' Union. She was sometime vice-president of the Amalgamated Clothing and Allied Trades' Union and a colleague of Guido Baracchi.
• She briefly lived in Sydney, where she married Pat Harford, who had also served in World War I. They soon returned to Melbourne. In electoral rolls from 1922 to 1925 her occupation was given as teacher, and in 1927 as law clerk.
• In poor health from childhood, she suffered for many years from tuberculosis.
• She was a fine poet and her work often focussed on working-class women. She published little, however, and much of her work was lost in a fire after her death. By the 21st century she has become known for her challenge to traditional class and gender roles. To some she has become a “queer icon”.
• Her brother Esmond Venner (Bill) Keogh (1895-1970) was a noted surgeon and medical scientist, and her sister Estelle Venner Keogh, later Wilkins, (1892-1966) served in the Queen Alexandrea’s Imperial Nursing Service during World War I and was awarded a Royal Red Cross for bravery under fire. 

Sources
Braden Ellem, In women’s hands? A history of clothing trades unionism in Australia (Sydney, 1989).