Vera Brittain

Vera Brittain was born in 1893 in Newcastle-under-Lyme, England, the daughter of a well-to-do paper manufacturer, and grew up in Macclesfield and Buxton. Her closest companion as a child was her younger brother, Edward. Overcoming her father's objections, she went to Somerville College, Oxford, in 1914 to study English literature. When the First World War began, she left her studies in 1915 to serve as a Voluntary Aid Detachment nurse, in Buxton, London, Malta and France. During the war her fiancé, Roland Leighton, two close friends and finally her brother Edward were all killed. Back at Somerville after the war she met Winifred Holtby, who became her close friend and fellow writer. Her memoir Testament of Youth (1933), which describes her wartime experiences and losses, became a bestseller and is still widely read. She later wrote Testament of Friendship (1940), about Holtby, and Testament of Experience (1957). In 1925 she married the political scientist George Catlin, and their daughter, Shirley Williams, became a well-known politician. Brittain became a committed pacifist and campaigned for peace during the Second World War. She died in Wimbledon, London, in 1970.

Vera Brittain is also an author in the library: author page and works.

Faith: An Anglican who joined the Anglican Pacifist Fellowship. Source: Wikipedia