Clare Hollingworth facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Clare Hollingworth
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Saigon, 1968
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| Born | 10 October 1911 Knighton, Leicester, England
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| Died | 10 January 2017 (aged 105) Central, Hong Kong
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| Resting place | St. Margaret of Antioch, Bygrave, Hertfordshire, England |
| Occupation | Journalist |
| Years active | 1939–1981 |
| Known for | Being the first journalist to report the outbreak of World War II |
| Spouse(s) |
Vandeleur Robinson
(m. 1936; div. 1951)Geoffrey Hoare
(m. 1951; died 1965) |
Clare Hollingworth OBE (10 October 1911 – 10 January 2017) was a famous English journalist and writer. She was the very first war correspondent to report the start of World War II. This amazing news story was called "the scoop of the century." In 1939, as a new reporter for The Daily Telegraph, she was traveling near the border between Poland and Germany. She bravely spotted a huge number of German forces getting ready to attack. Her newspaper quickly printed the headline: "1,000 tanks massed on Polish border." Just three days later, she was also the first to report that Germany had invaded Poland.
Queen Elizabeth II honored Clare Hollingworth with the OBE award in 1982 for her great work in journalism. She lived a very long life, passing away on 10 January 2017, at the age of 105.
Contents
Early Life and First Steps
Hollingworth was born in 1911 in Knighton, a town in England. Her parents were Daisy and Albert Hollingworth. During World War I, her father took over his family's shoe factory. This led the family to move to a farm. Clare showed an early interest in becoming a writer. Her mother was not keen on this idea. However, her father encouraged her love for history and war. They visited many old battlefields in Britain and France together. After school, she went to a college to study home economics, but she did not enjoy it much.
Preparing for a Career
Clare Hollingworth first worked as a secretary for the League of Nations Union. This group worked for peace around the world. She then won a special scholarship. This allowed her to study in London and later at Zagreb University in Croatia. There, she learned the Croatian language.
Hollingworth began writing articles for a magazine called New Statesman. In 1939, she was chosen to run for a seat in the British Parliament. She was going to represent the Labour Party. However, World War II started, and the election was put on hold.
Helping Refugees
After an agreement in 1938, a German-speaking area called Sudetenland became part of Germany. Clare went to Warsaw, Poland, to help Czech refugees. From March to July 1939, she helped thousands of people escape from Hitler's forces. She did this by arranging British visas for them. This important work led to her being hired by The Daily Telegraph newspaper in August 1939.
Reporting on World War II
Clare Hollingworth had only been working for The Daily Telegraph for less than a week. She was sent to Poland to report on the growing tensions in Europe. She convinced a British official to lend her his car and driver. She wanted to gather facts inside Germany. On 28 August, while driving near the German-Polish border, she saw something incredible. Strong winds blew away camouflage screens. This revealed a huge number of German troops, tanks, and armored cars. They were all lined up, ready to invade Poland.
Her report was the main story on the front page of The Daily Telegraph the next day. The headline read: "1,000 Tanks Massed on Polish Frontier; 10 Divisions Reported Ready For Swift Stroke."
The Invasion of Poland
On 1 September, Clare called the British Embassy in Warsaw. She reported that Germany had invaded Poland. The Embassy officials were unsure if it was true. To convince them, she held her telephone out of her hotel window. This allowed them to hear the sounds of German forces attacking. Clare's eyewitness report was the first news the British government received about the invasion of Poland.
She continued to report from Poland. In 1940, she started working for the Daily Express. She went to Romania and reported on King Carol II leaving his throne. She ignored rules about censorship when she called in her reports. In 1941, she traveled to Egypt. From there, she reported from Turkey, Greece, and Cairo. It was hard for her because women war correspondents were not officially recognized.
After a general named Bernard Montgomery took over a city in Libya in 1943, Clare was told to go back to Cairo. But she wanted to stay on the front lines. So, she went to cover General Dwight D. Eisenhower's forces in Algeria. She wrote for the Chicago Daily News. She then reported from Palestine, Iraq, and Persia. During this time, she became the first person to interview the Shah of Iran.
A Long and Brave Career
After World War II, Clare Hollingworth continued to report on many conflicts. She covered wars in Palestine, Algeria, China, Aden, and Vietnam. The BBC said that while she wasn't the very first woman war reporter, her deep understanding of military strategy made her special. The New York Times called her the "undisputed doyenne of war correspondents." This means she was the most respected and experienced woman in her field. She learned a lot about military technology. She even trained as a pilot in the 1940s, so she knew a lot about aircraft.
Post-War Reporting
Right after the war, she worked for The Economist and The Observer. In 1946, she and her husband were in Jerusalem. They were there when the King David Hotel bombing happened. She later refused to shake hands with the leader of the group responsible for the bombing. By 1950, she moved to Paris and worked for The Guardian. She visited Algeria often and made contacts with the Algerian freedom fighters. She reported on the Algerian War in the early 1960s.
In 1963, while still with The Guardian, she was in Beirut. She started looking into Kim Philby, another reporter. She found out he had left on a Soviet ship. The Guardians editor waited three months before publishing her detailed story. He was worried about legal problems. But her report about Philby's defection (meaning he secretly went to the Soviet Union) was later confirmed by the government. In 1963, she became The Guardians defense correspondent. She was the first woman to hold this important job.
Vietnam and China
In 1967, she left The Guardian and went back to writing for The Daily Telegraph. She wanted to work in war zones, not just report on government policies. She was sent to Vietnam in 1967 to cover the Vietnam War. She was one of the first to say that the war would end in a stalemate, meaning neither side would truly win. Her reports were also special because she paid attention to what ordinary Vietnamese people thought.
In 1973, she went to China. She became The Daily Telegraph's China correspondent. She was the first since the country became the People's Republic of China in 1949. She met important leaders like Zhou Enlai and Mao Zedong's wife, Jiang Qing. She was also the last person to interview the Shah of Iran. Another journalist said, "She was the only person he wanted to speak to." Clare stayed in China for three years. She moved to Hong Kong in the 1980s. She retired in 1981 but continued to travel. She even watched the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 from a hotel balcony.
Personal Life and Legacy
Clare Hollingworth was married twice. In 1936, she married Vandeleur Robinson, but they divorced in 1951. The same year, she married Geoffrey Hoare, a correspondent for The Times. He passed away in 1965.
From 1981, Hollingworth lived in Hong Kong. She often visited the Foreign Correspondents' Club. She was like a special ambassador there. In 1990, she wrote her life story in a book called Front Line. Her great-nephew, Patrick Garrett, wrote a book about her in 2016. It was called Of Fortunes and War: Clare Hollingworth, First of the Female War Correspondents.
Clare Hollingworth passed away at her home in Hong Kong on 10 January 2017, at the age of 105. As she wished, her body was returned to England. She was buried in a churchyard in Bygrave, Hertfordshire.
Awards and Honours
Clare Hollingworth received many awards for her outstanding journalism:
- In 1962, she won Woman Journalist of the Year for her reports on the civil war in Algeria.
- She won the James Cameron Award for Journalism in 1994.
- In 1999, she received a lifetime achievement award from a UK television show called What the Papers Say.
- In 1982, she was made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for her services to journalism.
- On 10 October 2017, Google honored her with a special Google Doodle for what would have been her 106th birthday.
Helping Others
While reporting from Poland at the start of World War II in 1939, Clare Hollingworth also did important charity work. She helped Czechoslovak refugees in Poland. She worked with the British Committee for Refugees from Czechoslovak. It is believed that she helped between two and three thousand people escape from the Nazis. Their takeover had made many people seek safety.
See also
In Spanish: Clare Hollingworth para niños
