Marguerite de Witt-Schlumberger facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Marguerite de Witt-Schlumberger
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Marguerite de Witt-Schlumberger
photo-portrait from 'Le Pays de France', 5 July 1919
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Marguerite de Witt-Guizot
20 January 1853 Paris, France
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| Died | 23 October 1924 (aged 71) Saint-Ouen-le-Pin, France
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| Occupation | Philanthropist and campaigner for
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| Spouse(s) | Paul Schlumberger (1848–1926) |
| Children | Jean Schlumberger (1877–1968) Conrad Schlumberger (1878–1936) Daniel Schlumberger (1879–1915) Pauline Schlumberger (1883–) Marcel Schlumberger (1884–1953) Maurice Schlumberger (1886–1977) |
| Parent(s) | Henriette Guizot de Witt |
Marguerite de Witt-Schlumberger (born January 20, 1853 – died October 23, 1924) was an important French activist. She worked hard to support families, encourage people to avoid alcohol, and fight for women's rights. She was the leader of the French Union for Women's Suffrage (UFSF), a group that wanted women to have the right to vote.
Marguerite married into the powerful Schlumberger family. She became a strong leader in her family and had several sons who became famous in their own fields. She was also active in international groups that worked for women's rights. At the Paris Peace Conference in 1919, she was a key leader in the fight for women's voting rights. For her dedication and service to the government, she received the French Legion of Honour award in 1920.
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Early Life and Family
Marguerite de Witt was born in Paris, France. Her father, Conrad de Witt, was a mayor and later a politician in the French National Assembly. Her family, the "de Witts," came from the Netherlands. They were also part of France's Protestant community, which was a minority group.
Marguerite's mother, Henriette Guizot de Witt, was a well-known writer. She came from another important French Protestant family, as her father was Prime Minister François Guizot.
Marguerite and her sister, Jeanne, were taught at home by their mother. They grew up surrounded by many cousins and other relatives, including members of the Broglie family.
Working for Change
Helping the Community
Marguerite and Jeanne actively joined their mother in her charity work. In 1865, they helped open a special workplace for young girls. This was at a former abbey that their family owned. Five years later, they added a children's home there.
For 20 years, Marguerite visited prisons as a Protestant volunteer. She worked with Sarah Monod, another Protestant helper, to support women who were in the Hospital-prison of Saint-Lazare. During this time, in 1876, she married Paul Schlumberger.
Marguerite strongly campaigned against alcohol abuse. She was a member of the National League against Alcoholism. In her hometown of Guebwiller, she even opened two special places where people could drink broth instead of alcoholic drinks. She believed that people should not drink alcohol or offer it to guests.
Fighting for the Right to Vote
Like many people involved in social improvement movements, Marguerite de Witt-Schlumberger became a feminist around the year 1900. These earlier efforts had opened up discussions about topics that were once considered private, like different legal rules for men and women.
From 1913, she led the French Union for Women's Suffrage (UFSF). She encouraged women during World War I to take on jobs while men were fighting. Julie Siegfried also served as president with Witt-Schlumberger. Both women had sons in the military, which made their calls for supporting the war effort very powerful.
To gain more support, feminists decided to add voting rights to the agenda of an international meeting in Paris in 1913. The next year, Witt-Schlumberger met with women from the International Women's Suffrage Alliance (IWSA) in Rome. By 1917, she became a vice president of the IWSA.
Women's Roles During World War I
During World War I, many men were away fighting. This meant that wives and other women in the Protestant Church took on leadership roles. In 1916, Witt-Schlumberger reached out to these women. She wanted to hear about their experiences within the Protestant Church.
She published stories of women who had taken over religious leadership roles. This helped to boost the spirits of other women at home. Marguerite's work showed women as both mothers and important heads of their households. This helped improve the image of French women.
In 1917, women who supported voting rights sent a petition to the Chamber of Deputies. They asked for equal voting rights because of all the work women had done during the war. The Chamber approved it in 1922, but the Senate stopped the law. Witt-Schlumberger promised to keep fighting for it.
International Women's Conference (1919)
In early 1918, Witt-Schlumberger wrote to President Wilson of the United States. She thanked him for supporting women's voting rights in America. She asked him to publicly state that women's right to vote was needed for lasting peace. President Wilson then made a public statement supporting women's political goals.
After the war ended, Witt-Schlumberger asked President Wilson to keep his promise at the upcoming Paris Peace Conference. At this conference, world leaders discussed the terms of peace. Witt-Schlumberger suggested that women's issues should be part of the peace treaty. This would help ensure women's rights around the world.
Her group, the French Union for Women's Suffrage, worked with the National Council of French Women. They invited women who supported voting rights from Allied countries to meet in Paris. This meeting, called the Inter-Allied Women's Conference, started on February 10, 1919.
The women at the conference asked U.S. President Woodrow Wilson and French Prime Minister Georges Clemenceau to let women join advisory committees. They also wanted to present their case for women's equality. Women were eventually allowed to speak to the League of Nations Commission and the Labor Commission.
On April 10, 1919, the women spoke to the League of Nations Commission. They argued that all League jobs should be open to women equally. They asked for an end to the trafficking of women and children. They also wanted education to be a protected right and for voting rights for women everywhere to be recognized. Some of their ideas were included in the final peace treaty.
After the War
In 1920, Witt-Schlumberger was the only woman appointed to the Conseil supérieur de la Natalité (CSN), which was a council focused on birth rates. She argued that women should be able to protect themselves from fathers who were unhealthy or unsuitable.
That same year, she received the French Legion of Honour award. This was for her active involvement and service to the government. In 1923, Carrie Chapman Catt stepped down as president of the International Women's Suffrage Alliance. Many people thought Witt-Schlumberger would be her successor. She was elected, but she turned down the job due to health reasons.
Personal Life
Marguerite de Witt married Paul Schlumberger on June 30, 1876. Paul came from a family of Protestant business owners. His grandfather, Nicolas Schlumberger, had made a lot of money in the cotton textile industry.
Marguerite had five sons and one daughter, all born in Guebwiller, France. Her oldest son, Jean Schlumberger, became a famous journalist and writer. Conrad and Marcel Schlumberger became a physicist and an engineer. They were known for their inventions in geophysics and oil technology. In 1926, these two brothers started what became the world's largest oilfield services company. Another son, Daniel Schlumberger, died in World War I.
Marguerite was from western France, but her husband's family was from Alsace. This region became part of Germany after the 1871 border changes from the Franco-Prussian War. It was difficult to move the family's large factories into France. Doing so would have left many factory workers jobless in Alsace.
Because of this, her children were born in the German state. However, as each of her sons neared age 15, the age when they could have been forced to join the German army, Marguerite moved them out of Alsace and into France. By doing this, she was seen as a "French patriot" who led "passive resistance" against what many French people saw as German control.
Marguerite de Witt-Schlumberger passed away on October 23, 1924.
