Expert who wrote Britain’s first ever sex guide is hailed for liberating women DR HUTTON’S PRIDE AND JOY
Heather Greenaway It was written before The Joy Of Sex was even a gleam in the illustrator’s eye.
And despite its puritanical-sounding title, Dr Isabel Galloway Emslie Hutton’s The Hygiene Of Marriage risked scandalising 1920s Britain.
Edinburgh doctor Isabel’s sex guide tackled the strictly taboo subjects of sexual intercourse, contraception and the workings of the female body.
Isabel, one of the first women in the UK to qualify as a doctor, was advised against its publication but she went ahead in 1923 and The Hygiene Of Marriage became the go-to sex guide for the next three decades.
Despite its popularity, the manual, which contained detailed diagrams, was considered too graphic for polite society and was never reviewed or advertised.
One horrified newspaper editor declared: “We are sorry but you must know that we never touch sex stuff.”
Publicly the book may have been shunned but in private it was educating a whole generation of young women and is credited with saving countless relationships.
Dr Patricia Fara, who lectures in the history of science at Cambridge University, says Isabel – who went on to become a mental health pioneer – is one of the most remarkable women she has come across.
She said: “Not only was Hutton a First World War hero who helped save countless lives in France and Serbia through her work with the Scottish Women’s Hospitals, she also deserves great recognition for her simple and practical guide The Hygiene Of Marriage.
“Hutton was keen to liberate women at a more personal, intimate level. As a naive medical student, she had been profoundly shocked when a demonstrator suddenly embraced her passionately.
“Always carefully chaperoned, she knew nothing about sexual relationships and lacked romantic films or TV programmes to guide her on suitable behaviour.
“Doctors received minimal training in normal female functions and they learnt nothing whatsoever about ‘moral hygiene’ – the euphemism for sex in all its joys and complications.
“From talking to patients, Hutton realised how desperate women were to know more (or even something) about everyday experiences such as female sexual gratification, birth control, inferti lity, the menopause and menstrual abnormalities.”
Fara, who is president of the British Society for the History of Science, added: “Although Marie Stopes has been credited with writing Britain’s first sex guide, Married Love’s f lowery prose often prevented basic information from being correctly understood.
“In contrast, although Hutton agreed that
maritalital mari harmonyh and children’s welfare depended on sound d sexuall relationships, ltihi sheh wrotet with ith clinical ddetachment and had no qualms about giving clear detailed descriptions.
“Such frankness, her friends warned her, risked compromising her career and even the liberal suffrage movement refused to advertise or promote it. Publishers were reluctant to accept Hutton’s manuscript.
“Undeterred, Hutton went ahead and, with five editions published, she must be credited with saving countless marriages and relationships.”
Isabel is one of the incredible women featured in Fara’s new book A Lab Of One’s Own, which celebrates the prominent female scientists who came into their own during World War I but have been neglected by history.
Fara, whose book is being published to mark the 100th anniversary of the end of World War I and women getting the vote, added: “Although women had helped the country to victory and won the vote for those over 30, they had lost the battle for equality.
“Men returning from the front reclaimed their jobs and conventional hierarchies were re-established, even though the nation knew that women were fully capable of performing work traditionally reserved for men.
“I wanted to examine how the bravery of these pioneer women scientists – temporarily allowed into a closed world before the door clanged shut again – paved the way for today’s women scientists. Yet inherited prejudices continue to limit women’s scientific opportunities.”
Isabel, who received the Serbian Order of the White Eagle, the French Croix de Guerre and the Order of St Anna of Russia for her services during the war, went on to become one of Britain’s leading psychiatrists.
Here, we take a look at three other remarkable Scots featured in Fara’s book.