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Annie Besant, Heretic
http://womenshistory.about.com/library/
weekly/aa020899.htm
Fascinating woman who started life as a vicar's wife, lived in sin with radical Charles Bradlaugh and adopted his atheism and belief in birth control, promoted the match girls' strike of 1888 and women's rights, and ended her life as leader of the Theosophists, who believed in a form of spiritualism.

Barbara Bodichon (1827-91)
www.victorianweb.org/gender/
wojtczak/bodichon.html
Biography of Barbara Bodichon, one of the foremost founders of the women's rights movement in Britain, whose work helps to increase the age of sexual consent to 13 in 1875.

Josephine Butler
www.pinn.net/~sunshine/
whm2001/butler2.html
Biography of the woman who fights organised prostitution and works to improve the conditions of prostitutes themselves.

Thomas Carlyle
www.victorianweb.org/authors/
carlyle/carlyleov.html
A mini-site within the Victorian Web ring, which includes Carlyle's biography and various articles on his impact on the visual arts, social history, political history and much else.

The Complete Work of Charles Darwin Online
http://darwin-online.org.uk/
The largest collection of writings by and about Darwin, including Darwin's complete publications, many handwritten manuscripts and the largest Darwin bibliography and manuscript catalogue. There are also over 200 supplementary texts, from reference works, reviews, obituaries, biographies and more.

Elizabeth Garrett Anderson 1836-1917
www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/
WandersonE.htm
Biography of the first British woman to become a licensed doctor.

Marx and Engels Internet Archive
www.marxists.org/archive/marx/
index.htm
Comprehensive resource of the writings of Marx, Engels and many other Marxist writers of the 1800s, including William Morris.

William Morris
www.victorianweb.org/authors/morris/
morrisov.html
Morris fights what he sees as the dehumanising effects of industrialisation with art, craftsmanship and poetry. This site contains articles on his life and works, within the context of the Victorian period.

John Ruskin 1818-1900
www.victorianweb.org/authors/ruskin/
ruskinov.html
A revered Victorian figure who becomes famous as an art critic, but is also a poet, philanthropist and social reformer. This site has articles on his life and works, all cross referenced with religion, science, political and social history.

Books

The Victorians by A N Wilson (Arrow, 2003)
In this portrait of Victorian Britain and Britons, the author anchors his narrative on Disraeli, Gladstone, Salisbury and Palmerston and warms to the critical commentary of the chief sages and seers of the era: Carlyle, Dickens and Manning.
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Eminent Victorians by Lytton Strachey (Penguin Books, 1989)
Seminal work originally published in 1918, which cracks open the old myths of high Victorianism and addresses chauvinism, hypocrisy and the stiff upper lip. Strachey exposes the self-seeking ambitions of Cardinal Manning, and the manipulative, neurotic Florence Nightingale. In his essays on Dr Arnold and General Gordon, his quarries are not only his subjects but also the public-school system and the whole structure of 19th-century liberal values.
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Brunel: The Life and Times of Isambard Kingdom Brunel by Angus Buchanan (Hambledon & London, 2001)
The story both of the engineer, who followed his father Marc into what was then a new profession, and of the man. It explores his successes and failures, at home and abroad, setting him in the context of his times, showing both what made him who he was and how he made the most of the great opportunities offered to him.
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Gladstone by Roy Jenkins (Pan, 2002)
Biography charting the political career and personal life of the only person who saw four terms as the British prime minister and who left behind a long and successful legacy of legislation. Jenkins examines the manifold activities of Gladstone's life and uses it to relate the political rhythms, travel patterns and religious assumptions of Victorian England to the modern day.
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Octavia Hill and the Social Housing Debate: Essays and letters by Octavia Hill edited by Robert Whelan (Civitas, 1998)
 Hill developed an approach to social housing that enabled the working-classes to rent good accommodation without subsidy. This collection of her writings and talks deepens the debate on social housing taking place today.
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John Stuart Mill: Autobiography edited by John Robson (Penguin, 1989)
Mill was a prolific journalist, brilliant logician, philosopher, liberal MP and a pioneer of women's suffrage, whose remarkable educational feats caused him a severe mental crisis in his 30s. This edition of his autobiography has been edited by the general editor of 25 volumes of Mills' collected works.
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The Subjection of Women: Contemporary responses to John Stuart Mill edited by Andrew Pyle (St Augustine's Press, 1995)
In The Subjection of Women, first published in 1869, Mill observed that half the population were denied the most elementary legal and political rights. This volume features a collection of responses to his polemical work, many of them from women intellectuals of the period.
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Letters from the Crimea by Florence Nightingale, edited by Sue M Goldie (Mandolin, 1997)
These letters come from the period in Florence Nightingale's life that brought her lasting fame. Written amid scenes of horror and chaos, to officials, family and friends, they express her hopes and fears and the doubts and frustrations of her arduous service.
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Sir Robert Peel by T A Jenkins (Palgrave Macmillan, 1998)
Peel is largely remembered for three things: his creation of the Metropolitan Police (hence 'bobbies'), his principal role in the repeal of the Corn Laws and his status as founder of the modern Conservative Party. However, this biography reveals many other aspects of the personality and politics of this key statesman of the early Victorian period.
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Queen Victoria by Lytton Strachey (Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers, 2000)
In this book, originally published in 1921 and considered revolutionary in the art of biography, Strachey uses elements of romantic fiction and melodrama to create a warm, humorous and very human portrait of an iconic figure.
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Albert: Uncrowned King by Stanley Weintraub (John Murray, 1998)
This study of Queen Victoria's often historically neglected husband reveals his ambition, significant political roles and the marital strain between the two powerful rulers.
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