Lesbia Harford

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Lesbia Harford (9 April 1891 – 5 July 1927) was an Australian poet.

Lesbia Venner Harford, daughter of E. J. and Helen Keogh, was born at Brighton, Victoria, on 9 April 1891. She was educated at the Sacré Coeur school at Malvern, Victoria, Mary's Mount school at Ballarat, Victoria, and at the University of Melbourne, where she graduated LL.B. in 1916.

Becoming interested in social questions, she obtained work in a clothing factory to obtain first hand knowledge of the conditions under which women worked. She campaigned strongly against forced conscription in World War I. In 1916 she campaigned for the release of the Sydney Twelve, members of the Industrial Workers of the World arrested and charged with treason, arson, sedition and forgery

She had begun writing verse, and in May 1921 Birth, a small poetry magazine published at Melbourne, gave the whole of one number to a selection from her poems. A severe attack of rheumatic fever while a young child led to a life of delicate health, and her death on 5 July 1927. She married P. Harford in 1919 but had no children.

In 1927 three examples of her work were included in Serle's An Australasian Anthology, and in 1941 a small volume The Poems of Lesbia Harford, sponsored by the Commonwealth Literary Fund and published by the Melbourne University Press, revealed a poet of originality and charm.

In Melbourne, the biennial Lesbia Harford Oration is named in her honour. The Lesbia Harford oration is a speech by an eminent speaker on an issue of importance for women.