Writer and political figure. She was a daughter of William French, a naval commander from Ireland. By the age of ten her father had died and her mother was committed to an insane asylum and she was sent to London to live with relatives. She was shocked by the poverty she saw and as a result developed radical political opinions. In 1870 she fell in love and married Max Despard, a Frenchman who shared her political beliefs. In 1874 her first novel, Chaste as Ice, Pure as Snow was published. During the next sixteen years Charlotte wrote ten novels. When her husband died in 1890, Charlotte decided to dedicate the rest of her life to helping the poor. She left her luxurious house in Esher and moved to Wandsworth to live with the people she intended to assist. She joined the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU). She was arrested and imprisoned for her WSPU activities. However, she dissaproved of Emmeline Pankhurst's methods and together with the three other women formed the Women's Freedom League (WFL). This new organisation still took a militant approach but unlike the WSPU the Freedom League concentrated on using non-violent illegal methods. In 1909 she met Gandhi and was influenced by his theory of 'passive resistance'. As the leading figure of the WFL, she urged members not to pay taxes and to boycott the 1911 Census. She continued to be involved in politics after the war and joined in the Sinn Fein campaign for a united Ireland but resigned as a response to the factionalism of its members. In 1930 she visited the Soviet Union and took the decision to move from Dublin to Northern Ireland in the wake of an attack on the Irish Workers' College, which she had financed for some time. In the mid-thirties, her finances were becoming strained and she was declared bankrupt in 1937. Nonetheless, she continued to fight Fascism until her death as a result of a fall at her home at the age of 95.