1935-1939: The league was unable to stop Nazi persecution during these years, but was able to continually aid refugees from the regime. WILPF’s international work continued throughout the war with the help of a new outpost established in New York.
1936: Charlotte Despard, in her nineties, addresses an anti-fascist rally in Trafalgar square. She had been a militant suffragist before 1914, and was a pacifist co-founder of WILPF.
Charlotte Despard
1945: Birth of WILPF Brazil
1945: WILPF attends the founding UN Conference in San Francisco, promoting world security that is based on freedom and justice, not on military power and prestige.
1946: Triennial Congress in Luxemburg City, Luxemburg.
1946: Emily Greene Balch, WILPF’s first International Secretary General, wins the Nobel Peace Prize.
Emily Greene Balch
1948: WILPF is granted consultative status as a non-governmental organisation with the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC).
1950: When armed conflict broke out in Korea, WILPF worked towards withdrawal of foreign troops, a ceasefire, and negotiated settlement.
1950: WILPF urges the setting up of a Mediation Commission to secure a general settlement and the holding of free elections throughout Korea, calling for an immediate conference between the US and China within the UN framework.
1946: WILPF member Doris Blackburn chairs the first “Ban the Bomb” meeting in Melbourne on the first anniversary of the Hiroshima bombing, asking that all major weapons of mass destruction be outlawed and that scientific research be free from military and political control.
Doris Blackburn (R) with her secretary Gloria Canet, at work in her Melbourne office. Image from National Library of Australia.
Charlotte Despard
Emily Greene Balch