By James Vernon, 2000
On February 28, 1929, Colonel Leslie Ivor Victor Gauntlett Bligh Barker
was arrested for contempt of court, having failed to appear at a bankruptcy
hearing the previous December. Removed to Brixton Prison, Barker was subjected to a routine medical inspection, during which he was discovered to be a woman and immediately transferred to the all-women Holloway prison. By March 6, the news had leaked to the press and led to a series of sensational revelations that dominated the front pages of the press for a week. Barker, it was disclosed, had been born a biological female in 1895 and christened Lilias Irma Valerie Barker by her parents of independent
means.
