Jane Hamilton

CPFC season ticket holder, mum of Joe, crazy cat lady!

[Jane Hamilton @JayneHamilton1]

@Nelson_Muntz23 Funnily enough here in Hurghada it’s only French, Spanish and the usual South American teams being worn by grown men (nearly all Russian!) I have my utterly beautiful LiT Leipzig trophy tee which is my travelling outfit! ❤️💙🦅

[Crazy Vibes @CrazyVibes_1]

November 1971. Chiswick, West London.
Erin Pizzey is 32 years old. She is not a lawyer. Not a politician. Not a doctor.
She is a woman who talked Hounslow Council into lending her a cold, rundown building on Belmont Road — a former community hall — for almost nothing. Her original plan was modest. A warm room. A cup of tea. Somewhere for mothers with young children to simply get out of the house.
Then the door opened.
A woman stood in the entrance. She was covered, head to foot, in bruises. She was holding two small children. She was shaking.
She didn't want tea.
She needed somewhere to hide.
Erin let her in. She didn't turn her away. She didn't tell her to call the police.
Because Erin had already called the police. They told her the same thing they told every woman in Britain at the time: they could not enter a private home over a "domestic dispute." That was the law. The home was private. What happened inside it was a family matter.
When Erin contacted a female civil servant to report what she was seeing, the response was astonishing. The woman told her flatly: "There wasn't a problem of battered wives until you made one."
Erin put down the phone. Then she went back to her residents and made sure they were fed.
Within weeks, 40 mothers and children were sleeping in four tiny rooms. No funding. No staff. No legal authority.
She didn't stop.
By 1973, word had spread through quiet whisper networks — one woman telling another, "There is a place. Go to Chiswick. She won't turn you away." That same year, Erin hosted the first National Women's Aid Conference in the UK. Women from across Britain arrived, and they all recognized the same thing at once: what she had built needed to exist everywhere.
In 1974, the council set a maximum of 36 residents. At peak times, 150 women and children were living inside those walls — sleeping on floors, on chairs, in hallways. The building smelled of cooking, fear, and something else entirely: relief.
Erin was taken to court for overcrowding. She appealed all the way to the House of Lords.
She kept the doors open the entire time.
That same year, she wrote a book. Scream Quietly or the Neighbours Will Hear. It was the first published account of domestic violence in British history. It used real stories from real women inside the shelter. Overnight, a problem that had no official name was on front pages from London to New York.
The movement spread. Refuges opened across the UK. Then Australia. Then Canada. Then the United States. The pattern she created in four small rooms in West London — no blueprint, no permission, no funding — had been replicated in hundreds of shelters across the Western world.
MP Jack Ashley stood up in Parliament and said: "It was she who first identified the problem, who first recognised the seriousness of the situation and who first did something practical."
She was ranked 14th in a poll of the 100 women who shook the world. She was awarded the Italian Peace Prize. She received a CBE. The charity she founded — Chiswick Women's Aid, which became Refuge — grew into the largest domestic violence charity in the United Kingdom, with over 460 employees and an annual income of more than £33 million.
Erin Pizzey passed away on October 4, 2025, aged 86.
She never stopped.
It all began with one woman, one borrowed building, and an absolute refusal to say no.
Forty women and children showed up with nowhere to go.
She made room.

Share this if you believe one ordinary person, refusing to look away, can build a shelter that holds the whole world.

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[Jane Hamilton @JayneHamilton1]

@WhyteleafeEagle @LegendsInThread I’ve just received my “Jason Cadle” which I’m going to wear as my airport outfit next week. Love the t-shirt, really excellent quality, as always with LiT! ❤️💙🦅🏆

[Jane Hamilton @JayneHamilton1]

@WhyteleafeEagle @McHardySimon @LegendsInThread I’ve just ordered a Jason Cadle… hope I get the t-shirt and not the man!! Soz Jason!!! 🤣

[Jane Hamilton @JayneHamilton1]

@dazzgedd73 @LegendsInThread Haha absolutely. After the FA Cup, I had to hide my credit card as ordered so much stuff!! Did it again at Christmas…! ❤️💙🦅

[Jane Hamilton @JayneHamilton1]

@GeorgeBray In no particular order:
1. The Jam
2. Sex Pistols
3. Madness
4. The Specials
5. The Vaccines
6. The Style Council
7. Queen
8. UB40
9. Barry White
10. Squeeze

[Jane Hamilton @JayneHamilton1]

@ljbrameld That is a great list! I’m ever so slightly jealous! Xx

[Jane Hamilton @JayneHamilton1]

@MarcWilliams22 @hhustler7576 Sadly I’m old enough to have seen them a load of times - they were awesome!!

[Jane Hamilton @JayneHamilton1]

@Carlie_Ellen I’m going to SP with the boy… see you there! Xx ❤️💙🦅

[Jane Hamilton @JayneHamilton1]

@gazbod @barberville …. Aaaand am crying again!!

[Jane Hamilton @JayneHamilton1]

@Mrs_H_Ola Beautiful moment captured in time! ❤️💙🦅

[Jane Hamilton @JayneHamilton1]

@HLTCO @Chele_CPFC ….and am crying again!! ❤️💙🦅

[Ieuan Rhys 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿🇪🇺 @Ieu61]

#DontvoteReform

[Jane Hamilton @JayneHamilton1]

@Hughesy_B I did. He plays and manages to fit in supporting Palace too. 100% agree with you! x

[Jane Hamilton @JayneHamilton1]

@gazbod BST Palace!!

[steve @bagshaw2112]

This made me smile #nasa #oil #clangers @NASA

[Protect the Wild @ProtectTheWild_]

SHARE if you agree!

Let's make 2026 the year that fox hunting is ended for good.

[Dundee Culture @DundeeCulture]

🥀❤️‍🩹🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 30 years ago today, Scotland and the town of Dunblane changed forever.

16 children and their brave teacher went to school and never came home. 15 others were injured.

30 years on, our hearts go out to the town of Dunblane. We have never forgotten, not for one moment.