(October 26th, 1864 — July 24th, 1916)

Sarah Macnaughtan was a Scottish novelist. Never married, Macnaughtan was a well-travelled woman for the time, partially of her own volition and partially due to her enlistment with the Red Cross Society. She travelled to Canada, South America, South Africa,  the Middle East, India, Russia, and throughout Europe.

Macnaughtan also helped champion women’s suffrage and documented her various experiences during conflict. Notably, she provided aid during the Armenian Genocide, the Second Boer War, the Balkan Wars, and WWI. She also volunteered to provide social services for the poor in London’s East End. For her work under fire in Belgium, she received the Order of Leopold.

Macnaughtan’s first novel, Selah Harrison, was published in 1898 when she was thirty-four. She published fifteen more books (two posthumously) over the next twenty years, some of which were novels and some of which were documentation of war experience.

Macnaughtan fell ill while travelling through Persia and died before the end of WWI and before women had been given the right to vote. Macnaughton [sic] Road in Toronto was named after her in payment for her writing services.