The mere mention of the word ‘Freemasonry’ among friends provokes startled reactions, ranging from the incredulous to the downright worried, ‘Oh! You don’t want to get involved with them!’ Too late, for I consider myself already involved. Prompted by a desire to learn more about this venerable organisation, I set out to do my own research. From the masons I had already met, I encountered only support and encouragement. I was not particularly concerned with the prospect of becoming a member, because - as far as I knew - the Freemasons do not accept women. I was wrong; you can be a woman Freemason.
    The history of the involvement of women with Freemasonry can be traced back to the 17th century, when non-operative women members were recorded in the Masons’ Company. Legend has it that Elizabeth St Leger, daughter of the first Viscount Doneraile, hid in a grandfather clock to witness a masonic ceremony which took place in her father’s house. On being found out, the masons were furious but had no choice other than to accept her to be ‘sworn without being a man’. The official acceptance of women, however, consisted in the founding in France of the first Co-Masonic Order entitled La Grande Loge Symbolique Ecossaise in 1879 which subsequently reached this country. Thus, at a festival held to commemorate 25 years of the founding of the Order of Universal Co-Masonry in Great Britain, we find the theosophist Annie Besant giving a speech about its importance in changing the status of women in society, a speech whose liberating, ‘feminist’ overtones cannot be over-emphasised: “The position of women today is recognised to be very different from the older western view of the ‘proper place of women’; they are now regarded as having the right to do any work which they are able to do.”
    In 1908, an independent splinter group calling itself The Honourable Fraternity of Ancient Freemasonry emerged with the consecration of three lodges in a single day. It continued to function in a mixed capacity until 1935 when it changed its name to The Order of Women Freemasons with its headquarters in London. There are currently more than 350 women’s lodges functioning in Great Britain, Canada, Gibraltar, Australia and elsewhere. (see Enid L.Scott’s Women and Freemasonry. 1992).
    Having returned to its original title, The Honourable Fraternity of Ancient Freemasons (HFAF) welcomes new members, provided that they are over 21 and believe in God. According to Eileen Grey CBE, the organisation’s current Grand Master, the HFAF is “still breaking down the bastions of an old male-dominated society. When I was first accepted into the Fraternity in 1952, one did not have anything to do with the men, but now they are very co-operative. We have always made it absolutely clear that we do not want to join with them, but would like to be acknowledged, and that they now do. They admit that we exist. Masonry is a way of life which is as applicable to a woman as it is to a man.”
    It is precisely this ‘way of life’ that has become the bone of contention with respect to masons’ notorious ‘secrecy’, based largely on ignorance, suspicion and even fear, fuelled by a hostile press that will cotton onto anything with sensationalist potential. Naturally, I had to ask Eileen Grey to comment on Chris Mullin’s recent legislation requiring members of the police, judiciary and associated professions to declare their membership. “That horrible little man! You can quote me on this.” Women Freemasons are outraged. “We had a few corrupt people in our midst, but there are corrupt people in all walks of life. One night, about six years ago, I was on the panel - the only woman - of a TV programme called After Midnight, which went on until 3am. There was this policeman accused of corruption, but I felt sorry for him because he came on this programme hoping for an opportunity to defend himself, and in fact they were shredding him. This is what the programme was all about. We were all invited for different reasons. I, for instance, to talk about women in Freemasonry - which had nothing to do with this poor policeman. He was a Freemason but this had nothing to do with the fact that he was a corrupt policeman.”
    I asked Eileen Grey if her organisation had anything to hide. “Freemasonry is not a secret society; Freemasonry is a society with secrets. When you become a member, you do have to promise to do certain things and you do take it up by a holy book which all races are prepared to use. If however we have a more devout candidate - say a Moslem - who wishes to swear on the Koran, then she holds the Koran in her hand, and when she has made her little promise, then she puts that away and we go on. All the rituals of the Freemasons - and I am not breaking any secrets because you can go to Great Queen Street and buy a ritual if you want to - are essentially to do with aligning our own lives to the building of a temple, which was King Solomon’s Temple, and it is very historical and very well documented in the Old Testament. We try to align ourselves to it. ‘Is that not that house made with hands united in the heavens?’ We are trying to build ourselves with perfect blocks. Everything that arrived there was of the right size and was perfect. They did not have any hammers or saws or anything else. That, in a nutshell, is the allegory of Freemasonry. So obviously we have to use the Old Testament to carry on our ceremonies.”
    Eileen Grey explained to me the process of going from the First to the Third Degree and the significance of Royal Arch and Mark with respect to the building of King Solomon’s Temple, the process and its significance being the same for women as for men.
    I asked her what kinds of women are attracted to Freemasonry. “All sorts.” she replied, “Let me give you an example. Last week we had the joy - if your mother is a Freemason you can join before you are 21, otherwise only after - to witness this delightful girl who is under 21 years of age joining the Freemasons, while her mother and grandmother were in the lodge to see her coming in. We had a Greek woman in the clothing business join and now we are full of Greeks, which is absolutely delightful - except that we cannot pronounce their names! That is the only difficulty we are having. There are no men in our organisation, but men are perfectly happy for their wives to join and usually husbands are very supportive.”
    Eileen Grey herself is one extraordinary example of the ‘kinds’ of women who choose to join the Freemasons. Apart from the many distinguished functions she continues to fulfil, she was one of the founders of the Women’s Cycle Racing Association back in 1945, her main aim being to campaign for the international recognition of women in sport. Realising that in order to be successful you have to campaign from the inside, she single-mindedly pursued her quest to become ‘one of us’ and succeeded brilliantly. In 1976, she became a member of the Olympic Committee, then the Commonwealth Games Council for England (“I was on the International Governing Committee - the only woman that has ever been on it”), and was then appointed President of the BCF (British Cycling Federation). She received an OBE in 1978. Ten years later, Eileen Grey became the first woman ever to be elected Vice Chairman of the British Olympic Committee. The list goes on... “When I first joined the fraternity, women did not as a rule go out to work. My husband did not have a particularly well paid job. He worked for the local council and I had a child and stayed at home to look after that child. I was getting bored and therefore became involved in all sorts of voluntary work. I have done so many things in my life. I am so used to serving I am going to write a book about it. I am currently on the London Marathon Trust Committee - the only woman again. Women don’t push themselves forward enough on these things. I have to say that - although this sounds sexist - I find, being involved in so many organisations, that women have more common sense, although men might have more knowledge, but I personally feel that they lack common sense. I don’t have much family; I have my son and granddaughter whom I don’t see very often, and my husband. And that is my total family. And I get these wonderful vibes from all the members, you know. Their husbands come here as well and we are delighted to meet them, and it is a wonderful atmosphere.”
    Eileen Grey is clearly an ‘achiever’ of high calibre. What, I wondered, did other women hope to achieve as Freemasons?
    “When they become Freemasons, their objective is that one day they will become Master of the Lodge. Like anything else that you join, your friends are in, you think that if they are enjoying it so much ‘there must be something in it for me as well’, so you join. There is no compulsion about anything if you come to join. Also, the friendship and social side is good, but not all members are ambitious for the Master’s Chair. Some become Treasurers or Secretaries and they are wonderful. We have people anxious to progress through all these degrees you have to learn. You don’t have to wait until you have been through the Chair, but having got right through all the offices and been the Master of the Lodge, then you can start again in the Mark and Chapter and learn what is required. Everybody is welcome, of any colour, creed or age. We have a very good record as a charitable organisation; we are in fact a registered charity, but we have a unique way of doing things and it seems to be working well.”
    The Grand Master showed me a display of masonic regalia. “When I first started, we used to wear nice evening gowns, but today with all this travelling we wear mostly black ankle-length skirts, plain black shoes and a nice top. If you turn up in gold lamé, we don’t mind it at Installations, but at meetings it is more practical to wear plain clothes so as not to detract from the ceremony.
    “The ordinary masons wear a white fabric apron - it used to be lambskin and we still have a few of these, but not many - with a pale blue border all around and two little rosettes. That is your apron. If you are in office you also wear a pale blue collar, on the end of which there is a silver insignia to tell you whether you are a Steward, for instance, in which case the insignia is a cornucopia which is rather nice, or a Deacon who looks after candidates, or a Warden who assists the Master. At every Installation when the Master is put in the Chair, each of these officers is collared by the Master and told what the jewels mean and why she is wearing them. If you are not in office, you don’t wear a collar but you must wear your apron.”
    A rather idiosyncratic gender anomaly of the kind that would attract irate comments from ‘feminists’ - which in fact goes back to the founding of the first Co-Masonic Order in 1908 - is the use of the masculine. Thus we have ‘brethren’, ‘he’ and ‘Grand Master’ for men and women alike. The decision, however, seems to be based on a pragmatic rather than a sexist decision to do with avoiding changing well-entrenched terminology. As Eileen Grey explains, “We had a battle regarding this issue, but if you are in a fraternity, you call the female members ‘she’ whilst the texts refer to ‘brothers’ and ‘he’. How can you call somebody a ‘brother’ and ‘she’ in the same breath? So we kept the terms unchanged in our speeches, often with hilarious consequences. For example, somebody’s ‘sister’ who at a meeting becomes a ‘brother’! But it makes more sense in a fraternity to remain brothers for we don’t particularly wish to go into sisterhood. After all, we use men’s rituals.”
    I ran out of questions, we finished our tea and I had quantities of material for my feature. I was not even surprised to be referred to the ‘web-site’ the Women’s Lodge had recently acquired - “as part of our campaign for openness. And you know,” the Grand Master enthused, “..we get all sorts of questions which come through from people in Turkey, or India, or China...”
    And by the way, women masons do open their blouses at initiation - but strictly to reveal the heart and nothing else!

The Honourable Fraternity of Ancient Freemasons can be contacted at 68 Great Cumberland Place, Marble Arch, London W1H 7FD. Website: http://www.powerpro.demon.co.uk/hfaf

Dr Sanda M Miller, writer and broadcaster, is Senior Lecturer in Art History at the Southampton Institute and author of the authoritative book on the sculptor, Constantin Brancusi (OUP 1995).