Hadow was born in 1875 at
South Cerney vicarage, near
Cirencester. She was the youngest child and fourth daughter of the Reverend William Elliott Hadow and Mary Lang
née Cornish. Her godfather was Sir
William Henry Hadow who was also her elder brother. In 1894, she went to
Trier in Germany for a year to study language and music. From 1899 to 1900, she taught at
Cheltenham Ladies' College. In 1900, she began to study English at
Somerville College, Oxford, While a student, she became president of the Women's Debating Society. In 1903, Hadow went to teach at
Bryn Mawr in the United States. She returned to Oxford in 1904 to work as a
don, becoming a tutor at
Lady Margaret Hall in 1906. In 1908 she published
The Oxford Treasury of English Literature: Growth of the drama, which would grow to three volumes. Her other publications included a selection of the works of
John Dryden (1908) and editions of
Robert Browning's
Men and Women (1911) and
Walter Raleigh's
The Historie of the World (1917). Hadow was a Suffragist and established the Cirencester Women's Suffrage Society. Her sister, Constance Hadow, was also a founder member. This was affiliated to Millicent Fawcett's
National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies and she was Honorary Secretary from 1911 to 1917. She was also the Secretary of the Cirencester branch of the
Conservative and Unionist Women's Franchise Association. During the
First World War, she was a member of the War Agricultural Committee and founded the Gloucestershire
Women's Institute (WI). In 1917 the
National Federation of Women's Institutes was formed. On 16 October
Lady Denman and Hadow were elected chair and vice-chair and
Alice Williams was elected honorary secretary and treasurer. Hadow would remain vice-chair for the rest of her life. There her work and ideas impressed
Professor W. G. S. Adams and, late in 1918, he persuaded her to become Secretary of the recently founded Barnett House at Oxford. Together with Adams she started the Oxfordshire Rural Community Council and guided the movement that saw rural community councils established in many other counties. In this endeavour she worked closely with the National Council of Social Service, later becoming a member of its executive committee. In 1921 she declined the position of
Principal of
Lady Margaret Hall in order to remain at Barnett House and work with Adams in implementing a Plunkett Foundation programme for the relief of rural disadvantage, and in the same year she wrote the first edition of the
National Federation of Women's Institutes (NFWI) handbook. From 1929 to 1940, she was
Principal of the
Society of Oxford Home Students (later
St Anne's College. During this period she lived at 7
Fyfield Road, Oxford, and is remembered there by an Oxfordshire Blue Plaque. In 1938, she was the only British woman delegate at the
British Commonwealth relations conference in Sydney, Australia, and then set out on a long speaking tour of the United States. She was said to be one of the best women speakers. She arrived back in the UK as the country prepared itself for war and in 1940 died from pneumonia at 11 Beaumont Street,
Marylebone, London. The three nieces recall Grace's relationship with her siblings, particularly Constance, and their family life, as well as her success with the Women's Institutes. ==Publications==