Maude Clarke also seems to have enjoyed university life. She and Helen, both daughters of Protestant clergy, became close friends. Maude was dark and slight, with large eyes, a quiet nature, and a sharp mind. She had a ‘freakish sense of fun’ and was always ready for adventure, provided it wasn’t boring. Friends described her ‘grave beauty lit up by flashes of humour and kindly malice or softened by quick sympathy.’
Helen Jane Waddell was born in Tokyo on 31 May 1889, the youngest of ten children of Reverend Hugh Waddell and Jane Martin. At age two, she returned to Belfast with her mother, who soon died of typhoid. Her father remarried and brought the youngest children back to Japan, where Helen spent an enchanted childhood. ‘The richest thing in my life has been Japan – outside books,’ she wrote. The family returned to Belfast in 1900, but within months, her father died. The loss deeply affected Helen, making her retreat into herself.
She attended Victoria College, Belfast, an academically rigorous school for girls. When her father died, Helen’s brothers financed her education, though her ability was recognized early. According to family lore, the school’s founder, Margaret Byers, placed her hand on Helen’s shoulder and declared, ‘This one I will educate for nothing.’ Two of Helen’s closest friends at Victoria, Meta Fleming and Helen Ritchie Forbes, would attend Queen’s with her, while another, Cathleen Nesbitt, later became a famous actress.
Helen’s home life was restrictive. She lived with her stepmother in a narrow terraced house in Belfast, where strict Presbyterian values ruled. Education was essential since the girls, like the boys, would need to support themselves. Helen’s older sister Margaret studied at Victoria College’s University House before marrying J. D. Martin, a Presbyterian minister. When Margaret moved to Kilmacrew House, seventeen-year-old Helen was left alone with her stepmother.
Maude Violet Clarke was born in Belfast on 7 May 1892, the only daughter of Reverend Richard James Clarke and Anne Jessop. When she was young, the family moved to Coole Glebe, a peaceful but isolated rectory outside Belfast. The house, rich in books and overlooking Belfast Lough, fostered a deep love of learning. However, its isolation left Maude feeling lonely. She found solace in her brothers, animals—including a pet ram and a peacock named Shah—and occasional adventures, like an unsuccessful attempt to be ‘kidnapped’ by gypsies.
Maude had a fascination with fire and, by age ten, had set the house ablaze twice. Despite her mischievous streak, she grew up in an intellectual household where conversation flourished. Helen later called it ‘the only house I know where one really talks at meals.’ The Clarke family was ‘desperately untidy, desperately bookish, and uncommonly cheerful,’ but they carried their own struggles. Maude’s childhood was overshadowed by her mother’s mental illness, which Helen described as ‘a strange egotistical sort of insanity.’
Maude attended Belfast Royal Academy and was tutored in Latin and Greek by her father. At thirteen, she was sent to board at Alexandra College in Dublin, a school known for its rigorous education. Like Victoria College, it aimed to prepare girls for university. In October 1910, Maude enrolled at Queen’s University Belfast.