In 1907 at the Bad Homburg spa in Germany, Hall met Mabel Batten, a well-known amateur singer of Lieder. Having reached adulthood without a vocation, she spent much of her twenties pursuing women she eventually lost to marriage. Hall was a lesbian but described herself as a ' congenital invert', a term taken from the writings of Havelock Ellis and other turn-of-the-century sexologists. She began to do as she pleased, dressing in typical men's fashion of the times, such as trousers, monocles and hats. Īs Hall grew older and gained more autonomy, she realized that she had enough inheritance money from her father to live without working or marrying.

She frequently dipped into Radclyffe's inheritance money for herself. Throughout her childhood, Mary made it clear that Radclyffe was unwanted after failing to get an abortion during pregnancy. Radclyffe's mother subsequently married Albert Visetti, a professor of singing, whom Radclyffe did not like and who had a tempestuous relationship with her mother. However, he did leave behind a considerable inheritance for Radclyffe. Radclyffe's father left in 1882, abandoning young Radclyffe and her mother. Hall's father was a wealthy philanderer, educated at Eton and Oxford but seldom working, since he inherited a large amount of money from his father, an eminent physician who was head of the British Medical Association her mother was an unstable American widow from Philadelphia.

Marguerite Antonia Radclyffe Hall was born in 1880 at 'Sunny Lawn', Durley Road, Bournemouth, Hampshire (now Dorset), to Radclyffe ('Rat') Radclyffe-Hall (1846-1898) and Mary Jane Sager (née Diehl). Mabel Batten sang to John Singer Sargent as he painted her portrait, around 1897.

Radclyffe hall's the well of loneliness