In 1956, a widow, Violet Clark, was accused of the murder of her baby twins. At her trial, Wright's defence saved her from the gallows. The Fifties were a conservative, inward looking decade during which women retreated once more to the safety of the kitchen. But Violet was defended by Rose Heilbron QC, the first woman to be appointed silk in Britain, the first woman to defend in a murder trial - and a tabloid celebrity. Rachel Cooke tells the story of Heilbron and some of her extraordinary contemporaries - Muriel Box, film director; Betty Box, film producer; Margery Fish, plantswoman; Patience Gray, cook; Alison Smithson, architect; Sheila van Damm, rally car driver and theatre owner; Nancy Spain, journalist and radio personality; Joan Werner Laurie, editor; Jacquetta Hawkes, archaeologist.