Early Life
Born George Jamieson on 29 April 1935, in Smithdown Road Hospital, Liverpool, she was one of six surviving children of a Roman Catholic father and a Protestant mother.
Raised in Liverpool, she had suffered from calcium deficiency and required weekly calcium injections at the Alder Hey Children's Hospital. Because she wet the bed she was given her own box room aged two when the family moved house.
She joined the Merchant Navy at the age of 14. She had under-developed genitalia and by the age of 15 she had not developed secondary sexual characteristics. She attempted suicide after returning home from the Merchant Navy, and given a dishonourable discharge was sent to the mental institution in Ormskirk for electric shock treatment. In her book The First Lady, Ashley tells the story of the rape she endured while still living as a man. A roommate raped her, and she was severely injured as a result of the sexual assault.
Read more about this topic: April Ashley
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