Born in Sevenoaks as Hilda Alice Browning, she was educated on a scholarship at a local grammar school, then studied teaching at Goldsmiths College.

[2] Selwyn-Clarke worked as an assistant to Fenner Brockway, then for the Society for Cultural Relations with the Soviet Union.

She went to live with her husband on postings in Ghana and Nigeria, and from February 1938 in Hong Kong, and brought up their daughter, Mary, who was born in 1936 and went to study at Somerville College, Oxford.

Although her husband initially continued in his role under Japanese occupation, he was arrested on 2 May 1943; she and Mary were sent to the Stanley Internment Camp.

Dr. Selwyn-Clarke refused to make any confession in spite of torture, and in December 1944, he was released from a prison sentence and the family was reunited at another camp.