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Ruth Langsford: I was sexually assaulted on crowded train as a school girl

Ruth Langsford has confessed she wanted to leave the public eye. (Getty Images)
Ruth Langsford has opened up about being sexually harrassed as a school girl. (Getty Images)

Ruth Langsford has revealed she was sexually assaulted on a crowded train as a school girl.

The Loose Women presenter - who grew up in Singapore, Libya, London and Cornwall, and also attended boarding school as her father was a British army officer - has revealed she experienced several incidents of sexual harassment between the ages of 11 and 16 which she never reported.

Langsford, 61, wrote in her column in Best magazine: "I was flashed at more than once, followed a few times and a man once put his hand up my skirt on a crowded train.

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"These incidents all happened to me between the ages of about 11 and 16. I now ask myself why I didn't shout, scream, kick up a fuss, report them to an official - all the things I would urge any girl or woman to do today."

Eamonn Holmes and Ruth Langsford co-host This Morning (Credit: ITV)
Ruth Langsford co-hosted 'This Morning' with husband Eaomnn Holmes (ITV)

The TV presenter said she felt moved by the murder of Sarah Everard to highlight that women have endured sexual harassment by men for many years.

She said: "In my case, my earliest recollections all centred around travelling to and from school in London.

"The Tube was my mode of transport and in the Seventies, it also seemed that perverts and predators were drawn to the same routes I took like wasps to jam.

"I was young and nobody talked about these things then, so I didn't know what to do... so I did nothing. Just kept my wits about me and hoped it wouldn't happen again."

Langsford added: "Sarah Everard's death marks a line in the sand. No more writing off stalking, exposing and sexual harassment as simply weird or odd behaviour... something that women grit their teeth and bear.

"It's time to serve notice on bad men (not all men). Enough is enough – this ends here."

Langsford - who has been married to This Morning co-presenter Eamonn Holmes since 2010, added that her husband "respects, champions and defends women".

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Everard, a former Durham University student went missing on 3 March while walking home after visiting a friend in south London, and her body was found in woodland near Ashford in Kent a week later. A police officer was arrested on suspicion of her murder.

A poster appealing for information in Clapham, London, after Sarah Everard, 33, disappeared after leaving a friend's house last week. Picture Date: Monday March 8, 2021.
Ruth Langsford was reacting to the death of Sarah Everard whose body was found after she walked home alone. (PA)

Her death sparked an outpouring from women on social media speaking out about fearing of being attacked while out walking alone.

A subsequent vigil held in her memory ended in police violence.

Watch: Ruth Langsford on working with husband Eamonn Holmes