SUFFRAGETTES 100th ANNIVERSARY VOTE FOR WOMEN

The original movement began in the USA in 1848. It started in Britain in 1870

.

Emmeline Pankhurst and her fellow suffragettes relentlessly fought to win the votes for women.  Their great suffering almost cost them their lives several times. She was beaten up by gangs of men and when in prison, as a protest, she and her fellow suffragettes refused food and water until they lost consciousness.

Then they were either force fed which was brutal or sent home which was their real aim of it.

Emmeline Pankhurst wrote her autobiography in 1914 “My Own Story”. A story which changed the life of all British Women and will now put into a film.

Emmeline Pankhurst was born in July, 1858 in Moss Side, Manchester  and died June, 1928 in Hampstead. Her family had radical, political outlooks. In 1879 she married a Lawyer Richard Pankhurst who supported women’s suffrage.

They had five children; including Christabel born in 1880 and Sylvia in 1882. Two sons died very young and Richard died in 1898.

In 1903 she founded the Women’s Franchise League and then she helped to found the more militant WSPU (Women’s Social and Political Union) in Manchester.

From 1866 till 1892 any Petitions, bills and resolutions on women’s suffrage were rejected in the House of Commons.

1905 A militant campaign began and Christabel and Annie Kenney were imprisoned. Emmeline’s two daughters Christabel and Sylvia were very much involved. While Emmeline and Christabel were fighting one cause at the time but Sylvia was heavily involved in anti-fascist politics, pacifism in the First World War and anti-racism.

The worst time for the suffragettes movement was in 1913 when Emily Davison threw herself or fallen under the king’s horse at the Epsom Darby and she died.

Emmeline described her prison experiences as follows. The first time she was in Holloway in 1908 after an arrest for marching on Parliament Square.  She was in solitary confinement and was shivering of cold and gasping for air. It was a narrow, dimly-lit cell for 23 hours .She stated that solitary confinement should never been given no matter the crime was. After two days she was sent to hospital.

The first force feeding was given in 1909. It was disgusting and cruel. Doctors went from one cell to the next and one woman threw herself from the gallery because she could not take it any more. Emmeline, when she heard them coming, picked up an earthenware jug and threatened them to throw it. The doctor said that he will be back in the morning.

1 March, 1912 she and several other suffragettes drove in a taxi to No 10 Downing Street. They had four stones with them and threw them into the window. As expected they were arrested. At the same time at every 15 minutes women did the same at Haymarket and Piccadilly, Regent Street and Strand. The last were Oxford Street and Bond Street.

The next attempt to draw attention and make the government give the women the votes was letterbox burning. The attack on letterboxes was carried out in London, Liverpool, Birmingham, Bristol and other cities. Over 5,000 letters were destroyed which was a lot at that time because post was not as widespread as today and most of them were very important.

In 1913 since they still had no impact on government’s decision they went further. On February 7 and 8 they cut telephone and telegraph wires. For hours all communicating between London and Glasgow stopped.  After a few days they broke windows in London smartest clubs. The jewel room at the Tower of London was invaded. The Refreshment house in Regent’s Park was burnt down.

On 18 February the house still being built at Walton-on-the-Hill for Mr Lloyd George was badly damaged by a bomb. Emmeline was arrested four days later for “counselled and procured” the person who did the damage. She was sentenced to three years. It was a start of hunger and water strikes.

All those years those brave women fought for our votes. The police played cat-and-mouse with them. They arrested them and when they fell unconscious they either sent them home or to a hospital. When they were better again they waited for them to arrest them again.

1918 Representation of the People Act giving the vote to women over the age of 30.

Today it is reduced to 21 years of age and women do not realise how hard the suffragettes fought and most of them suffered health problems till they died. It should be our duty to appreciate what they went through and use the vote.