The Suffragette

by Sylvia Pankhurst

  Meanwhile, the whole country had heard of the incident and an outcry had been raised. A correspondent wrote that he had seen a hose-pipe played on drunken stokers at sea. They were Norwegian stokers, the officer would not have dared to do it had they been English, but the passengers had intervened at what they felt to be revolting and unjustifiable brutality. The thought of turning that fearful force of ice-cold water upon a woman already weak from several days of fasting, was horrible indeed to anyone who realised what it meant.

  Mr. Gladstone himself admitted that the Visiting Committee who had ordered it were guilty of a grave error of judgment and ordered the discharge of Miss Davison; but later on he addressed a letter to the officials of Strangeways Gaol through the Prison Commissioners expressing his appreciation of the way in which the medical officers had carried out their duties and commending “the efficiency of the prison service, the carefulness and good sense shown by the staff,” and “the tact, care, humanity and firmness” with which the problem of the Suffragette imprisonments had been “handled by all concerned.”

  The other Manchester prisoners were obliged to complete their sentences, being forcibly fed during the whole time.

  At this point the Government had an opportunity of learning the view of the electorate as to their treatment of the women, for a by-election was now taking place in Bermondsey and the Suffragettes were, as usual, actively opposing the Government candidate. In order that every elector might understand as far as possible what forcible feeding really meant, a pictorial poster showing the operation was displayed throughout the constituency and models representing forcible feeding were shown at the W. S. P. U. committee rooms. A manifesto against the Government was also issued by nine representative men, including Mr. Brailsford, Mr. Nevinson and Dr. Hugh Fenton, which urged the electors “in the name of chivalry and humanity as well as in the interests of true Liberalism to see to it that whatever else may happen at this particular election the Government candidate is left at the bottom of the poll.” The Suffragettes worked, if possible, more vigorously than ever, and after the first three days of their campaign, Liberal workers came to them in despair, saying: “Why have you come down to boss our election?” The Suffragettes never go to Liberal meetings at election times, but the Liberal speakers were constantly being heckled by the men and women of Bermondsey as to the forcible feeding of the Suffragettes. The Suffragettes themselves were greeted with cheers and words of encouragement wherever they went. “All the policemen in this constituency are going to vote for you,” one of the constables said, and others testified that they preferred to keep order at the women’s meetings than at any other because “they talked sense.” In the result the Liberal candidate was defeated and the Liberal poll was reduced by more than 1,400 votes. The figures were:

  The figures at the last election had been:

  On polling day an unlooked-for, and to the Women’s Social and Political Union, unwelcome incident occurred. The Women’s Freedom League endeavoured to render the election void, because they objected to any election being held at which women might not vote. The W. S. P. U. were against this, because their policy was to prove that the electors were prepared to defeat the Government candidate in order to show their belief in Votes for Women. The attempt of the Freedom League members to render the election void was carried out in the following manner. Two members of the League, Mrs. Chapin and Miss Allison Neilans, each entered a separate polling booth with a glass test tube filled with a solution of ink and photographic chemicals which had been carefully prepared to destroy the ballot papers without any risk of injury to any person who might happen to touch it. In each case the woman concerned broke the test tube by striking it on top of the ballot box so that the black liquid might fall into the slot. When this was done by Mrs. Chapin a Mr. Thorley rushed forward, and some of the black liquid splashed into his eye. In Miss Neilans’ case a man stretched out his hand and some of the liquid fell upon it. In both cases the men asked if the stuff would burn, and were told it would do no harm if it were washed off at once. Miss Neilans’ own hands and gloves were soaked with the fluid, but she suffered no harm. Only five papers were touched by the fluid and none of these were indecipherable.

  A great outcry was raised, however, for it was declared that Mr. Thorley would be blind for life. For some time he went out wearing a black shade over his eye, but when he was called upon unexpectedly by some members of the Women’s Freedom League, he was found to be without the shade and his eye appeared perfectly normal. The cases hung over for some time and eventually, on November 24th, Mrs. Chapin was sentenced to three months’ imprisonment for interfering with the ballot box and four months for a common assault upon Mr. Thorley, the sentences to run concurrently; whilst Miss Neilans was ordered three months’ imprisonment. After a time it leaked out that the slight injury from which Mr. Thorley had suffered, had been caused, not by the liquid which Mrs. Chapin had thrown, but by some ammonia which he had used to counteract any aftereffects. Two days after Miss Neilans’ release Mrs. Chapin was granted the King’s Pardon.

  On October 30th Mrs. Leigh was suddenly released from Birmingham Gaol, in a very critical state, though two months out of the four to which she had been sentenced still remained to run. She was at once removed to a nursing home.

  November 9th was Lord Mayor’s Day, and, as usual, the Lord Mayor had invited the Cabinet Ministers to a banquet in the Guild Hall. Knowing this, Miss Alice Paul, an American citizen, and Miss Amelia Brown disguised themselves as charwomen, and, carrying buckets and brushes, entered the building with the other cleaners at nine o’clock in the morning. There they hid themselves and waited until the evening, when they took their stand in the gallery outside the Banqueting Hall. When Mr. Asquith was about to speak, Miss Brown, having carefully selected a pane of the stained glass window upon which there was no ornament, and which she thought might be easily replaced, stooped down, took off her shoe and smashed the chosen pane in order that her shout of “Votes for Women” might be heard by those below. Miss Alice Paul also took up the cry. Both women were arrested and afterwards sent to prison for one month’s hard labour on refusing to pay fines of £5 and damages of £2 ten shillings each. They were both forcibly fed and as a result of this Miss Brown was attacked with severe gastritis.

  Three days later, on November 13th, Mr. Winston Churchill visited Bristol to speak at the Colston Hall. Miss Theresa Garnet, the woman who had been twice through the hunger strike, and whom the Home Secretary had wrongfully accused of biting, resolved to humiliate Mr. Churchill, both as a member of the Government which preferred rather to imprison women than to enfranchise them and to torture them rather than to extend towards them the ordinary privileges of political prisoners; and also on his own account for his slippery and disingenuous statements in regard to the Votes for Women question.

  She therefore met the train by which he was arriving from London and found him on the platform in the midst of a large force of detectives who formed a semi-circle around him. She rushed straight forward, and they either did not, or would not, see her coming, but the Cabinet Minister saw her, he paled and stood there as though petrified, only raising his arm to guard himself. She reached him and with a light riding switch, struck at him three times, saying, “Take that in the name of the insulted women of England.’’ At that he grappled with her, wrested the switch from her hand, and put it in his pocket. Then she was seized and dragged away to prison.

  She was charged with assaulting Mr. Churchill, but eventually this charge was withdrawn (presumably because Mr. Churchill knew that he would be subpoenaed as a witness) and, on being accused of having disturbed the peace, was sentenced to one month’s imprisonment on refusing to be bound over.

  Meanwhile 30,000 men and women had turned out to help the Suffragettes in their protest around the Colston Hall where Mr. Churchill was speaking, and during the evening four women were arrested, and afterwards punished with from two months’ hard labour to fourteen days in the second divi
sion, whilst several men who had spoken up for them inside the Colston Hall were beaten unmercifully by the stewards. Forcible feeding was resorted to in Bristol Prison also, and handcuffs were used in some cases.

  Meanwhile the supporters of the Liberal Government were adopting militant tactics on their own account. What was called “A League against the Lords” had been formed with the warmly expressed approval of many of the Liberal leaders, and, though the leaders had kept in the background, the members of the League had twice assembled in Parliament Square to hoot the peers as they drove by in their carriages, and had come into collision with the police.

  At the same time the Liberal newspapers were openly commending the efforts of gangs of men who were going from meeting to meeting held by the Conservatives, and with shouts and violence were making it impossible for their political opponents to speak. Columns were devoted to describing the doings of what was called “The Voice” which persistently heckled Tariff Reformers and supporters of the House of Lords.

  Mr. Winston Churchill was now arranging to hold a campaign of public meetings in Lancashire, and the W. S. P. U. publicly and openly appealed for funds to insure that protests and demonstrations should be made in connection with all his meetings. Thousands of pounds were, on the other hand, spent by the authorities to defeat the women’s intentions. In Preston, in addition to many other precautions, seventy men were employed and £150 spent on barricading the windows and roof of the Hall where Mr. Churchill was to speak, and at Southport £250 was laid out on mounted police to protect the Empire Music Hall alone.

  When the Southport meeting began Mr. Churchill looked ill at ease and turned about sharply from time to time as though expecting an interruption. But at last he seemed to gain confidence and was proceeding briskly with his remarks, when, suddenly, there floated down from the roof a soft voice, faint and reedy, and peering through one of the great portholelike openings in the slope of the ceiling, was seen a strange little elfin form with wan childish face, broad brow and big grey eyes, looking like nothing real or earthly but a dream waif. But for the weary paleness of her, she might have been one of those dainty little child angels the old Italian painters loved to show peeping down from the tops of high clouds or nestling amongst the details of their stately architecture. It was Dora Marsden who with two other women had lain concealed on the roof since two o’clock in the small hours of the previous morning. So unexpected and pathetic was this little figure that leant further forward to repeat her message that the audience could not forbear to cheer her. They stood up, waving their hats and programmes, “looking delighted,” as the loftily placed intruder herself observed. Mrs. Churchill smiled also and waved her hand and even Mr. Churchill, though this was probably because of his wife’s presence, and of the general feeling of the audience, himself looked pleasantly up and said, “If some stewards will fetch those ladies after my speech is concluded, I shall be glad to answer any questions they may put to me.”

  But the stewards, who by this time had found the women, were not disposed to bring them into the hall. A hand was thrust over Dora Marsden’s mouth and she and the others were roughly pulled back from their coign of vantage, pushed through a window, and sent rolling down the steep sloping roof. “Stop that, you fools,” someone cried out, “you will all fall over the edge,” but one of the stewards answered, “I do not care what happens.” Fortunately two of the Suffragettes were caught in their perilous descent by the edge of a water trough whilst a policeman seized Dora Marsden by the ankle, telling her, “If I had not caught your foot, you would have gone to glory.” Once safely on the ground the women were placed under arrest, but the case against them was eventually dismissed.

  At Preston, Suffragettes dressed in shawls and clogs sallied forth at night and pasted forcible feeding posters on the street pillar boxes, the prison and other public buildings and the windows and doors of the Liberal Club, as a welcome to Mr. Churchill, and in connection with turbulent scenes which occurred whilst his meeting was in progress, four women were arrested. At every other town he visited the same kind of thing occurred. At Waterloo, there was one arrest, at Liverpool there were two, and one at Bolton and one at Crewe.

  Meanwhile Mr. Harcourt had held a series of meetings in the Rossendale Valley. On December ist the door and windows of the house in which he was staying were found to have been covered during the night with forcible feeding posters. The next evening three men were set to watch with large hosepipes attached to the main, but somehow or other the connection was mysteriously cut and the windows were broken without their being aware of it by some person or persons unknown. Two women were arrested in connection with disturbances on the following Monday, and were sent to prison for one month and fourteen days respectively. They both adopted the hunger strike, and were both forcibly fed. Two women were arrested outside Sir Edward Grey’s meeting at Leith on December 4th, 1909.

  A general election was now announced and on December 10th Mr. Asquith was to speak at a great meeting in the Albert Hall and whilst the authorities were making every attempt to keep them out, the Suffragettes were, of course, making every attempt to get into the building. Some of them did succeed in concealing themselves inside, but were discovered. Jessie Kenney, who disguised herself as a telegraph boy and tried to get in while the meeting was in progress, was also detected and turned back, but three men sympathisers protested during the meeting. To these Mr. Asquith replied, “Nearly two years ago I declared on behalf of the present Government that in the event of our bringing in a Reform Bill we should make the question of Suffrage for Women an open one for the House of Commons to decide. My declaration survives the General Election and this Cause, so far as the Government is concerned, shall be no worse off in the new Parliament than it would have been in the old.” Thus Mr. Asquith was cheerfully preparing for another general election without one word of regret or apology to those women who had been misled by his promise to introduce the Reform Bill before Parliament came to an end. That was almost the last of the old false promise.

  Meanwhile Charlotte Marsh, who had gone into Winson Green Gaol with the first batch of prisoners to be forcibly fed, was still being detained there, whilst Mrs. Leigh and all the rest had been released. Those who went to visit her once at the expiration of each month were only allowed to look at her through a small square of perforated zinc. They could neither see her clearly nor hear distinctly what she said. Nevertheless they gathered that she was suffering greatly. Our hearts ached for that noble girl. Often there came before our eyes the picture of the tall, straight figure that had carried the colours of our Union before us in so many gay processions. We saw the fair, fresh face with its delicate regular Saxon features, those masses of bright golden hair, the head so proudly held, and the faint flicker of a shy smile that always came when one spoke to her; we heard the boyish ring in her voice, and realised again her earnestness and enthusiasm, and the unaffected gentleness of her address. There was always something about her that made many a woman think of some dear young brother. Her father called her “Charlie,” and thought of her as his only boy amongst a family of girls.

  It was expected that she would have been released on December 7th, but the Government who had held her in torment for so long were anxious to extort from her the very last ounce of their pound of flesh. They determined not to grant her the remission of one-sixth of the sentence usually allowed, but to withhold it as a punishment for her refusal to take food, and they did this though they knew that her father was dangerously ill and though her mother had appealed for her release on that ground a week before. There was no fine that could be laid down to buy her out, for she had been sentenced without that option, and so perforce she must wait the pleasure of the Government. On the 8th of December, it was known that Charlotte Marsh’s father was dying and her family made another urgent appeal that she might be brought to him. But it was not until the 9th that the Home Secretary at last tardily let her go. She hurried at once to her home in Newcastle, so thin and
worn with what she had suffered, that her sisters scarcely knew her as she came into the house, only to find that her father was unconscious and would never wake to know her any more.