Deeds Not Words! The Fight for Women’s Suffrage

Deansgate, Manchester is one of the most important places in the history of women’s suffrage in Britain. The suffragists of the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies (NUWSS) tried to persuade politicians in the Houses of Parliament to give women the legal right to vote in parliamentary elections. Some campaigners for women’s suffrage felt peaceful means of persuasion were ineffective. As a result, the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU) was founded in Manchester, and the first act of direct action for the cause took place in the city.

Manchester Free Trade Hall. In 1868 the Manchester National Society for Women's Suffrage (MNSWS) held its first public meeting here. It is considered to mark the beginning of the suffrage campaign. The Hall is a symbol of protest and the fight for rights. It was built on the site of the 1819 Peterloo Massacre. It was here that the suffragette militant campaign began. In 1905, WSPU activists Christabel Pankhurst and Annie Kenney interrupted a Liberal Party meeting. They were forcibly removed, Christabel then spat at a policemen. Both women were arrested.

10 Downing Street. The traditional home of the Prime Minister. The fight for women’s suffrage was a struggle to convince the politicians in charge of the country that the law had to be changed. As the fight for suffrage was a political struggle, places associated with the British Government, law making and symbols of the establishment were sites for suffragette demonstrations and direct action. In the heart of London, the Palace of Westminster, where Parliament and the House of Lords debated the affairs of the country, 10 Downing Street and even Westminster Abbey were targeted.

This prison in Liverpool once held suffragette prisoners. From 1905 to 1914 around 1,000 suffragettes were sent to prison for smashing windows, setting fire to buildings and throwing stones. Many suffragettes continued to protest in prison, including refusing to eat. The authorities resorted to forcibly feeding prisoners on hunger strike. This involved prising mouths open and inserting feeding tubes down noses or throats. The 1913 ‘Cat and Mouse’ Act allowed for the early release of hunger-strikers on grounds of ill health but they could be recalled to prison when they had recovered.

Epsom Racecourse was the site of the suffragette movement’s most famous act. In 1909 Emily Wilding gave up her job as a teacher in order to commit herself to the suffrage movement. That year she was imprisoned in Manchester, sentenced to a month's hard labour for throwing rocks at the carriage of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, David Lloyd George. On 4 June 1913, Davison famously left the public enclosure at Epsom Racecourse and walked onto the track during the running of The Derby. She was knocked down by King George V’s horse Anmer. Emily died of her injuries four days later.

The suffrage campaign was interrupted by the outbreak of the First World War. When the war ended, it was recognised that many soldiers were not entitled to vote in parliamentary elections. The Representation of the People Act 1918 was passed, giving the vote to men aged 21 and over. It also granted the vote to women for the first time. However, only women who were 30 and over, and with certain property qualifications, could now vote. It was not until 1928 that a new Act gave voting rights to all women aged 21 and over. It was the first time that women had achieved electoral equality with men.