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Emmeline Pankhurst
Emmeline Pankhurst | |
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.jpg) Pankhurst, c. 1913 | |
| Born | Emmeline Goulden 15 July 1858 Moss Side, Manchester, England |
| Died | 14 June 1928 (aged 69) Hampstead, London, England |
| Monuments | |
| Occupation(s) | Political activist and suffragette |
| Political party |
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| Movement | Women's Social and Political Union |
| Spouse | |
| Children | 5, including Christabel, Sylvia, and Adela Pankhurst |
| Parents |
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| Relatives |
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Emmeline Pankhurst (née Goulden; 15 July 1858 – 14 June 1928) was a British political activist[1] who organised the British suffragette movement and helped women to win in 1918 the right to vote in Great Britain and Ireland. In 1999, Time named her as one of the 100 Most Important People of the 20th Century, stating that "she shaped an idea of objects for our time" and "shook society into a new pattern from which there could be no going back".[2] She was widely criticised for her militant tactics, and historians disagree about their effectiveness, but her work is recognised as a crucial element in achieving women's suffrage in the United Kingdom.[3][4]
Born in the Moss Side district of Manchester to politically active parents, Pankhurst was introduced at the age of 14 to the women's suffrage movement. She founded and became involved with the Women's Franchise League, which advocated suffrage for both married and unmarried women. When that organisation broke apart, she tried to join the left-leaning Independent Labour Party through her friendship with socialist Keir Hardie but was initially refused membership by the local branch on account of her sex. While working as a Poor Law Guardian, she was shocked at the harsh conditions she encountered in Manchester's workhouses.
In 1903, Pankhurst founded the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU), an all-women suffrage advocacy organisation dedicated to "deeds, not words".[5] The group identified as independent from – and often in opposition to – political parties. It became known for physical confrontations: its members smashed windows and assaulted police officers. Pankhurst, her daughters, and other WSPU activists received repeated prison sentences, where they staged hunger strikes to secure better conditions, and were often force-fed. As Pankhurst's eldest daughter Christabel took leadership of the WSPU, antagonism between the group and the government grew. Eventually, the group adopted bombings and arson as a tactic, and more moderate organisations spoke out against the Pankhurst family. In 1913, several prominent individuals left the WSPU, among them Pankhurst's younger daughters, Adela and Sylvia. Emmeline was so furious that she "gave [Adela] a ticket, £20, and a letter of introduction to a suffragette in Australia, and firmly insisted that she emigrate".[6] Adela complied and the family rift was never healed. Sylvia became a socialist.
With the advent of the First World War, Emmeline and Christabel called an immediate halt to the militant terrorism in support of the British government's stand against the "German Peril".[7] Emmeline organised and led a massive procession called the Women's Right to Serve demonstration[8] to illustrate women's contribution to the war effort. Emmeline and Christabel urged women to aid industrial production and encouraged young men to fight. Some have suggested there is an ideological link between the feminist movement and the white feather movement.[9]
In 1918, the Representation of the People Act granted votes to all men over the age of 21 and women over the age of 30. This discrepancy was intended to ensure that men did not become minority voters as a consequence of the huge number of deaths suffered during the First World War.[10]
She transformed the WSPU machinery into the Women's Party, which was dedicated to promoting women's equality in public life. In her later years, she became concerned with what she perceived as the menace posed by Bolshevism and joined the Conservative Party. She was selected as the Conservative candidate for Whitechapel and St Georges in 1927.[11][12] She died on 14 June 1928, only weeks before the Conservative government's Representation of the People (Equal Franchise) Act 1928 extended the vote to all women over 21 years of age on 2 July 1928. She was commemorated two years later with a statue in Victoria Tower Gardens, next to the Houses of Parliament.
- ^ Riddell, Fern (6 February 2018). "Suffragettes, violence and militancy". British Library. Archived from the original on 10 September 2021. Retrieved 15 September 2021.
- ^ Warner, Marina (14 June 1999). "Emmeline Pankhurst – Time 100 People of the Century". Time. Archived from the original on 6 March 2008.
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
legacy02was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ Cite error: The named reference
legacy01was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ E. Pankhurst 1914, p. 38.
- ^ Hochschild, Adam (2011). To End All Wars, p. 71. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Boston; ISBN 978-0-618-75828-9.
- ^ Quoted in Purvis 2002, p. 270.
- ^ The Illustrated First World War. London: The Illustrated London News. p. 66. ISBN 9780992709419.
- ^ "White Feather Feminism". Archived from the original on 6 December 2013. Retrieved 24 February 2014.
- ^ "Representation of the People Act 1918". Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 24 February 2014.
- ^ Purvis 2002, p. 248.
- ^ "Lord Lexden reminds Conservatives that Mrs Pankhurst joined their Party in the 1920s". Lord Lexden OBE. 8 August 2012. Archived from the original on 11 July 2018. Retrieved 7 August 2019.
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