"Unladylike Tactics": The Militant Actions Taken by the WSPU

            The June Purvis article titled “ 'Deeds, Not Words': Daily Life in the Women's Social and Political Union in Edwardian Britain” is especially important to the study of the women’s movement in Europe because she outlines the details of actions taken by WSPU members as well as other lesser known women’s suffrage organizations. Purvis reveals that the point of separation between the WSPU and these other organizations, as well as the reason why the WSPU’s fame continues today, is their “unladylike tactics” (CP 229).  This did not occur accidentally, as Purvis explains in the article, Christabel Pankhurst and Annie Kenney made a plan in October of 1905 to heckle male politicians in order to get arrested and gain attention for their cause (CP 229). The media attention that the women received that day was the beginning of the WSPU’s turn towards militancy.

                During its infancy, the WSPU seems to have been similar to other suffrage organizations that are now rarely discussed. The Women’s Freedom League and the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies are two of the groups which Purvis calls ladylike and law-abiding. To be more distinct, she calls these women “suffragists,” while the WSPU members are most commonly known as suffragettes, a thin but important difference. An example of their ladylike tactics includes campaigning at socialist and trade union meetings as well as creating posters and participating in marches (CP 229).

Although their “unladylike tactics” began in 1905 with minor offenses such as heckling politicians and spitting at officers, the actions taken by the WSPU women in 1912 were definitively militant in nature. June Purvis writes that the women burned golf courses and empty buildings, they cut telephone wires, and there was mass property damage at the hands of the WSPU including broken windows (CP 229). For being so militant, these women actually tried their best to remain ladylike throughout their protests. Purvis includes a quote from a suffragette in her article which reveals that the WSPU was concerned with acting humane. The suffragette stated, “Mrs. Pankhurst gave us strict orders about these fires: there was not a cat or a canary to be killed; no life; we were only allowed to give our lives” (CP 229). Clearly, the actions of the WSPU were well planned out and their intention was not to cause harm to anyone, but only to make people listen. The smile on Annie Kenney’s face in the picture below shows that she intended on being arrested so that her mission could get the publicity it deserved. 

Lytton's Speech: Self-Hurt Equals A Political Statement

  On January 31, 1910 Lady Constance Lytton gave a speech at the Queen's Hall addressing the issues of her treatment in prison. At the center of her speech is the issue of being force-fed and the reason behind the hunger strike as well as the pain women endured in order to make a political statement.
  When the hunger strike was called by Ms. Pankhurst all women suffragettes began to starve themselves. According to Lytton, "But what the women of this movement have specially stood out for is that they will not kill, they will not harm while they have other weapons left to them. These women have chosen the weapon of self-hurt to make their protest, and this hunger-strike brings great pressure upon the government. It involves grave hurt and tremendous sacrifice, but this is on the part of the women only, and does not physically injure their enemies" (CP 226). The hunger strike was not meant to cause pain to anyone but the suffragettes who were trying to get the government's attention to allow their voices to be heard. As a result, the government and medical officials did respond but it was not with reasonable actions but instead it was with forcibly feeding these women and causing tremendous pain not only to their bodies but to their mindsets as well.
   Often the force-feeding involved a tube being shoved down the throat and then liquefied food was poured into the tube that deposited the food into the woman's stomach. Choking and vomiting were common as Lytton writes, but one of the greatest tolls on the body was the "moral poisoning of one's whole mind" (CP 227). The doctors ordering this inhumane treatment were not thinking of the moral and physical damage that was being done to these women but instead were focused on the idea of returning the women to the home to complete their "womanly work". Meaning, these women were to be sent home to cook and raise children as they were supposed to have been doing all along. The idea was solely not to return these women to a healthy state physically but was to remind them of where their place was in society and that male officials would allows have control over them. I would argue that the force-feeding was used as a metaphor to show that the government would always have control over women; women did not have control over their bodies but the government did. Therefore, officials could make the decision on whether a woman could starve to death or would be forced to live through being force-fed.
Question:
-Do you all think the force-feeding had a metaphorical meaning behind it or was it strictly for medical purposes?

Works Cited

"Lady Constance Lytton: A Speech Delivered at the Queen's Hall, January 31, 1910." In Women In European History Coursepacket complied by Dr. Shelley Wolbrink. Spring 2014. 

Images from Google.

Lady Constance Lytton's 1910 Speech

Lady Constance Lytton was a woman born into the most privileged class in Great Britain, however she ultimately rejected this background and became an outspoken member of the Women’s Social and Political Union. In 1910, in a speech she delivered at Queen’s Hall, she recounted the treatment she received during her imprisonment and the forced feedings she endured. She also brings up how differently she was treated once her true identity and title was discovered and she was subsequently released. Throughout her speech, she emphasizes the importance of the hunger strike that they participate in and how inhumane and cruel the forced feedings she and others endured were. She vividly describes the forced feeding procedure that she endured, once saying, “I felt as though I were being killed-absolute suffocation is the feeling.” And further how much the experience haunted her, “what was even worse to me than the thing itself was the positive terror with which I anticipated its renewal.” (CP 227)
Though throughout the speech, she never forgets to mention that while she did suffer these forced feedings, there were many more women who suffered it worse or were still suffering at the time she gave the speech. In the beginning of the speech she states, “…yet they must remember this fact, that thirty-five other women have been treated as I have been treated, and of those women I have suffered the least.” (CP 226).  She even recounts an event in which she was arrested during a protest under her own name and was released, while a women who had been much less involved was held for longer and force fed.  This aspect of the speech emphasizes the vast differences that women of different classes faced while being involved in the suffragette movement, that while both working-class women and women of the aristocracy might be involved in the same hunger strike or protests, they faced very different punishments if caught.

An artists rendering of the forced feeding procedures  from Illustrated London News, 27 April 1912

Lady Constance Lytton with other suffragettes, including Sylvia Pankhurst

http://www.imow.org/community/blog/viewEntry?language=es&id=21

Starving Suffragettes

With the continuation of women’s suffrage, the document containing a speech given by Lady Constance Lytton at Queens Hall on January 31^st 1910.  This speech addresses the aspect of suffragettes involved in a hunger strike.  Lytton explains that the involvement of women during this strike is like using a weapon against the government.  She states that “these women have chosen the weapon of self-hurt to make their protest, and this hunger-strike brings great pressure upon the Government” (CP 226).  Lytton then confronts the government by accusing it of unreasonable, even torturous methods of abuse towards the suffragettes. Lytton explains that “when the Government retaliated with their unfair methods, with their abominable torture and tyranny of feeding by force, did you expect the women to drop their weapons” (CP 226).  Lytton goes on to provide a detailed account of the treatment she received from her “torturers” by explaining that she was forced to pour food down her throat, which created the sensation of choking (CP 227).  While telling her story, Lytton creates a perspective of the good and the bad.  The Suffragettes being good, and he Government being bad.  She creates a call to arms for women and does not stray from her views.  Her experiences of torture only fuel the fire of her words, and allow her to stay the course as well as convincing other women to do the same.   

Source: Womens History Coursepacket compiled by Dr. Wolbrink

Disguise to Discover the Truth

(Lady Constance Lytton, photographed in her Jane Wharton disguise.)

Lady Constance Lytton told a story that needed to be shared with the public. She told the story of how privilege was influencing how women were treated in prison. It was not just the terms of their sentence, or what they had done that determined their treatment, no this was determined by something very different. This treatment had all to do with one thing, social class. Those women who came from influential families, or knew influential families held privilege even in prison. The wardresses, the wardens, the guards, even the doctors who force-fed young women knew the value of certain women. She referred to a specific influence where her connections saved her while another suffered, “I said that in the same prison where I was, there was a woman, a first offender, who had done much less violence than I had, and she was fed by force without having her heart tested as all” (CP 226). Lady Constance Lytton knew of her privilege when they refused to force-feed her and instead released her after a hunger strike.

               

In the reading, she goes into detail explaining how she decided to follow the lies of the government with lies of her own. She said, “Lies, and nothing but lies! Well, I thought, you choose your weapons, I will fight with the same weapon, and you shall take my life, and do with it what you will” (CP 227). She created a new persona; she became Jane Wharton. Jane Wharton was a working class woman, with no influence and no impressive connections. As Jane Wharton, Lady Constance Lytton endured seven forced feedings before her ruse was discovered. Then because she was once again Lady Constance Lytton, she was immediately released due to her “weak heart”. Yet for many of the working class women, as proven by Lady Constance, none had their hearts tested, checked or monitored during the force-feedings. These individuals in power did not care to harm the small nameless women; they knew no-one would stand up for them. Yet with the proof Lady Constance discovered as Jane Wharton, outrage spread like wildfire both in the feminist circles as well as through the general public. Now everyone knew the terrible atrocities that were occurring in these prisons, the attacks these women faced for nothing more than fighting for their rights.

Emmeline Pankhurst "Why We Are Militant"

Emmeline Pankhurst’s speech, “Why We Are Militant,” convinces the audience that the militant element is necessary to persuade the representative government of England. For instance, Pankhurst states,” nothing ever has been got out of the British Parliament without something very nearly approaching a revolution.” (CP 207). She discusses how men were able to gain what they needed from the Parliament through violence, she states,” men got the note because they were and would be violent,” (CP 207) unlike woman who were are more patient and nonviolent. She states,” woman did not get it because they were constitutional and law-abiding” (CP 207). She believes woman are too patient but why should they if the Parliament does not take their words nor actions seriously? for instance, she states,” I am by nature a law-abiding person, as one hating violence, hating disorder-  I want to say that from the moment we began our militant agitation to this day I have felt absolutely guiltless in this matter” (CP 208). She expresses how important it is that militant element is the last resort and how the Suffrage movement has come to this, she states,” I tell you that in Great Britain there is no other way” (CP 208). 

Photo above is Mrs. Pankhurst speaking at a rally. 

Here is another one

This one really catches my eyes. 

Does Emmeline Pankhurst "Why We Are Militant" speech convince you that woman during this time should act militant to get the Parliament to take them seriously? What do you guys think? 

Sources: CP & Google images 

**Wrong week by accident, I read the syllabus wrong, LOL

Sylvia Pankhurst: November 9, 1909

Through Sylvia Pankhurst’s account on November 9, 1909, we can learn interesting aspects about WSPU women other than the Pankhursts. While this letter primarily discusses force-feeding and its dire consequences, other curious facts arise from it as well. Miss Brown, according to Sylvia Pankhurst, was imprisoned due to an incident in Guild Hall on Lord Mayer’s Day (CP 225). Sylvia Pankhurst stated that “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” (CP 225). From this recollection, we can determine that though militancy was the preferred method of gaining attention, some WSPU women, like Miss Brown, took thought into what they were destroying. In Miss Brown’s case, she chose to break a pane of no consequence, most likely because she did not want to destroy precious and beautiful property. Breaking a plain pane would likely have gotten the same attention as breaking a precious one would. I believe Miss Brown’s actions may show that these WSPU women had a sense of courtesy even while they destroyed property.

Another interesting aspect of this account was the utter contempt Sylvia Pankhurst and other WSPU women had for the iconic British leader Winston Churchill. According to Pankhurst, a Miss Theresa Garnet “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 toward 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” (CP 225). While many today perceive Churchill to be a hero of World War Two, it seems that his thoughts towards women may have been misogynistic.  

Questions:

Do you think taking into account what they were destroying and how valuable it could be made WSPU’s militancy any more justifiable?

When considering Iconic figures in history, such as Churchill, do you think that their chauvinistic tendencies towards women should alter your view of them? 

I chose this image because it closely relates to how Miss Garnet accosted Mr. Churchill.