The official website for BBC History Magazine
John Singer Sargent and the scandalous Madame X portrait that set the Gilded Age alight
Anna Maria Barry takes a look at what the bold portraits of celebrated society artist John Singer Sargent can tell us about the gilded world of the Edwardian elite
John Singer Sargent was the most in-demand portrait artist of his generation, though his career was not without controversy. Building his career with daring portraits of Edwardian socialites, he would later make waves for his art depicting the harrowing realities of the First World War, while his avant garde personal life remains a source of fascination. Born to American parents in Florence in 1856, the young Sargent spent his early years travelling around Europe with his family. He showed a precocious aptitude for art, sketching and painting the many cities and landscapes they visited – from Paris to the Pyrenees. In 1870 Sargent started to attend drawing classes in Florence. He moved to Paris in 1874 where he entered the studio of French painter Carolus-Duran. Over the next ten years, Sargent travelled and worked, gradually building his reputation as an artist. Read more | A beginner's guide to art history The scandal of Sargent's Madame X In 1884, scandal hit when Sargent exhibited his famous Portrait of Madame X at the Paris Salon. The sitter was Virginie Amélie Gautreau, a well-known Parisian socialite with a salacious private life. A good friend of Sargent’s, the statuesque Gautreau was a striking beauty – she accentuated her pale complexion with lavender powder, and dyed her hair red with henna. Sargent’s daring full-length portrait captures Gautreau turning coquettishly away from the artist, so that her face is shown in profile. Her pale skin contrasts with the shimmering black dress accentuating her narrow waist and ample cleavage. While her pose was interpreted as sexually suggestive, what caused most comment was a single strap of her dress which Sargent captured slipping down over her shoulder. Gautreau appeared a mere wiggle away from exposing herself to the viewer. Read more | Are Bertha and George Russell real? Inside the real Vanderbilt divorces that rocked the Gilded Age The painting caused an immediate stir when it was exhibited, with many claiming it to be vulgar and deliberately provocative. Sargent eventually reworked the painting so that the offending strap no longer slipped down. He later said of the work, “I suppose it is the best thing I have ever done”. In 2024, the portrait of Madame X returned to the country for the first time in 20 years, loaned to the Tate Britain. Sargent’s life: “Anything but conventional” After the Madame X scandal, Sargent moved to London and settled on Tite Street in bohemian Chelsea. Here, his neighbours included American painter James Whistler and writer Oscar Wilde. By the 1890s, he had achieved international recognition as a portrait artist and was in demand on both sides of the Atlantic. In this period his sitters included many distinguished individuals – from wealthy industrialists and statesmen to well-known actors and writers. He became famous for his sumptuous portraits of the wealthy, capturing luxurious fabrics and sparkling jewels with his incredible technical skill. Sitting for a portrait by Sargent became the ultimate mark of distinction. Sargent never married and was very private about his personal life. Many believed that he had romantic relationships with men. Indeed, the French artist Jacques-Émile Blanche, who knew Sargent, claimed his liaisons with men were “notorious in Paris, and in Venice, positively scandalous”. Although scholars have historically been reluctant to explore this aspect of the artist’s life, it has received more attention in recent years. It has been suggested, for instance, that Sargent may have had a relationship with Thomas McKeller, an African-American model who was the subject of many of his striking nude studies. A number of Sargent’s sitters and friends are also known to have had same-sex relationships, from trailblazing suffragette and composer Ethel Smyth to his neighbour Oscar Wilde. While we might ask what difference it makes to his art whether or not Sargent was gay, this is just one aspect of his life and career that challenges the view of the artist as a shallow society artist. Looking beneath the spectacular surface of Sargent’s portraits, we find a fascinatingly complex figure who was anything but conventional. Watch | Everything you wanted to know about the Gilded Age View Green Video on the source website By 1907, Sargent had grown tired of demanding patrons and said he would no longer accept commissions. Instead, he produced charcoal sketches of his clients, which could be completed in a single sitting. He called these works ‘mugs’. Sargent now devoted himself to landscapes, also working on a series of murals for the Boston Public Library in America (which he had started in 1890). During the First World War, the British Government commissioned Sargent to paint a war scene which was to be the central painting for a Hall of Remembrance. His theme was meant to be Anglo-American co-operation, but instead he produced a huge oil painting depicting the aftermath of a mustard gas attack on the western front – he had travelled to the front to see the devastation for himself. Read more | The “silent study of art”: the deaf artists of the Renaissance This huge, haunting picture is perhaps surprising to those who associate the artist with wealthy sitters at leisure in their finery. Gassed can be seen at the Imperial War Museum in London. Sargent died of a heart attack in 1925 and was buried in Surrey’s Brookwood Cemetery. Even before his death, the artist’s reputation had been in decline – his Gilded Age portraits were out of step with modernism and seemed like a relic of a bygone age. Some critiqued his work as being shallow, showy and superficial. Later in the 20th century, though, there was a revival of interest in Sargent’s work and a growing recognition for the way he had drawn upon the style of old masters like Anthony van Dyck and Diego Velázquez. A re-evaluation of Sargent’s work also shows him to be far more progressive than one might initially assume. Sargent and fashion The premise of the Tate Britain's 2024 exhibition Sargent and Fashion explored the artist’s role as a stylist, looking at how he used clothing to construct a particular image. Featuring several of the dresses and opulent accessories that can be seen in Sargent’s portraits, the exhibition reunited these items with the paintings for the first time. One room was devoted to Sargent’s portraits of performers, where visitors viewed his dramatic portrait of celebrated actor Ellen Terry. He immortalised Terry in the role of Shakespeare’s Lady Macbeth, wearing an emerald green dress embroidered with hundreds of iridescent beetle wings. Sargent’s portrait was displayed alongside the dress itself, loaned for the first time by the National Trust. One fascinating section of the exhibition looked at how the artist was drawn to sitters who subverted gender roles. One example is his portrait of close friend Violet Paget, better known as the writer Vernon Lee – she chose a name that was deliberately androgynous. Sargent painted Lee in the masculine clothing she favoured. Like several other women in Sargent’s circle, Lee had romantic relationships with women. In the same room as Vernon Lee was Sargent’s 1881 portrait Dr Pozzi at Home. The sitter was a renowned surgeon who was something of a dandy – Sargent painted him in a flamboyant red dressing gown and Turkish slippers, an unconventional choice and a bold aesthetic statement. When it was displayed at the Royal Academy, Vernon Lee said the portrait of Pozzi had “an insolent kind of magnificence, more or less kicking other people’s pictures to bits”. Viewers of the painting, displayed among many pieces that testify to Sargent’s subversive work and revised reputation, might find a similar effect today. Edwardian Entertainment Want to delve a little deeper into the world of the Edwardian elite? Here are some recommendations The Gilded Age (2022–) Julian Fellowes’ HBO drama exploring the opulence of New York society in the 1880s has been renewed for a third season. Capturing the world in which Sargent moved – there is even a cameo from Oscar Wilde – eagle-eyed viewers may even notice some of the costumes directly influenced by his portraits. Vita Sackville-West’s The Edwardians (1930) This novel by English author and garden designer Sackville-West captures (and critiques) the glittering social whirl at an aristocratic Edwardian estate. Sackville-West was very familiar with this elite world, having grown up at Knole in Kent – her grand family estate, now managed by the National Trust. Sargent knew her family. The Sound of John Singer Sargent Sargent was mad about music and had considerable musical talent himself. The team at the Tate has compiled a Spotify playlist of music that inspired the artist which provides the perfect soundtrack to the new exhibition. It includes music by some of the many composers who sat for Sargent. Anna Maria Barry is a historian and writer
Which treasures were lost when Titanic sank, and what did some survivors smuggle onto lifeboats?
When Titanic sank in April 1912, undoubtedly the highest cost was the more than 1,500 people who perished in the disaster on the Atlantic Ocean. But with the prestige of its maiden voyage attracting wealthy clientele, there was also a huge number of treasures on board. Hilary Mitchell reveals the historical riches lost to the sea – from ancient trinkets to Victorian art valued as the most valuable of its day…
It’s an eerie photograph, to say the least. A two-foot-tall bronze statuette of the Roman goddess of the hunt, known as Diana of Versailles, peers sightlessly to the right, the carefully cast, delicate folds of her tunic tarnished and darkened by decades of salt water. Originally gracing the mantlepiece of the ornate fireplace in Titanic’s opulent first-class lounge, she now lies half-buried in the abyssal darkness, 2.5 miles below the ocean’s surface. The picture was taken in 2024 by oceanographers from RMS Titanic Inc, a US company that holds the rights to the 113-year-old wreck. The statuette hadn’t been caught on camera since 1986, when marine scientist Bob Ballard led an expedition to the site using the deep-sea vehicle Alvin. Eight subsequent visits had failed to locate her, and there was some concern she had been illegally salvaged and sold. Finding her was like “finding a needle in a haystack”, said James Penca, a researcher on the RMS Titanic Inc. project. She was rediscovered in the final hours of the three-week-long dive. The statuette isn’t an original Roman bronze. It’s a replica of a much-larger marble sculpture currently on display in the Louvre in Paris, itself a partially restored Roman copy (first or second century BC) of a lost Greek bronze original attributed to Athenian sculptor Leochares (c325 BC). However, it was valuable in its own right; a prestigious, costly piece of decoration. In some ways, the Diana statuette can be used as a symbol to represent thousands of artefacts that were lost when Titanic hit an iceberg and sank beneath the waves on her maiden voyage in the early hours of 15 April 1912, resulting in the tragic, harrowing deaths of more than 1,500 men, women and children. Who was the richest person to die in the Titanic disaster? On its maiden voyage, Titanic was transporting many of the era’s wealthiest people to the US, several of whom were returning from lengthy sojourns in Europe. One of these elite passengers was John Jacob Astor IV, who was thought to be among the richest people in the world at that time, with a net worth of roughly $87m (equivalent to $2.83bn today) when he died in the disaster. Read more | Titanic passengers: 8 stories of people who sailed on the liner A year after the tragedy, The New York Times reported that the claims brought against Titanic's operator, the White Star Line, had reached more than $16m ($16,804,112.23 to be precise, equivalent to over half a billion today), a combination of death, personal injury and lost property claims. One Mrs Irene Wallach Harris claimed $1,000,000 for the loss of her husband, Henry Birkhardt Harris, a Broadway producer and theatre owner – which The Washington Post reported was “the heaviest of the 279 claims so far filed” in January 1913. These claims, many of which can be accessed online, offer a partial record of some of the items lost in the sinking of Titanic. However, many more valuables have been completely lost to history – because their owners joined them on their journey to the bottom of the freezing ocean. John Jacob Astor IV’s young wife Madeleine, who survived the disaster, is not on the list of claimants, but other first-class passengers did put in requests for compensation. These petitions shed some light on the huge array of finery some of these wealthy individuals brought on board. Which Egyptian artefacts were on Titanic? American socialite and philanthropist Margaret Brown – later dubbed ‘The Unsinkable Molly Brown’ – put in an insurance claim for $14,623 following the tragedy. Her lost items included an ermine opera cape valued at $300, a Brussels lace gown ($375), a $700 sealskin jacket, a necklace worth a staggering $7,000 – about $220,000 today – and “three crates of ancient models for Denver museum”, which were worth $500 in total. That’s over $16,000 today. These “crates of ancient models” contained Egyptian antiquities, which Brown had collected during her travels to the country before boarding Titanic. It’s not known what, exactly, these chests did contain, but it’s possible to hazard a guess. In 1912, tourists visiting Egypt could purchase a range of historically and archaeologically significant relics, as the trade in ancient artefacts was still relatively unregulated. Though the Antiquities Service of Egypt was working to curb looting at the time, enforcement was inconsistent. Many genuine ancient artifacts were openly sold in markets. Some of the most commonly available relics included Shabti figures (also known as ushabtis or shawabtis), which were statuettes placed in burials from the Middle Kingdom – between about 4,000 and 3,500 years ago – until the Ptolemaic Period, around 2,300 years ago. It was also possible to buy genuine New Kingdom (c1550–1070 BC) scarab amulets and original canopic jars containing mummified organs. Remarkably, Margaret Brown carried one of these treasures, a shabti, with her onto lifeboat number 6 when she abandoned ship. According to The Molly Brown House Museum, based in Denver, Colorado, “Molly thought to take her treasured three-inch turquoise-colored Egyptian statue purchased in Cairo and placed it in her pocket for luck.” She is believed to have gifted it to Arthur Rostron, captain of Carpathia, after the liner rescued her and the other Titanic survivors. According to Egyptologist Paul Boughton, who spent some time tracking it down, it eventually made its way into a 1998 exhibition called Titanic: Fortune and Fate at The Mariner’s Museum in Newport News, Virginia. History's Greatest Conspiracy Theories Member exclusive | Was the moon landing faked? Did Shakespeare actually write his plays? Were the pyramids built by aliens? Expert historians offer their perspectives on history's biggest conspiracy theories. Listen to all episodes now What was the most expensive item to go down with Titanic? Unfortunately, none of the other Egyptian artefacts that Brown intended to donate ended up in a museum. They’re down in the depths, with the Diana of Versailles sculpture, as well as the most expensive single item of property that was lost that night: a painting titled ‘La Circassienne au bain’ by French artist Merry-Joseph Blondel. This large, neoclassical artwork was brought on board by a Swedish businessman, 28-year-old Mauritz Håkan Björnström-Steffansson. It was valued at $100,000 (which would be around $3m today). When compensation claims were filed in January 1913, the painting was highlighted by the press as the largest claim made against the White Star Line for a single piece of baggage. Björnström-Steffansson survived the disaster, by jumping onto the empty bow of one of the last lifeboats to be launched from the starboard side of Titanic: a craft known as Collapsible D, which entered the water at 1.55am, just 25 minutes before the ship sank completely. ‘La Circassienne au bain’ had been completed by Blondel in 1814, and it was exhibited at the Paris Salon at the Louvre the same year. The subject of the portrait is a Circassian (Eastern European) woman, who is pictured getting into a bath – rather awkwardly, if surviving etchings are to be believed. According to contemporary reports, it didn’t initially set the art world alight, but as Blondel became more famous, the work became more popular, and its value went up. It’s not known for how much Björnström-Steffansson’s claim for ‘La Circasienne au bain’ was settled, but it’s unlikely that he received the full $100,000. The total eventually paid out to claimants was $644,000, significantly less than the $16,804,112.23 that had been asked for. Was there a car on Titanic? Artefacts and artwork weren’t the only expensive items lost at sea that night; an extremely valuable French-made car also sank beneath the waves. Fans of the 1997 smash-hit James Cameron movie Titanic will no doubt remember the steamy scene where Jack (played by Leonardo DiCaprio) and Rose (Kate Winslet) consummate their simmering romance in the back of a 1912 Renault Type CB Coupé de Ville in the ship’s cargo hold. Although James Cameron played fast and loose with some historical facts while making the film, the car wasn’t one of them. There was indeed a 1912 Renault Type CB Coupé de Ville on board, although it was probably sealed in a crate to protect it against damage and therefore not easily accessible to amorous twenty-somethings. The car was purchased in Europe by one William Carter, an American millionaire (and keen polo player) who was travelling with his family. He survived by boarding the very last lifeboat to be launched from Titanic, Collapsible C, which entered the water at 2am. At that point, Titanic's forecastle deck was almost completely submerged. William Carter was joined on Collapsible C by White Star Line managing director J Bruce Ismay. Both men would later face criticism for not going down with the ship, particularly given the fact that 166 women and children were still on board when it sank into the Atlantic Ocean. Read more | An inferno that claimed 33 lives: the story of a deadly Victorian disaster But the millionaire polo player defended his and Ismay’s actions shortly after the disaster. In a statement to The New York Times given on 22 April 1912, Carter said: "The statements which have been made by Mr. Ismay's conduct are an injustice to him […] The women that were in the boat were from steerage, with their children. I guess there were about forty of them. Mr. Ismay and myself and several of the officers walked up and down the deck, crying 'Are there more women here?' We called for several minutes and got no answer. One of the officers then declared that if we wanted to we could get into the boat if we took the place of a seaman. He gave us this preference because we were among the first-class passengers. Mr. Ismay called again, and after we got no reply we got into the lifeboat.” Carter later put in a claim for $11,670.00, including $5,000 for the car – equivalent to around $162,000 today. He also requested compensation for two pet dogs, which he said were worth $100 and $200 respectively. Although there were reports at the time that he was travelling with his prized polo ponies, he did not claim for their loss, so it seems unlikely that they were on board. Were any valuable literary works lost in the sinking of Titanic? Another unique item that was lost that night included one of the most lavishly decorated books the world has ever seen: a jewel-encrusted edition of the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám. The stunning edition of the Rubáiyát, a selection of quatrains attributed to Omar Khayyám ‘(the Astronomer-Poet of Persia’) was the work of acclaimed bookbinder Francis Sangorski, and had been commissioned by John Stonehouse, manager of Sotheran's bookshop in London. The book was encrusted with 1,050 jewels including specially cut rubies, topazes and emeralds. Around 100 square feet of gold leaf and 5,000 pieces of leather were also used. After it was completed, the Daily Mirror described it as "the most remarkable specimen of binding ever produced". Sotheran's put the book on sale for £1,000 – the equivalent of around £97,000, but it failed to sell. "It was three times more expensive than anything else in Sotheran's stock. I think it was just too expensive for the UK market," the bookshop's managing director, Chris Saunders, told the BBC in 2022. On 29 March 1912, the book went to auction at Sotheby's and was purchased by the agent of a New York book dealer called Gabriel Wells, who paid £405 for it, quite the bargain. Unfortunately, Wells’s celebrations were set to be short-lived. The book narrowly missed a crossing on 6 April and was instead taken aboard the next ship, RMS Titanic, and was lost. Quiz | How much do you know about RMS Titanic and the sinking disaster? Egyptian antiquities, a Neoclassical painting, a car, a jewelled book: all now sit at the bottom of the ocean, and unlike the Diana of Versailles sculpture, none have been spotted by any visiting divers. What has been seen, though, are scores of shoes belonging to the men, women and children who died that night, left behind after the bodies of their owners decomposed over time. It’s a ghoulish reminder of the real treasures that were lost with Titanic: human beings. Who knows what these people travelling to start their new life in America might have achieved when they got there; how many never got the chance to be acclaimed novelists, or artists, or bookmakers, or car designers. The world might look very different today if there had been enough lifeboats for everyone on board, meaning that more than 1,500 potential-filled lives were not cut short.
Your guide to the Pankhursts, the pioneering family who fought for Votes for Women
One family, led by Emmeline Pankhurst, would lead the charge towards equality and votes for women. Find out more about the accomplishments of the founder and leader of the WSPU, and her pioneering daughters
Who was Emmeline Pankhurst? Emmeline Goulden was born in 1858 to parents who fiercely supported reform and activism. She accompanied her mother to suffrage meetings and her grandfather had witnessed the Peterloo Massacre of 1819. Emmeline attended schools in both Manchester and Paris and soon noticed the stark differences between her education and that of her brothers – they studied business, the sciences and mathematics, while she was taught how to cook and look after the home. This would light a fire within her; a burning desire to one day see women treated as equal to men. Emmeline married likeminded lawyer Dr Richard Pankhurst in 1879 – he was a radical and a supporter of women’s rights, free speech and educational reform. Together they had five children: Christabel, Sylvia, Adela, Henry Francis Robert (Frank) and Henry Francis (Harry). The younger brother was named after the elder, who died of diphtheria at the age of four. The Pankhursts moved from Manchester to London in 1886, and it was while there that Emmeline became interested in the experiences of working-class women. She followed with great interest the Match Girls’ strike of 1888. Girls and women worked up to 14 hours a day in match factories for low pay, suffered ill health caused by the chemicals they used, and were threatened with fines for talking or going to the toilet without permission. More than a thousand women walked out on a strike that lasted for three weeks – the protest was one of several that inspired Emmeline. By 1889, Emmeline had helped to form the Women’s Franchise League in London – its main goal was to secure married women’s right to vote in local elections. The Pankhursts returned to Manchester in 1893 and it was then that Emmeline began establishing herself as an activist. Deeds not Words: the suffragette story Member exclusive | With their radical demands for votes for women, the suffragettes shook up Edwardian Britain. Their campaign for equal rights would see them not just rallying crowds with speeches and marching on the streets, but setting fire to politicians’ homes and planting bombs in public places. Find out more in our podcast series: Deeds Not Words. Listen to all episodes now When did Emmeline Pankhurst set up the WSPU? She set up the WSPU, the Women’s Social and Political Union, (often called the suffragettes) in 1903 with her daughters Christabel and Sylvia, and from 1908 they were using militant tactics to garner support and attention. Emmeline was imprisoned several times, including for the charges of striking a police officer, damaging property and conspiracy to incite violence; she undertook hunger strikes to improve conditions in prison for herself and others. When World War I began, Emmeline put her support behind the war effort, organising rallies and encouraging the government to allow women to enter the workforce, taking the places of the men who had gone to fight. The more violent actions against the government by the WSPU were halted in favour of the war effort. Read more | Sisters in arms: women at war during WW1 A devoted anti-communist, Emmeline joined the Conservative Party in 1926 and was chosen as a prospective parliamentary candidate. She died in June 1928 – just a few weeks before all women gained the same voting rights as men. Did you know? In 1913, Emmeline Pankhurst starred in a silent movie alongside American activist Harriot Stanton Blatch. What 80 Million Want saw the protagonist foil would-be assassins and take down corrupt politicians while fighting for women’s suffrage. Who was Christabel Pankhurst? The eldest daughter of Emmeline and Richard Pankhurst, Christabel was born in 1880. She was educated in Southport and Manchester and briefly lived in Geneva, but returned home with Emmeline after Richard died in 1898. She had a particularly close relationship with her mother, and played a key role in founding the WSPU. After relatively peaceful beginnings, the WSPU evolved into a militant movement and gained national attention when, in 1905, Christabel and fellow WSPU member Annie Kenney disrupted a Liberal Party meeting in Manchester. The following year, Christabel became the WSPU’s ‘chief organiser’ and used her skills as a law graduate to deliver informed and impassioned speeches and arguments – even though, as a woman, she wasn’t allowed to practise as a lawyer. In March 1912, a warrant was issued for Christabel’s arrest on a charge of conspiracy to commit damage. She went on the run and escaped to France, where she remained until the outbreak of World War I, continuing to manage the WSPU and edit its newspaper from overseas. In September 1914, Christabel returned to London and threw herself into the war effort, encouraging women to engage in war work as a way to win their enfranchisement. In the 1918 general election, Christabel stood as a candidate for the Women’s Party but narrowly missed her chance of becoming an MP by 775 votes. She left England for the US in 1921 and there became heavily involved with the Second Adventist movement – a Protestant denomination that believed in the imminent Second Coming of Christ – and adopted a daughter, Betty. After returning to the UK in the 1930s, she left for the US again in 1940 where she remained until her death. Made DBE (Dame Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire) in 1936, Christabel died in California in 1958, aged 77. Who was Sylvia Pankhurst? Born in 1882, Emmeline and Richard’s second daughter was also active in the WSPU. A graduate of the Royal College of Art, Sylvia created the WSPU’s distinctive ‘look’ and was imprisoned numerous times for her suffrage activities. Notably, she also spearheaded the WSPU’s campaigns in East London, witnessing the dire poverty of women in the local slums. Eventually, Sylvia’s views on militant action began to diverge from those of her mother and sister Christabel, and she founded the East London Federation of Suffragettes – initially part of the WSPU. When Britain went to war in 1914 – a conflict she vehemently opposed – she set up several mother and baby clinics in the capital to offer support as supplies ran short. A passionate left-winger, Sylvia went on to host the inaugural meeting of the British Communist Party in 1920. In 1927, aged 45, she gave birth to a son but refused to name or marry his father. Her refusal saw Emmeline break ties with her daughter and the pair never spoke again. Sylvia continued to rally against fascism and colonialism, moving to Ethiopia to continue her activism. She died there in 1960. Who was Adela Pankhurst? The youngest Pankhurst daughter, Adela (b1885), shared her family’s views regarding women’s rights but, like her sister Sylvia, disagreed with the violence advocated by the WSPU. After becoming estranged from the rest of the Pankhursts – her socialist and pacifist beliefs were deemed a ‘risk’ to the WSPU’s success – she was given a one-way ticket to Australia by her mother, along with £20 and a bundle of clothes. She would never see her mother or sisters again. In Australia, Adela married trade unionist Tom Walsh and together they founded the Australian Communist Party. Later, however, she moved away from communism and abandoned left-wing politics altogether. In the late 1920s, she formed the Women’s Guild of Empire – a Christian group against communism that sought to preserve Australia’s place within the British empire. After spending a portion of World War II in prison for supporting the Japanese, she died in Sydney in 1961. This article was first published in BBC History Revealed
Alwyn Turner discusses life in Britain at the turn of the 20th century – an era of music halls, mass media and mixed feelings about the nation's future
The Edwardian era is sometimes regarded as an uneventful stopgap between the cultural and technological innovations of the Victorian period and the seismic shifts brought about by the First World War. But is this a fair assessment? Alwyn Turner talks to Jon Bauckham about what life was really like during the reign of Edward VII, and how anxieties about Britain's place in the world were beginning to take centre stage. Alwyn Turner is the author of Little Englanders: Britain in the Edwardian Era (Profile, 2024) Buy now on Bookshop.org Buy now on Amazon <a href="https://www.awin1.com/cread.php?id=489797&clickref=historyextra-269498&awinmid=3787&p=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.waterstones.com%2Fbook%2Flittle-englanders%2Falwyn-turner%2F9781800815308%23%3A%7E%3Atext%3DLittle%2520Englanders%253A%2520Britain%2520in%2520the%2520Edwardian%2520Era%2520%28Hardback%29%26text%3DReflecting%2520on%2520the%2520Edwardian%2520era%2Cthe%2520birth%2520of%2520modern%2520Britain.#:~:text=Little%20Englanders%3A%20Britain%20in%20the%20Edwardian%20Era%20(Hardback)&text=Reflecting%20on%20the%20Edwardian%20era,the%20birth%20of%20modern%20Britain." rel="sponsored" target="_blank">Buy now on Waterstones
What was the Cat and Mouse Act? The reason why suffragettes were force-fed
June Purvis considers the power of the hunger strike and the importance of this radical form of protest to the suffragettes' political arsenal
“They fed me five weeks by the nose and at the end of that time my nose what they called ‘bit’ the tube, and it would not pass into the throat even though they bent it and twisted it into all kinds of shapes. Instead, it went up to the top of my nose and seemed to pierce my eyes… Then they forced my mouth open by inserting their fingers and cutting my gums… and the lining of my cheeks… when I was blind and mad with pain they drove in two large gags. Then the tubes followed and they pressed my tongue down with their fingers and pinched my nose to weaken the natural, and also the purposeful, resistance of my throat.” This was how imprisoned suffragette Mary Richardson described one of the many times she was forcibly fed in 1914, after going on hunger strike. Her fate was that of many members of the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU), founded by Emmeline Pankhurst in October 1903 to campaign for the parliamentary vote for women in Britain. The WSPU, with its slogan ‘Deeds, not words’, became the most notorious of the women’s suffrage groupings, some one thousand of its members being imprisoned from 1905 to the outbreak of the First World War, in August 1914. A women-only organisation, the WSPU sought not just to end the discrimination that barred all females from their democratic right to elect a government but also to press for wider social reforms that would bring equality within the law, education and employment. Read more | How the battle for female suffrage in Britain was won Prior to the general election of 1906, which the Liberals were expected to win, the suffragettes engaged in non-violent actions to press their cause – such as assertive questioning of leading members of the Liberal Party and deputations to parliament. When a Liberal government was returned and Herbert Asquith, a renowned opponent of women’s suffrage, became prime minister in 1908, the fight for women’s enfranchisement became much harder. Banned from Liberal Party meetings, the suffragettes, from 1912, engaged in secret attacks on public and private property – including vandalising letter boxes, firing empty buildings and smashing shop windows in London’s West End – as a tactic to force the government to yield to their demand. Deeds not Words: the suffragette story Member exclusive | With their radical demands for votes for women, the suffragettes shook up Edwardian Britain. But their campaign for equal rights would see them not just rallying crowds with speeches and marching on the streets, but setting fire to politicians’ homes and planting bombs in public places. Find out more about the dramatic story of the suffragette campaign in our podcast series: Deeds Not Words. Listen to all episodes now Throughout, the aim was never to endanger human life. As Emmeline Pankhurst said on 17 October 1912, “[T]he only recklessness the militant Suffragists have shown about human life has been of their own lives, not of the lives of others; and I say here and now that it has never been, and never will be the policy of the Women’s Social and Political Union to recklessly endanger human life”. Although dramatic stories of window-smashing suffragettes have passed into history, it is the haunting picture of the forcibly fed suffragette, alone in her prison cell, that has become the definitive image of the suffragette campaign. Read more | What was life like for women in Edwardian Britain? How did the suffragettes use hunger strikes as a political tool? The hunger strike as a political tool was introduced not by the WSPU leadership but by a member of the rank-and-file. On 5 July 1909, Marion Wallace Dunlop, a sculptor and illustrator, sent to Holloway prison for printing an extract from the Bill of Rights on the wall of St Stephen’s Hall in the House of Commons, went on hunger strike. She was protesting against the refusal of the authorities to recognise her as a political offender and, as such, entitled to be placed in the First Division where political prisoners enjoyed considerable privileges. After 91 hours of fasting, she was released. Believing they had found a powerful weapon with which to fight an obdurate Liberal government, other imprisoned suffragettes began hunger striking too. The government responded by forcibly feeding them, arguing that this “ordinary hospital treatment” was necessary to preserve the women’s lives. So began a vicious circle of events that was to shape the representation of the suffragette movement for years to come. The image of the individual suffragette, voluntarily on hunger strike in her isolated prison cell, had a particular cultural resonance since she appropriated a form of protest that had been adopted by some, mainly male, dissidents in the past – and made it her own. Wishing to retain control of her own body, which had often been bruised and battered in various deputations, she used it as a political statement to contest an all-male government’s refusal to allow her to enter the realm of politics. The hunger strike was a means of passive resistance to the injustices that women experienced, because of their sex. Why were some suffragettes force-fed? Forcible feeding as carried out on the hunger strikers was a brutal, life-threatening and degrading procedure, undertaken by male doctors on struggling female bodies. Although the word ‘rape’ was not used by the prisoners to describe their experiences, the instrumental invasion of the body, accompanied by overpowering physical force, suffering and humiliation was akin to it and commonly described as an ‘outrage’. That rubber tubes were not always new and might be dirty inside through having been previously used on those who were diseased or mentally ill, added to the feelings of violation that the suffragettes expressed. Read more | A brief history of International Women's Day: what is it and why do we celebrate it? One of the earliest women to be forcibly fed in September 1909 was working class Mary Leigh, in Winson Green gaol, Birmingham. Feeding by nasal tube was “an outrage”, she wrote in an influential pamphlet that was widely circulated. “The sensation is most painful – the drums of the ear seem to be bursting, a horrible pain in the throat and the breast. The tube is pushed down 20 inches… I resist and am overcome by weight of numbers.” The shocked and indignant WSPU leadership soon commissioned a well-publicised poster titled “Torturing women in prison”, which depicted the operation in gruesome detail. It was commonly believed by the WSPU that working class prisoners were treated less favourably than their well-known middle class counterparts. Lady Constance Lytton, on hunger strike in Newcastle prison that autumn of 1909, was not forcibly fed but released after just two days, officially because of her weak heart. Believing she had received preferential treatment because of her family background and political connections, she set about proving the point. Assuming the guise of ‘Jane Warton’, a working woman, she rejoined the WSPU under her new name. Arrested outside Walton gaol, Liverpool, Jane Warton was sent to prison and forcibly fed eight times. Read more | 8 famous suffragettes and votes for women campaigners “The pain of it was intense”, wrote Lady Constance. The doctor turned the steel gag in her mouth “much more than necessary until my jaws were fastened wide apart, far more than they could go naturally. Then he put down my throat a tube which seemed to me much too wide and was something like four feet in length… I choked the moment it touched my throat until it had got down. Then the food was poured in quickly; it made me sick a few seconds after it was down and the action of the sickness made my body and legs double up, but the wardresses instantly pressed back my head and the doctor leant on my knees. The horror of it was more than I can describe.” Once her true identity was known, Lady Constance was hastily released. Although she had proved her point about the differential prison treatment for women from differing social backgrounds, she never fully recovered from her ordeal. Yet for Lady Constance, as for many others who were forcibly fed, the spirit soared over the inhumane treatment. Men might insist upon controlling women’s bodies, but physical force could never triumph because their cause was just. The point was underlined by the WSPU leadership who presented hunger strikers with commemorative medals “For Valour” in pursuing “to the last extremity of hunger and hardship a great principle of political justice”. <img src="https://images.immediate.co.uk/production/volatile/sites/7/2018/01/0507428FORCEFEEDING_sml-8db576f-e1682411874582.jpg" width="618" height="413" alt="Suffragette, Lady Constance Lytton wearing a prison number badge and hunger strike medal, c1912. Lytton became involved with the women's suffrage movement in her late thirties, and was first arrested for joining a protest demonstration in February 1909. Having been sentenced to four weeks in Holloway, she was confined to the prison hospital with an alleged heart condition, but soon suspected that she was being given preferential treatment because of her social rank. Her treatment in Newcastle prison following a second arrest in October of the same year confirmed her suspicions: after a 56-hour hunger strike she was not forcibly fed, like other suffragettes, but examined by a heart specialist and allowed to go free. The following year, at a protest demonstration in Liverpool, Lytton disguised herself as a working-class woman and gave the false name of Jane Warton when she was arrested. This time she suffered the same treatment as the other suffragettes in prison. In 1912 she suffered a stroke and remained an invalid for the rest of her life. Suffragette, Lady Constance Lytton wearing a prison number Credit: Museum of London / HIP / TopFoto" title="0507428FORCEFEEDING_sml-8db576f" /> Apart from one week in November 1910, the WSPU suspended militant action for that year, until 21 November 1911, in order to allow the various Conciliation Bills for Women Suffrage to be presented to parliament. But political stalemate continued since the Liberals remained divided on the issue, as did the Tory opposition. Given the structure of party politics, the bills were doomed. A narrow bill, based on property qualification, would bring propertied women onto the electoral role and benefit the Tories; a wider one that included non-propertied women would bring in working class wage earners for the Liberals. Militant protest, such as window smashing of shops in London’s West End, returned with a vengeance in March 1912 as suffragettes felt betrayed by empty promises and party political manoeuvring. The vicious cycle of hunger striking and forcible feeding returned. Prison life was especially difficult for mothers with young children, like Myra Sadd Brown. Denied writing materials, she wrote with a blunted pencil on dark brown toilet paper a poignant message to them. “Mummy thanks you ever so much… for the letters – they were such a joy & I wanted to kiss them all over – but I am going to kiss all the writers when I see them & I don’t think there will be much left when I have finished.” What was the Cat and Mouse Act of 1913? The ordeal of forcible feeding became especially cruel and dangerous after the passing in April 1913 of the ‘Cat and Mouse Act’, which allowed a prisoner weakened through hunger striking to be released into the community on a license and nursed back to good health, only to be re-admitted once she was well enough to continue her sentence. Although the new act prolonged the experience, it was also a publicity gift to the WSPU since many ‘mice’ skillfully evaded re-arrest, dramatically appearing at a meeting. A widely circulated WSPU poster of a large ginger cat bearing his bloodied teeth – the limp, injured body of the small suffragette in his mouth – vividly portrayed the brutality of it all. The priority for the imprisoned suffragette now became to find a quicker way to be released, and so Zelie Emerson and Sylvia Pankhurst, Emmeline’s middle daughter, initiated a thirst and hunger strike, a form of protest soon adopted by others. By the end of December 1913, Emmeline Pankhurst herself, always in the thick of the action, had also added a sleep strike to her refusal to eat and drink water. She was released, in an emaciated condition, after just four days. While the authorities never dared forcibly feed her, for fear they might have a martyr on their hands, her daughter Sylvia did not fare so well. For Sylvia, the sense of degradation endured when being forcibly fed was worse than the pain of sore and bleeding gums, with bits of loose jagged flesh, or the agony of coughing up the tube three or four times before it was successfully inserted. Such harrowing personal accounts, published in the suffrage press, helped to strengthen the bond of comradeship and purpose among the WSPU membership. The forcibly fed suffragette knew she was not alone. The operation that had been intended to silence her became a platform from which she could speak about the injustices to her sex. Read more | Emily Davison: the suffragette martyr By 1914 the government’s response to hunger strikers had become more brutal, with stories emerging of imprisoned suffragettes being drugged to make them docile, as well as more tales of accidents when feeding by tube. Ethel Moorhead, in Calton prison, Edinburgh, developed double pneumonia after her eighth forcible feeding when some ‘foreign substance’ entered her lungs. Under such a repressive state policy, many of the women feared not only for their health but their sanity. Kitty Marion experienced such pain during the 232 times she was forcibly fed that she thought she was going mad and begged the doctor to give her some poison. <img src="https://images.immediate.co.uk/production/volatile/sites/7/2018/01/50703970_10FORCEFEEDING_sml-a4dc621-e1682411904770.jpg" width="620" height="412" alt="Suffragette demonstration w. women carrying wands tipped with silver broad-arrows and banner From Prison to Citizenship, each of 617 arrows representing a conviction of a Suffragette. (Photo by Time Life Pictures/Mansell/Time Life Pictures/Getty Images)" title="Suffragette demonstration w. women carry" /> The situation could not continue. Increasing numbers of doctors, as well as members of the general public, were speaking out against forcible feeding, saying it contravened the rules of medical practice and that those doctors performing the operation were punishing, rather than treating, their patients. Even The Times, well known for its anti-suffragism, was suggesting a review of policy. By mid-July 1914, a few women, such as Fanny Parker in Perth prison, were writing of how they were fed by the rectum and vagina. The outbreak of war the following month enabled both the WSPU and the authorities to retreat. Emmeline Pankhurst called a temporary suspension of militancy while the government granted an amnesty to all suffrage prisoners. Thus ended the most shameful episode in the history of the British women’s suffrage campaign. The hunger-striking suffragette laid bare the sexual divisions in Edwardian society, exposing a deep flaw in an all-male Liberal government that claimed to be ‘democratically’ elected yet tortured those women who challenged its legitimacy. Although partial enfranchisement for certain categories of women over the age of 30 was not granted until 1918, the forcibly fed suffragette had won the moral high ground. Through her courage and endurance, she had showed that physical force could never overcome the justice of her cause. In the battle for women’s equality, she had politicised her body in a way that those who came after her would never forget. What was it like to be force-fed? The abuse of women’s bodies The forcible feeding of hunger striking suffragette prisoners between 1909 and 1914 was an abuse of women’s bodies. The prisoner was usually held down on a bed by female wardresses or tied to a chair which wardresses then tipped back. Two male doctors carried out the operation, pouring a mixture of milk, bread and brandy through a rubber tube that was either forced up the nostril or pushed down the throat into the stomach. The latter was the more painful method since a steel gag was inserted into the mouth and screwed open as wide as possible. Tissue in the nose and throat was nearly always damaged while sometimes the tube was accidentally inserted into the windpipe, causing food to enter the lungs and endangering life. When forcible feeding of suffragettes began in 1909 there was widespread condemnation, not only from the WSPU leaders, but also from prominent public figures, such as George Bernard Shaw and the Labour MP, Keir Hardie. The Liberal government justified their action as ‘ordinary hospital treatment’ for those prisoners who refused food, a line supported by most newspaper editors. Henry Nevinson and Henry Brailsford, influential leader-writers for the Daily News, resigned in protest against their editor’s support for the policy. Although 116 doctors sent a memorial of protest to the prime minister Herbert Asquith, most medical practitioners failed to condemn the practice, due to their cosy relationship with the government and their anti-suffragism. The discredited procedure was finally stopped on the outbreak of the First World War. This article was first published in the June 2009 issue of BBC History Magazine
Marie Curie: a guide to the scientist's life, achievements and legacy
Hailed as a 'celebrity scientist' in her lifetime, Marie Curie was the first female to win the Nobel Prize in 1903 – for her pioneering research on radioactivity – and the first person to win a second Nobel Prize
Who was Marie Curie and what is she famous for? Marie Curie is a Polish-born physicist and chemist who is remembered for being the first woman to be awarded the Nobel Prize, in 1903 for her research into radioactivity. Curie later went on to win a second Nobel Prize, for chemistry, in 1911. She is still the only person to have won two Nobels in two different sciences. Born in Warsaw, Curie studied physics at university in Paris where she met her future research collaborator and husband, Pierre. Together they identified two new elements: radium and polonium, named after her native Poland. After he died, she raised a small fortune in the US and Europe to fund laboratories and to develop cancer treatments. Despite becoming ill from the radioactive materials she constantly handled, Curie never lost her determination to excel in the scientific career that she loved. Her memory is preserved by the cancer society that bears her name and continues to help terminally ill patients all over the world. Marie Curie's early life and education Marie Curie – or as she was named at birth, Marie Skłodowski – was born on 7 November 1867 in Warsaw, Poland. She was the youngest of five children. Both her parents, Władysław and Bronisława (née Boguska) Skłodowski, were prominent teachers in their local area. Her father taught physics and mathematics – subjects Marie would later pursue. Marie’s family was hit hard by the Polish national uprisings that broke out during the 19th century with the aim of restoring Polish independence. Her father was fired by his Russian supervisors for his pro-Polish beliefs, and the family was forced to take in lodgers in order to survive financially. Growing up in Warsaw in the 19th century, Marie displayed an interest in science from an early age. She excelled at boarding school and graduated with a gold medal from a gymnasium – a European form of grammar school – for girls in 1883. Despite not being allowed to attend the University of Warsaw owing to her sex, Marie continued her studies by attending classes at the ‘flying university’ – an underground education movement in Warsaw. Marie became determined to further her education, and she worked as a governess and a tutor in order to save up the tuition fees. In 1891 Marie moved to Paris, where she studied mathematics and physics at the Sorbonne. Despite having very little money and surviving on a poor diet, Marie completed a degree in physics in 1893. Just a year later, she received her degree in mathematics. Marie Curie topped our poll of 100 Women Who Changed the World – find out what the experts think here Marie Curie's marriage While undertaking her studies in 1894, Marie met Pierre Curie, a professor at the School of Physics and Chemistry. A year later, the couple were married. Inspired by German physicist Wilhelm Roentgen’s discovery of x-rays in 1895, and Henri Becquerel’s research into rays produced by uranium salts in 1896, Marie began her research into the properties in uranium. She examined whether these properties were found in other forms of matter. What were Marie Curie's achievements? Sharing an interest in chemistry and physics, Marie and Pierre worked in collaboration to investigate radioactivity, and in 1898 they announced that they had discovered two new chemical elements: polonium and radium. In 1903, owing to the couple’s work into radioactivity with physicist Henri Becquerel, all three were awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics. Marie was devastated when, in 1906, Pierre was killed after being knocked over by a horse and cart. Marie took over Pierre’s teaching post at Sorbonne, becoming the first woman to teach at the college. Affected by her husband’s death, Marie devoted herself to continuing the research that she and Pierre had worked on. In 1911, Marie was presented with her second Nobel Prize, this time in the field of chemistry for her work in isolating radium. To this day, Marie is the only person to receive two Nobel Prizes in different sciences. Soon after Marie received her second Nobel Prize, two laboratories were constructed at Sorbonne. In one of the laboratories, Marie led a team of researchers analysing radioactivity, while the other laboratory was used to explore possible cancer treatments. Following the outbreak of the First World War in 1914, Marie developed a mobile x-ray unit that could be transported near to the frontline and allow her to analyse soldiers’ injuries. With her 17-year-old daughter, Irene, Marie worked at one of the casualty clearing stations, where they x-rayed men to detect bullets and shrapnel in their wounds, and monitor fractures. In 1914 the International Red Cross made Marie the head of the radiological service, where she helped to train doctors and medical assistants in the latest techniques. After the war ended in 1918, Marie returned to her work as the head of a laboratory and in 1919 published her personal account of the war in her book Radiology in War. Explore more science history Ada Lovelace: a visionary of computing 6 women in science history you (probably) didn’t know about Isaac Newton: life, discoveries, rivalries and the truth about the apple Albert Einstein: facts about his life, death, education and work <img src="https://images.immediate.co.uk/production/volatile/sites/7/2018/03/GettyImages-537124901-ce63896.jpg" width="3579" height="2710" alt="Austrian physicist Lise Meitner" title="Austrian physicist Lise Meitner (right), photographed c1953. Meitner was the first scientist to realise that an experiment had demonstrated the possibility of the nuclear fission of uranium. (Photo by ullstein bild via Getty Images)" /> How did Marie Curie die? Marie’s health began to deteriorate during the 1920s. After years of being exposed to radioactive materials and carrying test tubes of radium in her pockets, Marie died of aplastic anemia – a serious blood condition where the bone marrow does not create enough blood cells – on 4 July 1934 at the age of 66. Read more | Marie Curie: the woman who stirred up science What is Marie Curie's legacy? Marie’s eldest daughter, Irene, went on to become a scientist and, like her mother, won a Nobel Prize for Chemistry. The prize was awarded in 1935 as a result of her work into artificial radioactivity. Marie Curie’s legacy continues to this day. Numerous research institutions have been named after her, including the Pierre and Marie Curie University in Paris. The Marie Curie charity was established in 1948 and continues to provide care for people with terminal illnesses. Upon the request of the then French President François Mitterrand, Marie and her husband were in 1995 reburied in the Pantheon – the Parisian mausoleum for France’s most honoured dead. This article was first published in the November 2005 issue of BBC History Magazine
King Edward VII’s love chair: how did Dirty Bertie’s siège d’amour actually work?
Yes, King Edward VII really did have a specially made ‘love chair’ that he kept at a Paris brothel – but how did it work?
As a young man, the perpetually pleasure-seeking Albert, Prince of Wales (later King Edward VII) was responsible for commissioning arguably one of the most famous pieces of erotic furniture of all time – the love chair. It took the form of a brocade 'bunk bed' of stacking seats, complete with stirrups to hold the legs of not one, but two different partners. A threesome chair, if you will, designed for a royal with famously gargantuan sexual appetites. King Edward VII's love chair, known as the ‘siège d'amour’ in French, epitomised opulence and sensuality. And, possibly more importantly, it allowed the overweight king-to-be to have sex with two women at the same time without crushing them. Why did Edward VII need his love chair, or siège d’amour? It was a surprisingly beautiful piece of furniture, manufactured by Louis Soubrier, a famed cabinetmaker of the Rue du Faubourg Saint-Antoine. Clearly there could be nothing but the best for a member of the British royal family. It's worth noting at this point that by the time of his coronation in 1902, King Edward VII had an impressive 48-inch waist and was clinically obese, a symptom of a life-long love affair with fine food and even finer alcohol. According to contemporary reports, the playboy Prince of Wales would regularly sit down to five meals a day, comprising mostly ten-course affairs. All of this was washed down with large volumes of fine wine and champagne, hence his rapidly expanding waistline. This is where the siège d'amour came in. Edward VII’s love chair: how did it work? The famous love chair, kept at the famed Parisian brothel Le Chabanais, allowed the unathletic Bertie to have relations with two women simultaneously, all with the minimum of effort to himself, or risk to them. It also ensured his stomach was kept out of the way. Read more | Sexing up history: how to study and tell the history of sex So, how did it work? Picture, if you will, the hedonistic Prince Albert (referred to as 'Dirtie Bertie' by the tabloids of the time, as well as 'Edward the Caresser') standing upright, while one companion reclined on her back before him, and another lay beneath her. The women placed their feet into specially made bronze stirrups, intricately carved into the chair's frame, to help them stay in position. What happened to Edward VII’s love chair? A replica of the siège d'amour went on show from 2015 to 2016 at the exhibition 'Splendour and Misery: Images Of Prostitution 1850-1910’, at the Musée D’Orsay in Paris. A replica is also exhibited in the Sex Machines Museum in Prague. The original is believed to have been sold at a private auction – presumably to a very discreet collector – in the 1990s. Was the love chair Edward VII’s only piece of erotic furniture? No, the siège d'amour wasn’t the only piece of erotic furniture that the playboy prince kept at Le Chabanais. Another of the future king's favourite diversions was to carouse with multiple women in a luxurious copper bath decorated with a half-woman, half-swan figurehead, filled to the brim with champagne, in which he splashed and cavorted with his multiple female partners. Sounds chilly, but certainly decadent. Hilary Mitchell is a journalist with a Masters degree in Classics from Edinburgh University, where she specialised in the Late Bronze Age and Early Iron Age of Greece
Suffragettes history facts: 10 things you might not know about the Votes for Women campaigners
Dr Jacqui Turner from the University of Reading reveals some lesser-known facts about the political movement
Passionate about women's rights, in 1903 the suffragettes of the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU) split from the suffragists of the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies (NUWSS) to follow the militant agenda 'deeds not words'. In the years that followed, these women took radical steps to force a change in the laws in Britain for women. But how much do we really know about the suffragettes? Read more | What was the difference between the suffragists and the suffragettes? 1. Women did not get the vote on the same terms as men in 1918 Many people assume that, as a direct result of women’s war work during the First World War, they were given the vote on equal terms to men. However, they were not. The Representation of the People Act of 1918 was primarily needed to resolve the issue of soldiers returning from service in the First World War who were not entitled to the vote, as they did not meet existing property qualifications. The 1918 act abolished almost all property qualifications for men over the age of 21 and gave the vote to women over 30 – but only if they met minimum property qualifications or were married to a man who did. Women could also vote as part of a university constituency if they were a university graduate. The age differential was to ensure that, following the loss of men in the war, women did not become the majority voters. After the act was passed, women made up 43 per cent of the electorate. Women were not given the vote on the same terms as men until a decade after the act was passed: on 2 July 1928, the Second Representation of the People (Equal Franchise) Actwas passed into law. In a cruel twist of fate, Emmeline Pankhurst, leader of the militant WSPU, died on 14 June 1928, some 18 days before equal suffrage rights were granted. Deeds not Words: the suffragette story Member exclusive | The suffragettes' campaign for equal rights would see them not just rallying crowds with speeches and marching on the streets, but setting fire to politicians’ homes and planting bombs in public places. Find out more in our podcast series: Deeds Not Words. Listen to all episodes now 2. Suffragettes were accused of being ‘unladylike’ and ‘unnatural’ The bedrock of the anti-suffrage movement was an appeal to women’s femininity and the ‘natural order’. Suffragettes supposedly fell foul of the ‘norm’ and engaged in ‘unladylike’ and public activities. They were presented as women who had failed to reach the ultimate female goal in life of marriage and motherhood. They were depicted as bitter spinsters and caricatured as masculine, plain and ‘unnatural’. Their presence also apparently ‘feminized’ men, too. Read more | Anti-suffrage: the women who didn't want the vote The suffragette represented a figure outside of the order of society; they supposedly lacked ‘womanliness’; were seen to be sexually repressed; and were even against ‘God’s order’. 3. Not all suffragists were women The suffrage campaign and particularly militancy is almost always presented as a protest by women only. However, this is untrue, as many men were committed to the suffrage cause. Keir Hardie MP regularly raised questions in the House of Commons, and George Lansbury MP resigned his seat over the issue. Lansbury was also arrested at a suffrage rally in 1913 after speaking in support of the campaign of arson attacks. Even more closely involved with the movement was Frederick Pethwick-Lawrence. The WSPU did not admit male members, but Fred and his wife, Emmeline, became joint editors of the WSPU journal Votes for Women. Fred also represented the WSPU in legal matters, including trials, as women were not permitted to do so. Fred was imprisoned many times for his involvement with the movement. Like his wife and other suffragettes, Fred went on hunger strike and was forcibly fed (from 1909, women demanding the status of political prisoners began to refuse food, and the government’s response was to forcibly feed them). In his autobiography, Fate Has Been Kind (1943), he described how he was force-fed: “The head doctor, a most sensitive man, was visibly distressed by what he had to do. It certainly was an unpleasant and painful process and a sufficient number of warders had to be called in to prevent my moving while a rubber tube was pushed up my nostril and down into my throat and liquid was poured through it into my stomach. Twice a day thereafter one of the doctors fed me in this way. I was not allowed to leave my cell in the hospital and for the most part I had to stay in bed.” 4. Force-feeding was a serious problem The force-feeding of hunger-striking suffragettes was invasive, demeaning, and dangerous, and in some instances it damaged the long-term health of the victims. It should also be remembered that women were given disproportionately long sentences for minor offences such as protesting, resisting arrest, or smashing a window. The Cat and Mouse Act of 1913 attempted to address the issue, but instead created a vicious circle: women whose health was damaged were released from prison to recover, only to be returned to prison when they were fit again to finish their sentence. Professor June Purvis’s study of the letters, diaries and autobiographies written by prisoners [in particular Emmeline Pankhurst: A Biography (2003) and Votes For Women (1999)] indicate the horrors of force-feeding and the particularly harsh treatment of poor or working-class women. Purvis describes the experiences of Lady Constance Lytton, who disguised herself as a poor woman named Jane Warton in order to gather evidence of differential treatment. Warton was “held down by wardresses as the doctor inserted a four-foot-long tube down her throat. A few seconds after the tube was down, she vomitted all over her hair, her clothes and the wall, yet the task continued until all the liquid had been emptied into her stomach. As the doctor left ‘he gave me a slap on the cheek’, Constance recollected, ‘not violently, but, as it were, to express his contemptuous disapproval’.” Warton was forcibly fed seven more times before her true identity was revealed and she was released. Constance never fully recovered from her ordeal – she suffered a stroke in 1912 and died in 1923. Forcible feeding was humiliating, Purvis states, “especially so for women, such as Fanny Parker, fed through the rectum and vagina. The knowledge that new tubes were not always available and that used tubes may have been previously inflicted on diseased people undoubtedly added to the feelings of abuse, dirtiness and indecency that the women felt.” 5. No-one knows how many suffragettes there were The question of how many suffragettes there were is impossible to answer. Many women drifted in and out of the various movements due to personal circumstances, as well as political disagreements. Many suffragists and women in the Labour Movement often had other affiliations, including involvement with trade unions. Others held membership under pseudonyms or fictitious names to protect themselves and their families. Furthermore, the NUWSS and the WSPU were not the only suffrage organisations – there were many other national and local groups with varying longevity. Read more | 8 famous suffragettes and votes for women campaigners We can estimate the number of women who went to prison at somewhere more than 1,000, but many were imprisoned under public order offences and are not always easy to identify. Neither can we be certain how many went on hunger strike or were forcibly fed. What we can be certain of is that votes for women had mass support. Marches attracted vast numbers of militant and non-militant supporters, both male and female, from all walks of life. The Women’s Sunday Procession in June 1908 attracted more than 300,000 protesters carrying 700 banners through London. There were certainly more suffragist members of the NUWSS than militant members of the WSPU. By the outbreak of the First World War, the NUWSS had 50,000 members, but estimates on membership numbers for the WSPU vary massively from between 2,000 to 5,000. 6. Adela: the lost Pankhurst sister You are probably aware that Emmeline and her husband, Dr Richard Pankhurst, had two daughters who went on to become prominent suffragettes – Christabel (born in 1880) and Sylvia (born in 1882). But in fact they had five children – three daughters and two sons. Their first son, Frank, was born in 1884 but died of diphtheria in 1888. The Pankhursts’ other son, Henry Francis, was born in 1889. In-between was the ‘lost sister’ Adela, born in 1885. Like her sisters, Adela played an active role in the ‘Votes for Women’ campaign. She was imprisoned for her involvement and went on hunger strike, although she never supported what she perceived to be the “excesses of militancy”. Adela and her sister Sylvia left the WSPU in 1913. Sylvia became a socialist, and Adela was encouraged to emigrate to Australia after her mother gave her a ticket and £20. The rift within the family never healed. 7. There was more funding for the Suffragettes than for the Labour Party After the WSPU split from the NUWSS in 1903, the WSPU quickly became better-funded than the early Labour Party. In 1908, Labour Party subscriptions and donations were around £10,000, while by 1909 the WSPU had an annual income of £21,213 and growing. However, this was of little comfort to the poorer individuals involved in the moment. In her autobiography, Memories of a Militant (1924), Annie Kenny acknowledged: “I left the Movement, financially, as I joined it, penniless. Though I had no money I had reaped a rich harvest of joy, laughter, romance, companionship, and experience that no money can buy.” 8. Many suffragettes refused to complete the 1911 census in protest In addition to highly visible acts of civil disobedience, such as window smashing and setting fire to postboxes, many women also carried out quieter forms of civil protest. In 1911, the Women’s Freedom League launched a campaign to encourage women to refuse to complete the 1911 census, and in April that year a meeting was held in Trafalgar Square instructing women not to participate. The protesters followed the slogan: “I don’t count so I won’t be counted”. Some spoiled their papers with slogans such as “No persons here, only women!”; they gave their occupations as ‘suffragette’, and listed their ‘disenfranchisement’ in a column headed ‘Infirmity’. 9. Suffragettes used the Royal Albert Hall for rallies The Royal Albert Hall was regularly hired by both suffrage and anti-suffrage groups, including the National League for Opposing Women’s Suffrage. There were also more than 20 suffragette meetings and rallies at the Royal Albert Hall between 1908 and 1918. The WSPU became the first group to be banned from the hall, because of costly disruption and damage. 10. Suffragettes ran for seats in parliament Lady Nancy Astor was the first woman to take her seat in parliament; her husband, Waldorf, was the sitting MP and (supported by him) she won his Sutton Plymouth seat at a by-election in 1919. Astor was not the first woman to stand for parliament or to be elected, however – this was Sinn Féin’s Constance Markievicz, who was elected at the general election of 1918 but did not take her seat. The 1918 general election had seen 17 female candidates, including Christabel Pankhurst, who stood for the Women’s Party in Smethwick. Despite the Conservative Party agreeing not to field a candidate, Christabel narrowly lost to the Labour Candidate by 775 votes. In 1919, suffragettes were dismayed that the first woman MP had played no role in the suffrage movement and had succeeded her husband. Initially Nancy Astor was unsupported by any faction of the movement – after all, she was upper class, elite, and an American! She soon won them round though, by making clear her commitment to women’s causes, supporting other female MPs, and by campaigning vigorously for the Equal Franchise in 1928. Dr Jacqui Turner is a lecturer in modern history at the University of Reading, and is the author of Battleaxes and Benchwarmers, Early female MPs 1919-1931 (2017)
8 famous suffragettes and votes for women campaigners
The Pankhursts and Millicent Fawcett were leading figures of the suffrage movement whose names are often invoked and remembered today. Here we take a closer look at eight other people who supported the campaign for women’s right to vote…
Lady Constance Lytton The aristocrat in disguise As the daughter of the Viceroy of India, Lady Constance Lytton (1869–1923) was born into a life of immense privilege. But her involvement in the women’s suffrage movement saw her swap palaces for prison cells. Lytton was converted to the cause after meeting suffragettes while campaigning for prison reform. Soon she was speaking across the country and petitioning her influential political connections on behalf of the Pankhursts. In 1909, Lytton was imprisoned in Holloway but was swiftly released when officers learned of her illustrious family background. In order to avoid similar special treatment on later arrests, Lytton adopted the alias Jane Warton, disguising herself as an “ugly London seamstress” during activities that might land her in prison, such as pelting MPs’ cars with stones. Lytton’s dedication to the cause ran so deep that she even attempted to carve the words ‘Votes for Women’ into her skin while in prison. However, after carving a letter ‘V’ over her heart, she was prevented from completing the job by prison doctors. In 1914, she published a book about her experiences of incarceration and force feeding, reflecting: “When the ghastly process was over, I tapped on the wall and called out... ‘No surrender’ and there came the answer past any doubt… ‘No surrender’.” Deeds not Words: the suffragette story Member exclusive | The suffragettes' campaign for equal rights would see them not just rallying crowds with speeches and marching on the streets, but setting fire to politicians’ homes and planting bombs in public places. Find out more in our podcast series: Deeds Not Words. Listen to all episodes now Sophia Duleep Singh The publicity-grabbing princess Princess Sophia Duleep Singh (1876–1948) didn’t fit the standard profile for a street-fighting political activist. Descended from Sikh royalty that had once ruled in northwest India, Sophia was a goddaughter of Queen Victoria and a fixture of the royal court. She spent her earlier years as a well-known socialite, preoccupied with parties, fashion and scandal. <img src="https://images.immediate.co.uk/production/volatile/sites/7/2024/06/MHPH20-2368d4c-e1718266827444.jpg" width="618" height="412" alt="Sophia Duleep Singh" title="Princess Sophia Duleep Singh (1876 - 1948), daughter of Maharajah Duleep Singh and his first wife, Bamba Muller. She was a prominent suffragette and leader of the Women's Tax Resistance League. Pictured as a key figure in organising India Day, a day of th" /> But after a 1903 trip to India opened her eyes to racism and Indian nationalism, Sophia became increasingly politically minded. On her return to Britain, she turned her attention to women’s suffrage. Sophia’s fame put her in a unique position to generate publicity for the cause, with attention-grabbing antics such as refusing to pay taxes (since she couldn’t vote on how they were spent), spoiling census papers and selling suffragette newspapers outside Hampton Court Palace. She donated huge sums to the WSPU and was even embroiled in fights with police during the infamous ‘Black Friday’ march of 1910. Emily Wilding Davison The ultimate martyr Today, Emily Wilding Davison (1872–1913) being trampled by the king’s horse at the Epsom Derby in 1913 is probably the most famous incident in the suffrage campaign. Yet although Davison’s death secured her legacy as a martyr for the cause, it is debated as to whether she intended the fatal consequences of her actions. While Davison had spoken of the movement needing the “sacrifice of human life”, some believe her death was accidental and she was simply trying to interrupt the race. Either way, by the time of her death, the 40-year-old Londoner was an ardent supporter of votes for women, with years of activism under her belt. After joining the WSPU in 1906, Davison was arrested several times for activities including throwing stones, obstruction, smashing windows in the House of Commons and setting fire to a postbox. Five thousand women marched in her funeral procession. Lilian Lenton The daring escapee “Whenever I was out of prison my object was to burn two buildings a week,” Lilian Lenton (1891–1972) wrote of her time as a suffragette. “The object was to create an absolutely impossible condition of affairs… to prove it was impossible to govern without the consent of the governed.” Known as the “tiny, wily, elusive Pimpernel”, Lenton – who gave up a career as a dancer to join the suffragettes – spent much of 1912–13 leading the police on a wild goose chase. After being suspected of a Doncaster arson attack in 1913, she evaded the police disguised as an errand boy before jumping on a yacht and escaping to France. Lenton was also at the centre of a scandal over the treatment of suffragettes in prison, when it was made public that she had contracted pleurisy after being force-fed (due to food entering her lungs). The Home Secretary falsely denied Lenton’s ordeal, and serious embarrassment ensued when the truth was revealed. Despite her contributions, Lenton was too young to vote when the Representation of the People Act was passed in 1918. Annie Kenney The working-class hero Having experienced the struggles faced by working-class women in Edwardian Britain first-hand, Annie Kenney (1879–1953) saw the vote as a means of improving their lives. Hailing from Springhead, an area of Oldham, Kenney worked in a cotton mill from the age of 10. She and her sister Jessie became involved in the movement after witnessing a speech from Christabel Pankhurst. Kenney was an important recruiter and co-founded the first London branch of the WSPU, becoming one of the only working-class women in the WSPU’s leadership. Arrested 13 times in total, postcards of her were sold to adoring fans. Keir Hardie The political ally To most politicians, the suffragettes were objects of derision and even hatred. But they did have one key ally on the inside – Keir Hardie (1856–1915). The founder of the Labour Party saw suffrage as the key to improving the lives of working women and was a frequent speaker at rallies. Hardie spoke out in the House of Commons against the brutal treatment of suffragettes in prison, and even helped smuggle WSPU members into political meetings in order to cause mayhem. Although this gained Hardie many political enemies, he saw the suffrage question as one that transcended party divisions, writing in 1905: “To those who are opposed on principle to women having the vote at all I have little to say. These I find it easier to pity than to reason with…” Edith Rigby The eccentric doctor’s wife Even before she became a suffragette, Edith Rigby (1872–1950) was a woman who confounded society’s expectations. Married to a doctor in Preston, the unconventional Rigby raised eyebrows with her sandals, Turkish cigarettes, heavy amber necklaces and “extraordinary dresses that looked as if they were made of blue sacking”. She ruffled the feathers of her middle-class neighbours by arguing that servants should be treated as equals and even deigning to scrub her own doorstep. Keen to help those less well off, in 1899 Rigby opened a night school for working women. Edith’s neighbours’ disapproval turned to disgust when she became involved with the WSPU. She was an influential recruiter and actively engaged in militant activities, planting a bomb in Liverpool Corn Exchange and setting fire to a bungalow belonging to former MP William Lever. Like other WSPU members, Rigby was force-fed in prison, and received a hunger strike medal for her efforts. Read more | Were the suffragettes terrorists? Flora Drummond The commander of the troops Nicknamed ‘The General’, Flora Drummond (1878–1949) was often seen marshalling marches wearing a military-style uniform atop a horse. A working-class Scottish firebrand whom Emmeline Pankhurst hailed as “a woman of very great public spirit”, she was renowned for her public speaking and no-nonsense approach to silencing hecklers. Drummond was inspired to join the women’s suffrage movement after witnessing the poor working conditions of women in Manchester. She became a full-time organiser in 1906, teaching WSPU members Morse code to communicate between prison cells, and was arrested a total of nine times.
Deeds not words | 1. Battlelines are drawn
We explore how calls for women’s suffrage reached boiling point in Edwardian Britain – and a dynamic new movement emerged to fight for the cause
In the opening episode of our new series on the suffragettes, Ellie Cawthorne charts how calls of “votes for women” reached boiling point in Edwardian Britain. Speaking to expert historians, she uncovers how a dynamic new movement was formed to campaign for women’s suffrage using “deeds not words”, and how it would go on to become locked in a bitter war of attrition with the British establishment. Want to hear more? Browse more episodes in this podcast series