Everything Everywhere Daily: History, Science, Geography & More - White Feather Girls (Encore)

Starting point is 00:00:00 Hey everyone, this is Gary. Good news. I'm feeling better. I'm sounding better. And even if I'm not back to 100% tomorrow, I think you're going to be getting brand new episodes. So enjoy this, the last encore episode of My Sick Leave. The First World War wasn't just fought in the fields of France and Belgium. There were lesser battles fought on the home fronts of the nations which were fighting. In the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth countries, this battle was fought on the streets of cities and towns between men who didn't wear a uniform and women who tried to shame them into joining the military. These street conflicts got so bad that the government actually had to take action. Learn more about the white feather girls and how they shaped World War I on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.

Starting point is 00:01:00 What if your perceptions about the past were wrong? ThruLine is a podcast that takes you back in time to uncover the parts of the story that may have gone unnoticed. It effectively turned day into night. And how it shaped the world now. Time travel with us every week on the Thulein podcast from NPR. Before the outbreak of the First World War, a social movement was underway in the United Kingdom, similar to that in other Western countries at the time.

Starting point is 00:01:34 Women's suffrage. In Britain, women were restricted from voting, and the suffrage movement was an organized effort to change the laws, to grant women the right to vote. When the war started, partisan politics, in theory, were put on hold, as was the suffrage movement. While the external expression of political movements were put on hold, the underlying desires and policies were not. They were just shifted into war-related activities. The women's suffrage movements split into two camps.

Starting point is 00:02:00 There was a smaller camp of pacifists who were against the war, then there was a larger group of pro-war nationalists who tried to use the war to advance their goal of having the vote extended to women. As men were sent to continental Europe to fight, women took up roles in factories and other jobs that were traditionally held by men. The theory was that when the war was over, their patriotism and support of the war would make it hard to continue to deny them the right to vote. Taking up factory jobs and other roles traditionally held by men were important, but also really not that controversial. But there were other actions that some British women took to support the war that were far more controversial and divisive. When the war began, there was no conscription in the U.K. The British military was an all-volunteer force for the first two years of the war.

Starting point is 00:02:46 That necessitated, getting as many men as possible to enlist and fight. Just a few weeks after the start of the war, British Admiral Charles Fitzgerald, who was pro-conscription, hatched a plan to get more men to enlist. He recruited 30 women in the town of Folkstone in southeast England to walk around town and hand white feathers to men who were not in uniform. And here I have to explain the symbolism of the white feather. The white feather has had many different and often diametrically opposed meanings throughout history. The white feather was often used as a sign of peace, pacifism, or cowardice,

Starting point is 00:03:21 and often the difference between those was really just in the eye of the beholder. Supposedly, in 1775, a group of pacifist Quakers in Easton, New York, were having a meeting when a group of Indians who were on the warpath trying to find white settlers who had attacked them. Upon being confronted, the Quakers refused to fight back or flee. When the chief of the tribe entered the meeting house, found no weapons, and saw that the Quakers did not attack, he put a white feather on the door to indicate that they should be left alone. A century later, a non-violent Maori uprising took place in New Zealand, which used the white feather as their symbol. In early 20th century Britain, however, the white feather

Starting point is 00:03:59 wasn't a symbol of pacifism. It was used as a symbol of cowardice. And just to give you an idea, how symbols can mean totally different things. During the Vietnam War, Carlos Hathcock, the United States' greatest sniper with 93 confirmed kills, wore a white feather in his hat. Likewise, in 1346, the Prince of Wales plucked three white ostrich feathers off of the King of Bohemia's corpse and integrated them into his coat of arms. So, while it has meant different things throughout history, for the purpose of this story, the white feather was a symbol of cowardice. These British women would find men on the street and hand them white flowers to shame them into enlisting.

Starting point is 00:04:38 The idea was that it was more effective if the shame came from a woman than it would be if it came from other men. By all accounts, it was effective. One 2020 study showed a jump in British enlistments by a third within 10 days after the first mention of white feathers appearing in the news. Lord Kitchener, who was the head of the British military at the start of the war, approved the program. He said, quote, the women could play a great part. in the emergency by using their influence with their husbands and sons to take their proper share in their country's defense. And every girl who has a sweetheart should tell the men that she would not walk out with him again until he has done his part in licking the Germans." End quote.

Starting point is 00:05:18 Women across Britain began giving white feathers to random men that they saw on the street and would even give them to their relatives. Some women would send white feathers in the mail, often attached to a postcard so everyone could read it. Informally, they were known as the order of the White Feather or the White Feather Brigade, and it even spread to other Commonwealth countries. Many women took part in the White Feather movement because it gave them a sense of empowerment, a way to break the norms of the period in a socially approved manner, a sense of purpose, and a way to contribute to the war effort. The White Feather Girls quickly became very controversial and unpopular in certain circles. One reason for their unpopularity is

Starting point is 00:05:56 something that we probably wouldn't consider today. Back then, it was considered very unladylike to approach any strange man to talk to them. Giving out white feathers was doing exactly that, even though the circumstances were not improper. Secondly, they goaded some men into joining who were later killed or wounded. Many family members started to lay blame for what happened to the men and their families directly at the feet of the white feather girls. In a 2008 article for the Guardian newspaper, writer Francis Beckett told the story of his mother, who lost her father at the age of nine in the war. Her father was exempt from the war because he had three small children and was near-sighted. However, he joined after he was given a white feather.

Starting point is 00:06:36 He wrote, quote, My mother was nine and never got over it. She blamed the politicians. She blamed the generation that sent him to war. But most of all, she blamed that unknown women who gave him a white feather and the thousands of brittle self-righteous women all over the country who had done the same. End quote. Next, they were rather indiscriminate as to who they gave white feathers to.

Starting point is 00:06:57 You were fair game if you were male and not in a military uniform. The problem was that many of the men who were given feathers were not avoiding military service, but had a very good reason for not being in uniform. The first group were men involved in important civilian industries, directly contributing to the war effort. Many men were working at munitions and armament factories, which were considered essential industries. Trying to explain the nuances of your job as it pertained to the war was very difficult when someone was in your face telling you that you were a coward.

Starting point is 00:07:26 Eventually, the British Home Secretary created badges for men to wear which said, King and Country, so they wouldn't be harassed by the white feather girls. However, these badges didn't eliminate the problem. The next group were men who were serving or who had served in the war and were given white feathers. These cases made many of the men who served in the military very angry at the white feather girls who questioned their bravery. One of the most telling stories came from Private Norman Demeth, who was honorably discharged after he was wounded. He recalled, quote, Almost the last feather I received was on a bus.

Starting point is 00:08:00 I was sitting near the door when I became aware of two women on the other side talking to me, and I thought to myself, Oh, Lord, here we go again. One lent forward and produced a feather and said, here's a gift for a brave soldier. I took it and said, thank you very much. I wanted one of those. Then I took my pipe out of my pocket and put this feather down the stem and worked it in a way I've never worked a pipe cleaner before. When it was filthy, I pulled it out and said, you know, we didn't get these in the trenches and handed it back to her.

Starting point is 00:08:27 She instinctively put out her hand and took it. So there she was sitting with this filthy pipe cleaner in her hand, and all the other people on the bus began to get indignant. She then dropped it and got up to get out, but we were nowhere near a stopping place and the bus went on quite a long ways while she got well and truly barriced by the rest of the people on the bus. I sat back and laughed like mad." End quote. Maybe the most ironic case was that of George Samson. He was awarded the highest honor in the British military, the Victoria Cross for his gallantry during the Battle of Gallipoli. He saved 30 men and was shot a dozen times. He was literally on his way to a reception in his honor for having been awarded the Victoria Cross when he was stopped by a woman and given

Starting point is 00:09:10 a white feather for being a coward. He was wearing civilian clothes. There were cases of men without limbs who displayed their wounds in anger after having been given a white feather. In another case, a 15-year-old boy by the name of Frederick Broome lied about his age to enter the military. He was sent to France, injured, and sent back home both because of his injury, and it was discovered that he was underage. Even though he was still underage at 16, couldn't legally enlist, had already served, and was wounded. He was surrounded on the street by a crowd of women who yelled and screamed at him, calling him a coward. In tears, he immediately ran to enlistment office, but the officers there knew who he was and wouldn't let him re-enlist.

Starting point is 00:09:51 list. Another 15-year-old boy, who again couldn't legally join the military, was given 15 white feathers in the course of a week. There were even cases of men committing suicide after having been given white feathers when they were medically disqualified from enlisting. As with the badges given by the Home Secretary, the government eventually awarded the silver war badge to those who were honorably discharged so that they could wear it on their civilian clothing so they wouldn't get harassed. even though the British began widespread conscription in 1916 that didn't stop the white feather brigade. By the end of the war, even wearing a uniform wasn't enough. There were cases of men being given white feathers because they wore a uniform that was too clean,

Starting point is 00:10:32 indicating that they hadn't been in the front line. The white feather girls became very unpopular with a very large segment of British society. But something interesting came out of it. On November 21st, 1918, just 10 days after the end of the end of the end of the army, end of the war, Parliament granted the first right to vote to women in the UK to those over the age of 30 and with property. And in 1928, just 10 years later, this was extended to all men and women over the age of 21. It isn't known just how much the White Feather movement had to do with women being granted the right to vote, but the timing of the franchise being extended so soon after

Starting point is 00:11:09 the end of the war does seem to indicate that it might have had something to do with it. After the war, members of the pacifist wing of the suffragettes, such as Virginia Wolf, tried to downplay the white feathers prevalence. She claimed that only 50 or 60 were given out during the entire war, when in truth there were individual men who reported having been given that many. The true number was certainly in the tens of thousands over the four-year period of the war. Likewise, many pro-war nationalistic suffragettes didn't claim the movement as their own either, referring to leave it in the past, given its unpopularity.

Starting point is 00:11:43 The handing of a white feather has appeared in many literary, musical, and cinematic works about the First World War. Most recently, there was a scene in the second season of Downton Abbey, where one of the house staff was given a white feather, and there was a similar scene in the 2021 movie, The King's Man. There was a brief and unsuccessful attempt to revive the white feather movement at the start of World War II. The stories of feathers being given to wounded soldiers in the First War, plus the early adoption of conscription in Britain during the Second War, ensured that the movement never reached the same levels it did before. There hasn't been a similar movement like the White Feather Movement before or since,

Starting point is 00:12:17 and outside of other Commonwealth countries, it didn't exist anywhere else during the war either. Ultimately, the White Feather Movement was a unique product of the social and cultural forces which shaped Britain during the period of the First World War. The executive producer of Everything Everywhere Daily is Charles Daniel. The associate producers are Benji Long and Cameron Kiever. I want to give a big shout out to everyone who supports the show over on Patreon, including the show's producers. Your support helps me put out a show every single day.

Starting point is 00:12:50 And also, Patreon is currently the only place where Everything Everywhere daily merchandise is available to the top tier of supporters. If you'd like to talk to other listeners of the show and members of the Completionist Club, you can join the Everything Everywhere Daily Facebook group or Discord server. Links to everything are in the show notes.

Everything Everywhere Daily: History, Science, Geography & More - White Feather Girls (Encore)

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