Short History Of... - The Suffragettes

Episode Date: March 7, 2022

While British women had been requesting the right to vote for decades, in the early 1900s, the Suffragettes refused to take no for an answer. But despite their PR expertise, as their methods became more violent, theirs was a movement that divided the nation. But what radicalized them? Were they revolutionaries? Terrorists? Or simply an oppressed majority with no legitimate way to protest? This is a Short History of the Suffragettes. Written by Jo Furniss. With thanks to Helen Pankhurst, author of Deeds Not Words: The Story of Women’s Rights Then and Now, and to Dr Diane Atkinson, author of Rise Up Women: The Remarkable Lives of the Suffragettes. For ad-free listening, exclusive content and early access to new episodes, join Noiser+. Now available for Apple and Android users. Click the Noiser+ banner on Apple or go to noiser.com/subscriptions to get started with a 7-day free trial. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's the 15th of November 1909. At Temple Meads train station in Bristol, England, a woman makes haste along a busy platform. She waves away steam and porters looking for a tip. Her name is Teresa Garnet, although she often uses an alias. Garnet is wearing a black morning suit and a hat decorated with a rolled silk scarf. She's borrowed the smart outfit from a wealthy friend

so that she blends in with the well-to-do crowd. She appears to be an ordinary lady passenger hurrying to catch a train. But at just 21, Teresa Garnett has had an extraordinary life. Born with working-class roots, she was orphaned when her mother died in a lunatic asylum. Now she has a new family. For them, and the values they stand for, she's smashed windows, chained herself to railings, and assaulted a prison warden. Up ahead, she catches sight of a man disembarking. Meeting him is her sole purpose for travelling to Bristol today. She has a message to deliver.

She holds it tight, hidden in a large pocket she has sewn into the silk lining of the coat. The man is surrounded by an entourage and a protective wall of policemen. He's shorter than the others, but bulky in a fur overcoat and a top hat that shines. This man holds the attention of everyone on the platform. His bulldog-like face is instantly recognisable. He is the Home Secretary, Winston Churchill. Garnet maintains her swift but steady approach, her buttoned leather boots clacking on the concourse. Churchill is introducing someone to the assembled group, a tall, striking woman who takes a moment to size up the men before greeting them with a slow smile. Teresa Garnett recognizes

Churchill's wife, Clementine. She is said to be shrewd, a supporter of women's suffrage, but Garnett and her associates have not been impressed by Mrs. Churchill's efforts. Despite having the ear of one of the most powerful men in Britain, she's hardly been an instrument of change. Her fellow women have been asking politely for the vote for years, decades, standing patiently in the background, just like she is now, waiting to be introduced to the world of men. For Garnet, though, the time for chit-chat is over. In the hastily sewn coat pocket, she adjusts her grip on a weapon. This is the message she will deliver to Churchill today.

If these gentlemen continue to ignore women like her, she will make them pay attention. Now she's near enough to hear his distinctive voice. Churchill is relaxed, complacent, and standing very close to the edge of the platform. Garnet sees her chance. Shouldering her way between two policemen, she comes face to face with Churchill. All the men stare at her. She uses their moment of frozen surprise to pull her hand from her pocket. In her fist is a long, leather dog whip.

She swings the weapon over one shoulder and brings its two straps down onto the Home Secretary's head. Churchill staggers. His top hat knocked askew. Garnet plunges forward and whips him again. One more step and he will fall between the train carriages onto the track. Garnet raises her arm. But just then, Clementine Churchill bounds over a pile of luggage. She catches her husband by the sleeve, hauling him away from the platform's edge.

Then there is pandemonium. Policemen grab Garnet from all sides. Churchill holds her stare as he touches a hand to his reddened cheek, but his hat took the brunt of the blow, and the whip hasn't drawn blood. As several officers manhandle Theresa Garnet off the platform, she thrashes and screams, making as much of a spectacle as one woman can manage. At the top of her voice, she calls the war cry of the suffragettes. Deeds not words, Mr. Churchill. Votes for women. From its roots in the mid-1800s to the first votes for women at the end of the First World War, the British campaign for suffrage was long and bitter. For decades, women had been

requesting the right to have a say in political matters, but their entreaties were consistently rebuffed. In the early 1900s, the suffragettes simply refused to take no for an answer. This relatively small group of women used direct action to propel the issue into the spotlight and from there to the top of the political and social agenda. But as their methods became more violent, including bombings and arson attacks, many of their members left in protest, Theresa Garnett among them.

What radicalised these otherwise ordinary women? How did one suffragette become known as the most dangerous woman in Edwardian England? Were they revolutionaries? Terrorists? Or an oppressed majority whose exclusion from democracy left them no legitimate way to protest? And how is it that, to paraphrase Winston Churchill, never in the field of women's suffrage is so much owed by so many to so few? I'm Paul McGann, and this is a short history of the suffragettes. After the attack on Churchill, Garnet will be sentenced to one month in Bristol jail.

When she embarks on a hunger strike, she'll be subjected to the brutal treatment of force feeding. As a result, she'll see out the rest of her sentence in hospital. But to understand the suffragettes, we have to go further back. As early as 1832, the British Parliament is asked to give an extension of the vote, or suffrage, to women. This first bill is defeated, but the campaigners, known as suffragists, are undeterred. Political theorist John Stuart Mill is an early supporter of women's suffrage. But despite his many petitions to Parliament in the 1860s, any attempts at reform are voted down.

Into the latter part of the century, the women's issue is sidelined by politicians again and again. On the other side of the world, New Zealand becomes the first country to extend national suffrage to all women in 1893. Australia follows soon after, but only gives the vote to white women. In Britain, though, all progress is stalled. It's Friday the 13th of October, 1905. The Free Trade Hall in Manchester, England, is packed with men and women who've come to hear an address from the Liberal Party leader, Sir Edward Grey.

He's accompanied by a much younger Winston Churchill, still a rising star of the party, and as yet unfamiliar with the wrong end of a dog whip. In the audience are two women. Like Churchill, they are young and charismatic, and quickly gaining a reputation for themselves in politics, albeit in more limited circles. They are Christabel Pankhurst and her friend and colleague Annie Kenny.

Christabel is the daughter of two intellectuals. Her father is the barrister and prominent socialist Dr. Richard Pankhurst. And her mother is Emmeline Pankhurst, also a political activist. Christabel holds a degree in law from the University of Manchester, although as a woman she's not allowed to practice. By contrast, Annie has a job in a cotton mill, where she's worked since the age of ten. She is one of twelve children, whose parents are trade unionists at the mill. Today Annie and Christabel plan to confront the liberal politicians.

They want to know if the party's promise to deliver what they say will be government of the people by the people includes people who happen to be women. Christabel and her mother, Emmeline, have formed an organization called the Women's Social and Political Union, or WSPU. They're not yet known as suffragettes. They're not very well known at all, but that will change today.

The meeting gets underway. The men on the stage give speeches and invite questions from the audience annie kenny gets to her feet and asks if they will give votes to women the politicians ignore her they ask if there are any other questions. Annie tries again, but she's pushed down into her seat by members of the audience. Annie and Christabel share a look that says it is time for Plan B. Annie pulls from her sleeve a banner in the purple, green and white colors of the WSPU. It's painted with the words, Will you give votes for women? It's painted with the words, But as they unfurl the sign, they find it's too long. So they hold up the part that reads, Later, this concise slogan,

Annie and Christabel barely have time to raise the banner before they're grabbed by several policemen and bundled outside the free trade hall. But their protest is not over. When she left home that morning, Christabel promised her mother that she would sleep in prison that night. But you don't get arrested for merely disrupting a meeting. So as soon as her feet hit the pavement, Christabel squirms out of the policeman's grasp, turns in his arms, and spits in his face.

You do get arrested for assaulting an officer of the law. This is the first militant act of the WSPU. When their case comes to court, Christabel and Ania are offered the chance to pay a fine instead of a custodial sentence. They refuse, and they're sent to Strangeways Prison. That night, Emmeline Pankhurst and her second daughter Sylvia hold a vigil for the prisoners in a nearby park. The court case has drawn a lot of attention, even press coverage. Emmeline addresses the crowd from the back of a truck. She says the WSPU are not lawbreakers, but lawmakers.

They are engaged in a fight for their rights, and Christabel and Annie have just fired the first shot. Helen Pankhurst is the great-granddaughter of Emmeline and granddaughter of Sylvia. She is the author of a book named after another suffragette motto, Deeds Not Words, a story of women's rights then and now. Imagine yourself at that time, you know, you're either living your life of Women's Rights, Then and Now. Imagine yourself at that time, you know, you're either living your life of drudgery, all the rest of it, or convention. And then suddenly there are these people talking about the agency of women, the opportunities, the ability to dream, and camaraderie, and friendship, and sisterhood, and all of that. So I really think we need to stress the amount of positivity that came out of

it. And interestingly, you know, in the historical narratives, we talk a lot about the militancy and the violence and the difficulty and the abuse that they suffered. And without doubt, that was the case. But we also have to counter it with that kind of amazing moment in history that they felt part of by the edwardian era a british woman is allowed to own property and business on which she must pay tax she may work in critical industries and she is subject to the laws of the land she has all of the responsibilities but none of the rights. Until now, the traditional method of campaigning has been genteel. It involves the endless lobbying of politicians via letters and meetings.

But Prime Minister Herbert Asquith is one of the many people of both sexes who oppose women's suffrage for both political and ideological reasons. Dr Diane Atkinson is a historian and author of the book Rise Up Women, The Remarkable Lives of the Suffragettes. This argument of race suicide, which is two very odd words to put together, was very current at the time, race suicide. So they said, well, the British race would die out. And then they said, well, if the countries of the empire hear about this, if we give them the vote in the mother country,

then the colonies will object to this and the empire will fall apart because they will have no respect for the mother country. It's all rubbish, of course. They said if women have the vote, then men will stop being chivalrous. And that would be a bad thing. So it's a threat to the status quo is what people are upset about. Women have had years of broken promises from the ruling Liberal Party. The opposition Labour Party have also failed to prioritise the issue. The opposition Labour Party have also failed to prioritise the issue.

Now the WSPU have had enough. They decide it's time to abandon a traditional ladylike approach to campaigning. The suffragettes opt for direct action. They said, we've waited long enough, the urgency is huge, so we're going to demand it. But what suffragettes would do, they would identify a big meeting in a town, say in Leeds or Liverpool or London or wherever, and they would somehow kind of squirrel themselves away in the building and they would hide there the night before.

And they'd hide in the boiler room or on one occasion they hid in the organ at a big event. So they're hiding amongst all the organ pipes and they go prepared when they come little lunches or suppers or whatever you know because they might be hiding in a cupboard then of course they'd hear people coming and they hear the meeting starting and then they would just appear and say Mr Asquith when you give women the vote sometimes the public would just hear a disembodied voice Mr Asquith when are you going to give women the vote? Sometimes the public would just hear a disembodied voice, Mr Asketh, when are you going to give women the vote? So it was funny.

It wasn't threatening or violent, but it just put the politicians off their stroke. The Daily Mail newspaper first uses the term suffragette in 1906 as an insult. Emmeline Pankhurst embraces the word, pronouncing it suffragette, because they will get the vote. The WSPU is quick to understand the power of the press. What they wanted was publicity, so they didn't mind the threat of going to prison. They were prepared to do that so that the papers would have to write about them. They love gimmicks, they love stunts,

they love a bit of a laugh, they love winding up politicians. Eventually they're going to start stalking politicians in this slight slapstick way or they would hide on golf courses where politicians would hang out the weekends and they'd hide in bushes and they'd jump out and say Mr Askey, when are you going to get rid of woman? They just wait until they're lining up their shot and then they do that. So it's a huge laugh. But politicians hated it because they'd never had that before. They hated being humiliated. They hated the idea they might be hemped. So it's a real affront to their dignity. But the suffragettes, this is one of the tactics they loved doing the most. And of course, this caused a great deal of annoyance. But it worked.

It worked because they got a lot of press coverage. The suffragettes proved to be brilliant at propaganda and merchandise. They wear elegant Edwardian dresses, long and white, to contradict the chauvinistic taunt that suffragettes are unfeminine women who can't find a husband. They design and produce jewellery in the purple, white and green colours of the WSPU. Brooches, pins and hair clips, which women can wear to display their support for the cause. Some are cheap, some very expensive.

The suffragettes attract women of all backgrounds and social classes, so they cater for every budget. Some items are bold, some subtle. Many women have to hide their badges under scarves, because membership at the WSPU is enough to lose a woman her job. Teachers are sacked for attending WSPU meetings. Servants lose their positions when their mistresses find out that they're politically curious. Other suffragettes lose family and friends.

But, despite the risk, more women flock to the cause, with or without the support of the men in their lives. To spread the word, the suffragettes mass-produce leaflets, known as handbills, which state their goals in straightforward language They often use cartoons, so that illiterate women can understand them These handbills are given away outside factories and at county fairs up and down the country From the start, the WSPU is eager to bring working women into the fold. The absolute critical character in this was a woman called Annie Kenney. And she joined the WSPU in 1905. And she becomes a poster girl for the suffragettes because she's often photographed quite deliberately in studios wearing her mill clothes that she wore to the

factory, like a long dress or a skirt, and her shawl over her head to keep it warm, and her clocks. And these photographs were collected and often shown. And other working women thought, oh, she's one of us. You know, she's interesting. And they could identify with her. And her reach into working class communities was immense. She becomes a very senior member of the organisation. She's like the number three in the hierarchy. So from very humble background, this enables her to reach out, recruit women, and then get this fantastic recognition from the leadership and these huge promotions. And Annie Kenny was really important in the organisation,

right from the beginning, right to the outbreak of the First World War. She's huge. The diversity of the WSPU is remarkable, as women from all classes recognise its importance. They can only change their lives if their concerns are represented in Parliament. A key figure is Sophia Duleep Singh, Princess Sophia. The daughter of a deposed Indian Maharaja,

Sophia grows up in England in the decadence of high society. Princess Sophia is a fashion icon. She cannot resist a party, a scandal or a dare. She is said to be one of the first women to ride a bicycle. And her Pomeranians win top prize at the first meeting of Crofts, England's most famous dog show. She is an Edwardian it girl. But everything changes when Princess Sophia becomes engaged in women's suffrage. But everything changes when Princess Sophia becomes engaged in women's suffrage.

She joins the WSPU and starts by giving out handbills on the street outside her home at Hampton Court Palace. But like many suffragettes, she finds unique and radical ways to protest. As part of the Women's Tax Resistance League, Sophia refuses to pay taxes to a government elected without votes for women. Her boycott leads to prosecution and bailiffs at the door of Hampton Court. Even this indignity is fed back into the suffragettes' PR machine. Eventually, bailiffs seize Sophia's possessions to pay off her tax debts. Her furs, jewels, furniture and other valuables are sold at auction. The WSPU then stage protests outside the auction house, shouting the slogan, no vote, no tax. Every opportunity for press coverage is exploited.

There really is no such thing as bad publicity as far as the WSPU are concerned. In 1909, two suffragettes called Daisy Solomon and Elspeth McClelland attempt to post themselves as human letters to the Prime Minister. For the price of a Thripney stamp, a telegraph messenger boy delivers the two women to the front door of 10 Downing Street. When they're refused entry, they're taken back to the sorting office as, in post office parlance, dead letters. Of course, there is a suffragette photographer on hand to record the entire event, and the image makes the front page of the Daily Mirror the next day. Prime Minister Herbert Asquith is said to be most amused by the incident,

but still refuses to meet the women. A suffragette named Flora Drummond dreams up more dramatic stunts. She sails a boat up the River Thames through central London in order to shout at MPs on a private terrace of the Houses of Parliament. Her colleague, Elsie Hoey, dresses up as Joan of Arc and rides a white horse to greet suffragettes as they're released from prison. Another radical, Edith Garrett, tours the music halls. She gives demonstrations of martial arts that women can use in self-defense on the dangerous streets of London. The jiu-jitsu training of Edith Garrett will come into its own when events take a darker turn.

As the Edwardian era enters its second decade, it is the WSPU leadership who are in need of personal protection. It's the 18th of November, 1910. A day that will become known as Black Friday. Rosa May Billinghurst is on her way to the Houses of Parliament. She navigates uneven pavements in her wheelchair that is decorated with the suffragette banner. Childhood polio left Rosa unable to walk. Now she is a prominent WSPU campaigner, a recognisable figure in her modified tricycle. Up ahead, Rosa sees Princess Sophia Duleep Singh walking alongside Emmeline Pankhurst

and Annie Kenny. Some 300 women are on the march, in small groups, so they don't get arrested. The women are going to demand a meeting with the Prime Minister. Back in January, Asquith promised to back a so-called conciliation bill. It would have given the vote to around a million women. It would have given the vote to around a million women. It was a meagre offering, and would only have enfranchised certain women according to their wealth and marital status. But Emmeline Pankhurst saw it as a step in the right direction,

and agreed to suspend militant activities while the bill went through Parliament. Ten months later, though, when the conciliation bill was right on the cusp of becoming law, Asquith torpedoed it. Despite all his promises, the suffragette campaign is back where it started. Today there is none of the usual singing of popular songs as the women march by. Rosa Mae Billinghurst knows it's easy to sing out of joy or sadness, or hope or defiance, and the suffragettes have sung all those songs over the years. But now they're silenced by anger. There is only the steady rhythm of their boots and the thrum of Rosa's wheels. It's a chilly November morning, not a day for lingering outside. And yet, as the women approach Parliament Square, they see a throng of people.

The railings are lined by uniformed policemen, armed with truncheons, and ready to stop the procession from reaching the Commons. There's also a crowd of onlookers, though the women don't yet realise that many of these are actually plain-clothes police officers, brought in from the east end of London to bolster security. It comes as no surprise to Emmeline Pankhurst and her colleagues that Prime Minister Asquith refuses to meet a delegation of suffragettes. So the women try to force their way into the Houses of Parliament.

This action is met with a swift and brutal response from the police. Soon there is only the sound of scrabbling feet, screams and shouts, and the thump of fists. Rosa is caught in the riot, unable to find her way out of the melee in her wheelchair. As she turns this way and that, she sees friends punched in the face, thrown into the path of police horses, attacked with batons. Suddenly Rosa is moving backwards out of the fray, dragged by a policeman who grabs her

wheelchair and pushes her down a side alley. As the officer looms over her, she realizes that the silent shadows are even more dangerous than a noisy riot. The policeman throws Rosa out of the tricycle onto the ground, twisting her arms behind her back and almost breaking her finger. In a particularly vindictive move, the officer steals the valves from her wheels, leaving the disabled woman stranded in the alleyway. Some eyewitnesses report that the policeman encourages bystanders to slash Rose's

tires with a knife, but even the hooligans who joined the riot refuse to go that far. Shocked by the level of brutality, some the riot refused to go that far. Shocked by the level of brutality, some actually step in to protect the stricken woman from further assaults by the policemen. The riot goes on for six hours. The suffragette headquarters at Caxton Hall becomes a triage point for injured women, many of whom are traumatized as well. There are numerous accounts of sexual violence from the police. At least 29 women lodge formal complaints about being molested by officers, although many more will later write about the abuse they suffered. They describe being grabbed by the chest, groped, or even swung round by their breasts.

Some are kneed between the legs. Others are thrown bodily into a crowd of male onlookers. These men are told by the police that they are free to do as they wish with these difficult women. There is a sense of the protesters being taught a lesson, put in their place. a lesson put in their place. By the end of the day, four men and 115 women are arrested. But Home Secretary Winston Churchill orders that no charges should be brought against the suffragettes. It's possible he does not want accusations of police brutality to be made public at a trial. Black Friday is a watershed moment. The savagery hardens the suffragettes. They feel betrayed by politicians, abused by police. They have

always been militant, but now they are willing to meet violence with violence. Mrs Pankhurst, whose sister had been assaulted by the police on that day, Mary Clark, realised that this is really dangerous. And she said, this is too dangerous. Somebody will die. So we can't afford to try and press the government. We can't go in these mass demonstrations to Parliament because it's too dangerous. The police have physically and sexually assaulted our women. It's unsafe. So what she says was, we'll go underground and we will wage a guerrilla war against this government. And that's what happens. It spreads all over the country like wildfire and it changes tactics. It's vandalism, it's window smashing, it's arson.

It's vandalism, it's window smashing, it's arson. In 1909, a woman called Marian Wallace Dunlop is arrested for writing a quote about political freedom from the Bill of Rights onto a wall at the House of Commons. Once incarcerated, she argues that she should be treated as a political prisoner, not a common criminal. When her plea is refused, she goes on hunger strike. Hunger strikes become a regular form of protest for suffragette prisoners. On their release from jail, the WSPU presents the women with medals to wear pinned to their chests like soldiers.

Those who endure a hunger strike are given a higher order of commendation. By now, the suffragette campaign has a distinctly military nature. The women who go on hunger strike are its foot soldiers. Emmeline Pankhurst, now aged in her fifties, starves herself many times, as do her daughters and all the prominent suffragettes. But the Liberal government is afraid that a suffragette might die in prison, giving the WSPU a martyr to use in their powerful propaganda. So ministers sanction the force-feeding of women,

a treatment that is never before used in prisons, but only in asylums. The use of force-feeding leaves many of the women with life-changing injuries. So Sylvia, my grandmother, was exposed to a lot of this. She was force-fed a lot of times. And the main kind of story that I remember from a personal perspective is my mother saying that Sylvia always had difficulty in digestion in the rest of her life because of the damages caused during that force feeding process. I came across an example of a woman talking about force feeding and then what it was like when it was over, you know, the vomiting, the stress, the palpitations, all of that, having your teeth knocked out, that kind of thing.

But then, of course, they have to get the pipes out from the stomach. So she described at the end of feeding, whenever it happened, they would just yank out the tubes. So it was just yanking out through the throat. She said, I felt as though my stomach was coming out through my mouth. Some of the suffragettes go to prison for longer sentences, during which they endure twice daily force feeding that may be repeated hundreds of times. It was a form of physical control abuse

and was a continuation of some of the physical abuse that happened, you know, in the streets and in the demonstrations. So this was just a more formalized process of it in a institution controlled by this liberal state. So a liberal state imprisoning women who want to be considered as citizens, imprisoning them and then force-feeding them. Again, you know, the concept of a liberal state doing that is just still shocking, I think, in so many ways.

The years leading up to the First World War are the most dangerous for the suffragettes. In a speech at the Royal Albert Hall in London in 1912, Emmeline Pankhurst reminds the women that the WSPU stands for deeds, not words. that the WSPU stands for Deeds, not Words. She directly incites the meeting to rebellion and vows to take personal responsibility for anything the women do in the name of the cause. One of the most aggressive suffragettes is a German woman called Kitty Marion.

She comes to England to work in the music halls, but finds a casting couch mentality where actresses are abused by managers and patrons. These female performers have no protection in law. She has a Me Too moment, joins the WSPU and becomes a key actor in their reign of terror, in the words of Christabel Pankhurst. Kitty Marion carries out arson attacks and bombings on churches and trains. She throws bricks through the windows of post offices, shops and even the home office. Her actions are timed to cause maximum damage and publicity but minimal injury. Any symbol of the patriarchy presents Kitty with a target.

In June 1913, she burns down the grandstand at Hurst Park Racecourse in Surrey and goes to prison for three years. Kitty Marion will become known as the most dangerous woman in Edwardian England. But she combines direct action with a stage career. On one occasion, the actress is released from prison after being on hunger strike and enduring force feeding, only to go straight into rehearsals for a pantomime in the West End. For Kitty and the Suffragettes, the show must go on. A nationwide campaign of arson and bombings is dubbed by the newspapers,

the suffragette outrages. The level of violence prompts some people to quit the WSPU, including the woman who attacked Winston Churchill with a whip, Teresa Garnett. But others are willing to fight on. In 1913, suffragettes blow up a house belonging to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, David Lloyd George. They plant bombs at the Theatre Royal in Dublin, where Prime Minister Asquith is in attendance. In 1914 they burn down Yarmouth Pier. There are scores of attacks in these years, prompting a defiant Christabel Pankhurst to defend their methods, saying, when men use explosives and bombs, they call it war. Why should a woman not use the same weapons as men? Christabel Pankhurst said, we're going to terrorise the liberal politicians. We're

going to terrorise them. But she never, ever proposed blowing them up or physically hurting them. They were just interested in destroying property. I'm not prepared to call them terrorists in the way that we understand it today. And in fact, much more violence was done to suffragettes than they ever performed against anybody else. So it's easier for us to talk about the evil that's done to them than some of the things, the acts that they did that were, you know, that were quite brutal. It's lucky that nobody died. And I think it's really important that we don't just sugarcoat that and say they were willing to challenge and be violent. And I think it's really important that we give them that agency. So let's put on the table first

how the state was force feeding, using physical violence violence, etc., etc. And in that context, you know, what did the women do? Did they do what women should do and stay quietly and stay at home and give up? Or do they also put on the table tactics that are aggressive, that are violent? And they decided to do that. they decided to do that. On the 4th of June 1913, thousands of revellers pack Epsom Racecourse near London. Today is Derby Day,

the hottest ticket in the racing and social calendar. King George V is here to watch his horse, Anmer, run in the title race. A woman called Emily Wilding Davison is in the crowd. She is a committed suffragette, a survivor of numerous hunger strikes and bouts of force-feeding. And yet, she is unpopular at the WSPU, never accepted into the tight inner circle of leadership. Emily is seen as something of a loose cannon. Yesterday, she laid a wreath at the statue of her hero, Joan of Arc, a martyr who sacrificed her life for a cause.

Today, instead of a wreath, Emily brings to the races a suffragette banner. She has it tucked up her sleeve. As the derby gets underway, the suffragette finds a spot beside the track. Perhaps by accident, perhaps on purpose, she is right opposite the cine cameras that film the scene. The atmosphere reaches fever pitch and the noise is deafening. Screaming people, drumming hooves, betting slips snapping in the air. But Emily is calm. Her plan requires split-second timing.

Emily knows that the King's horse is not on good form and, as expected, Anmer falls back until he's third from last. Emily lets the lead horse's thunder pass. As soon as she sees the jockey in the king's collars, she steps onto the track. Anmer approaches at a full gallop, a speed of around 40 miles per hour. Emily only has time to raise one arm, perhaps to protect herself as she realizes her fatal mistake. Perhaps to try to grasp the horse's bridle and somehow attach her banner. Or perhaps to purposefully martyr herself for the cause, like Joan of Arc.

like Joan of Arc. The horse and jockey have no time to swerve. They slam into Emily, a slight figure in a white dress. The animal somersaults. The jockey is knocked unconscious. Emily goes under the hooves of the other horses and is kicked along the track like a child's lost balloon. Only the King's horse, Anmer, escapes relatively unscathed. His jockey, Bertie Jones, is badly injured. Even when he recovers physically, he is haunted by the incident, and years later will commit suicide. Emily is taken to hospital, where she dies four days later, surrounded by an honour guard of suffragettes. The death of Emily Welding Davison is caught on camera

and replayed around the world. It's the most shocking image of the women's suffrage campaign, and still its most famous. But it's also deeply divisive. Some in the movement hail Davison as a martyr. Others distance themselves, saying her rash act makes women appear unstable and unworthy of the vote. It wasn't an accident. You don't stand in front of a horse galloping towards you,

I don't know how many miles an hour, weighing half a ton, and think you're not going to get hurt. She took that risk and was happy to take it. So in a way, she's a bit like a suicide bomber. In a way, she's standing in front of a horse and blowing the whole day up, if you like, spoiling it for the king and putting a lot of attention on the subject. I mean, Mrs. Pankhurst wasn't happy with her doing that. Nobody knew what she was going to do. And they saw it for what it was, which is the suicide bit. And it was successful. I think Emily Marlene Davidson would be thrilled with how much we talk about her.

She'd love the accolades that people have thrown at her because I think she would feel happy to be recognised. So I think she probably gave her life quite happily, if you can say that, for the cause. Just over a year after Davidson's death comes the outbreak of World War I. She probably gave her life quite happily, if you can say that, for the cause. Just over a year after Davison's death comes the outbreak of World War I. A majority of suffragettes end their militant campaign and back the war effort, directing their energy into the national emergency. The war brings about unforeseen complications in the electoral process.

Around 58% of British men are eligible to vote now, but only if they've been resident in the UK for 12 months prior to an election. This technicality means that millions of men will lose the vote, simply because they've been posted overseas. The government fears an angry backlash from soldiers, who heroically fought for their country, only to be stripped of their civil rights when they return home. Therefore, before the war ends in 1918, the government passes the Representation of the People's Act. It gives the vote to all men over the age of 21, so long as they are registered in a constituency. And it extends the vote to women too, but only those aged over 30 who own a property.

As a result, around 13 million men are now able to vote, compared to 8 million women, who can go to the polls for the first time. compared to 8 million women who can go to the polls for the first time. The reason why 30 was chosen, allegedly, was that the politicians said, oh, well, women are just too giddy. The real reason was, of course, was that women were in the majority of the electorate and with the huge war casualties, slightly more so, because about 830,000 British men were killed in the war. So going from Novak's women to then suddenly having women in the majority of the electorate,

I mean, that would just be too terrifying for words. It would be just too much of a seismic shift. The impact of World War I on women's suffrage has been much debated. It's a time of rapid social change. And in four years years people get used to seeing women carry out so-called men's roles. Driving ambulances, manufacturing heavy weaponry, pushing ploughs. The work of women on the home front undermines the anti-suffrage argument that jobs are inherently gendered. But some say it's wrong to assume that the war did more for women's suffrage

than a long and radical suffrage campaign. The reality is without the war, you wouldn't have had a delay of another four years. Absolutely, that wouldn't have happened. So I think that the war delayed things. Also, if you look at who got the vote in terms of the war, it wasn't those women who were most active in the war effort. They were working class young women. They are not the women who got the votes. So that kind of logic that it was the women who were most involved in the war that got the vote doesn't really work.

And so my argument would be that it's just a nice narrative from those who don't want to look at women's agency, let alone a difficult women's agency, to say that it's the war that gave women the vote. Soon after women over 30 are given the vote, they're also given the right to stand for Parliament. The first woman to be elected is a Northern Irish politician called Constance Markovits. But in accordance with Sinn Féin party policy, she doesn't take up her seat

The first woman to enter the House of Commons as an MP is an American On the 28th of November 1919, a glamorous woman walks along the platform at London Paddington Station Her clothing is tasteful and well cut A black coat and tricorn hat with a white fur stole. She wears many strings of pearls. If she's nervous about her first day in a new job, she doesn't show it. Nancy Astor is accustomed to moving in elite circles. She lives at Cliveden House, a vast country estate on the banks of the River Thames that was a wedding gift.

And she's just been elected MP for Plymouth Sutton, a seat formerly held by her husband, Viscount Waldo Vasta. During her campaign, there were those who said that her extreme privilege means she's no more in touch with the issues facing working women than any of the men in government. But her easy charm and wit won her the election, and Nancy Astor arrives in London ready to make history. As she reaches the end of the platform, she hears an ugly din. A group of noisy women hang over the barrier, waving banners. Nancy Astor was not involved in the crusade for women's suffrage. She did not support either the moderates or militants. But she's well aware of the reputation of the suffragettes. When the women catch sight of the first female MP, they swarm the platform and surround her.

For a moment, she thinks these women are angry that it's not one of their own who gets to sit in Parliament after their years of struggle, almost two decades of imprisonment, hunger and the torture of force-feeding. But now, one of the suffragettes steps forward to welcome Nancy Astor. She says it's the beginning of a new era. The unknown woman tells the new MP, I'm glad to have suffered for this. It will take a further ten years of campaigning before British women are given the vote on the same basis as men.

Emmeline Pankhurst will die only weeks before the Act is passed in 1928. Her daughters, Christabel and Sylvia, are divided by a bitter rift, but remain courageous and controversial political activists. Many suffragettes continue their work for women's rights. The actress Kitty Marion emigrates to America, where she promotes birth control. Princess Sophia Duleep Singh takes up the cause of women's suffrage in India. The former mill worker Annie Kenny spends the war working for the Minister of Munitions, David Lloyd George, the same politician whose house was blown up by suffragettes. But after the war, Annie Kenny hangs up her militant hat.

Like many of the women, she suffers from the long-term health effects of hunger strikes and forced feeding. With the vote won, the first wave of feminism in Britain is over. But the direct action of the suffragettes inspires feminists to fight for women's rights throughout the 20th century. Helen Pankhurst says that even a hundred years later, there remain inequalities that still require deeds, not words. Women and girls are subject to all sorts of social curfews and physical curfews because of concern and worries about their own safety. of social curfews and physical curfews because of concern and worries about their own safety. And if you still have half the population that's concerned at that most basic level around the safety in ways that are just exactly like what they would have been 100 years ago, I mean, it's slightly morphing. The form of violence might look a little bit different,

but we're still fundamentally in our bodies concerned about our safety. So how far have we moved if 100 years later that's still defining our lives? So I think they'd still be saying, come on, is this the best we can do? Next time on Short History Of, we'll bring you a short history of the Watergate scandal. There was a reason why he ordered the cover-up,

and that was that Watergate was not an isolated event. There was a pattern of crimes and dirty tricks that had been carried out at his behest, some of which he knew a lot more about than he knew about the Watergate. And frequently, you know, these crimes had been carried out by the very same people that broke into the Watergate. So Nixon had reason to fear that if he allowed a sort of unfettered, honest investigation of the Watergate, then all these other crimes would come to light

during the period leading up to, you know, the election. And he couldn't risk that. That's next time on Short History Of.