UNDER ATTACK

The Cat & Mouse Act

In 1909 imprisoned suffragettes began to go on hunger strike. The government introduced force-feeding, a dreadful torture, in which a suffragette was held down and liquid food was poured down a tube pushed through her nose into her stomach. As hunger striking continued and women became dangerously ill, the government introduced the hated “Cat and Mouse” Act whereby suffragettes on the point of death were released, then re-arrested when their health improved. Despite such brutality, women continued to fight for their rights.

The women’s suffrage campaign faced constant attacks. People argued that women did not belong in politics; they should stay at home. Some said women were not capable of understand affairs of state. Voting and standing for parliament were unwomanly and should be left to men. Even though campaigners worked, ran businesses, owned property and were teachers, factory inspectors and school governors, their demands for the vote were constantly refused. Anti-suffragists wrote letters to the papers, accusing suffragists and suffragettes of being violent, unwomanly and “turbulent spinsters”, who were making politicians’ lives impossible. When activists stood up to speak, they were told to go home and look after their husbands, or were pelted with rotten fruit, eggs and stones. Some suffragettes wore cardboard under their clothes to protect themselves. As suffragettes became more militant, attacks became more brutal. In London, demonstrating suffragettes were beaten and their clothes torn and brutalised. More than 1,000 suffragettes were imprisoned and hundreds more arrested.

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On 6 May 1913 an angry mob charged suffragette Miss Billing when she spoke in Wellington Square. Clinging to a lamppost she continued speaking until knocked to the ground. A few days later, on 14 May, a larger and more violent anti-suffrage riot took place when angry crowds attacked a procession of local suffragettes who had been resisting tax. Women bravely battled their way through a booing and jeering crowd. They were constantly attacked, the crowd destroying their banners, tearing the women’s clothes and hitting men who tried to support them. No one was ever arrested.

Women’s Anti-Suffrage League

Some women did not agree with women having the vote. 1n 1908 a Women’s Anti-Suffrage League formed, headed by Mrs Humphrey Ward. A branch opened in Hastings. Its members wrote angry letters to the press but did not sign their names.

Hastings ‘prisoners’

Local WSPU organisers Mary Allen and Dorothy Bowker both spent time in prison. They sent letters back to the WSPU office in Hastings, which were read aloud at meetings. “I hate to hear women talk politics, and I almost forget the proverbial gallantry of an Englishman to “the sex,” when the said sex is represented by a petticoated spouter on women’s rights.”

Hastings and St Leonards Observer, 1872

Opposite page: May 1913 – crowds gather to watch women’s tax resistance demonstration. Hastings Pictorial Advertiser Above: Banners destroyed by rioters and a campaigner being escorted to safety. 37