The 1907 Rutlandshire by-election was held on 11 June 1907. The by-election was held due to the death of the incumbent Conservative MP, George Henry Finch. He had held the seat since 1867 and was Father of the House. The by-election was won by the Conservative candidate John Gretton [1] who held the seat until 1918 when the constituency was abolished.
The Women's Social and Political Union suffragettes campaigned against the government. At an open-air meeting in Uppingham, Mary Gawthorpe and Christabel Pankhurst were pelted and Gawthorpe fell unconscious; Sylvia Pankhurst wrote that the "incident and her plucky spirit, made her the heroine of the Election". [2]
Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ±% | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Conservative | John Gretton | 2,213 | 61.9 | +5.2 | |
Liberal | W. F. H. Lyon | 1,362 | 38.1 | −5.2 | |
Majority | 851 | 23.8 | +10.4 | ||
Turnout | 3,575 | 87.6 | −1.7 | ||
Conservative hold | Swing |
Emmeline Pankhurst was a British political activist who organised the British suffragette movement and helped women to win in 1918 the right to vote in Great Britain and Ireland. In 1999, Time named her as one of the 100 Most Important People of the 20th Century, stating that "she shaped an idea of objects for our time" and "shook society into a new pattern from which there could be no going back". She was widely criticised for her militant tactics, and historians disagree about their effectiveness, but her work is recognised as a crucial element in achieving women's suffrage in the United Kingdom.
Estelle Sylvia Pankhurst was an English feminist and socialist activist and writer. Following encounters with women-led labour activism in the United States, she worked to organise working-class women in London's East End. This, together with her refusal in 1914 to enter into a wartime political truce with the government, caused her to break with the suffragette leadership of her mother and sister, Emmeline and Christabel Pankhurst. Pankhurst welcomed the Russian Revolution and consulted in Moscow with Lenin. But as an advocate of workers' control, she rejected the Leninist party line and criticised the Bolshevik regime.
Dame Christabel Harriette Pankhurst was a British suffragette born in Manchester, England. A co-founder of the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU), she directed its militant actions from exile in France from 1912 to 1913. In 1914, she supported the war against Germany. After the war, she moved to the United States, where she worked as an evangelist for the Second Adventist movement.
The Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU) was a women-only political movement and leading militant organisation campaigning for women's suffrage in the United Kingdom founded in 1903. Known from 1906 as the suffragettes, its membership and policies were tightly controlled by Emmeline Pankhurst and her daughters Christabel and Sylvia. Sylvia was eventually expelled.
Adela Constantia Mary Walsh was a British-born suffragette who worked as a political organiser for the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU) in Scotland. In 1914 she moved to Australia where she continued her activism and was co-founder of both the Communist Party of Australia and the Australia First Movement.
Rachel Barrett was a Welsh suffragette and newspaper editor born in Carmarthen. Educated at the University College of Wales in Aberystwyth she became a science teacher, but quit her job in 1906 on hearing Nellie Martel speak of women's suffrage, joined the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU) and moved to London. In 1907, she became a WSPU organiser, and after Christabel Pankhurst fled to Paris, Barrett became joint organiser of the national WSPU campaign. In 1912, despite no journalistic background, she took charge of the new newspaper The Suffragette. Barrett was arrested on occasions for activities linked to the suffrage movement and, in 1913–1914, spent some time incognito to avoid re-arrest.
Black Friday was a suffragette demonstration in London on 18 November 1910, in which 300 women marched to the Houses of Parliament as part of their campaign to secure voting rights for women. The day earned its name from the violence meted out to protesters, some of it sexual, by the Metropolitan Police and male bystanders.
A movement to fight for women's right to vote in the United Kingdom finally succeeded through acts of Parliament in 1918 and 1928. It became a national movement in the Victorian era. Women were not explicitly banned from voting in Great Britain until the Reform Act 1832 and the Municipal Corporations Act 1835. In 1872 the fight for women's suffrage became a national movement with the formation of the National Society for Women's Suffrage and later the more influential National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies (NUWSS). As well as in England, women's suffrage movements in Wales, Scotland and other parts of the United Kingdom gained momentum. The movements shifted sentiments in favour of woman suffrage by 1906. It was at this point that the militant campaign began with the formation of the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU).
Mary Eleanor Gawthorpe was an English suffragette, socialist, trade unionist and editor. She was described by Rebecca West as "a merry militant saint".
The 1912 Bow and Bromley by-election was a by-election held on 26 November 1912 for the British House of Commons constituency of Bow and Bromley. It was triggered when the Labour Party Member of Parliament (MP), George Lansbury, accepted the post of Steward of the Chiltern Hundreds as a technical measure enabling him to leave Parliament.
The 1908 Leeds South by-election was a parliamentary by-election for the British House of Commons constituency of Leeds South in the West Riding of Yorkshire held on 13 February 1908.
The 1907 Bury St Edmunds by-election was held on 24 August 1907. The by-election was held due to the succession to the peerage of the incumbent Conservative MP, Frederick Hervey who become the Fourth Marquess of Bristol. It was won by the Conservative candidate Walter Guinness.
Aeta Adelaide Lamb was one of the longest serving organizers in the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU), the leading militant organization campaigning for Women's suffrage in the United Kingdom.
Helen Miller Fraser, later Moyes, was a Scottish suffragist, feminist, educationalist and Liberal Party politician who later emigrated to Australia.
Henry Devenish Harben was a British barrister and Liberal Party politician who later joined the Labour Party. He was a notable supporter of women's suffrage.
Mary Elizabeth Phillips was an English suffragette, feminist and socialist. She was the longest prison serving suffragette. She worked for Christabel Pankhurst but was sacked; she then worked for Sylvia Pankhurst as Mary Pederson or Mary Paterson. In later life she supported women's and children's organisations.
Women's Sunday was a suffragette march and rally held in London on 21 June 1908. Organised by Emmeline Pankhurst's Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU) to persuade the Liberal government to support votes for women, it is thought to have been the largest demonstration to be held until then in the country.
Caroline Agnes Isabella Phillips was a Scottish feminist, suffragette and journalist. She was honorary secretary of the Aberdeen branch of the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU), met and corresponded with many of the leaders of the movement and was also involved in the organisation of militant action in Aberdeen.
Sylvia is a British musical with book by Kate Prince and Priya Parmer, with music by Josh Cohen and DJ Walde and lyrics by Prince based on the life of Sylvia Pankhurst.
Horatia Dorothy MoloneyLancaster (variously known as Dorothy,Mary, Dolly,Miss Maloney and Miss Molony, Moloney and O'Connor) was an Irish suffragette campaigner and member of the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU). She became Organiser to the London Council of the Women's Freedom League in 1908, following its split from the WSPU. She famously disrupted the 1908 Dundee by-election by ringing a bell every time Winston Churchill attempted to address a crowd demanding that he apologize for insulting remarks he had made about the women's suffrage movement.