1911 United Kingdom census boycotters

Suffragettes boycotting 1911 census in Manchester

These British suffragettes and suffragists are known to have participated in the boycott of the 1911 United Kingdom census. ^[1] The number of boycotters has been estimated to have been in the thousands, but was probably fewer than 100,000 in total. ^[1]

Notable women who participated in the boycott include:

• Laura Ainsworth, 38 other women and one man sought to hide in Jezreel's Tower in Gillingham, Kent, but they were betrayed and still counted by census officials. ^{[2] [3]}
• Rhoda Anstey: participated on behalf of the Anstey College of Physical Education, which she had founded in 1897 ^{[4] [5] [6]}
• Helen Archdale: hosted a mass census boycott party with Adela Pankhurst ^[7]
• Minnie Baldock
• Inez Bensusan: member of the Actresses' Franchise League who performed during a mass evasion party ^[8]
• Rosa May Billinghurst
• Mary Blathwayt
• Nina Boyle: wrote "No Votes. No Census. Votes for Women" on her census form ^[9]
• Georgina Brackenbury: hosted an evasion party for 25 women and 1 man.
• Marie Brackenbury: hosted an evasion party for 25 women and 1 man. Wrote on the census form: "Miss Marie Brackenbury in charge takes this opportunity of registering her protest against the votelessness of the women of Great Britain by refusing to fill in this form." ^[10]
• Constance Bryer
• Florence Canning
• Joan Cather ^[11] and her husband ^[12]
• Joseph Clayton
• Annie Coultate ^{[7] [13]}
• Ellen Crocker
• Hilda Dallas
• Irene Dallas
• Emily Davison: hid in the House of Commons and was thus registered as an 'occupant' of the Palace of Westminster and enumerated in Parliament. ^{[14] [15] [16] [17]}
• Charlotte Despard ^[18]
• Lillian Dove-Willcox: organised the boycott in Trowbridge ^[1]
• Flora Drummond
• Bessie Drysdale: wrote on her form: “as the Government refuses me a vote and as I am not therefore recognised as a citizen, I refuse to perform the duties of one in giving the information required by the Government” ^[19]
• Florence Earengey ^[1]
• Dorothy Evans: organised parties for census boycotters in Birmingham ^[20]
• Millicent Fawcett
• Ada Flatman
• Florence Gertrude de Fonblanque
• Eva Gore-Booth
• Kate Harvey ^[21]
• Alice Hawkins ^[22]
• Vera Holme
• Clemence Housman ^{[23] [ page needed ]}
• Laurence Housman: advertised the boycott in several writings ^[a]
• Edith How-Martyn
• Elsie Howey: refused to be enumerated and wrote "Votes for Women" on her form ^[25]
• Maud Joachim ^[26]
• Violet Key Jones: organised the suffragette boycott in York ^[27]
• Helena Jones
• Annie Kenney: organised the census boycott in Bristol ^[1]
• Lilian Lenton ^[1]
• Marion Mackenzie ^[1]
• Mildred Mansel: hired 12 Lansdowne Crescent in Bath to be used by the 35 local census evaders ^[28]
• Katherine "Kitty" Marshall ^{[29] [30]}
• Muriel Matters
• Eleanora Maund ^[31]
• Winifred Mayo ^[32]
• Decima Moore
• Ethel Moorhead
• Clara Neal: stayed overnight in a sea cave on the Gower Peninsula ^[33]
• Henry Nevinson ^[34]
• Margaret Nevinson and an undetermined number of other women documented their reasons for refusal ^[1]
• Frances Olive Outerbridge
• Adela Pankhurst ^[7]
• Christabel Pankhurst
• Emmeline Pankhurst ^{[30] [35]}
• Emmeline Pethick-Lawrence ^[36]
• Frederick Pethick-Lawrence, 1st Baron Pethick-Lawrence
• Dorothy Pethick
• Mary Phillips (suffragette): wrote on her form "NO VOTE NO CENSUS. Posterity will know how to judge the Government if it persists in bringing about the falsification of national statistics instead of acting on its own principles and making itself truly representational of the people" ^[37]
• Emily Phipps: stayed overnight in a sea cave on the Gower Peninsula ^{[38] [39]}
• Catherine Pine ^[40]
• Ellen Pitfield ^[41]
• Aileen Preston
• Katherine Raleigh ^[42]
• Edith Rigby ^[43]
• Elizabeth Robins
• Bertha Ryland
• Lavena Saltonstall ^{[44] [45]}
• Alice Schofield
• Evelyn Sharp (suffragist) and other census resisters ^[34]
• Isabel Giberne Sieveking: the enumerator wrote on her return: "Husband had left the town when I called and the wife, who is a suffragette, refused to sign as correct" ^[46]
• Sophia Duleep Singh ^[47]
• Ethel Smyth
• Jessie Stephenson: organised the census boycott in Manchester ^{[1] [30]}
• Frances Swiney
• Violet Tillard: wrote on the household census form: “No Vote No Census. Should women become persons in the eye of the law this session - full information will be forwarded” ^[48]
• Aethel Tollemache ^[1]
• Alice Vickery ^[49]
• Jessey Wade ^[50]
• Ethel Williams (physician)
• Lilian Wolfe
• Rose Lamartine Yates ^[51]
• Israel Zangwill

Notes

1. He advertised the movement through a series of articles published in The Vote, in which he argued for the reasoning and tactical benefits of the boycott. ^[24] He also wrote fiction supporting the movement, setting this series in a potential future where the boycott went well. ^[24]

References

1. Liddington, Jill; Crawford, Elizabeth (2014). Vanishing for the vote: suffrage, citizenship and the battle for the census. ISBN   9780719087486. OCLC   861673182.
2. Crawford, Elizabeth. "Laura Ainsworth". Woman and her Sphere. Retrieved 4 December 2017.
3. "Medway women boycott 1911 census". BBC News. 20 March 2011. Retrieved 3 December 2017.
4. Crawford, Elizabeth (2 April 2013). "Suffrage Stories: An Entire Birmingham College Boycotts The 1911 Census". Woman and her Sphere. Retrieved 19 November 2024.
5. Elkes, Neil (6 February 2018). "Suffragette city: How three inspiring Birmingham women helped win the vote 100 years ago". Birmingham Live. Retrieved 19 November 2024.
6. Gauld, Nicola (19 August 2018). Words and Deeds: Birmingham Suffragists and Suffragettes 1832-1918. History West Midlands. ISBN   978-1-905036-48-6.^{[ page needed ]}
7. Waters, Michael (1 January 2018). "The Campaign for Women's Suffrage in York and the 1911 Census Evasion" . Yorkshire Archaeological Journal. 90 (1): 178–194. doi:10.1080/00844276.2018.1465692. ISSN   0084-4276.
8. "Inez Bensusan". © Orlando Project. Archived from the original on 1 December 2017. Retrieved 12 June 2025.
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12. "January 2014". Woman and her Sphere. Retrieved 8 November 2019.
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14. The Palace of Westminster Official Guide. Houses of Parliament. 2012. p. 17. ISBN   978-0-95620-292-5.
15. "Emily Wilding Davison and Parliament". UK Parliament. Retrieved 17 November 2024.
16. "No Vote, No Census - 1911 Census Protests". Historic UK. Retrieved 12 June 2025.
17. Smith, Simon (27 May 2021). The British Census. Bloomsbury Publishing. ISBN   978-1-78442-455-8.
18. Graham-Matheson, Lynne; Matheson-Pollock, Helen (19 March 2020). Mrs Despard and the Suffrage Movement: Founder of The Women's Freedom League. Pen and Sword. p. 1871. ISBN   978-1-5267-3113-5.
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32. "The Suffragettes of Oakley Street". House Historian. 12 February 2016. Retrieved 12 June 2025.
33. "Blue plaque to Clara Neal". Swansea. Retrieved 12 June 2025.
34. John, Angela V. (15 August 2019). Rocking the Boat: Welsh Women who Championed Equality 1840-1990. Parthian Books. p. 94. ISBN   978-1-912109-22-7.
35. White, Ian (1 December 2010). "No vote ‐ no census: an account of some of the events of 1910–1911". Population Trends. 142 (1): 33–51. doi:10.1057/pt.2010.30. ISSN   2040-1590.
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38. Wilson, Kim. "Unveiling Emily". Women of Eastbourne. Retrieved 12 June 2025.
39. Oram, Alison (1996). Women Teachers and Feminist Politics, 1900-39. Manchester University Press. p. 122. ISBN   978-0-7190-2759-8.
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