War and Suffrage

The National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies (NUWSS) continued campaigning for equality throughout the war.  President of the NUWSS, Millicent Garret Fawcett, appealed to members to join the war effort as a means of proving themselves worthy of the vote, although had been in favour of a peaceful solution to the crisis in Europe.  She wrote in the suffrage magazine, ‘The Common Cause’ on 7^th August 1914, “Let us show ourselves worthy of citizenship, whether our claim be recognised or not…”

The attention of the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU) shifted away from their political aims and was channelled in to supporting the war effort.  Mrs Emmeline Pankhurst declared a truce so the Government declared amnesty and on 10^th August, all suffragettes in prison at the outbreak of war were unconditionally released.  Mrs Pankhurst was fiercely patriotic and as far as she was concerned, there was no point in having the vote without a country to vote in.  She devoted her time to encouraging women to join the war effort, but soon discovered that some trade unions were refusing to accept them in what they considered to be ‘men’s jobs’.  This led Mrs Pankhurst to leading a vigorous campaign for the ‘right to serve’.  On 17^th July 1915 the Women’s Right to Serve Demonstration in central London attracted around 30,000 women, despite the bad weather. 

Sylvia Pankhurst, unlike her mother Emmeline and sister Christabel, was a socialist and a pacifist stating in her memoirs, ‘The Home Front’, “Stop this breaking of homes, these sad privations, this mangling of men, this making of widows!”  After her expulsion from the WSPU, Sylvia founded the East London Federation of Suffragettes in 1914, an organisation that saw the vote as just one aspect of the struggle for equality alongside fighting for a living wage, decent housing, and equal pay, and much more.  Sylvia continued to campaign against the war and in 1915, gave her enthusiastic support to the International Women’s Peace Congress held at The Hague, despite being unable to attend.