THE SUFFRAGETTES.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1086, 27 March 1911, Page 5

THE SUFFRAGETTES.

GREAT MEETING IN LONDON] AUDIENCE SUBSCRIBES £6000, . By Telegraph—Press Association-CopyTieM London, March 24. Tha Woman's Social ami Political Union held a crowded meeting at tho Albert Hall. The audience subscribed .£6OOO to the funds. Miss Viela Goldstein, tho Australian women's rights advocate, expressed sympathy with the militant policy of the suffragettes in England. CHARGE AGAINST THE POLICE. ALLEGED VIOLENCE. London, March 24. Lord Hobert Cecil, Mr. J. Morton Griffiths, M.P., and Mr. J. T. Ellis, in a letter to the "Times," state that they examined a hundred statements by witnesses and found .there was a clear case for a searching inquiry regarding the conduct of tho police towards the suffragettes on November 18 last They state that several suffragettes were kicked on the bodies and limbs, the marks showing afterwards, while others were struck in the face and beaten generally. The women suffered every species .of violence, including indignities of a very gross kind. EXCITING SCENES. On Friday, November 18 (says "The Times"), after Mr. Asquith's letter to Lord Lytton repeating'that the time at the disposal of the Government would not permit of further progress being made with the Woman Suffrage Bill during i!»U, some hundreds of tko extremists made a continuous series of attempts to force a way into the House of Commons. Batches of women kept dashing at the police cordon, and they were in every case seized, pushed, and carried to the other side oi Bridge Street. On Kovember 22 a lareo body of women marched from Caxton Hall to Downing Street. Just before they reached Downing Street, 15 policemen arrived from Scotland Yard, but the single line oi police could not be expected to withstand tho impact of the attacking force, and in Downing Street there was at once a seething mass of spectators and struggling police and suffragists. Reinforcements o police quickly arrived, and the process ol clearing the street began. The fight was short, sharp, and decisive, and lasted only ten minutes, although there was such a wealth of incident that tho struggk seemed to be of much longer duration The rioters appeared to have lost all coiv trol of themselves. Some shrieked, soini laughed hysterically, and all fought witl: a dogged but aimless pertinacity. Som( of the rioters appeared to be quite yonnp girls who must have been the victim; of hysteria rather than of deep convic tion. , L . , .» ■ It was recently announced that tin Women's Parliamentary Suffrage Com mittee intended to ask for a public in quirv into the way in which the polici actcrl towards suffragettes during the per iod from November 18 to November 23 Tho committee alleges that the police in terprcted the order not to make arrest: as a license to do as they please. Sonn onlookers state that woniei) were-struct with fists their arms twisted , and thumb: bent back, and that they were subjectcc to other indignities. In thn House of Commons Mr. Winstor Churchill, in reply to a question, saic the police had acted with their customary forbearance and humanity.