WHO ARE THE SUFFRAGETTES?

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume LVI, Issue LVI, 26 August 1908, Page 6

WHO ARE THE SUFFRAGETTES?

There is a misimpression abroad in \ the colonies as to who the suttragettes \ are and what position they occupy m , the Old. Land, and in some quarters j their efforts are discounted in the be- } lief that they are but a blatant, insignificant section of the community. As ' a matter of fact many of the suffra- ' gettes who have been serving sentences ! in gaol are delicate and refined women < of independent means/ some of them t women of considerable attainments, 1 and, as Miss Christabel Fankhurst says, j such women would not go x to prison } unless they .believed heart and soul in ( .principles for which they are fighting. Miss Dora Spdiig, who went to prison, . for a month, is the daughter of a wealthy business man. Her _ portrait ( hangs on the walls of the Royal ' Academy. Another of the ladies, Miss '• Maud Joachim, is the niece of the t famous' violinist. Another, Miss Isa- I bel Logan, is the daughter of a Parlia- 1 inentarian. Miss Edith New, who was ] sentenced to two "months' imprisonment , for breaking Mr Asquith's windows — not in the second division, but ordinary I imprisonment — has been a teacher. She I secured her \ certificate from Stockwell I College, ' and taught in the poorer I schools of East .Greenwich and Dept- I ford until January, when she became an * organised of the IVanchise Union. SJ* was ' one of the ' ladies who cb" ' herself to the railings at No. 1° •** ing, Street, and in March 1- _^ined suffered two weeks' in- Downan attempt to get" : -*st year she Commons, while , for Buffered anqt 1 the House of demohstrr'" again in January she Miss I" - £ier three weeks for the to '* " -«Jon outside Downing Street. - * .lorencß Haig, who was sentenced » three months' imprisonment, is a ,very clever artist. Miss Vera Wentworth, also undergoing three months' >' imprisonment, was a shop assistant, and had already served a sentence of six weeks at Holloway. Miss Rose Howey, whose sentence was three months, is the daughter of a large landowner at Malvern. Miss Jessie Kenny, given one month, used to work in a cotton factory, attending at the same , time evening classes, and devoting hei spare time -to the village Sundaj » school. Miss'Brackenbury is an artist Miss Frances Parker a graduate oi » Newnham, Miss Mary ,Gawthorpe i King's scholar of. Leeds University, anc Miss Annie Kenney was a ' 'tenter" ii a spinning mill ai 16. " Miss Pankhursi was asked if she regarded window breaking as a political offence, and n<y a criminal one| ' "Yoji. mSjst conside: the question of mdtive"/' sHe said. "Ii extradition cases a man may. even hav< •taken somebody's life, but if the ob ■ject.of .so. doing was a political one the' merits of the case for extraditioi are, not considered solely on th< ground, that he, has committed a mur , der.^'.^Thi^Js special pleading, but i . ia> impossible not to be impressed b: the^ spirit oftlie law-breakers.