FORCIBLE FEEDING.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 10769, 15 May 1913, Page 2

FORCIBLE FEEDING.

HOW IT IS DONE. MISS PANKHURST : S EXPERIENCE. Miss Sylvia Pankhurst has issued a statement on her treatment in Holloway after receiving her two monthssentence for window-breaking. Her description, which is given, of course, as a pXirely ex parte statement, describes how, after "hunger-striking" for nearly four days, she was forcibly fed. Six women officers, she declared, seized her, and, though she struggled, got her on to the bed and. held her down. "After this," her statement proceeds, " the doctors came stealing in. . . . Somebody caught me by the head from, behind, and tied a sheet under my chin. I set my teeth like a vice, and my breath came go quickly that I thought I shotild suffocate. I felt a man's hand trying to force my mouth open, and trying to get his fingers between my lips, which t tightened over my teeth as much as I could. At last he managed to succeed in spite of all my efforts. I felt his finger and a steel instrument trying to find a gap between my teeth, and trying to force back my lips. . . . Presently I felt

a steel instrument beine forced agains my gums, where I haa had two teetl out. I fought against it with all nn strength, but, cutting its way into the flesh, it worked its way in, and then they turned a screw, which gradually forced my jaws apart. It felt as though I were having my teeth drawn. My quick breaths seemed to come with a low scream, which was growing louder. I think I Avas making a good deal of noise. I think they used two steei gags, one on each side—they did on some days, and I fancy they did on this first day. " They then started to force the tube down my throat. I tightened the muscles and struggled with all my might. ... I was scarcely conscious, except that I was fisrhting, that my gums were aching, and" that I felt T should jp mad at the outrage of the thing. Presently they said, 'That's all,' and dragged out the tube. They left me on the bed exhausted and shaking with sobs.'' She describes her sensations after other attempts at forcible feeding, stating that once or twice sho screamed " in an uncontrollable sort of way."' She also states that: "Sometimes after the struggle, when I was left all shaken and exhausted, my breath would come in long sobs, and I can remember saying things in a strange, high roice, between sobs, that sounded as if it belonged to someone else."

Sho was given solitary confinement and deprived of privileges for refusing food, and after eleven cloys, she states, tlie doctor ordered her to lie allowed books, nnd, a few days after, ordered her exercise, but she refused, as she was told that she must go alone. On March 13 she was allowed exercise with another suffragist, a Miss Emerson. " T felt very shaky on my feet at first." she says. " Miss Emerson was already walking round when T cot into the garden. .At first T could hardly believe it was she. her figure wa,s so much changed. Sho was only half her size. I saw her again at exercise next day, and three times later." That night, she states, " T think T had a. fit of nerves. I cried, and then I began to hear myself saying many things that were trno things. X hoard myself pry out. ' T won't hare any more of it : No! No! No! No! T won't have any more of it.' over and over again." Finally, after walking about her cell for twenty-eight hours, feeling very ill and her eyes troubling her, she saw the governor and the doctor and agreed to take food pending tlm resist of a petition to the Home Office. That was on the Saturday. On the following Thnrs- j day she recommenced the hunger strike, but was not forcibly fed, and was re- j leased on the Friday.