Beyond the Pankhursts
The Pankhursts were born and raised in Manchester, a city with a radical political history.
Undoubtedly they inspired others around them to engage with the suffrage debate, but they were not the only active women in the City. Many others were raising awareness and championing equality.
Manchester was buzzing with support for women’s rights. In their handwritten magazine, Ashburne Hall students detailed their own participation in a suffrage demonstration where a ‘University contingent formed the vanguard’.
Evelyn Manesta and Lillian Forrester were convicted of damaging 13 paintings in Manchester Art Gallery with hammers. They stated it was a politically motivated response to the imprisonment of Emmeline Pankhurst for inciting arson.
This grotesque scarecrow holding a copy of Votes for Women was created by an unknown opponent of women’s suffrage. Women who stepped out of the domestic and into the public sphere were attacked in person and in print during this period. Such women were unfailingly depicted as coarse and unfeminine.