The British Women’s Suffrage Movement in 100 Objects

A Material History

Elizabeth Crawford

• Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic
• Year: 2026
• Edition: 1
• eBook ISBN:
  9781350520790
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Modern British History
• Index: History

This book tells the story of the British 'votes for women' campaign in a sequence of 100 objects. From the beginning of the campaign in 1866 until all women were granted the vote on the same terms as men in 1928, women used every means in their power to persuade the government to allow them the right to elect members of parliament. Through the analysis of an astonishing array of objects – including books, bags, petitions, posters, postcards, plays, photographs, china, chess sets, leaflets, newspapers, games, jewellery, scarves, badges, belts, sashes, rosettes, films, and figurines - The British Women's Suffrage Movement in 100 Objects explores the role that material culture played in this vital struggle.

Elizabeth Crawford looks at how, during the sixty-year campaign, items that played any part in life were put to work for 'votes for women', as suffrage activists both used and abused buildings, transport, and communications. These included not only objects created by the campaigners to influence public opinion, but also those produced by commercial firms to capitalise on the extraordinary publicity generated by the 'votes for women' movement.

Every one of the 100 objects included in this highly illustrated book represents a stage in the journey to equal citizenship. Among them are many our ancestors could have had in their homes or noticed in the street. Using the words of suffrage campaigners and their contemporaries, the accompanying text sets each object in context, with passages explaining politics and key personalities included throughout.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• 1 The printed pamphlet form of the 1866 women’s suffrage petition
• 2 Lydia Becker’s dress, 1889
• 3 Cartoon of Lydia Becker and Jacob Bright, c.1868
• 4 An advertisement in the Orkney Herald, 4 October 1871
• 5 An engraving of a suffrage meeting, 1872
• 6 Statue of John Stuart Mill, erected 1878
• 7 Annual reports of nineteenth-century suffrage societies
• 8 The Haslam memorial seat, St Stephen’s Green, Dublin
• 9 The Women’s Suffrage Journal
• 10 Invitation card to ‘A National Demonstration of Women’, 6 May 1880
• 11 Oil painting by Richard Staunton Cahill, 1888, ‘Mary Smith Lecturing on Woman’s Rights’
• 12 Carte de visite photograph, Sheffield 1882, annotated
• 13 Election handbill for Helen Taylor’s candidature at the North Camberwell parliamentary election, 1885
• 14 An engraving of a meeting of the Women’s Franchise League, 1891
• 15 Photograph of Elizabeth Wolstenholme Elmy
• 16 Portrait of Mary Wollstonecraft
• 17 Helen Blackburn’s bookcase, 1897
• 18 Scenes at the National Convention for the Civic Rights of Women, magazine illustration, 1903
• 19 The Pankhurst home, 62 Nelson Street, Chorlton-on-Medlock, Manchester
• 20 Photographic postcard of the ‘Lancashire and Cheshire Delegates on the Women’s Franchise Deputation to the Prime Minister’, May 1906
• 21 A German photographic postcard, 23 October 1906
• 22 Illustration of ‘The Mud March’, February 1907
• 23 Press photograph taken on 31 October 1906
• 24 Women’s Freedom League Minute Book 1907–8
• 25 A suffrage poster
• 26 Suffrage scrapbook compiled by Mrs Spencer Graves
• 27 Suffrage newspapers
• 28 Women’s Social and Political Union ‘Haunted House’ buckle and belt
• 29 Women’s Freedom League ‘Dorothy bag’
• 30 ‘Susan B. Anthony’ suffrage banner, 1908
• 31 The train and the suffrage movement
• 32 The bicycle and the suffrage movement
• 33 The car and the suffrage movement
• 34 The caravan and the suffrage movement
• 35 Suffrage offices
• 36 Women’s Freedom League ‘Proclamation’ banner, 1908
• 37 Bow Street Police Court, 1908
• 38 Photograph of women wearing replica prison dress, 1908
• 39 Record of a speech made by Christabel Pankhurst, 1908
• 40 Tea rooms and the suffrage movement
• 41 Suffrage medals
• 42 Postcard advertising the NUWSS ‘Pageant of Women’s Trades and Professions’, April 1909
• 43 China and the suffrage movement
• 44 Women’s Freedom League petition badge, 1909
• 45 Suffrage society badges
• 46 Designs for emblems of the federations of the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies
• 47 Photograph of Millicent Fawcett planting a tree in Annie’s Arboretum, Batheaston, 1910
• 48 Photographic postcard of the Prisoners’ Pageant, 23 July 1910
• 49 Suffrage shops
• 50 Suffrage postcards
• 51 Suffrage games
• 52 Suffrage jewellery
• 53 Suffrage plays
• 54 Suffrage novels
• 55 Suffrage songs
• 56 May Billinghurst’s ‘Velociman’
• 57 A Votes for Women poster highlighting male activism
• 58 National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies flyer in support of the Second Conciliation Bill, 1911
• 59 ‘Votes for Women’ novelties
• 60 Diaries and suffrage
• 61 ‘The Pillar Box and the Suffragette’ money box
• 62 Anti-suffrage flyer, 1912
• 63 German photographic postcard of a window smashed by suffragettes, March 1912
• 64 ‘Elusive Christabel’, optic toy, 1912
• 65 ‘Topical Chessmen (Suffragettes v. The Law)’
• 66 A cloth embroidered with the signatures of suffragette prisoners, 1912
• 67 Forcible feeding: A ‘comic’ postcard
• 68 A ceramic figurine of a suffragette
• 69 Report book kept by an organizer for the New Constitutional Society for Women’s Suffrage
• 70 A silver basket ‘Sold for King’s Taxes’
• 71 The pendant/brooch presented to Millicent Fawcett by the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies, 1913
• 72 Photographic postcard of ‘Suffragette Fire, Nevill Cricket Ground, Tunbridge Wells’
• 73 A lily carried at Emily Wilding Davison’s funeral, 14 June 1913
• 74 National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies Pilgrimage haversack, 1913
• 75 A still from the film The Hunger Strike, 1913
• 76 Group photograph of delegates to the Church League for Women’s Suffrage General Council Meeting, 2 July 1913
• 77 The Suffrage Annual and Women’s Who’s Who, 1913
• 78 Mrs Pankhurst’s shoe
• 79 Irish Citizen leaflet, 15 August 1914
• 80 A Flyer for ‘The Right to Serve’ March, 1915
• 81 East London Federation of the Suffragettes: First Annual Report
• 82 Photographs of ambulances of the Scottish Women’s Hospitals for Foreign Service, 1915–17
• 83 ‘The Suffrage Oak’, Kelvingrove Park, Glasgow
• 84 Mrs Despard’s election card, 1918
• 85 Lady Astor’s parliamentary outfit
• 86 Helena Normanton’s KC jabot
• 87 A Minerva Club plate
• 88 Photograph of a garden party at Aubrey House, Kensington, 1925
• 89 A poster advertising Time and Tide
• 90 ‘Pilgrimage of Peace’ banner, 1926
• 91 Postcard of members of the National Union of Societies for Equal Citizenship photographed at Westminster, 2 July 1928
• 92 A pamphlet, The Need for Women Members of Parliament, 1921
• 93 Mrs Pankhurst’s grave
• 94 A pamphlet, Women and the General Election, 1929
• 95 Library, Women’s Service House, Westminster, London
• 96 Sign for the Suffragette Fellowship’s ‘Women’s Record House’, Westminster, London
• 97 Sylvia Pankhurst’s typewriter
• 98 The Suffragette Fellowship Memorial, Christchurch Gardens, Westminster, London
• 99 ‘New Dawn’, a contemporary light sculpture celebrating the campaign for women’s suffrage, sited at the entrance to St Stephen’s Hall in the Houses of Parliament, 2016
• 100 The statue of Millicent Garrett Fawcett in Parliament Square, London, erected 2018
• Notes
• Resources
• Index