My own story
sides: "They are arresting Mrs. Pankhurst!" Something very like a free
fight ensued, occupying all the attention of the police who were not in
the immediate vicinity of the cab. The men surrounding that rocking
vehicle succeeded in tearing the veiled figure from the arms of the
other women and piling into the cab ordered the chauffeur to drive full
speed to Bow Street. Before they reached their destination, however, the
veiled lady raised her veil--alas, it was not Mrs. Pankhurst, who by
that time was speeding away in another taxicab in quite another
direction.
Our ruse infuriated the police, and they determined to arrest me at my
first public appearance, which was at the Pavillion on the Monday
following the episode just related. When I reached the Pavillion I found
it literally surrounded by police, hundreds of them. I managed to slip
past the outside cordon, but Scotland Yard had its best men inside the
hall, and I was not permitted to reach the platform. Surrounded by plain
clothes men, batons drawn, I could not escape, but I called out to the
women that I was being taken, and so valiantly did they rush to the
rescue that the police had their hands full for nearly half an hour
before they got me into a taxicab bound for Holloway. Six women were
arrested that day, and many more than six policemen were temporarily
incapacitated for duty.
By this time I had made up my mind that I would not only resist staying
in prison, I would resist to the utmost of my ability going to prison.
Therefore, when we reached Holloway I refused to get out of the cab,
declaring to my captors that I would no longer acquiesce in the slow
judicial murder to which the Government were subjecting women. I was
lifted out and carried into a cell in the convicted hospital wing of the
gaol. The wardresses who were on duty there spoke with some kindness to
me, suggesting that, as I was very apparently exhausted and ill, I
should do well to undress and go to bed. "No," I replied, "I shall not
go to bed, not once while I am kept here. I am weary of this brutal
game, and I intend to end it."
Without undressing, I lay down on the outside of the bed. Later in the
evening the prison doctor visited me, but I refused to be examined. In
the morning he came again, and with him the Governor and the head
wardress. As I had taken neither food nor water since the previous day
my appearance had become altered to such an extent that the doctor was
plainly perturbed. He begged me, "as a small concession," to allow him
to feel my pulse, but I shook my head, and they left me alone for the
day. That night I was so ill that I felt some alarm for my own
condition, but I knew of nothing that could be done except to wait. On
Wednesday morning the Governor came again and asked me with an
assumption of carelessness if it were true that I was refusing both food
and water. "It is true," I said, and he replied brutally: "You are very
cheap to keep." Then, as if the thing were not a ridiculous farce, he
announced that I was sentenced to close confinement for three days,
with deprivation of all privileges, after which he left my cell.
Twice that day the doctor visited me, but I would not allow him to touch
me. Later came a medical officer from the Home Office, to which I had
complained, as I had complained to the Governor and the prison doctor,
of the pain I still suffered from the rough treatment I had received at
the Pavillion. Both of the medical men insisted that I allow them to
examine me, but I said: "I will not be examined by you because your
intention is not to help me as a patient, but merely to ascertain how
much longer it will be possible to keep me alive in prison. I am not
prepared to assist you or the Government in any such way. I am not
prepared to relieve you of any responsibility in this matter." I added
that it must be quite obvious that I was very ill and unfit to be
confined in prison. They hesitated for a moment or two, then left me.
Wednesday night was a long nightmare of suffering, and by Thursday
morning I must have presented an almost mummified appearance. From the
faces of the Governor and the doctor when they came into my cell and
looked at me I thought that they would at once arrange for my release.
But the hours passed and no order for release came. I decided that I
must force my release, and I got up from the bed where I had been lying
and began to stagger up and down the cell. When all strength failed me
and I could keep my feet no longer I lay down on the stone floor, and
there, at four in the afternoon, they found me, gasping and half
unconscious. And then they sent me away. I was in a very weakened
condition this time, and had to be treated with saline solutions to save
my life. I felt, however, that I had broken my prison walls for a time
at least, and so this proved. It was on July 24th that I was released. A
few days later I was borne in an invalid's chair to the platform of the
London Pavillion. I could not speak, but I was there, as I had promised
to be. My licence, which by this time I had ceased to tear up because it
had an auction value, was sold to an American present for the sum of one
hundred pounds. I had told the Governor on leaving that I intended to
sell the licence and to spend the money for militant purposes, but I had
not expected to raise such a splendid sum as one hundred pounds. I shall
always remember the generosity of that unknown American friend.
A great medical congress was being held in London in the summer of 1913,
and on August 11th we held a large meeting at Kingsway Hall, which was
attended by hundreds of visiting doctors. I addressed this meeting, at
which a ringing resolution against forcible feeding was passed, and I
was allowed to go home without police interference. It was, as a matter
of fact, the second time during that month that I had spoken in public
without molestation. The presence of so many distinguished medical men
in London may have suggested to the authorities that I had better be
left alone for the time being. At all events I was left alone, and late
in the month I went, quite publicly, to Paris, to see my daughter
Christabel and plan with her the campaign for the coming autumn. I
needed rest after the struggles of the past five months, during which I
had served, of my three years' prison sentence, not quite three weeks.
FOOTNOTE:
[5] Mr. Lansbury shortly before this had resigned his seat in Parliament
and had gone to his constituents on the question of women's suffrage.
Both the Liberal and the Conservative parties had united against him,
with the result that a Unionist candidate was returned in his place. Mr.
Lloyd-George publicly rejoiced in the result of this election, saying
that Mr. Marsh, the Conservative candidate, had been his man. The Labour
Party, in Parliament and out, meekly accepted this piece of Liberal
chicanery without protest.
CHAPTER VII
The two months of the summer of 1913 which were spent with my daughter
in Paris were almost the last days of peace and rest I have been
destined since to enjoy. I spent the days, or some hours of them, in the
initial preparation of this volume, because it seemed to me that I had a
duty to perform in giving to the world my own plain statement of the
events which have led up to the women's revolution in England. Other
histories of the militant movement will undoubtedly be written; in times
to come when in all constitutional countries of the world, women's votes
will be as universally accepted as men's votes are now; when men and
women occupy the world of industry on equal terms, as co-workers rather
than as cut-throat competitors; when, in a word, all the dreadful and
criminal discriminations which exist now between the sexes are
abolished, as they must one day be abolished, the historian will be able
to sit down in leisurely fashion and do full justice to the strange
story of how the women of England took up arms against the blind and
obstinate Government of England and fought their way to political
freedom. I should like to live long enough to read such a history,
calmly considered, carefully analysed, conscientiously set forth. It
will be a better book to read than this one, written, as it were, in
camp between battles. But perhaps this one, hastily prepared as it has
been, will give the reader of the future a clearer impression of the
strenuousness and the desperation of the conflict, and also something of
the heretofore undreamed of courage and fighting strength of women, who,
having learned the joy of battle, lose all sense of fear and continue
their struggle up to and past the gates of death, never flinching at any
step of the way.
Every step since that meeting in October, 1912, when we definitely
declared war on the peace of England, has been beset with danger and
difficulty, often unexpected and undeclared. In October, 1913, I sailed
in the French liner, _La Provence_, for my third visit to the United
States. My intention was published in the public press of England,
France and America. No attempt at concealment of my purpose was made,
and in fact, my departure was witnessed by two men from Scotland Yard.
Some hints had reached my ears that an attempt would be made by the
Immigration Officers at the port of New York to exclude me as an
undesirable alien, but I gave little credit to these reports. American
friends wrote and cabled encouraging words, and so I passed my time
aboard ship quite peacefully, working part of the time, resting also
against the fatigue always attendant on a lecture tour.
We came to anchor in the harbour of New York on October 26th, and there,
to my astonishment, the Immigration authorities notified me that I was
ordered to Ellis Island to appear before a Board of Special Inquiry. The
officers who served the order of detention did so with all courtesy,
even with a certain air of reluctance. They allowed my American
travelling companion, Mrs. Rheta Childe Dorr, to accompany me to the
Island, but no one, not even the solicitor sent by Mrs. O. H. P. Belmont
to defend me, was permitted to attend me before the Board of Special
Inquiry. I went before these three men quite alone, as many a poor,
friendless woman, without any of my resources, has had to appear. The
moment of my entrance to the room I knew that extraordinary means had
been employed against me, for on the desk behind which the Board sat I
saw a complete _dossier_ of my case in English legal papers. These
papers may have been supplied by Scotland Yard, or they may have been
supplied by the Government. I cannot tell, of course. They sufficed to
convince the Board of Special Inquiry that I was a person of doubtful
character, to say the least of it, and I was informed that I should have
to be detained until the higher authorities at Washington examined my
case. Everything was done to make me comfortable, the rooms of the
Commissioner of Immigration being turned over to me and my companion.
The very men who found me guilty of moral obloquy--something of which no
British jury has ever yet accused me--put themselves out in a number of
ways to make my detention agreeable. I was escorted all over the Island
and through the quarters assigned detained immigrants, whose right to
land in the United States is in question. The huge dining-rooms, the
spotless kitchens and the admirably varied bill of fare interested and
impressed me. Nothing like them exists in any English institution.
I remained at Ellis Island two and a half days, long enough for the
Commissioner of Immigration at Washington to take my case to the
President who instantly ordered my release. Whoever was responsible for