Fawcett’s father owned a corn and coal warehouse in Aldeburgh and he was extremely successful by the 1850’s so he could afford to send his children away to be educated. So instead of having wonderful oratory Millicent impressed her audience with her intellect. These very different backgrounds meant very different ways of leading these groups.
When Fawcett was 12 years old her sister Elizabeth Garrett moved to London to become a doctor. When Millicent went to stay with her sisters Elizabeth and Louise she came across many people with many different views. In 1865 Louise took Millicent to a women’s rights speech. The speaker was John Stuart Mill. Millicent soon became an avid supporter.
Due to meetings with other campaigners for women’s rights she developed the skill to have a political debate rather than just arguing.
Emily founded the WSPU (Women’s Social and Political Union) in 1879 and members were experts in each of their own fields. There were artists who designed and created wonderful posters; there were actresses to organise campaigns and many more. Their skills meant that they were very powerful as a team. Milicent was not the best public speaker, however, she had wonderful organization skills and soon she became a recognized leader of the suffrage movement. She aided Clementina Black to make the government help under-paid female workers and she helped Josephine Butler to campaign against white slavery. She did this because she believed that the success they had was due to campaigning in a wide variety of causes.
Although the suffragists were against militant action, the suffragettes thought that they were not getting anywhere and so they did many violent and harmful things so that people would notice them and would have to do something about them. They would stop if the received the vote. They had petitions signed, they put acid on golf courses, burnt down churches and homes and much more. The suffragettes chained themselves to railings and when they were arrested they refused to eat so that they would be released from prison, as they were too ill to stay. However in 1909 Mary Leigh was sent to prison for throwing stones and she went on hunger strike but the prison wardens forced a tube down her throat and poured down meat juices and lime cordial. This became common practice in prison for the hunger strikers. Some people resisted the tube and if they did then it would be forced to their stomach through their nose. The suffragettes used posters of force-feeding as propaganda and it was very effective. Even King George V said that the government should discontinue it.
In 1912 Emily Pankhurst went to prison 12 times. This was because of her militant ways of trying to push women’s suffrage. She burnt down buildings, smashed windows, slashed pictures and went on a hunger strike. The government could not believe the way that these women had chosen to fight for their rights and many people thought that their way of doing things did not help but hinder the fight for women’s suffrage because she was showing people what women could do and who would have wanted these particular women to have a choice in who was running the country.
In conclusion, I feel that these two extremely different ways of fighting for suffrage were fuelled by two very different people. Fawcett was afraid that Emily’s ways would alienate supporters of women’s suffrage. Whilst for Emily this was a battle she felt so strongly for she put other peoples lives in danger. I think that the suffragettes were the most effective group in achieving the vote for women because they stood up for themselves and did something about what they believed in.
