Some women, however, became dissatisfied with peaceful methods and thought they were getting nowhere with simple demonstrations so they decided to use some militant strategies. They formed Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU), an illegal organisation that used violence and militant actions rather than constitutional actions like the NUWSS to further its aims. The public gave members of the WSPU the name Suffragettes. Members of the WSPU no longer were willing to restrict themselves to the constitutional methods used by the NUWSS. Their motto was ‘Deeds, not words’, which meant that they were ready to take action to get what they wanted.
The suffragettes wanted publicity and to be noticed so they disobeyed many rules to change in the Constitution. They chained themselves to railings in Downing Street and shouted ‘votes for women’, they threw stones and broke several windows of 10 Downing Street, and they burned churches, destroyed public buildings and private residences, exploded bombs and assaulted the police and individuals. Suffragettes also attacked art galleries, universities and railway stations.
In 1909 the WSPU introduced a new weapon in its fight against the government. Members, which were sent to prison, went on hunger strikes, they refused to eat which resulted to force-feeding. They were force fed through a 2-meter rubber tube being pushed down the nose to the stomach.
Another method the Suffragettes used was disturbing meetings. On October 13, 1905, Christabel Pankhurst and Annie Kenney attended a meeting in Manchester to hear Winston Churchill. During the meeting the girls shouted out ‘will the Liberal government get votes for women?’ when Churchill refused to answer their question, they continued to repeat the question. They were then evicted from the meeting and were arrested and charged with assault.
At another meeting in Birmingham where Asquith was speaking, two Suffragettes climbed onto the roof of a nearby building and threw slates through the glass roof of the hall. They were then arrested.
The members of the NUWSS feared that the militant actions of the WSPU would alienate potential supporters of the women’s suffrage.
From the evidence above we can see that both organisations used different methods to achieve the same goal, which was to gain women the vote. The Suffragists used peaceful methods without harming anyone or anything while the Suffragettes used violence and lawless actions. The actions of the WSPU did more harm than good.
