Suffragettes

Perhaps 17th December is a little too soon to be blogging about what 2018 might bring, but I thought it might be an idea to give some advance warning that 2018 is going to be looking back 100 years, to the Representation of the People Act (6th February), which led to an increase from 8 million folk being allowed to vote, to about 21 million. 

Over on the UK Parliament website, they explain that only 58% of adult men had the vote prior to 1918, this being restricted to property and landowners, and excluded many members of the armed forces who might not have been resident in Britain for the full 12 months before an election.

The Representation of the People Act gave the vote to all men over the age of 21, all male armed forces personnel over the age of 19, and women of property, over the age of 30 were also given the vote. Nevertheless, there was still inequality which was finally sorted with the Equal Franchise Act of 1928 (2nd July), when all women over the age of 21 were enabled to vote. 

A couple of pages from the 1918 Act are available here.

Leicester have been fortunate enough to have been awarded some money to use for celebratory and commemorative events in the coming year, along with 6 other cities - Manchester, Leeds, Bolton, Bristol, London and Nottingham. A prominent Leicester Suffragette was Alice Hawkins, who died in 1946, and in whose honour a new statue is being sculpted and will probably be erected in Leicester's new Market Square in February 2018. There's some more information about the sculptor here, and a bit more about the location here. 

There's plenty of information out there about Alice, like this comprehensive website, and a book about the lady in question: Whitmore, Richard (2007). Alice Hawkins and the Suffragette movement in Edwardian Leicester. Breedon Books. There's also an interesting website in the making on which we'll be able to search for local events during 2018.

Talking of local - well, this is a Loughborough-focussed blog, after all - we had our own Suffragettes in Loughborough, Nora and Kathleen Corcoran, daughters of Dr Corcoran. There's a bit more information on them by Mike Shuker in East Midlands History and Heritage, Issue 3, July 2016, pp. 17-19, and an article in the Loughborough Echo of March 2016. I believe there is some connection between the sisters and a fire at the Red House on Burton Walks - oops, better not mention the Red House, about which I was going to blog, ummm, over a year ago (sorry).

Anyway, next year will see many events taking place in Loughborough in commemoration of the Suffragettes and their protests, including exhibitions, talks and other special moments. 

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Dyer, Lynne (2017). Snowy Loughborough. Available from: https://lynneaboutloughborough.blogspot.com/2017/12/suffragettes.html [Accessed 17 December 2017]

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Lynne