Holloway Prison, London.

The movement for women’s suffrage took many forms and involved many different groups and societies. The National Union of Women’s suffrage Societies (NUWSS) campaigned peacefully and aided the movement by signing petitions and publishing pamphlets and newspapers. The women involved in peaceful actions were known as suffragists. Organizations such as the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU) and the Women’s Tax Resistance League (WTRL), resorted to more violent actions such as setting fires, vandalizing property, and hassling government officials.

Holloway Prison, London. Clemence Housman Is Incarcerated for Tax Evasion.

The movement for women’s suffrage took many forms and involved many different groups and societies. The National Union of Women’s suffrage Societies (NUWSS) campaigned peacefully and aided the movement by signing petitions and publishing pamphlets and newspapers. The women involved in peaceful actions were known as suffragists. Organizations such as the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU) and the Women’s Tax Resistance League (WTRL), resorted to more violent actions such as setting fires, vandalizing property, and hassling government officials.

Clemence and Laurence Housman Found The Suffrage Atelier - 1909

Since the publication of Mary Wollstonecraft’s feminist text, Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792), the women’s movement in Britain had grown exponentially. In the 1830s, the women’s movement turned their attention to women’s suffrage, with various groups dedicated to enfranchisement forming by the 1860s. The inability to vote meant women had few rights in comparison to men. As a result, the vote quickly became a symbol of civil and gender inequality that impassioned Victorian women across Britain.

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