She was imprisoned eight times for offences including assault and stone-throwing. Emily Wilding DavisonĮmily Wilding Davison was particularly committed to 'deeds not words', notably hiding in the House of Commons on a number of occasions, including on Census night in April 1911 when she spent the night in a cupboard in the Chapel of St Mary Undercroft in order to state 'House of Commons' as her address on her census return. There were further Conciliation Bills proposed in subsequent years but they failed to resolve the situation. Following its failure there were violent clashes outside Parliament. The bill was written to extend voting rights to women but failed to become law. In 1910, a Conciliation Bill was read in Parliament. The hunger strike/force feeding process then began all over again. This permitted the early release of women who had become so ill as a result of their hunger strike that they were at risk of death but required that they return to prison when their health was better to continue their sentence. The Prisoners' Temporary Discharge for Ill-Health Act, also known as 'The Cat and Mouse Act' was passed in 1913. When imprisoned, suffragettes would go on hunger strike, leading to the authorities force-feeding women in prison, a dangerous and humiliating treatment which provided the suffragettes with powerful propaganda. Stephen's Hall in the Houses of Parliament. She had been arrested for damaging a wall in St. The first hunger strike was undertaken by Marion Wallace Dunlop in 1909 as a protest when she was not given political prisoner status in prison.

Deeds not words helen pankhurst