By Tim Lambert
In the years from 1912 to 1914 Suffragettes committed crimes like vandalism and arson. They also planted bombs. However, the WSPU did not want votes for all women – only those who met a property qualification. (In Britain not all men could vote, a large minority did not have that right)
On 1 March 1912 suffragettes had a smashing time in London. About 150 women with hammers hidden in bags went to famous streets like Oxford Street, The Strand, and Regent Street and smashed shop and office windows. The damage was estimated at £5,000. (A huge amount of money in 1912 equivalent to hundreds of thousands of pounds today). The police arrested 124 suffragettes.
On 18 July 1912 Suffragettes attempted to set fire to the Theatre Royal in Dublin.
On 19 February 1913, a bomb exploded at the summer house that was being built for Chancellor David Lloyd George, at Walton-on-the-Hill in Surrey.
On 20 February 1913 suffragettes burned down the tea pavilion in Kew Gardens, London. Twelve days before they destroyed three orchid glasshouses, including the orchids. The tea pavilion was actually owned by two women. But the suffragettes were unrepentant about destroying other women’s livelihoods. They said they were fighting a war and combatants might have to suffer.
On 10 March 1913 Suffragettes burned down Saunderton Railway Station in Buckinghamshire. They also burned down Croxley Green Railway Station in Hertfordshire.
On the night of the 19th-20th March 1913 Suffragettes burned down Trevethan, a house, near Egham, in Surrey.
On 5 April 1914 Suffragettes bombed St-Martin-in-the-Fields Church in Trafalgar Square in London
On 11 April 1913 Suffragettes burned down a cricket pavilion at Nevill Athletic Ground in Tunbridge Wells.
On 13 April 1913 Suffragettes burned down Levetleigh House at St Leonards, in Sussex.
On 17 April 1913, a railway porter discovered a bomb at Aberdeen Railway Station. The fuse was a lighted candle. Fortunately, he managed to extinguish the candle and prevent the bomb from exploding.
On 23 April 1913, a bomb placed by suffragettes exploded in the Free Trade Hall in Manchester.
On 26 April 1913 Suffragettes burned a parked train in Teddington.
On 2 May 1913, a parcel containing nitroglycerine was discovered at Picadilly Underground Station. Fortunately, it was dealt with before it exploded.
On 6 May 1913 Suffragettes burned down St Catherine’s Church in Hatcham, London.
On 7 May 1913 suffragettes placed a bomb in St Pauls Cathedral in London. Luckily staff found it before it exploded.
On 20 May 1913 Suffragettes bombed the Royal Observatory in Edinburgh.
On 8 June 1913 Suffragettes set fire to the Grand Stand at Hurst Park Racecourse, West Molesey in Surrey. Fireman fought the blaze for hours but the building was gutted.
On 11 November 1913 Suffragettes bombed the cactus house in Alexandra Park in Manchester.
On 15 December 1913 suffragettes used dynamite to try and blow up the wall of Holloway prison. They did not succeed but the prison wall was badly damaged. (Suffragettes were held in Holloway for arson, smashing windows, etc.)
On 24 January 1914 Suffragettes bombed Kibble Palace in Glasgow’s Botanic Gardens.
On 12 February 1914 Suffragettes burned down Northfield Library in Birmingham.
On 10 March 1914, a suffragette named Mary Richardson vandalized a famous painting, Rokeby Venus, by Velázquez with a meat cleaver while it hung in the National Gallery in London. She slashed the painting several times.
On 9 April 1914, a Suffragette named Clara Lambert smashed Chinese porcelain cups and a saucer in the British Museum.
On 6 May 1914, a Suffragette named Mary Wood attacked a portrait of Henry James with a meat cleaver.
On 23 May 1914 Suffragettes smashed a glass case holding a mummy in the British Museum.
On 11 June 1914 a bomb placed by suffragettes by the coronation chair in Westminster Abbey, London exploded. Fortunately, nobody was hurt.
On 8 July 1914 Suffragettes attempted to bomb Burns Cottage, the birthplace of the Scottish poet Robert Burns.
On 11 July 1914, a bomb exploded in Rosslyn Chapel in Edinburgh.
On 17 July 1914, a Suffragette damaged a portrait of Thomas Carlyle in the National Portrait Gallery with a meat cleaver.
Suffragettes also poured acid and other chemicals into post boxes to destroy mail. Thousands of letters were damaged or destroyed. On 7 February 1913, a postman named Arthur Stockwell suffered burns to his hand after emptying a pillar box that had been vandalised with sulphuric acid on Fulham Road, Chelsea.
The Suffragettes also cut telephone and telegraph wires in several places. On 8 February 1913, they cut telephone wires in Scotland between Glasgow and Kilmarnock.
The Suffragettes stopped their campaign of arson, bombing, and vandalism when the First World War began in August 1914.
In 1918 all men in Britain were given the vote. So were women over 30 who met a property qualification. Finally, in 1928 all women were given the right to vote at the age of 21 – the same as men.
