Christabel Pankhurst
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Dame Christabel Harriette Pankhurst DBE (September 22, 1880 – February 13, 1958) was a suffragette born in Manchester, England.
Christabel was the daughter of the lawyer Dr. Richard Pankhurst and suffragette Emmeline Pankhurst, and a sister of Sylvia Pankhurst and Adela Pankhurst. Along with her mother Emmeline and others, Christabel co-founded the Women's Social and Political Union (WPSU) in 1903. In 1905, Christabel Pankhurst interrupted a Liberal Party meeting by shouting demands for voting rights for women. She was arrested and along with fellow suffragette Annie Kenney went to prison rather than pay a fine as punishment for their outburst. Their case gained much media interest and the ranks of the WSPU swelled following their trial. Emmeline began to take more militant action for the suffragette cause after her daughter's arrest and was herself imprisoned on many occasions for her principles.
In 1906, Christabel Pankhurst obtained a law degree from the University of Manchester and moved to the London headquarters of the WPSU, where she was appointed its organising secretary. Earning the nickname "Queen of the Mob", Christabel was jailed again in 1907 in Parliament Square and 1909 after the "Rush Trial" at Bow Street. Between 1912 and 1913 she lived in Paris, France to escape imprisonment under the terms of the Prisoner's (Temporary Discharge for Ill-Health) Act better known as the Cat and Mouse Act. The start of World War I compelled Christabel to return to England in 1913, where she was again arrested. Christabel engaged in a hunger strike, ultimately serving only 30 days of a three-year sentence.
She was influential in the WSPUs 'anti-male' phase after the failure of the Conciliation Bills, she wrote a book called The Great Scourge and How to End It on the subject of sexually transmitted diseases and how sexually equality (votes for women) would help the fight against these diseases. [1]
After women were granted the right to vote at the end of World War I, Christabel ran as a Women's Party candidate, in alliance with the Lloyd George/Conservative Coalition in Smethwick and Westminster but was narrowly defeated.
Leaving her native England, she moved to the United States where she eventually became an evangelist.
She was appointed a Dame Commander of the British Empire in 1936.
Christabel Pankhurst died in Los Angeles, California at the age of 77, and was buried in the Woodlawn Memorial Cemetery in Santa Monica, California.
[edit] Further reading
- Pressing Problems of the Closing Age by Christabel Pankhurst (Morgan & Scott Ltd., 1924)
- The World's Unrest: Visions of the Dawn by Christabel Pankhurst (Morgan & Scott Ltd., 1926)
- Queen Christabel by David Mitchell (MacDonald and Jane's Publisher Ltd., 1977) ISBN 0-354-04152-5
- Sylvia and Christabel Pankhurst by Barbara Castle (Penguin Books, 1987) ISBN 0-14-008762-3
[edit] See also
- Pankhurst Centre in Manchester
