Manchester in the 19th and 20th century was a hub of activism, a city which witnessed the mobilisation of marginalised groups who were striving for better lives. The National Society for Women’s Suffrage (NUWSS) was founded in 1867 by Manchester-born Lydia Becker; as the first national organisation dedicated to women’s suffrage, the society was fundamental to women’s enfranchisement in 1928. Becker chose to host the first public meeting of the NUWSS in Manchester’s Free Trade Hall; the hall was built on the site of the Peterloo Massacre to mark the repeal of the Corn Laws. The location of this first meeting highlights the suffrage movement’s inherently intersectional origins. Yet the organisation soon began to lose sight of its class cause, by focusing on ‘votes for ladies’, rather than ‘votes for women’.
The NUWSS called for women’s suffrage under the same terms as male enfranchisement – with property as the determining factor for one’s right to vote – but after the 1884 Representation of the People Act, the poorest 40% of men still did not have the right to vote, to the frustration of many working-class activists. Similarly, the NUWSS’ militant and violent counterpart, formed in 1903, the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU), only four years into its lifetime began to lose the support of working-class activists for the very same reason as its predecessor. By 1907, the WSPU had become increasingly undemocratic, led primarily by the middle-class Pankhursts. As the movement became more violent, with hunger strikes and vandalism, many working-class women had to step away from the cause. These women had too much to lose if they were arrested, leaving children behind, sacrificing a much-needed wage for their family. It was at this point too that the WSPU cut ties with the Labour movement which was dominant in Manchester. Organisations such as the Women’s Cooperative Guild, the Women’s Trade Union Association, and the Independent Labour Party had worked alongside the suffrage movement until this point. Second wave feminists Jill Lidington and Jill Norris conducted research in the 1970s about working class women in the suffrage movement in Lancashire and Cheshire and concluded that these women did not fit into the suffragist nor suffragette movement. By celebrating and highlighting these women, it is vital to remember the role they played in women’s suffrage. These women should not be buried beneath the middle-class actions of the NUWSS and the WSPU, they should be remembered in their own right as pioneering activists, striving for equality on all fronts.
Lily Maxwell
Maxwell was born in Scotland around 1800 and worked as a servant for a businessman in Manchester. Her success in this position enabled her to save enough to rent her own house and shop in the suburb of Chorlton-Upon-Medlock. In the 1867 Reform Act, one million more men were given the vote, as dictated by property requirements. Maxwell was mistakenly included on the Register of Electors following this act, due to her new properties. This error made Maxwell the first ever woman to vote; of course, her vote was dismissed, but the mistake prompted a campaign – led by Lydia Becker – to persuade over 5,300 other women to add their names to the electoral roll. As the first woman to cast a vote, Maxwell was the inspiration for the birth of the suffrage movement in Manchester.
Esther Roper
A middle-class woman from Manchester, Roper was the first generation in her family to graduate from Owen’s College (Manchester University) and became the secretary for the Manchester Suffrage Society. Following a campaign in 1894 to try to involve working-class women in the movement, Roper started visiting factories in Lancashire. Roper and her partner Eva Gore Booth joined forces with proclaimed ‘radical suffragists’ Sarah Reddish and Sarah Dickenson, disgruntled by the classist nature of the NUWSS, to launch a new petition in 1900, aimed exclusively at Lancashire cotton mills. By spring of 1901, their petition had 30,000 signatures, and the women had organised more than 30 open air meetings. These middle-class women continued to support their working-class peers, despite the endemic classism of the NUWSS.
Sarah Reddish
Reddish was born in Westleigh, Greater Manchester, in 1849 to a working-class family, and spent her formative years as a textile worker. Reddish became an integral member of her community, the suffrage movement, and a strong advocate for class equality. She was elected to the Bolton School Board in 1899, ran for office as a Poor Law Guardian and was involved in the organisation of the Women’s Trade Union League. Dedicated to improving the lives of working-class women, Reddish established a school in Bolton to provide support for struggling mothers, the success of which was so profound a further 8 centres were opened, and there was a significant reduction in child mortality in the town. As well as all this, Reddish served as an organiser for the North of England Society for Women’s Suffrage and aided fellow radical suffragists in involving working-class women in the movement.
Women have had the vote for almost one hundred years and many presume this success is down to the NUWSS and the WSPU; although these organisations were fundamental to the enfranchisement of women, it is vital to remember the many women these movements overshadowed and alienated. Working-class women were the backbone of the suffrage movement and should be remembered for not giving up the fight to achieve votes for women, not just for ladies.