Suffrage Spotlight Archives

Gertrude Baillie-Weaver: anti-vivisectionist, suffrage campaigner, theosophist

If she is remembered at all Gertrude Baillie-Weaver is best known as the author G Colmore (George or Gertrude Colmore) whose 1911 novel Suffragette Sally was republished by Pandora Press …

Spotlight on…Flora Drummond

Flora McKinnon Drummond (1878–1949) (née Gibson) was born in Manchester and brought up on the Isle of Arran. After leaving school at the age of fourteen, she qualified as a …

Spotlight On…Helen Margaret Nightingale (1883-1921)

I recently re-read Helen Margaret Nightingale’s suffrage play, A Change of Tenant. The play was often performed at meetings and fund raisers by suffrage societies, and was also produced by …

Spotlight on…Mabel Harriette Cross, Suffragist

Usually referred to as Mrs W C H Cross, she was born Mabel Harriette Duncan in Bristol in 1872. Her mother was Adelaide, and her father, Edward Duncan, was a …

Spotlight On…George Abraham Gibbs (1873–1931)

Tyntesfield, near Wraxall, North Somerset This is the view from our picnic spot when we had a day out at Tyntesfield just outside Bristol recently. Tyntesfield is now …

Spotlight On…Mr and Mrs F W Rogers of Bristol

Frederick William Rogers (1859–1927), who ran a firm of Bristol stone masons, and Blanche Mary Rogers (1866–1951), were married at St Mary Redcliffe in Bristol in 1889. They were supporters …

“Madder than ever”: The Tollemache Family of Batheaston

In 1894 Reverend Clement Reginald Tollemache (1835–1895) moved to The Villa, Batheaston with his wife, Frances Josephine, and three daughters, Mary, Grace and Aethel. The family had been living in …

Spotlight on…Adela Pankhurst (1885-1961)

…governess, she was shipped off to Australia in 1914. Here her career traced a trajectory from socialist to conservative, with several imprisonments along the way. Initially she worked for feminist,…

Spotlight On: Mabel Tothill 1869-1964

Mabel Tothill was a Quaker, a tireless worker for social reform , and a non-militant suffragist. She was born in Liverpool and her family moved to Bristol when her father …

Spotlight On…Cicely Hamilton

I’m so excited about my latest book purchase I just have to share it! I’ve just acquired a copy of Cicely Hamilton’s autobiography, Life Errant (London: J M Dent and …

Spotlight on Reginald McKenna (1863-1943): The Man who Introduced the Cat and Mouse Act

Reginald McKenna, the man who introduced the infamous “Cat and Mouse Act”, was Home Secretary from 1911 to 1915. Born into a Catholic family in London, he later converted to …

Spotlight on…Mrs Humphry Ward (1851 – 1920)

In 1915 the best-selling novelist Mrs Mary Humphrey Ward published Delia Blanchflower. In many ways it’s typical romantic fare: a stern guardian to a wilful young heiress must save her …