Emmeline Pankhurst

Emmeline Pankhurst (1858-1928), British suffrage leader, who led the movement to win the vote for women in Britain. Born Emmeline Goulden in Manchester, she studied (1873-77) at the École Normale in Paris. In 1879 she married Richard Marsden Pankhurst, a barrister, who worked with her to promote equality for women. In 1889 she was one of the founders of the Women's Franchise League, which five years later succeeded in promoting passage of a law granting women the right to vote in local elections. In 1903 she founded the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU) in Manchester. The group came to prominence when Pankhurst moved its headquarters to London, held public meetings, and led protest marches to the House of Commons. Becoming increasingly militant, she was arrested and sentenced to prison terms several times between 1908 and 1913. During her periods in jail she used the hunger strike as a means of protest.

The beginnings of World War I in 1914 prompted Pankhurst and the WSPU to cease their campaign and devote themselves to war work. Pankhurst died in London on June 14, 1928, a few weeks after British women were granted full voting rights. See also Woman Suffrage.