39 Constance Lytton to Aunt T, 19 August 1888 in Betty Balfour (ed.), Letters of Constance Lytton, p. 10.
40 Votes for Women, 24 October, 1909, quoted in Jill Liddington, Vanishing for the Vote: suffrage, citizenship and the battle for the census (Manchester University Press, 2014), p. 71.
41 Constance Lytton to Teresa Earle, August 1888, in Betty Balfour (ed.), Letters of Constance Lytton, p. 11.
42 Constance Lytton, speech at the Queen’s Hall on 31 January 1910, quoted in Cheryl R. Jorgensen-Earp, Speeches and Trials of the Militant Suffragettes, p. 107.
43 Michelle Myall, Flame and Burnt Offering, p. 94.
44 Ray Strachey, The Cause: A Short History of the Women’s Movement in Great Britain (G. Bell & Sons, 1928), p. 305.
45 Constance Lytton to Teresa Earle, 12 April 1909, in Betty Balfour (ed.), Letters of Constance Lytton, p. 163.
46 Alice Kedge quoted in Joyce Marlow, Votes for Women: The Virago Book of Suffragettes, p. 80.
47 Margaret Haig, This Was My World, p. 120, quoted in Krista Cowman, Women of the Right Spirit, p. 26.
48 Votes for Women, 25 June 1908, quoted in Katherine Connelly, Sylvia Pankhurst, p. 35.
49 Martin Pugh, The Pankhursts, p. 164.
50 Krista Cowman, Women of the Right Spirit, p. 18.
51 Neville Lytton, The English Country Gentleman, p. 268.
52 Constance Lytton to Teresa Earle, 30 November 1908, GD433/2/337/114–116 Balfour Papers, National Archives of Scotland,
53 Constance Lytton to Herbert Gladstone, 21 December 1908, British Library Add MSS 46066/200.
54 Constance Lytton to Teresa Earle, 24 December 1908, in Betty Balfour (ed.), Letters of Constance Lytton, p. 155.
55 Constance Lytton to Annie Kenney, 14 December 1908, KP/AK/2/LyttonC/3.
56 Jessie Kenney’s unpublished autobiography, KP/JK/4/2/2/3.
57 Constance Lytton, ‘No Votes for Women: A Reply to Some Recent Publications’ (Fitfield, 1909), p. 23.
58 Constance Lytton, ‘No Votes for Women’, p. 30.
59 Constance Lytton, ‘No Votes for Women’, p. 26.
60 Constance Lytton, ‘No Votes for Women’, p. 31.
61 Constance Lytton to Betty Balfour, 9 January 1909, Balfour Papers, National Archives of Scotland, GD/433/2/338/7.
CHAPTER SIX
HOLLOWAY
‘The poor prisoner, when she entered Holloway, dropped, as it were, into a tomb. No letters and no visitors were allowed for the first month of a sentence … kept in solitary confinement in a narrow, dimly lit cell, twenty-three hours out of the twenty-four.’ 1
Constance was ready to take the next step and become a militant herself. On 28 January 1909, she wrote to Emmeline Pankhurst, offering herself up for the next deputation of women who would attempt to petition the Prime Minister. She was accepted and did not have long to wait. The King’s Speech, on 16 February, made no mention of women’s suffrage, and Christabel immediately wrote to The Times to announce their intention to pay Asquith a visit. ‘Upon his attitude to this deputation the future policy of the Union will depend.’2 In the meantime, Muriel Matters hired an airship emblazoned with ‘Votes for Women’ and sailed over London, while Jessie Kenney, discovering that postal regulations allowed people to be sent through the mail, posted two ‘human letters’ to Downing Street. There was still room for a sense of humour and a sensational gesture.
Elsewhere, Constance was making her first faltering attempts to become a speaker for the cause. Speakers were sent all around the country to address meetings of assembled suffragettes, to inspire them on to greater service. Sometimes opponents came along to heckle them, but Constance didn’t mind this, since it sharpened her sense of the just righteousness of the cause and of the suffragettes as David fighting a Goliath of public hostility. Those who came out of the meetings as converts or even recruits made it all worthwhile. Constance was not a natural orator, unlike the Pankhursts or even her brother. But she screwed up her courage, and was determined to practise. ‘I always “perorate” on origin of “nobility”, and spirit of suffragette motto “To defend the oppressed, to fight for the defenceless, not counting the cost”, and that always unites the audience in loud approval,’ she told Betty.3 Back at home, there was an awkward encounter with Margot Asquith in which she tried to prove ‘I was still same-as-Con – not a maniac, or wild’un’. Both of them were nervous, and made difficult small talk before getting down to business. ‘She most civil and sympathetic … but I felt she did not really want to hear.’4 Adela’s infant son died of meningitis at this time; Constance represented her at the funeral as Adela could not bring herself to go.5 She was also arranging the English publication of Olive Schreiner’s latest work, which came out as A Closer Union in 1909.6
On 24 February, Constance headed for London without breathing a word of her plans to her mother. Her letter home makes clear how much her mother depended on her for all things practical: ‘The account papers, tradesmen addresses, wages paper are in the lift-up place of desk on dining-room writing table,’ she wrote. ‘I expect I shall be away from you a month. The others will cling round you. If I were going on a trip abroad you would not resent the separation. In my little warm nest in Holloway my only thought of the outer world will be of you.’7 It’s a curious mix of reassurance and wilfulness. She cannot have thought for a second that Edith would be mollified by the idea that a prison sentence was anything like ‘a trip abroad’.
This was the dramatic evening described in the preface. It wasn’t an especially violent night by suffragette standards, though for the innocent Constance it was yet another eye-opening experience. Her new-found sense of solidarity with working-class women permeated even the tumult of her first protest. From among the jeers in the crowd, one remark cut through to her: ‘Go home and do your washing.’ That has echoes even today in the way that women who get ideas above their station are told to get back to the kitchen. Constance, of course, had never had to work in her kitchen or do her own laundry. But she loved cleaning, as we have seen, and she was fascinated by washing. ‘If there is one single industry highly deserving of recognition throughout the world of human existence and of representation under parliamentary systems, it is surely that of the washers, the renewers week by week, the makers clean.’8 That was enough to keep her fixed on her goal throughout the evening.
After her arrest, Constance’s emotions were in turmoil. She was filled with pride, with a sense of unity with her sisters and a belief in the importance of her work. On the one hand: ‘For the first time in my life I felt of some use; since we were all so different from each other, it seemed we could each contribute something to the general solidarity of experience, of opinion, of conduct.’
And yet, on the other:
I felt, for about the fiftieth time that I had come in touch with the WSPU, ashamed of myself in their presence … some had to face a situation in their homes more distressing even than my own. My little share of difficulty and sacrifice, of risk and dread, which had completely filled my horizon for so many weeks, seemed insignificant enough now.9
What lengths would she have to go to in order to truly feel she was one of them?
Constance was allowed to return home before her trial and sentence but she had been so caught up in the excitement, she hadn’t organised a place to stay. The only place she could think of was Betty’s house and towards midnight, dropping with exhaustion, she made it to safety. Betty was out, having gone to a play, but Emily was there and reported Constance’s state to Edwin.
I said jokily ‘Are you arrested?’ and she said yes. She was in an awful state of exhaustion and collapse with a racking headache, but happily we got her hot water and bottles, and she recovered … how she did it all I can’t imagine. Betty came in at 12 o’c. and we had a good talk till about 1, when I went to bed, and we put Con to bed, but I am afraid she got no sleep, but Bets rubbed her and was with her, and we were so happy we could be together.10
The next day, Constance re
turned to Bow Street Magistrates’ Court to be sentenced, accompanied by Betty. She was one of a dozen suffragettes on trial, including Emmeline Pethick-Lawrence. One or two others, including Daisy Solomon and Rose Lamartine Yates, would become comrades and correspondents in the future. Constance stood in the dock, utterly unashamed, and triumphant. She said that she ‘was more proud to be able to stand by her friends … than of anything else she had done in her life’. She said that the suffragettes must have an opportunity of making their case, however much the government wanted to ignore them.11 Constance got her reward in the form of a blessing from Christabel Pankhurst herself.
She said ‘thank you,’ and seemed grateful for my share in the day’s work. This was a most unlooked-for honour and joy, from that moment I felt a very privileged and happy person. The sound of her voice and the look in her eyes remained stamped upon my mind, and played the part of a sort of consolation whenever the trials of imprisonment weighed upon my spirits.12
There was no keeping her name or her face out of the paper now. The photo of her in the Daily Mirror took up half a page. Beatrice Webb saw her and was moved to write to Betty:
It is magnificent and it is war. That is what I felt when I saw that Lady Constance had been taken up. She has done emphatically the right thing, because she is the right person to do it, with her charm and refinement, and also her delicacy, and last, but not least, her name.13
Emily and Betty were determined to stand by her, as was Neville. ‘Her action is one of real courage and courage is the rarest and noblest of all human qualities. I am sure father would have been proud of her as no-one knew better than he the value of courage,’ he wrote to Edith.
I think also that her action, in view of the natural timidity and delicacy and horror of publicity, will do a great deal for the cause which she has at least. She is so little like the typical tub thumper that her strength at this moment will astonish her friends and enemies and will prove what a splendid thing faith is which overcomes all difficulties.14
Betty also wrote to The Times, challenging their coverage of the deputation. Their reporter said the women had been scratching and pushing the police, as well as doling out ‘a vigorous if totally ineffective and unimpressive lashing of the tongue of sarcasm and abuse’; none of this had come up in court and in fact the police had testified that the women were quiet and orderly after arrest.15 Given that Constance always stressed her isolation, it is important to remember that, in fact, her siblings did their best to be loyal and supportive: they only disagreed with her on the necessity of violence.
Having committed herself to going to prison, she was as excited as a child going on a school trip to finally get there. She was thrilled to discover that she was able to indulge her love of cleaning. What the other women dreaded or accepted as inevitable, Constance embraced as a treat. Her biggest concern during these first few days was that she would have to get up early, because she was not a morning person. Constance enjoyed making fun of herself and her naivety at these moments, but as the academic Marie Mulvey-Roberts points out, her use of humour may well be a way of keeping trauma at bay; making light of an experience means that she can contain it, not be consumed by it.16
Despite her determination to avoid special treatment, she sometimes gave in to temptation. The brutality of her arrest was still affecting her health, and she asked to be allowed to follow her vegetarian diet and wear flannel underwear to keep warm. Outside the prison, Victor had demanded to see the head of the Prisons Commissioners and then insisted that she also be allowed flannel bedsocks. Constance also allowed herself to receive a letter from Edith and a visit from Betty. Her response to that visit gives some sense of the utter loneliness and uncertainty that she could barely allow herself to acknowledge lest it defeat her. ‘The joy of it’ – seeing Betty – ‘seems so exaggerated, I cannot trust myself to convey it,’ she wrote in Prisons and Prisoners.17 But Constance was in so much emotional confusion that instead of conveying her delight she somehow managed to tell her sister off. Her inability to put this right caused her great anguish in the many silent hours ahead.
Constance was unpleasantly surprised to find herself at first in the prison hospital instead of the ordinary cells. This was not part of her plan at all. The hospital patients were waited on hand and foot by other prisoners, whereas Constance ‘wanted to share the lot of the bulk of my Suffragette companions … to know from my own experience the routine life of ordinary prisoners’.18 It seemed to be an effort on the part of the authorities to keep their aristocratic inmate away from the routine degradations of ordinary prison life. The one advantage of being kept apart was that she shared the hospital wing with Emmeline Pethick-Lawrence, who took the opportunity to instruct her disciple, telling stories of suffragette heroism and derring-do. Emmeline wasn’t ill either: she was being isolated from the other suffragettes so that they didn’t rally around her and use her as a focus for rebellion. One night, Emmeline recited some of Olive Schreiner’s Dreams, attracting a rapt audience and reminding Constance not only of her beloved Olive but also her father: Dreams had been one of Robert’s favourites.19
But Constance was determined to prove to the authorities that she was well enough to be sent to ordinary prison. She refused the extra food offered to hospital patients and stubbornly slept on a mattress on the floor instead of a bed. When that failed, she decided on a more dramatic course of action. She would scratch the words ‘Votes for Women’ across herself.
The first problem was to find something to do it with: she decided she couldn’t spare a hairpin. She managed to squirrel away a blunt needle and began her work. She managed a ‘V’ over her heart and then eyed it dubiously. ‘I remained in doubt as to whether my evil deed had been sufficiently impressive.’20 Eventually she decided, with ‘a craftsman’s satisfaction’, that it would do: she demanded a plaster and some action. If she was not released to join her comrades in the prison itself, she would continue to scratch at herself, ensuring that when she was released her face would be scarred and she would tell the world why. The prison authorities gave in and discharged her from the hospital. They had not listened when she had tried to reason with them: they only responded to violence. Constance believed the same principle would apply to the broader struggle.
Though it pales in comparison to her later acts as Jane Warton, and though she executed it poorly, this act of self-mutilation was an extraordinary thing for Constance to do. This was a woman crippled by shyness, who hated to be the centre of attention, and here she was, demanding to be looked at. It was also, I believe, a unique act: I have not found any other references to suffragettes who cut themselves in this way.21
Prison was an anthropology experiment for Constance. It was a chance to become immersed in the lives of some of the most wretched women in society. The suffragettes were not kept apart from ordinary prisoners. These prisoners were nothing like the working-class women who lived around the estate at Knebworth: they were from slums where the poverty was beyond anything Constance had experienced or could imagine. ‘Their faces wore an expression of extreme dejection; the lifeless, listless way they walked, enhanced the lack of entire detachment of one from the other; in spite of being so closely herded each seemed in a world of her own individual sorrow.’ She was moved both by their sheer numbers and their accumulated weight of misery and also by a few individuals with particularly heartbreaking stories. By and large, Constance saw these women as victims of circumstance who needed ‘the opportunity to mend their own lives, better conditions of work, fairer payment, and above all a more honourable recognition of their service as women’ – in short, everything that they lacked because they could not vote. The suffragette cause was vital to helping these women. ‘I thought of them as beads of a necklace, detached, helpless and useless, and wondered how long it would be before they were threaded together by means of the women’s movement into a great organised band.’22 Her ability to empathise with, rather than judge, these women is striking. But there is a
lso some truth to Neville’s view that ‘Conny believed there was no such thing as a genuine criminal; she thought that all imprisonment was the result of miscarriage of justice, or defective education, or the vicious constitution of society’.23 She could not see their flaws as well as their strengths, and so failed to see them as real people.
Nevertheless, Constance believed that working-class women were worth much more than women of her own class. Their experience was authentic, their problems were genuine and they needed a political voice much more than she did. Compared with them, the women of her class lived ‘futile, superficial, sordidly useless lives, quarrelling in their marriage market, revelling in their petty triumphs, concerned continually with money … they are the dross, the dead fruit … they act upon the social organism in a way that is almost wholly harmful’.24 This is strong condemnation for her friends, acquaintances and even her sisters.
But she did not, and would never, condemn the individual wardresses who worked in the prison. She did not blame them for their unkindnesses or abruptness: she understood that these were women who were a product of a brutal system. Unlike nearly all the other prisoners – Emmeline Pethick-Lawrence being, perhaps, the only other exception – Constance was from a class far above the wardresses: in different circumstances, they would have been taking her orders and this influenced the way she treated them. One wardress suffered from a constant, hacking cough, and Constance, sympathetic to nagging illnesses, proposed to help by rubbing the woman’s chest. She saw nothing wrong or inappropriate in her suggestion. She also made elaborate and secret plans to meet with one of the wardresses once she was free. This came to nothing, perhaps because the wardress was scared of discovery.
While prison was as grim and bleak as Constance had expected, she was not prepared for the mental and emotional toll that the experience took on her. She usually enjoyed silence and solitude, but now talking was entirely forbidden and conversations were conducted in hurried whispers. She fell prey to a ‘morbid depression of spirits’ and found prison ‘gave one the feeling of belonging to a race apart, something degraded and imbecile, despised not only for the particular crime one had committed but as an all-round inferior being’. She was saved from being overwhelmed by remaining outside her own experience. ‘I in no sense regarded myself as a criminal, and was aware of a detached spectator’s commentary running through my mind,’25 she wrote in Prisons and Prisoners. She had to maintain this sense of herself as an observer, a stranger gathering notes to report back to the outside world, in order to survive.
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