Mary Gawthorpe

Mary Eleanor Gawthorpe (1881-1973) was a British suffragette, socialist, trade unionist and editor, described by Rebecca West as "a merry militant saint".. She was born to John Gawthorpe, a British leatherworker, and Annie Eliza (Mountain) Gawthorpe. Her mother, Annie, at a very young age worked at a mill until her older sister offered her a position as an assistant. Mary Gawthorpe had four siblings, the baby and eldest sister died within a year of each other due to pneumonia when Mary was seven years of age, and the other two, Annie Gatenby and James Arthur, survived to adulthood.

After qualifying as a teacher in her native Leeds Mary became a socialist and was active in the local branch of the National Union of Teachers. She became increasingly involved in the Women's Suffrage movement. In 1905, she joined the WSPU; then in 1906, she left teaching to become a full-time, paid organiser for the Women's Social and Political Union in Leeds. One of her first assignments within the WSPU was to join Christabel Pankhurst in Wales, where she drew upon her own working-class background and involvement in the labor movement. At the meeting in Wales, organized by Samuel Evans, who was up for reelection as Welsh representative in Parliament, Mary Gawthorpe, in perfect Welsh, had worried Evans by putting questions to him in his own language at his own meetings. The chairman at the meeting started the Welsh National Anthem, but Mary turned this to her advantage by leading the singing in her rich voice which "won the hearts of the people still more." Due to Mary's beautiful singing and powerful oratory skills, Samuel Evans left the meeting in anguish, which caused his friends to never mention Mary Gawthorpe to him, and his wife kepti him at home the next time there was a suffrage debate at the House of Commons.

Mary also spoke at national events including a rally in Hyde Park in 1908 attended by over 200,000 people. In the spring of 1907, Mary organized an open-air meeting during the Rutlland by-election campaign. While standing on a wagon - accompanied by several other ladies - while a crowd of "noisy youths began to throw up peppermint 'bull's eyes' and other hard-boiled sweets." Undeterred by the rowdy children, due in part to her time as a schoolteacher, she retorted "Sweets to the sweet," with a smile on her face and continued her argument until a pot-egg, thrown from the crowd hit her on the head and she fell conscious. She was carried away but returned the next day, like a "true Suffragette," quite undaunted and the incident and her "plucky spirit, made her the Heroine of the Election."

...
Wikipedia