None known

26

Single

Holly Lodge, Cradley, Malvern

WSPU

Evades

Elsie Howey was the daughter of a clergyman. She was born in Finningley, South Yorkshire, in 1884 but the family moved to Malvern after her father’s death in 1887. Her sister (see) Mary Howey was also a suffragette. She attended the University of St Andrews, studying English, French and German between 1902-1904. In February 1908 Elsie was arrested, along with her sister Mary, for taking part in a demonstration outside the House of Commons. She was sentenced to six weeks' imprisonment. In May 1908, she campaigned with Annie Kenney and Mary Blathwayt at a by-election in Shropshire. Elsie was arrested for the second time after taking part in a demonstration outside the home of Herbert Asquith. She was sentenced to three months' imprisonment. Others called her “a wonderful speaker”, but eventually her voice was damaged due to forced feeding when on hunger strike during a prison term. Elsie went to work for the WSPU in Bristol. Whilst there, she and Vera Holme hid in a large pipe organ at Colston Hall to disrupt a political meeting calling ‘Votes for Women‘ from the organ but no-one could discover where the sound was coming from. In 1909, Howey rode as Joan of Arc (see image) at the head of the procession to welcome Mrs Pethick-Lawrence on her release from Holloway Prison. Together with Vera Wentworth and Jessie Kenney, Elsie also assaulted Herbert Asquith and Herbert Gladstone on a golf course. She was criticised for this attack by WSPU supporter and the owner of Eagle House in Bath who wrote to Christabel Pankhurst that Elsie and Vera would no longer be welcome there. Eagle House belonged to the Blathwayt family and was used as a refuge by numerous suffragettes on the run from police or recovering from their treatment during terms of imprisonment. He wrote that "an attack on one undefended man by three women was an act I did not expect from the Society". Elsie had planted a tree there on 9 May, 1909. In January 1910, Constance Lytton was imprisoned and forcibly fed at Walton Gaol. In response, Howey broke the gaol governor's windows so that she too would be jailed in support. She was arrested again in 1910, in Penzance, and was on hunger strike for 144 hours. In total, she was arrested six times. It took her four months to recover from throat injuries caused by forced feeding carried out to undermine her hunger striking. It appears that Elsie evaded the government's 1911 census being absent from her family home at Holly lodge. Like many suffragettes, her life and living arrangements at this time were transient. Elsie continued her militant campaign. Her final arrest, in 1912, resulted in all her teeth being broken. In June 1913, Elsie again played the role of Joan of Arc at the funeral of Emily Wilding Davison.  Elsie died on 13 March 1963 at the Court House Nursing Home, Court Road, Malvern after a lifetime of illness. Source: https://suffragettestories.omeka.net/bio-elsie-howey & Elizabeth Crawford, The Women's Suffrage Movement: A Reference Guide, 1866-1928 (Routledge). Contributed by Herefordshire community fundraiser, Clare Wichbold MBE.