None

42

Single

15 Somerset Terrace, London

WSPU

Resists

Lady Constance Lytton (1869-1923) joined the WSPU in January 1909 and was a committed suffragette. She was imprisoned in Holloway prison for one month in February 1909 but was found to have a weak heart so began her sentence in the hospital wing, rather than the cells. During her sentence she carved the letter ‘V’ on her chest with a hairpin (with the intention of writing ‘Votes for Women’). She was arrested in October 1909 after throwing a stone at a car in Newcastle. Constance was sentenced to one month’s imprisonment and began a hunger strike. On her third day without eating, following a medical examination, her sentence was terminated, and she was released. Constance did not want the special privileges that she felt she had been given because of her family (her father had been Viceroy of India), so in January 1910 she travelled to a protest in Liverpool disguised as a seamstress named Jane Warton. She was arrested and sentenced by contrast to two weeks in the Third Division criminal class of prison. ‘Jane’ did not reveal her medical condition and went on hunger strike. She was force-fed eight times before her real identity was established and she was released. Following her release, she wrote a graphic account of her experiences for The Times and provided a report to the Home Office. The furore surrounding Constance's preferential treatment compared to lower class 'Jane' was embarrassing for the government and a publicity coup for the WSPU: though her treatment as 'Jane' took a serious toll on Constance's health. From June 1910 she was a paid organiser for the WSPU, earning £2 per week. She rented a flat near the Euston Road, where she lived at the time of the 1911 census and gave speeches around the country. She refused to give her details for the census, and they were completed by the registrar with an estimated age. After a stroke in the autumn of 1910, she became paralysed down one side, but subsequently recovered and carried on with speaking engagements. Constance’s last imprisonment was in November 1911 after she threw stones, breaking glass at a Post Office. She was sentenced to fourteen days in the First Division, but her fine was paid anonymously, and she was released, even though this was against normal suffragette policy. Another stroke in May 1912 meant that Constance moved back to Knebworth to live with her mother. She taught herself to write left-handed and wrote a book about her experiences called Prisons and Prisoners, which was published in March 1914. Constance did not take part in any more direct suffragette action but continued to hold the cause dear and was visited by many of her WSPU friends. During the First World War she worked on behalf of a range of different causes and sold many of her possessions so that she could give more money. Constance was delighted when some women were given the vote in 1918. She died in 1923, and a palm leaf in Suffragette colours was placed upon her casket by Emmeline Pethick Lawrence. For more about Constance’s life at Knebworth read my blog for Mapping Women’s Suffrage. Sources: B. Barnett-Sanders and E. Lenton (ed.) Suffrage Stories: Tales from Knebworth, Stevenage, Hitchin, and Letchworth (Stevenage: Stevenage Museum, 2019) P. Miles and J. Williams, An Uncommon Criminal (Knebworth: KHEPT, 1999) L. Jenkins, Lady Constance Lytton: Aristocrat, Suffragette, Martyr (London: Biteback, 2015). Contributed by Katherine Dunstan, Education Officer, Knebworth House Education and Preservation Trust www.knebworthhouse.com