The standard answer is Mrs Pankhurst and her law-breaking suffragettes. The credit really belongs elsewhere, as Alistair Lexden explained in the main letter published in The Daily Telegraph on December 21.
SIR--We do not need more statues to Emmeline Pankhurst, the Tory candidate for Whitechapel at the time of her death in 1928 (“Pankhurst statue gets Government backing”, December 18). She is quite adequately commemorated by the well-known statue beside the Houses of Parliament, unveiled by her friend Stanley Baldwin who gave all women over 21 the vote, in the face of strong opposition from Winston Churchill.
The historian of the campaign for women’s suffrage, Professor Martin Pugh, has pointed out that the Pankhursts and their militant suffragettes “remained a small part of the movement.” It was led by Millicent Fawcett, head of the law-abiding suffragists, some 100,000 strong. By 1897 they had won round the majority of MPs. Tories were overwhelmingly in favour.
Legislation was not passed because of the unyielding antipathy of Liberal Party leaders, particularly HH Asquith. The antics of the suffragettes played into their hands, stiffening resistance to votes for women among the existing male electorate.
Millicent Fawcett has always had the strongest claim to a statue. Now, at last, she is to have one. It will be unveiled in Parliament Square next November, the centenary of the first votes cast by women, those over 30. The existing design shows her holding an inflammatory placard. She would have discarded it, and so must the sculptor.
Lord Lexden
London SW1