Suffragette Planners and Plotters

This true story about the British fight for women’s suffrage “looks at the tumultuous relationship between two couples who led the militant movement” (Publishers Weekly).

In early twentieth-century England, Emmeline Pethick-Lawrence was treasurer of the Women’s Social and Political Union, founded by the famed militant Mrs. Pankhurst. Emmeline’s husband, Fred, was the only man to achieve leadership status in the organization. Without their wealth, determination, and skills we might never have heard of the suffragettes—yet the couple has been largely forgotten while Mrs. Pankhurst and her daughters are still renowned.

Emmeline was always at Mrs. Pankhurst’s side, while Fred was the ‘Godfather’ who stood bail for a thousand women. Both were imprisoned and force-fed. They provided the militant movement with its home and much of its vision, and it was their associates who initiated the hunger strike and who brought force-feeding to national attention. But in 1912, the couple was dramatically ousted from the organization by the Pankhursts in a move that has often been misrepresented. This book is the first in-depth portrait of the couple and their relationship with the Pankhursts—and of their inspirational fight not just for the vote for women but for freedom and equality across the world.