Gathered Leaves: From the Prose of Mary E. Coleridge. With a Memoir by Edith Sichel.

SICHEL, Edith. [Mary E. Coleridge; Emily Duval].

$300.00

Item Number: 134052

London: Constable and Company, 1910.

First edition of this collection of the prose of Mary Elizabeth Coleridge from the library of militant English suffragette Emily Duval. Octavo, original cloth, engraved frontispiece portrait of Coleridge. From the library of Emily Duval, although not marked. English suffragette Emily Duval was a militant petitioner in the fight for women’s voting rights and was imprisoned on six occasions. Her daughter, Elsie Duval, was also arrested many times throughout her life and in 1913 became the first woman to be released from Holloway Prison under the so-called ‘Cat and Mouse Act’. In very good condition.

In 1872, the fight for women’s suffrage became a national movement in England with the formation of the National Society for Women’s Suffrage and later the more influential National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies (NUWSS). In addition to England, women’s suffrage movements in Wales, Scotland and other parts of the United Kingdom gained momentum. By 1906, the movements had begun to shift popular sentiments and a militant campaign began with the formation of the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU). Known as the suffragettes, its membership and policies were tightly controlled by Emmeline Pankhurst and her daughters Christabel and Sylvia (although Sylvia was eventually expelled). The WSPU membership became known for civil disobedience and direct action. It heckled politicians, held demonstrations and marches, broke the law to force arrests, broke windows in prominent buildings, set fire to post boxes, committed night-time arson of unoccupied houses and churches, and—when imprisoned—went on hunger strike and endured force-feeding.