My Own Story.

PANKHURST, Emmeline.

Item Number: 135291

London: Eveleigh Nash, 1914.

First edition of the autobiography of the organizer of the UK suffragette movement, Emmeline Pankhurst. Octavo, original cloth, illustrated with plates including tissue-guarded frontispiece portrait of Pankhurst. In near fine condition. Uncommon in this condition.

The primary organizer of the UK suffragette movement, English suffragette Emmeline Pankhurst founded Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU), an all-women suffrage advocacy organization dedicated to “deeds, not words” in 1903. The group identified as independent from – and often in opposition to – political parties. It became known for physical confrontations: its members smashed windows and assaulted police officers. Pankhurst, her daughters, and other WSPU activists received repeated prison sentences, where they staged hunger strikes to secure better conditions, and were often force-fed. In 1999, Time named her as one of the 100 Most Important People of the 20th Century, stating that "she shaped an idea of objects for our time" and "shook society into a new pattern from which there could be no going back".