defiantly told Inspector Edward Parker, ‘I wish you to inform Mr McKenna that
when he attempts to arrest me again he will require a regiment of soldiers; I am
a prisoner of war.’^14
Storms of protest arose, especially in Glasgow, over the brutality of
Emmeline’s treatment. A few days later, deputations demanding an inquiry were
led to magistrates there and to Scottish MPs in London. WSPU members inter-
rupted church services all over Britain, protests were made in restaurants and
theatres while a small band of guerrilla activists engaged in terrorist acts that
outraged the public. On 10 March, Mary Richardson slashed with a meat
chopper the famous Rokeby Venus painting in the National Gallery. ‘I have
tried to destroy the picture of the most beautiful woman in mythological history
as a protest against the government for destroying Mrs. Pankhurst, who is the
most beautiful character in modern history’, she explained. ‘Justice is an
element of beauty as much as colour and outline on canvas. Mrs. Pankhurst
seeks to procure justice for womanhood, and for this she is being slowly
murdered by a Government of Iscariot politicians.’^15 Houses, hayricks, a timber
yard and a pavilion were found in flames in different parts of the country while
eighteen windows in the house of Mr. McKenna, the Home Secretary, were
smashed.^16
Back in prison, Emmeline immediately went on a hunger and thirst strike.
Refusing to be examined or to use her bed, she lay on the floor in her torn
velvet dress. At 11.10 a.m. on 12 March the medical officer noted that she
complained of pre-cordial pain and although she still refused to be examined,
agreed to have a mustard leaf placed over her heart. On the day of her release,
Saturday 14 March, on a seven-day licence, he reported that she had spent a
restless night and seemed weaker. ‘Begged last night not to be left alone. Cell
door kept open, and a special officer was detailed to watch her.’^17
This was Emmeline’s seventh release from prison since her sentence at the
Old Bailey in April of last year to three years penal servitude. Ethel, in Egypt,
was distraught with worry and wired to find out how Emmeline was. ‘You can’t
prepay reply here which made me hesitate – but deferred rate is 6d a word, & I
know my dearest you won’t grudge a few shillings to give me peace of mind’, she
later explained.^18 But Ethel was in Emmeline’s thoughts and a telegram had
been despatched. As soon as she was back in the care of Nurse Pine, at
Campden Hill Square, she wrote a long letter to her dearest friend:
Just a word now that I am out. I found three of your letters waiting for
me. If you only could know what a support you are. I have to be some-
thing near what you think of me. ...
Well, it is over once more for a time, and I am not as bad as one
would think. Dr. Murray was surprised to find me so well. ... Oh, my
dear, I fear that all this has broken into your work sadly, but you will
have to feel as people do whose sons are at a war, and just go on having
faith in my star and a certain way I have of smoothing my path inFUGITIVE