Remembering Christabel Pankhurst

This year we are celebrating the centenary of the Representation of the People Act 2018 which, for the first time, granted some women in Britain the right to vote. One of the women who campaigned to win the right for women to be allowed to vote was Christabel Pankhurst, Emmeline Pankhurst’s eldest daughter. Christabel was a leader, alongside her mother, in the Women’s Social and Political Union and was the first suffragette to spend a night in prison. In 1905 she and another woman assaulted a police officer and were both arrested. This was the beginning of a decade of civil disobedience directed against the Liberal Prime Minister Herbert Asquith who delayed a vote on suffrage for women despite there being growing support for it in the House of Commons.

Christabel took advantage of the opportunity for women to study law and, in 1906, gained a first-class honours degree in law from Victoria University, Manchester. In 1908 she was brought to trial for her WSPU activities and defended herself. She issued a court summons to Lloyd George, who was then the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and cross-examined him personally. By 1912 the government had decided to crush the women’s movement and imprison the leadership. Christabel fled to France and from there she continued to lead the WSPU.

In 1918 Christabel read a book on biblical prophecy and came to personal faith in Jesus Christ. The terrible traumas caused by the First World War had made her, and many others, seriously concerned about the future of the world. Through her reading of the Bible, Christabel became convinced that the second coming of Jesus Christ was the only hope for this troubled world.

In 1923 she moved to Toronto to join her mother and became a popular speaker at Christian events in both North America and the UK. She wrote a regular column in The Christian newspaper and wrote several books. In 1936 she was made a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire. When the local paper reported her death in 1958 it described her as “Dame Christabel Pankhurst, militant campaigner for Christ and women’s suffrage.”

Christabel Pankhurst was a passionate lady. At great personal cost, she campaigned passionately for the rights of women in Britain who were being very badly treated. She was passionate about the future wellbeing of the people of this world. She was passionate in her faith in Jesus Christ and tirelessly proclaimed him to others. And, so, even though she is dead, her life still speaks today.

Posted on July 16, 2018 by Peter Milsom