CHAPTER V
THE PILGRIMAGE AND THE DERBY DAY, 1913
"Proclaim liberty throughout the land unto all the inhabitants thereof."—Lev. xxv. 10.
The Pilgrimage was a piece of work which could only have been undertaken successfully by a powerful organization, and such the N.U.W.S.S. certainly was. We had divided the whole area of Great Britain into nineteen federations; in each federation there was a working committee meeting regularly, whose aim was to form a non-militant, non-party women's suffrage society in every parliamentary borough in its area. Each federation and each society aimed at being self-supporting; but the large sums, amounting to many thousands of pounds, collected at our big Albert Hall demonstrations in London enabled the executive committee of the whole N.U.W.S.S. to make grants for special work to specified societies or federations. Our organization was thoroughly democratic, the executive committee and all the officers being subject to election at our annual council meetings, where each society could claim representation in proportion to its numbers. No new departure in policy could be undertaken without the authority of the council. In 1913 we had over 400 societies, and they were constantly increasing; in 1914, just before the war, there were over 600. We calculated that, adding together the central funds, the Election Fighting Fund, and the funds raised and expended by our societies locally, the National Union at this time was using over £45,000 a year for the furtherance of the enfranchisement of women.
We were giving full time employment to scores of organizers, mostly highly intelligent young women of University education, who not only did admirable propaganda work throughout the country, but kept headquarters informed of all important local developments and incidents bearing on our movement.
The Pilgrimage was a march of bands of our societies, all non-militant suffragists, from every part of Great Britain, converging on London, and so arranged as to reach their goal on the same day. Eight routes were selected: the great North Road, the Fen Country, the East Coast, Watling Street, the West Country Road, the Portsmouth Road, the Brighton Road, and the Kentish Pilgrims' Way. In each case the Pilgrimage procession started at the point most distant from London, carrying banners, and accompanied, where possible, by music. The pilgrims were prepared to stop and hold meetings, distribute literature, and collect funds in towns and villages en route. As they proceeded their numbers rolled up; friends lent motor-cars for conveying luggage, and the most wonderfully generous hospitality was extended to them all along the route, especially in the towns where we had powerful societies. This we might have been said to expect; but what surprised us was the extraordinarily warm welcome we received from the villages we passed through. Once their inhabitants understood that we were non-militant, and had no desire to injure anybody or anything, they gave us the most cordial reception; indeed, we were often stopped as we were passing through villages which we had deemed hardly large enough for a meeting with the remonstrance, "You are surely never going to pass us by without saying a word!"
The meetings in the towns were not so uniformly friendly. Hooligans sometimes declined to believe that we were non-militant, and demonstrated their enthusiasm for law and order by throwing dead rats, potatoes, rotten eggs, and other garbage, at our speakers. No real harm was done to any of us, but occasionally the services of the police were needed to protect our speakers. This, however, was exceptional, and had reactions in our favour. For instance, one lady, well on her way towards old age, who had started on our Pilgrimage at Land's End, originally intended to break off her march at Plymouth, but, being roughly treated by a band of disorderly youths at Camborne, resolved that she would accompany the pilgrims all the way to London, which she did. The start was made in each case from the points most distant from London on June 18th, and the Pilgrimage in all its eight branches arrived in London on July 25th, the final demonstration being held in Hyde Park on July 26th. Here there were nineteen platforms, representing the nineteen federations of the N.U.W.S.S. There was a huge and an entirely sympathetic crowd in the Park. When a bugle sounding from the central platform announced the putting of the resolution, there was hardly a hand held up against it.
On the next day—Sunday, July 27th—many hundreds of the pilgrims, wearing their badges and colours, assembled in Trafalgar Square and walked in procession, but without banners, to St. Paul's to attend the afternoon service. A large number of seats had been courteously reserved for them under the dome, and a sermon appropriate to the occasion was preached by Canon Simpson. We thought it just like our good luck that the first Psalm for the evening service on the twenty-seventh day of the month was the absolutely appropriate one: "When the Lord turned again the captivity of Sion, then were we like unto them that dream.... They that sow in tears shall reap in joy. He that goeth on his way weeping, and bearing forth good seed, shall doubtless come again with joy, and bring his sheaves with him." A deep sense of peace and of absolute confidence in our ultimate triumph came upon us. We were as certain of it as if it had already been in our grasp.
It may not be inappropriate here to add a few words about Mrs. Harley, who originated the Pilgrimage. She was a woman of great originality and imagination. The widow of a soldier, and sister of General French, she had lived most of her life among military people and in a military atmosphere. She was the life and soul of the suffrage movement in Shrewsbury and the neighbourhood, where her fine character has left a lasting impression. In December, 1914, she joined the first unit of the Scottish Women's Hospitals for foreign service under Dr. Elsie Inglis, and acted as administrator of the great hospital, afterwards so famous, which was opened in the Abbaye de Royaumont. Mrs. Harley took her young daughter with her as one of her orderlies. On one occasion, when this gently nurtured girl was scrubbing a ward, a sick French soldier asked her if it were true that she was the niece of Lord French. When she replied in the affirmative, the poilu rejoined: "I don't think General Joffre's niece would scrub our ward." These little things made a deep impression, and, I am told, puzzled our French friends not a little. When the French Government asked the S.W.H. for a second hospital, one was opened at Troyes, and Mrs. Harley accompanied it, again acting as administrator. It was the first open-air hospital ever seen in France. The soldiers nursed in it were enthusiastic in their praise. When the French Expeditionary Force was sent to Salonica the French Government asked the Scottish Women's Hospitals Committee to allow this unit to go with it, a request which was, of course, willingly granted. While at Salonica Mrs. Harley received from the French military authorities the Croix de Guerre avec Palme, a decoration which she brought to show us at our suffrage office in the summer of 1916, when she was in London for a short time arranging for the transport to Serbia of a couple of motor ambulances. This was the last time we saw her, for she was killed by Bulgarian shell-fire at Monastir on March 7th, 1917. Her works do follow her. A very fine tribute to her memory was paid by the Serbian authorities on the occasion of the unveiling of a memorial to her. "To die for one's country," said one of the Serbs, "that is fine, but that we understand; but to die for another country, that is superb—that is something beyond us."
Returning to the Pilgrimage and its results. Petitions to Parliament in favour of women's suffrage had been sent up from the very numerous meetings which the pilgrims had held while on their march towards London. These were presented by our friends in the House in batches, with short speeches, not just dropped silently into the bag behind the Speaker's chair, as in the old days. A number of M.P.'s received deputations from their constituents who had taken part in the Pilgrimage. At the end of July the Home Secretary, Mr. McKenna, received a deputation from some of the pilgrims, who wished to bring to his notice the inadequacy of police protection given at some of the meetings they had addressed. One of the speakers said there was an impression abroad that women's suffrage meetings were fair game, and that disorder and hooliganism could take place at these without disagreeable consequences to those who indulged in them. In his reply there was a notable change for the better in Mr. McKenna's attitude towards the N.U.W.S.S. He asked for a list of the meetings of which complaint was made, and promised enquiry, adding that he would do his utmost to give suffragists protection as complete as that extended to other citizens holding peaceful political meetings. He even added: "I sincerely admire the courage with which you have carried on your work ... and I honestly believe that your method of action has assisted your cause." This was a great improvement compared with the time, not many months earlier, when he was so long in making up his mind whether or not to prosecute us for promoting the sale of an "obscene" book.