The figures at the General Election had been:

H. G. Finch (C.)2,047
Harold Pearson (L.)1,564
483

The campaign in Rutland was not yet over, when Mrs. Pankhurst and part of our forces were obliged to go north to Jarrow, where there was a Government majority of nearly three thousand votes to pull down. The Conservatives, the Labour Party, the Irish Nationalists, and, of course, the Liberals themselves had each put a candidate into the field, and every one of this bevy of candidates was "in favour" of Votes for Women.

Whether the majority of these who came in contact with the Suffragettes during these By-Election Campaigns understood the workings of the Party machinery, which controls the Government of our country, well enough to realise that by voting against the Government they would help the Votes for Women cause may perhaps be doubted by some, though the Suffragettes were constantly receiving both written and verbal assurances from electors who declared that their votes had turned upon this question; but that the hearts of the people were stirred by the Suffragettes' appeal is absolutely sure. In the leafy lanes and tiny villages of Rutland great interest and sympathy had been evoked, but in smoky struggling Jarrow, with its coal mines, shipbuilding yards and engineering works, with its dingy slums where overcrowding and infant mortality are, in common with the rest of this district, more rife than in any other part of the country, the message of the Suffragettes came to the overburdened women as a wonderful ray of hope that had burst in upon the squalor of their lives.

On the first night of their arrival in Jarrow, Mrs. Pankhurst and Annie Kenney held the largest open-air meeting that had ever been seen in that town, and the numberless subsequent gatherings, whether for men and women, or for women only, which were held in halls, in open spaces, at work gates, and at the collieries, were, in every case, larger and more orderly than those held by any of the other parties. A systematic canvass was made of the women householders, who numbered more than one thousand, and a Committee of Local Women who had come forward with offers of help sprang almost spontaneously into being.

Three days before the end of the contest it was suggested that a women's procession should march to the various polling booths, in order to remind the men to vote against the nominee of the Government that had refused to allow women to become voters too. The idea was eagerly caught up, banners were quickly made by voluntary helpers, the news was carried throughout the district, and on polling day great crowds of women came flocking to the Mechanics' Hall, where they were to assemble. They came early, but found that a well dressed mob of men and youths, wearing the Liberal Colours, had already gathered to bar the doorway, and the women were literally obliged to fight their way both in and out of their own meeting. As soon as the procession had got fairly out into the main road, however, everything went well, for though at no time did the police put in an appearance, either to keep order or to clear the way for them, the women were protected from obstruction by the sympathy and good will of the populace. As they passed onward, greater and greater numbers joined their ranks until it seemed as though all the women of Jarrow were marching along the road.

The men whom they met coming from the polling booths greeted them with cheers and cries of "We have voted for the women this time. We have kept the Liberal out." They spoke truly, for when the votes were counted, it was found that the Government candidate was third on the list, and that the Liberal vote at the General Election had been reduced by more than half. The figures were:

Pete Curran (Lab.)4,698
P. Rose Innes (C.)3,930
Spencer Leigh Hughes (L.)3,474
J. O'Hanlon (N.)2,124

The figures at the General Election had been:

Sir C. M. Palmer (L.)8,047
Pete Curran (Lab.)5,093