Struggle and Suffrage in Swindon

ebook Women's Lives and the Fight for Equality

By Frances Bevan

cover image of Struggle and Suffrage in Swindon

Sign up to save your library

With an OverDrive account, you can save your favorite libraries for at-a-glance information about availability. Find out more about OverDrive accounts.

   Not today
Libby_app_icon.svg

Find this title in Libby, the library reading app by OverDrive.

app-store-button-en.svg play-store-badge-en.svg
LibbyDevices.png

Search for a digital library with this title

Title found at these libraries:

Loading...
An in-depth history of women's activism and achievements in one English town, with photos included.

As the industrial revolution and the coming of the railways transformed the Wiltshire countryside, Swindon women were on the front line of change, shaping the new industrial town and transforming the old market one. Newcomers arrived from the great railway centers across the country to create a welcoming, tolerant and creative community with women's contribution at its heart.

Following the incorporation of Old and New Swindon in 1900, innovative women stepped up to the plate: women like Swindon-born suffragette Edith New, who challenged political conventions, and Emma Noble, Swindon's first female councilor, who campaigned to improve living conditions in the town. During two world wars, Swindon women worked in the railway factory in jobs once considered beyond their strength and endurance. Women supported the war effort on the home front, volunteering in what little spare time they had.

Struggle and Suffrage in Swindon tells the stories of women like Mary Slade and Kate Handley, two teachers who during WWI headed the Prisoners of War Committee, which sent food parcels to soldiers held in German POW camps. The story of Swindon women includes artists and actresses, political activists and social reformers—and the ordinary women who worked in the factories, raised their children, and made a difference.
Struggle and Suffrage in Swindon