Your guide to the Pankhursts, the pioneering family who fought for Votes for Women

The Pankhursts moved from Manchester to London in 1886, and it was while there that Emmeline became interested in the experiences of working-class women. She followed with great interest the Match Girls’ strike of 1888. Girls and women worked up to 14 hours a day in match factories for low pay, suffered ill health caused by the chemicals they used, and were threatened with fines for talking or going to the toilet without permission. More than a thousand women walked out on a strike that lasted for three weeks – the protest was one of several that inspired Emmeline.

By 1889, Emmeline had helped to form the Women’s Franchise League in London – its main goal was to secure married women’s right to vote in local elections.

The Pankhursts returned to Manchester in 1893 and it was then that Emmeline began establishing herself as an activist.

Deeds not Words: the suffragette story

Member exclusive | With their radical demands for votes for women, the suffragettes shook up Edwardian Britain. Their campaign for equal rights would see them not just rallying crowds with speeches and marching on the streets, but setting fire to politicians’ homes and planting bombs in public places. Find out more in our podcast series: Deeds Not Words.

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When did Emmeline Pankhurst set up the WSPU?

She set up the WSPU, the Women’s Social and Political Union, (often called the suffragettes) in 1903 with her daughters Christabel and Sylvia, and from 1908 they were using militant tactics to garner support and attention. Emmeline was imprisoned several times, including for the charges of striking a police officer, damaging property and conspiracy to incite violence; she undertook hunger strikes to improve conditions in prison for herself and others.

When World War I began, Emmeline put her support behind the war effort, organising rallies and encouraging the government to allow women to enter the workforce, taking the places of the men who had gone to fight. The more violent actions against the government by the WSPU were halted in favour of the war effort.

• Read more | Sisters in arms: women at war during WW1

A devoted anti-communist, Emmeline joined the Conservative Party in 1926 and was chosen as a prospective parliamentary candidate. She died in June 1928 – just a few weeks before all women gained the same voting rights as men.

Who was Christabel Pankhurst?

The eldest daughter of Emmeline and Richard Pankhurst, Christabel was born in 1880. She was educated in Southport and Manchester and briefly lived in Geneva, but returned home with Emmeline after Richard died in 1898. She had a particularly close relationship with her mother, and played a key role in founding the WSPU.

After relatively peaceful beginnings, the WSPU evolved into a militant movement and gained national attention when, in 1905, Christabel and fellow WSPU member Annie Kenney disrupted a Liberal Party meeting in Manchester. The following year, Christabel became the WSPU’s ‘chief organiser’ and used her skills as a law graduate to deliver informed and impassioned speeches and arguments – even though, as a woman, she wasn’t allowed to practise as a lawyer.

In March 1912, a warrant was issued for Christabel’s arrest on a charge of conspiracy to commit damage. She went on the run and escaped to France, where she remained until the outbreak of World War I, continuing to manage the WSPU and edit its newspaper from overseas. In September 1914, Christabel returned to London and threw herself into the war effort, encouraging women to engage in war work as a way to win their enfranchisement.

In the 1918 general election, Christabel stood as a candidate for the Women’s Party but narrowly missed her chance of becoming an MP by 775 votes. She left England for the US in 1921 and there became heavily involved with the Second Adventist movement – a Protestant denomination that believed in the imminent Second Coming of Christ – and adopted a daughter, Betty. After returning to the UK in the 1930s, she left for the US again in 1940 where she remained until her death.

Made DBE (Dame Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire) in 1936, Christabel died in California in 1958, aged 77.

Who was Sylvia Pankhurst?

Born in 1882, Emmeline and Richard’s second daughter was also active in the WSPU. A graduate of the Royal College of Art, Sylvia created the WSPU’s distinctive ‘look’ and was imprisoned numerous times for her suffrage activities. Notably, she also spearheaded the WSPU’s campaigns in East London, witnessing the dire poverty of women in the local slums.

Eventually, Sylvia’s views on militant action began to diverge from those of her mother and sister Christabel, and she founded the East London Federation of Suffragettes – initially part of the WSPU. When Britain went to war in 1914 – a conflict she vehemently opposed – she set up several mother and baby clinics in the capital to offer support as supplies ran short.

A passionate left-winger, Sylvia went on to host the inaugural meeting of the British Communist Party in 1920. In 1927, aged 45, she gave birth to a son but refused to name or marry his father. Her refusal saw Emmeline break ties with her daughter and the pair never spoke again. Sylvia continued to rally against fascism and colonialism, moving to Ethiopia to continue her activism. She died there in 1960.

Who was Adela Pankhurst?

The youngest Pankhurst daughter, Adela (b1885), shared her family’s views regarding women’s rights but, like her sister Sylvia, disagreed with the violence advocated by the WSPU. After becoming estranged from the rest of the Pankhursts – her socialist and pacifist beliefs were deemed a ‘risk’ to the WSPU’s success – she was given a one-way ticket to Australia by her mother, along with £20 and a bundle of clothes. She would never see her mother or sisters again.

In Australia, Adela married trade unionist Tom Walsh and together they founded the Australian Communist Party. Later, however, she moved away from communism and abandoned left-wing politics altogether. In the late 1920s, she formed the Women’s Guild of Empire – a Christian group against communism that sought to preserve Australia’s place within the British empire. After spending a portion of World War II in prison for supporting the Japanese, she died in Sydney in 1961.

This article was first published in BBC History Revealed