Emmeline Pankhurst - London, England - Statues of Historic Figures on Waymarking.com

Emmeline Pankhurst was born in Moss Side, Manchester on July 15, 1858. She was a social activist and the leader of the British suffragette movement that helped women win the right to vote.

Born Emmeline Goulden, she was raise in a politically active family. She attended the École Normale Supérieure in Paris and in 1878 married Richard Pankhurst, a lawyer older than her by 24 years who was a supporting women's right to vote. They had five children.

Emmeline Pankhurst became involved with the Women's Franchise League, which advocated suffrage for women and later attempted to join the Independent Labour Party but was rejected because of her gender. She also worked as a Poor Law Guardian and to alleviate the shockingly harsh working conditions she encountered in Manchester workhouses.

After her husband died in 1898, Pankhurst founded the all-woman Women's Social and Political Union. The group became infamous when its members smashed windows and assaulted police officers. Pankhurst, her daughters, and other Women's Social and Political Union activists were sentenced to repeated prison sentences. In prison, they staged hunger strikes to secure better conditions. When the Great War began , she suspended her militant activism and supported of the British government in the war effort.

In 1918, the Representation of the People Act granted votes to British women over the age of 30. She was widely criticized for her tactics, but most believe her work was crucial in achieving women's suffrage in Britain. Pankhurst formed the Women's Party, which was dedicated to promoting women's equality in public life. She died in 1928. Two years later, on March 6, 1930, the statue of Emmeline Pankhurst created by sculptor Arthur George Walker was dedicated. It was placed in its present location in London's Victoria Tower Gardens in 1956.

The life-size bronze statue of Emmeline Pankhurst stands on a granite pedestal which is in the middle of a low half rotunda. She is wearing a low cut ankle length dress an overcoat with fur trim on the sleeves and collar. Her right arm is bent out at the elbow with her fingers spread and her palm up. She is holding a ring-like object in her left hand.

An inscription at the foot of the pedestal is inscribed: