Today in Herstory: Suffrage Hikers Descend on Wilmington, Delaware (19 feb 1913)

[niyad]

Today in Herstory: Suffrage Hikers Descend on Wilmington, Delaware

February 19, 1913: After seven consecutive days of walking and approximately 116 of the 225 miles from Newark, New Jersey, to Washington, D.C., behind them, the suffrage hikers are spending this eighth day in Wilmington, Delaware, “getting new feet” as they put it.


Elizabeth Freeman holds the reins as Lausanne pulls the literature wagon.

But while the morning may have been spent applying much of the city’s available supply of liniment to sore feet, their voices were not given any pampered treatment during the day’s stopover. Most of the hikers, once their feet were sufficiently rubbed down, were eager to fulfill the numerous speaking requests made in this very friendly city. By noon there were speakers at the Pullman Car Works. The Hollingsworth ship and railroad workers got a briefing as well, and in the evening the hikers went to the Garrick Theater, where five-minute suffrage speeches alternated between the vaudeville acts, and both types of performances were applauded.

General Rosalie Jones, leader of this suffragist Army of the Hudson, held a reception in her hotel room this afternoon. Among those attending were the city’s mayor, as well as Captain Thomas Johnson, age 86, of Cape Charles, Virginia, who came to town specifically to see the hikers.

There has been much public concern and speculation about the condition of Lausanne, the $59.98 suffrage horse, bought in Newark to pull Elizabeth Freeman’s literature (“ammunition”) wagon. But a veterinarian who had heard that Lausanne was “spavined, had a bowed tendon, sprung forward legs, interfered badly and was a cribber” found upon examination that Lausanne’s “legs were just slightly sprung,” and that the horse “has a heavy appetite,” but was otherwise all right and fit to complete the rest of the trip.

Though General Jones’ troops are dedicated to winning the battle for the ballot by totally peaceful means, the news that the unoccupied country home of David Lloyd-George, British Chancellor of the Exchequer, had just been damaged stirred controversy in the ranks today. Freeman, who has served time in British prisons for her suffrage activities there, said that she could understand the reason for such a militant action:
The situation in England is entirely different from the situation here. The women know that [Prime Minister] Asquith is their enemy. He has frankly said so. Now, Lloyd-George posed as friendly. He held out one hand to them and then had torpedoed a bill that would have helped them. Englishmen hold above all else the sacredness of property. Well, Englishwomen have attacked sacred property and they will continue to do so. I believe in destruction of property where human life is not endangered. Lloyd-George knows now what Englishwomen really think of him.

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http://feminist.org/blog/index.php/2015/02/19/today-in-herstory-suffrage-hikers-descend-on-wilmington-delaware/