In heart of democracy, first statue to women’s vote heroine
DAME Millicent Fawcett made history for the second time yesterday – as the first woman to be commemorated by a statue in Parliament Square.
The activist helped British women get the vote in 1918 after a 52- year campaign. Among 11 men, including Gandhi and Nelson Mandela, hers is the only female statue.
The 8ft 4in bronze was unveiled in central London on the centenary of the Representation of the People Act 1918, which allowed some women to vote.
Theresa May told hundreds of people at the unveiling: ‘I would not be here as Prime Minister, no female MPs would have taken their seats in Parliament, none of us would have had the rights and protections we enjoy, were it not for one truly great woman, Dame Millicent Garrett Fawcett.’
Dame Millicent, a suffragist who campaigned peacefully, brought together groups such as the more militant suffragettes to make her case. The statue shows her at 50 with a banner stating, ‘Courage calls to courage everywhere’, from a speech she made after suffragette Emily Wilding Davison died when she threw herself under King George V’s horse at the Derby in 1913.
London Mayor Sadiq Khan said: ‘Today is an historic day. The decision to commission this statue was a no-brainer.’
Activist and writer Caroline Criado Perez started the campaign in Parliament Square in 2016 after running through Westminster and realising there were no statues of women.
The Representation of the People Act gave women over 30 the vote. But it was not until 1928 that they were able to vote from 21 – the same age as men.
Dame Millicent was in the House of Commons’ public gallery, aged 81, for the historic occasion. She died a year later.