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Mildred Mansel

Mildred Mansel
WSPU postcard
Born1862
Roehampton, Surrey, England
Died11 March 1942
Binsted, Arundel, Sussex, England
Children3
Parent(s)Arthur Guest
Adeline Chapman
RelativesLady Charlotte Guest (grandmother)
Ivor Guest, 1st Viscount Wimborne (cousin)

Mildred Ella Mansel (née Guest, c. 1868 – 11 March 1942) was a British suffragette and organiser for the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU) in Bath.[1]

Family

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Mansel was born in 1868 in Roehampton, Surrey.[2] Her parents were the conservative politician Arthur Guest (1841–1898) and suffragist Adeline Chapman (1847–1931).[3] Her mother was a member of the Central Society for Women's Suffrage and the Women's Tax Resistance League.[4] She had a brother, Arthur Rhuvon Guest.

Her family were well connected in society, as Mansel’s grandmother was the aristocrat and linguist Lady Charlotte Guest (1812–1895)[1] and her first cousin was Ivor Churchill Guest, 1st Viscount Wimborne (1873–1939), member of Parliament for Cardiff and the Liberal Party chief whip.[5]

She married Colonel John Delalynde Mansel of Bayford Lodge, Wincanton in 1888.[4] They had three children, two daughters and a son.[2]

Activism

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Mansel became an campaigner for women's enfranchisement and was a member of the WSPU by 1909.[3] During the Bill of Rights March on 29 June 1909, Mansel was arrested with Evelina Haverfield and Emmeline Pankhurst as they had tried to break into the House of Commons and present a petition to Herbert Asquith, the Prime Minister.[6]

Mansel became an organiser of the Bath WSPU branch in 1910 and supported the establishment of a new branch in Yeovil.[6] When Grace Roe was sent to Ipswich to recruit for the WSPU and set up a branch, she invited Mansel and Marie Brackenbury to support her there.[7]

Mary Blathwayt's dad's photo of the Fructu-Luteo Holly planted on 21 October 1910 by Mansel

On 21 October 1910, Mansel was invited to plant a tree at Eagle House, known as "suffragette's rest".[8] She planted an Ilex Aquifolium Fructu-Luteo Holly and the surviving plaque is held in the collection of the Roman Baths Museum.[8]

In 1911, Mansel participated in the suffragette boycott of the 1911 census and hired 12 Lansdowne Crescent in Bath to be used by the 35 local census evaders, including Mary Blathwayt of Eagle House.[3] She also participated in an 'at home' meeting in the home of Mary Morris in preparation for a London Procession,[9] and gave a speech in support of women's suffrage with Annie Kenney at Melksham Town Hall.[10]

Mansel was arrested after the failure of the Conciliation Bill in November 1911 in Wales, and was sentenced to a week in prison.[11] Mansell was sent to Holloway Prison for a week after an action where she broke windows at the War Office, London.[12]

Mansel was put in charge of coordinating the movement of women between safe houses from 1913, to shelter them after being released from prison under the "Cat and Mouse Act." Due to her familial connection with Ivor Guest she was considered "untouchable".[1] As part of this role, she rented a flat in London for Grace Roe.[2] Also during 1913, Mansel visited her friend Christabel Pankhurst in Paris, France.[3]

In 1914, Mansel said to a group of suffrage supporters: “Something has been said about our Union being “underground. Does this meeting look as though we were underground? We are underground, and overground, and everywhere.[13]

Later life

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During World War I, both of her daughters became nurses.[8]

Mansel attended a reunion dinner on 11 February 1928 to celebrate Equal Franchise, which was also attended by Nina Boyle, Teresa Billington-Greig, Edith How-Martyn, Muriel Matters, Anna Munro, Emmeline Pethwick-Lawrence and Daisy Solomon.[14]

When Emmeline Pankhurst died on 14 June 1928, Mansel was one of her pallbearers, alongside other former suffragettes Georgiana Brackenbury, Marie Brackenbury, Marion Wallace Dunlop, Harriet Kerr, Kitty Marshall, Rosamund Massy, Marie Naylor, Ada Wright and Barbara Wylie.[15][16]

Mansel founded the Mid Somerset Musical Competitive Festival in 1934.[8]

She died in 1942 in Binsted, Arundel, Sussex.[8]

References

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  1. ^ a b c Cowman, Krista (15 July 2007). Women of the Right Spirit: Paid Organisers of the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU), 1904-18. Manchester University Press. p. 18. ISBN 978-0-7190-7002-0.
  2. ^ a b c "Mrs Mildred Ella Mansel". Women's Suffrage Resources. Retrieved 11 January 2025.
  3. ^ a b c d Naylor, Ellis. "Mildred Mansel". Mapping Women's Suffrage. Retrieved 11 January 2025.
  4. ^ a b Crawford, Elizabeth (12 September 2019). "Chapman [née Chapman; former married name Guest], Adeline Mary (1847–1931), campaigner for women's suffrage". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. doi:10.1093/odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-369183. Retrieved 11 January 2025.
  5. ^ Jenkins, Lyndsey (12 March 2015). Lady Constance Lytton: Aristocrat, Suffragette, Martyr. Biteback Publishing. p. 1. ISBN 978-1-84954-892-2.
  6. ^ a b "Sherborne & the fight for women's suffrage". The Old Shirburnian Society. 15 June 2018. Retrieved 11 January 2025.
  7. ^ Crawford, Elizabeth (15 April 2013). The Women's Suffrage Movement in Britain and Ireland: A Regional Survey. Routledge. p. 86. ISBN 978-1-136-01054-5.
  8. ^ a b c d e "Mildred Mansel". Suffragette Stories. Retrieved 11 January 2025.
  9. ^ "At Home". Votes for Women. 26 May 1911. p. 569.
  10. ^ "Melksham Remembers". www.melkshamremembers.org.uk. Archived from the original on 24 June 2021. Retrieved 11 January 2025.
  11. ^ Wallace, Ryland (15 May 2018). The Women's Suffrage Movement in Wales, 1866-1928. University of Wales Press. p. 1907. ISBN 978-1-78683-329-7.
  12. ^ Andrews, Maggie; Lomas, Janis (23 October 2018). Hidden Heroines: The Forgotten Suffragettes. The Crowood Press. ISBN 978-0-7198-2762-4.
  13. ^ Purvis, June (10 November 2019). "Did militancy help or hinder the granting of women's suffrage in Britain?". Women's History Review. 28 (7): 1200–1234. doi:10.1080/09612025.2019.1654638. ISSN 0961-2025.
  14. ^ Luscombe, Eileen (20 October 2023). History and Legacy of the Suffragette Fellowship: Calling all Women!. Taylor & Francis. ISBN 978-1-000-98710-2.
  15. ^ Purvis, June (2 September 2003). Emmeline Pankhurst: A Biography. Routledge. p. 253. ISBN 978-1-134-34191-7.
  16. ^ Pugh, Martin (2008). The Pankhursts: The History of One Radical Family. Vintage. p. 408. ISBN 978-0-09-952043-6.
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