Peaked cap

ID:

50.82/1197

Production date:

1908

Location:

In Store

The cap was first worn by the Suffragette organiser 'General' Flora Drummond during Women's Sunday on 21st June 1908 and, along with a matching epaulette and sash was presented to her by the regalia manufacturer Toye & Company. In the 11th June 1908 edition of the Votes for Women newspaper it is noted that General Drummond has been the ‘recipient of a handsome gift from an enterprising firm who had heard of her new official title.’  < ...Read more

The cap was first worn by the Suffragette organiser 'General' Flora Drummond during Women's Sunday on 21st June 1908 and, along with a matching epaulette and sash was presented to her by the regalia manufacturer Toye & Company. In the 11th June 1908 edition of the Votes for Women newspaper it is noted that General Drummond has been the ‘recipient of a handsome gift from an enterprising firm who had heard of her new official title.’

Flora Drummond, known as 'General' due to her role in leading processions on horseback played a key role in Women's Sunday and was responsible for ensuring all seven processions arrived safely in Hyde Park. The week before the event Votes for Women defined Drummond's role as 'She will be in constant touch with every one of the processions, and will make it her business to see that every one of them is in marching order, and that all the arrangements are complete and satisfactory'.

Flora was one of the original members of the Women's Social and Political Union. In 1905 she was one of the speakers touring Lancashire towns as part of the Women's Social and Political Union campaign. In October, after the imprisonment of Annie Kenney and Christabel Pankhurst for an altercation at Manchester's Free Trade Hall (the first militant act), she helped to capitalise on the ensuing publicity by organising meetings and printing leaflets. Like the Pankhursts she left the Inderpendent Labour Party, believing it only paid lip-service to women's rights.

In 1906 Flora moved with Annie Kenney from Manchester to London and became a paid organiser for the campaign but also kept close links with the WSPU campaign in Scotland. Within a year of this photograph, taken on the occasion of the Hyde Park demonstration of June 1908, Flora gave birth to a son, Keir, named after the Labour politician Keir Hardie.

In 1909 Flora was sent to Glasgow to organise the WSPU's general election campaign in Scotland and the Glasgow Women's Exhibition of 1910. When Drummond returned to London late in 1911 she was put in charge of co-ordinating all WSPU branchs throughtout the country. In January 1913 she led a deputation of working women, alongside Annie Kenney to Lloyd George, who was reported to have congratulated Drummond on her handling of the event.

Flora was imprisoned nine times for Suffragette militancy including once when pregnant with her son. She took part in the prisoner hunger strikes but was never forcibly fed by the authorities. Similarly to Emmeline Pankhurst, she was regarded as too prominent a personality to be subjected to such a controversial procedure. < Hide

Measurements

DM 274 mm; H 120 mm (overall)

Materials

wool; silk; leather; metal

Last Updated

2024-01-08