Photograph, surveillance image

The Home Office commissioned the undercover photography of militant Suffragettes from 1913. This surveillance photo was taken as Gertrude exercised in the yard of Holloway prison. Such photos were used to identify militant Suffragettes attempting to enter public buildings such as museums or art galleries. The authorities have mistakenly identified Gertrude as Helen Archdale, indicating the difficulties faced by the authorities when identifying Suffragettes.
Gertrude Mary Ansell (1861-1932) worked as a telephonist and typist, running a busy office, before joining the Women's Social & Political Union in 1906 having been inspired by the imprisonment of Emmeline Pethick-Lawrence and the 'rallying cry' of Flora Drummond. She was first imprisoned in 1908 for taking part in the 'raid' on the House of Commons. The following year she became Honorary Treasurer of the Animal Defence and Anti-Vivisection Society and for the next five years primarily focused on her passion for animal rights although she continued to attend major WSPU processions. She campaigned for the Dogs Exemption Bill and the Plumage Bill but when these failed to be passed into law Gertrude returned to Suffragette militancy in 1913.
This photo dates from one of her periods of imprisonment that occured between 1913 and 1914. On 31st July 1913 Gertrude smashed a window at the Home Office for which she was sentenced to one month in Holloway where she immediately went on a hunger-and-thirst strike. Having been released on 6th August under the Cat and Mouse Act she failed to return to Holloway on 14th August and remained free until 30th October when she was spotted selling The Suffragette newspaper at Holborn Tube station. It is possible the circulation of this photograph by the Criminal Record Office and the accompanying description of her as 5' 4," grey eyes, hair turning grey' led to her being identified at the Station as a 'Known Militant Suffragette'. In May 1914 Gertrude smashed Herkomer's portrait of the Duke of Wellington in the Royal Academy and was sentenced to six months imprisonment. This time she was not released but forcibly fed. By the time she was released under the amnesty on 10th August she had been forcibly fed 236 times. In the occasion of Gertrude's arrest in 1908 the October 15th edition of Votes for Women noted that Gertrude 'has earned her living since the death of her father (a scientist). 'She soon became convinced through experience that the economic position of women would never be satisfactory without political freedom and joined the NWSPU soon after the opening of the militant campaign.'.