Handkerchief, embroidered panel

White cotton handkerchief embroidered in purple and green silk with a list Suffragette prisoners in Holloway in1911. The central embroidery section, worked in alternate rows of green and purple silk reads 'Votes for women worked in Holloway for dear Mrs Terrero Jan 28 1912 Members who were sentenced at the sessions to 2 months Dec 1911 Miss Archdale Mrs Rothwell Mrs Huddleston Mrs Jones Mrs Rowe Miss Wharry Miss Wentworth Miss Potbury Miss Slade Miss Harvey Miss Stuart Miss Bennett Miss Grant Cissie Wilcox. The name 'Cissie Wilcox' is embroidered larger than the other names and refers to the embroiderer. On the top left hand corner is embroidered 'Newcastle hunger strike 3 days Jan 1910', top right corner is embroidered 'WSPU motto Deeds not Words', on the bottom left is embroidered 'Holloway one month Jan 1910' and the bottom right 'Holloway two months Nov 1911'.
The handkerchief, worked in Holloway prison by Cissie Wilcox was gifted to Janie Terrero by Cissie and her fellow window-smashing Suffragettes. It appears to have been produced as a thank-you to Janie Terrero, and may be associated with Janie's donation of a Christmas hamper to Holloway prisoners. In December 1911 the Votes for Women newspaper made a plea for donations of hampers for the prisoners spending Christmas in Holloway. The following issue of Votes for Women, named Janie Terrero, the secretary of the Pinner branch of the WSPU as a contributor to the hamper appeal.
At the time she embroidered the panel Cissie was serving a two month sentence in Holloway for smashing plate glass windows in the Strand owned by the catering firm J.Lyons and Company and the London and South Western Bank. Her action was part of the organised WSPU window smashing policy and Cissie's fellow prisoners whose names appear on the panel were also serving sentences for window smashing.
Cissie's full name was Mary Ellen Wilcox. She lived in Gateshead and, in the 1901 census is recorded as working in domestic service. Although a member of her local Newcastle branch of the Women's Social & Political Union, Cissie had also travelled to London in November 1910 to take part in the notorious 'Black Friday' demonstration outside Parliament that resulted in clashes with the police. At her trial for window smashing in December 1911 Cissie referred to the injuries she had suffered at the hands of the police during Black Friday. These included bruises and wounds caused by having her arms twisted by the police, her head pulled back and being kicked repeatedly. Cissie's association with Janie Terrero is linked to Black Friday as she, along with 3 other Suffragettes went to stay with Janie and her husband Manuel at their home in Pinner to recover from their injuries. A letter written to the journal Justice in March 1911 by Manuel describes how Cissie’s injuries were the worst of the four women who had stayed with them and explained how his wife and a female doctor had examined the women. Cissie reported in Votes for Women in December 1911 that she still had an open wound six weeks later.
Cissie was further arrested in October 1913 for attempting to set fire to a newly built school in Whitely Bay, Northumberland. Local newspapers described how the police were tipped off and waited for the women to set the fire. Cissie was caught and when the policeman asked her about two boxes of matches she dropped on the railway bridge she replied ‘Perhaps they are yours’. She was asked to remove her coat and the pocket contained one shilling and sixpence and a broken matchstick. For this offence of 'carrying inflammable material' Cissie was sentenced to two weeks in prison.