Lavena Saltonstall

Other sources: http://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/C4769024
Jill Liddington, Rebel Girls: Their Fight for the Vote (2006)

Database linked sources: https://www.suffrageresources.org.uk/resource/3208/working-class-women-in-the-suffrage-movement

Additional Information: Lavena was drawn into Labour movement politics and was an agitator for the Women's Labour League in Halifax. She invited Emmeline Pankhurst to speak locally and was briefly swept up between 1907 and 1908 in the suffragette movement, being arrested and imprisoned for protesting at Westminster. She was known locally for her witty and acerbic political attacks, through letter writing in newspapers. Her writing also gives interesting glimpses into the views of young, politically motivated women within their own working class communities. She explained that 'Should any girl show a tendency to politics... she is looked upon by the majority of women as a person who neglects doorsteps and home matters and is therefore not fit to associate with their respectable daughters and sisters.' Lavena seems to have moved away from the WSPU and back to focusing on working class and Labour movement politics.