On this day in 1847 Dame Millicent Garrett Fawcett was born. A leading suffragist, she spent many years campaigning for women’s right to vote. She was the leader of the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies (NUWSS) from 1890-1919. During the Boer war in South Africa, she visited South Africa as part of an investigation into conditions in the concentration camps there. She was later involved in founding Newnham College, Cambridge.
Millicent Fawcett did not support the militant tactics of the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU), commonly known as the suffragettes.
In 1928, when women were finally granted equal voting rights, Millicent Fawcett was in Parliament to see the culmination of 61 years of her involvement in the suffrage movement. She died the following year, in August 1929. In April 2018 she became the first woman to have a statue in Parliament Square.
Follow the links below to read more about Millicent Fawcett:
https://www.biographyonline.net/politicians/uk/millicent-fawcett.html
https://www.fawcettsociety.org.uk/our-history