Women Winning the Vote 10.01.14
“The only reason that women won the vote was because of their service during the Great War of 1914-1918"
In 1918 women were given the right to vote in parliamentary elections. However this right was not just "given" to them. In the early 20th Century women and men were treated very differently. Men went to work whereas women were expected to stay at home. The one thing both men and women had to do was pay taxes. After realising that they both pay taxes but women did not even get a say in who is elected, they decided to stand up for their rights and tried to win the vote. Women had to work for an extremely long time before they were granted the vote. They campaigned, protested, and in some cases chained themselves to gates. Women were very committed and dedicated to trying to win the vote that they even sacrificed their lives. Their campaigning was interrupted because of World War 1. Women decided to give up on winning the vote to help the country. After the war all women were granted the vote. Looking back at the quotation on the top of the page
"The only reason that women won the vote was because of their service during the Great War of 1914-1918". There are many pieces of evidence and opinions which argue against and for the statement and throughout this essay I will be weighing up different points to make a final conclusion.

Though women were granted the vote after the war, they also did an incredible amount of protestsing before the war. They tried to persuade men that they were equally responsible. There were two groups of women who tried very different methods of persuasion. One group was called the Suffragists. Their leader was Millicent Fawcett and they had very gentle and calm approaches to prove they were worthy of getting the vote. Their tactics included writing letters to Members of Parliament and peaceful marches to London. The group of Suffragists mainly consisted of upper class women to had contacts to MPs. The other group of women were called the Suffragettes. Even thought there might only be a slight difference in the name of the two groups, the difference in tactics was unbelievable. The Suffragettes had a more direct and forceful approach. Their methods were smashing windows, burning down buildings, vandalising pieces of expensive artwork and going on hunger strike. The Suffragettes went for more violent and impetuous tactics which also put the general public at risk. I think both groups were either too calm, which showed they were not that eager for the vote, or too violent which showed they were not responsible enough for the vote.

Though women caused a lot of chaos before the war, they helped a lot during the actual war. Without women England would have had a very small chance of defeating the other countries. Women helped the war effort a lot both directly and indirectly. Since men had gone to fight in the war as soldiers, women had to take over and do the jobs which men did. These included collecting tickets for transport or construction work. Though these jobs might seem small and useless, they were very important. Women also made bombs and worked in aircraft factories. Most of these jobs were usually done by men but since they were not around women did them. Women proved that they more than capable of doing jobs which men did and that they were as equally as skilled as men. Women also gained the support of newspapers after the war; especially the Times (which was one of the most important newspapers) which