in memoriam

Today I salute the suffragette Emily Davison whose actions at The Derby on this day 100 years ago resulted in her death. There has been much debate about whether she intended to commit suicide. People say she must have known that to run out in front of the horses during the race would be fatal. Hwever, she had bought a return ticket from London to Epsom and in her bag she had a suffragette banner and a pass to a suffragette party on the night of 4 June 1913. In her home town, Morpeth, she and fellow suffragettes had been practising approaching horses as they walked around a parade ring. My favourite theory is that she'd wanted to attach the suffragette banner to the King's horse in the Parade Ring at Epsom but hadn't been able to do so. She therefore decided to try to disrupt the race for the King's horse instead as a publicity stunt, whatever the consequences.