Medals from the collection of the late Mike Leahy

Women’s Social and Political Union Medal for Valour, silver, 22 mm, the obverse inscribed ‘Hunger Strike’, the reverse inscribed ‘Isabel Kelley’, the suspension bar inscribed with the date ‘July 30th 1909’, the top suspension brooch bar inscribed ‘For Valour’, with original ribbon, good very fine and rare £800-1000

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, Medals from the collection of the late Mike Leahy.

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Miss Isabel Kelley was one of thirteen women arrested in the street outside Mr Lloyd George’s great Budget League meeting at Limehouse on 30th July 1909. Twelve of the women were sentenced to various terms of imprisonment in Holloway Prison, Isabel Kelly for a term of fourteen days. These women all went on hunger strike and were eventually released. Isabel Kelley described her experiences in Votes for Women: ‘During the entire time of my imprisonment I performed the ordinary work expected of a prisoner, although during the whole time (five days, seven hours) I took no food whatever. I tried to bear in mind that my protest was not against the officials of the prison, who had no power but to carry out their instructions, but against the Government. On Monday, while we were exercising, the doctor came up to me and said, “I hear you are not taking your food?” I replied that it was so. He then asked, “Must this continue?” I said it must. From that time forward he made no attempt to persuade me to modify my protest, evidently realising that the protest had not been entered into without full consideration, and all that it implied, and that, therefore, any reasons he might advance would be useless. On Wednesday I sent to Mr Gladstone a petition that I might be placed in the First Division. The only answer to my petition was the information conveyed to me on Thursday evening that orders had been received for my release on the following morning.’

A later issue of Votes for Women reported, in September 1909, of the disturbances at a Budget Meeting held in Dundee: ‘With great daring and resource, Miss Isabel Kelley, who has only recently been through a hunger-strike at Holloway, determined on an entirely novel method of securing admittance. She climbed a high scaffolding erected on the Bank of Scotland, from the roof of which she let herself down a distance of some 25 ft. on to the roof of the hall. In order to do this she lay concealed on the roof for seventeen hours, in spite of several searches for Suffragettes, one searcher, indeed, being seen by her during that time. In order to facilitate her movements, Miss Kelley was attired in gymnastic dress, over which she wore a dark cloak. She was provided with a strong rope of about 24 ft. in length, at one end of which was an iron hook to fasten to the roof, while at the other end was a running noose. Entering by a skylight which gave on to the stairs leading to the gallery, Miss Kelley was able to make her protest at one of the doors; the creaking of the door, however, attracted the attention of the stewards, who were on the watch, and she was removed from the hall. The police conducted her to the entrance, and she was driven to the police office in a cab.’ However, in the absence of sufficient evidence she was later released.