Procession of Emily Davison's funeral

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© National Portrait Gallery, London

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Procession of Emily Davison's funeral

by Ferdinand Louis Kehrhahn & Co
postcard print, June 1913
3 1/2 in. x 5 3/8 in. (88 mm x 135 mm) image size
Purchased, 1994
Photographs Collection
NPG x45196

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In June 1913, Emily Davison ran out in front of the King’s horse, Anmer, at the Epsom Derby, causing horse and rider to fall. She suffered a fractured skull and died four days later. Her funeral was held on the 14 June and was attended by suffragettes from across the country. They wore symbolic colours of white, purple and black and carried bouquets of purple irises and red peonies. The procession was led by a suffragette carrying a cross and union members dressed in white dresses with laurel wreaths. Crowds of onlookers gathered along the streets as the funeral procession travelled from Victoria to St George's Church, Bloomsbury, where a memorial service was held. A further procession took place in Morpeth, Northumberland, where her mother lived and where Davison was buried. Her gravestone bears the WSPU slogan, 'Deeds not words.' The first woman to die for the cause, Davison acquired the status of ‘Suffragette Martyr’, and the Government feared her apparent sacrifice would set a dangerous precedent.

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Current affairs

The Suffragette, Emily Davison dies after stepping out in front of the King's horse as a protest at the Epsom Derby. In the same year the Liberal government passed the Cat and Mouse Act allowing them to release and re-arrest Suffragettes who went on hunger strike while in prison. Davison, herself, had been on hunger strike and was force-fed while detained at Holloway Prison.

Art and science

Stravinsky's ballet The Rite of Spring comes to London following its premier at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris. Audiences were shocked by Stravinsky's rhythmic and dissonant musical score and by the violent jerky dancing of Sergei Diaghilev's Ballets Russes, which were intended to represent pagan ritual.

International

Henry Ford introduces the assembly line at the Ford Motor Company, rapidly increasing the rate at which the famous Model T could be manufactured, leading to massive growth in the motorcar industry and demonstrating to other industries the efficiency of mass production.

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