Hunger Strike Medal

The WSPU awarded a range of military-style campaign medals to raise morale and encourage continued loyalty and commitment to the cause. The Hunger Strike Medals were designed by Sylvia Pankhurst and first presented by the leadership of the WSPU at a ceremony in early August 1909 to women who had gone on hunger strike while serving a prison sentence. Later the medals would be presented at a breakfast reception on a woman's release from prison.

• Name — Hunger Strike Medal • Awarded By — Women's Social and Political Union • Established — 1909 08 • Motto — For Valour • Ribbon — greenwhitepurple Green, White, Purple • Criteria — Awarded to suffragette prisoners who had gone on hunger strike during their imprisonment. • Total — 81 known • Grades — Force-feedingadditional striped enamel bar

On 5 July 1909, suffragette Marion Wallace Dunlop began her hunger strike in Holloway Prison. She had been sentenced to one month for stenciling a message from the Bill of Rights on the wall of the House of Commons. The prison authorities considered her a criminal prisoner whereas she viewed herself as a political prisoner and began her strike in objection to this classification. Her strike lasted 91 hours, ending only because the prison released her to avoid her death. The hunger strike was Wallace Dunlop's idea and she did it without informing the leadership of the WSPU. Many others quickly imitated her.

• Illustration — Hunger Strike Medal awarded to Georgina Fanny Cheffins Each Hunger Strike Medal was presented in a purple box with a green velvet lining. A piece of white silk was fitted inside the lid which was printed in gold with the dedication: "Presented to [name] by the Women's Social and Political Union in recognition of a gallant action, whereby through endurance to the last extremity of hunger and hardship a great principle of political justice was vindicated."

The BBC television series Call the Midwife featured an episode with an elderly suffragette played by Annette Crosbie who gifted her Hunger Strike Medal to one of the nurses who cared for her.

• Illustration — Charlotte Blacklock's Hunger Strike Medal, Museum of Australian Democracy collection The Museum of London holds the medal awarded to the suffragette leader Emmeline Pankhurst who went on hunger strike during a two-month prison sentence in 1912 for throwing a stone at a window of 10 Downing Street. • Illustration — Helen MacRae's Hunger Strike Medal, auctioned by Lockdales Auctioneers in 2015. Author: Chris Elmy Helen MacRae's Hunger Strike Medal in its case was auctioned in 2015 to a private collector, for £12,300. Lockdales Auctioneers' auction manager, James Sadler, said "these are among the most historically important items we have ever dealt with." A medal found in a drawer awarded to suffragette Elsie Wolff Van Sandau who was arrested for smashing a window in Covent Garden on 4 March 1912 and who went on hunger strike in prison was sold at auction in 2019 for £12,500. A medal belonging to suffragette Selina Martin, auctioned in Nottingham in 2019 and expected to fetch £15,000–20,000, was bought by the National Gallery of Victoria for £27,000. The Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa purchased Frances Parker medal in 2016. The Museum of Australian Democracy holds the medal awarded to Charlotte Blacklock. The medal awarded to Kate Williams Evans was sold at auction as part of a collection in 2018 which realised £48,640. It is now in the collection of Amgueddfa Cymru – Museum Wales. Rosamund Massy medal and Holloway brooch are buried inside the plinth of the statue of Emmeline Pankhurst in London. In September 2023, Glasgow Women's Library decided to buy Maud Joachim's medal as it was awarded for the first WSPU hunger strike in Scotland. The money-raising campaign was successful and it was brought back to the library in October.

• Illustration — Emily Davison wearing her Hunger Strike Medal and Holloway brooch c. 1910–1912 • Illustration — Janie Terrero wearing her Hunger Strike Medal and Holloway brooch c. 1912 As of 2025 10 there are 91 known medal recipients. If known, this list also contains the dates of their arrest(s) as inscribed on their medals. • Illustration — Suffragettes on hunger strike in 1909photo by Elin Wagner

These women are WSPU hunger strikers who therefore meet the conditions to have been awarded a medal but the evidence of their medals has yet to be located.