Read Ebook {PDF EPUB} From Suffragette to Fascist The Many Lives of Mary Sophia Allen by Nina Boyd Mary Sophia Allen: Suffragette to fascist. Mary Sophia Allen, one of the first British policewomen, was an extraordinary and outrageous woman. Born in 1878, she grew up in where she rebelled against the strictures of middle class life and, at the age of thirty, left home to become a suffragette. Mary was jailed three times for smashing windows, went on hunger-strike, and was forcibly fed in Holloway Gaol. The outbreak of the First World War, and the suspension for the duration of the war of suffragist hostilities, left her casting around for a suitable occupation for an independent-minded woman with a penchant for leadership. She was particularly keen to wear a uniform, and was attracted to the new Women Police Service. She soon became its leader, and contributed a great deal to women’s policing in Germany, Ireland, and at home, and supplied hundreds of trained women to police munitions factories. Her work was rewarded with an OBE. However, the authorities found that Mary wanted more power and influence than they were prepared to give. For many years she fought for her position against the Metropolitan Police, a fight she lost, although she continued to travel the world in her uniform, and was generally accepted abroad as the chief British policewoman, much to the dismay of the police and government authorities at home. Mary had a lifelong obsession with uniforms and masculine authority. She was strongly drawn to dictatorial men, and was proud to have met Hitler and Mussolini. She became a devoted follower of and his British Union of Fascists. Mary narrowly escaped internment during the second World War, for her anti-Semitic activities and for the possibility that she was spying for Germany, although this was never proved. Her movements were severely restricted, and her activities were observed. Women adored Mary, and a number of them were eager to fund her increasingly grandiose schemes, including the formation of a Women’s Reserve, which was intended to fight Communism and other perceived threats to the British way of life. Mary Sophia Allen, suffragette, policewoman and fascist, died in a nursing home at the age of 86.

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Mary Sophia Allen (12 March 1878 – 16 December 1964) was a British woman who worked for women's rights. She is chiefly noted as one of the early leaders of the Women's Police Volunteers as well as for her involvement in far right political activity. Contents. Early years. Allen was born to a well-to-do family in in 1878, one of the ten children of Thomas Isaac Allen, Chief Superintendent of the . Mary was close to her sisters, all of whom had a tendency to religious mysticism. She was educated at home and later at Princess Helena College. [1] She left home at the age of thirty in 1908 after a disagreement with her father about women's suffrage, and joined 's Women's Social and Political Union, becoming an organiser in the South West, and later in . She was imprisoned three times in 1909 for smashing windows, twice went on hunger-strike, and was force-fed on the last occasion, for which she was awarded a hunger-strike medal by Emmeline Pethick-Lawrence. First World War. At the outbreak of the First World War, militant suffragist activities ceased. Allen turned down an offer of work with a Needlework Guild and looked around for a more active occupation. She heard that a number of women were trying to set up a women's police force and, in 1914, she joined Nina Boyle's Women Police Volunteers, which was taken over by Margaret Damer Dawson in 1915 and renamed the Women Police Service (WPS), with Allen as second-in-command. They designed their own uniform and opened training schools in and Bristol. They saw their role as mainly dealing with women and children and rescuing women from vice and 'white slavery'. Allen served at and , overseeing the morals of women in the vicinity of army barracks. She went on to police munitions factories which employed large numbers of women. She also worked in London, where 'khaki fever' was perceived as a problem. [2] Child welfare work led the WPS to set up a Benevolent Department and a home for mothers and babies. Allen was awarded the OBE for services during the War. Allen and Margaret Damer Dawson cropped their hair and assumed a severe military appearance, and Allen wore her police uniform in public for the rest of her life. In 1915 Dawson made a will which left everything to Allen; when Dawson died unexpectedly in 1920, Allen assumed the role of WPS Commandant. [3] After the War, the WPS was expected to disband: the authorities saw no further need of that organisation. The Metropolitan Police set up its own women’s division and accused the WPS of masquerading as Metropolitan policewomen. Allen was even arrested in 1921 for wearing a Metropolitan Police uniform before it was decided that her activities, which included producing dossiers on left- wing activists, were harmless and she should be allowed to continue wearing it. [4] The WPS changed their name to the Women's Auxiliary Service (WAS) and, with minor modifications to their uniform, carried on as before, setting up a further training school in Edinburgh. The Government appointed the Baird Committee to investigate the activities of the WAS. Despite no longer being recognised by the authorities, Allen was invited by the Government to travel to Germany and advise on the policing of the British Army of the Rhine. This semi-acceptance encouraged her to represent herself overseas as chief of the British women police. She travelled in uniform and was welcomed by police authorities in Europe and in South and North America. Politics. In November 1922 Allen stood unsuccessfully for Parliament as an Independent Liberal candidate for Westminster St George's. During the General Strike of 1926 Allen was involved with the Organisation for the Maintenance of Supplies and turned her Women's Auxiliary Service over to the strike-breaking movement. [4] Allen learned to fly. She attended international police congresses in Austria and Germany. She also visited the Netherlands, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Turkey and Brazil, advising on the training of police women. She travelled to Egypt in 1936 on holiday (wearing her uniform), but was received as if sent by the police authorities in Britain. Her interest in vice and white slavery continued to be a preoccupation, and she attended the conference in on the traffic in women. Wherever she went, she was perceived by many as the leading British policewoman. She did nothing to discourage the impression, and made contact with police chiefs and political leaders all over Europe. The began to take an interest in Allen's activities in 1927. She was becoming an embarrassment and a nuisance to the Government, partly because of her acceptance abroad as representing the British authorities, and partly because she was mistaken for a Metropolitan police officer at home. Home Office records covering the period 1927–1934 reveal that she kept dossiers on people she suspected of activities connected with vice and white slavery. She was also suspected of fascist activities, and articles by or about her in national newspapers increased the Home Office surveillance. Allen met a number of fascist leaders abroad, including Eoin O'Duffy in Ireland, Franco in Spain, Mussolini in Italy, and Hitler and Göring in Germany. Although her links to Oswald Mosley's British Union of Fascists were unofficial until 1939, she engaged in various militant activities, including the formation of the Women's Reserve in 1933, which was intended to serve the country in the event of subversive forces taking over. The publicity for the Women's Reserve reveals her fascist sympathies, and her fear of communism. She met Hitler in 1934 and discussed women police with him. She was captivated by Hitler and expressed her admiration for him in public. Once she had joined the British Union of Fascists, she wrote numerous articles for its newspapers and openly declared herself to be a fascist. A Suspension Order under the Defence of the Realm Act 1914 was made against her when suspicions arose about her contacts with Germany. Her home was searched, and internment was considered, but not implemented. She was suspected of making flights to Germany, and acting as a spy for the Nazis, but this was never proved. Following the outbreak of the Second World War Allen joined the Women's Voluntary Service but also became a regular speaker at BUF peace rallies. Outrage followed with Daily Herald , and News Chronicle stories calling for Allen's removal from the WVS, particularly after comments in which she refused to condemn were published. [5] Due to her close connections to Mosley and Special Branch regarded Allen with some suspicion. After a review of her activities and a study of her personality and associates, they declined to detain her under Defence Regulation 18B. The final report was dismissive, describing her as a "crank. trailing round in a ridiculous uniform". [6] Eventually however she was placed under a lesser form of detention as a precaution, being restricted to within a five-mile radius of her home and banned from using cars, bicycles, telephones and the wireless. [7] Personal life. Allen was known as 'Robert' by her close circle of female friends, and she was called 'Sir' by her officers. Her friends included Margaret Damer Dawson, Isobel Goldingham and Helen Bourn Tagart, all of whom she met in her policing days. [ citation needed ] She wrote three volumes of autobiography: The Pioneer Policewoman (1925), A Woman at the Cross Roads (1934), and Lady in Blue (1936). A Woman at the Cross Roads reveals aspects of her life and philosophy but is reticent about her private life. It was written at the time when Allen met Hitler, and her political views are made plain: she was at a crossroads in her life because she was looking at as a solution to the world problems that she perceived. She also wrote numerous articles for newspapers and magazines, and founded The Policewomen’s Review , which ran from 1927 to 1937, to which she was a major contributor. Few details of Allen's personal life are available after the Second World War. She continued to be associated with Mosley and other fascists, including Norah Elam with whom she had shared a lifelong friendship. Both had been members of the WSPU, and as miliant suffragettes had undergone force feeding. They both turned to animal activism after the demise of the Mosley movement, being staunch anti-vivisectionists and members of the London and Provincial Anti-Vivisection Society. [8] She always had a strong interest in religion, without any particular affiliation. She converted to Roman Catholicism in 1953, [ citation needed ] and died in a nursing home in Croydon at the age of 86, attended by her sister, Christine. From Suffragette to Fascist: The Many Lives of Mary Sophia Allen by Nina Boyd. The next two names on the list are both well-known and researched: Mary S Allen was arrested on 25 February 1909, 12 July 1909 both in London and 13 November 1909 in Bristol and Louisa Garrett Anderson arrested on 5 March 1912. Nina Boyd has written a biography The Many Lives of Mary Sophia Allen published in 2013. Both have detailed and fascinating entries on Wikipedia for example. The next name on the list sheds light on the relationships between the campaigners and the threads that continued to entwine them for the rest of their lives. Constance Andrews was arrested on 7 June 1913 and 31 March 1914. The daughter of Oliver, an architect and surveyor and Mary Andrews Constance was born in 1864 in Stowmarket, Suffolk; her full name was Emily Constance. The local papers record her musical prowess as a teenager often giving recitals either on her own or with one of her sisters. Her father died in 1885, and a few years later in 1891 Constance is recorded on the census return living in Gloucester working as a schoolteacher probably of music. By 1894 Constance had moved back to Stowmarket and was taking in her own music pupils as well as giving piano recitals. She was by this point an Associate of the London College of Music. Two years later she was instrumental in the setting up of the Ladies Section of the Stowmarket Cycling Club being appointed its first captain. Unusually for the time Constance and two other female members along with a William Bury were in partnership in a building firm based in Stowmarket. By 1901 the partnership had been dissolved, and Constance had moved to Ipswich continuing to teach music. In 1907 Constance participated in the campaign for women’s suffrage founding the Ipswich branch of the Women’s Freedom League in 1909. An endeavour in which she was joined by her sister, Lilla. In 1911 Constance, like many women organised an event in Ipswich to ensure they were not at home for the taking of the census. Among those present were her sister and Isobel Tippett, the mother of Michael Tippett, the composer. A few weeks later she appeared before the Magistrates Court in Woodbridge for her failure to have a dog licence. Refusing to pay the fine she was imprisoned in Ipswich Gaol for a week. On her release she was collected from the prison gates by several suffragists including Charlotte Despard. Isobel Tippett was a cousin of Charlotte Despard which possibly explains Charlotte’s presence in Ipswich on Constance’s release and her accompanying Constance and others touring Suffolk during the summer of 1912 in a caravan with the aim of spreading their message across the rural and coastal villages. As was the case in other parts of the country they were frequently heckled but continued despite such lukewarm receptions. During the early months of 1913 she addressed various meetings of the Women’s Freedom League in the North East, the Sunderland Daily Echo reporting that perhaps unusually she had no difficulty in getting her message across and was warmly treated by all. Although in May she successfully defied the ban of public speaking in Hyde Park on the subject of votes for women she was not so lucky a month later when she was charged with obstructing the police when trying to speak outside St James’s Palace. When the matter came to court all three of the women charged requested time to call witnesses which was denied. They were ordered to pay 20 shillings or go to prison for fourteen days. Charlotte Despard who attended the hearing shouted, “There is no justice for women in ”. Refusing to pay the fine Constance was imprisoned. According to the arrest record Constance was arrested again on 31 March 1914, but the reason has not been found. Constance was a member of the Church of the New Age in Manchester. Similar in its views to Theosophy believing in tolerance and service to humanity members were often vegetarians as were the followers of Theosophy. Members of the Church were Countess Markievicz and Esther Roper. Constance held a licence to perform marriages and supported clergyman in services for women of the church. She believed in equality of men and women regardless of religion or sex and their equal right to be ministers. From Suffragette to Fascist : The Many Lives of Mary Sophia Allen. Mary Allen, once a window-smashing suffragette, went on to become a pioneer policewoman, helping create Britain's first female police force. Honoured for her work policing munitions factories and bombed towns during the First World War, she was soon infuriating the Establishment, travelling the world in her unauthorised uniform to the acclaim of foreign leaders and the dismay of the British government. Mary's head was next turned after a meeting with Hitler, and she joined Mosley's British Union of Fascists, narrowly escaping internment despite suspicions of spying, secret flights to Germany and Nazi salutes. The liaisons she formed with wealthy heiresses funded an extravagant lifestyle and the formation of a private army of women intended to save the country from Communist aerial attacks, nudity and white slavery. Although adored by her loyal friends, Mary was a stubborn, opinionated woman and today her achievements are overshadowed by the eccentricities of her later years. Citing documents specially released from the Home Office and sources contributed from Mary's own family, Nina Boyd has produced a fascinating account of this extraordinary woman. show more.