Queer Places:
(1900, 1956) Hawse End, Keswick, Cumberland
(1913)
1 Barton St, Westminster, London SW1P 3NG, UK
(1961) 2 Linnell Drive,
Hampstead Way, London NW11
24 Palace St, Westminster, London SW1E 5JD, UK
Catherine
Elizabeth Marshall (29 April 1880 – 22 March 1961) was a suffragist and
campaigner against conscription during the First World War.[2] She
moved from women's votes to peace and worked in Geneva supporting the League
of Nations. In London, Rosika
Schwimmer lived and worked with two British suffragists, Catherine
Marshall and Mary Sheepshanks.
Marshall managed an active suffrage society in the Lake District, a branch of
the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies (NUWSS), and between 1911 and
1914 she worked full time as honorary parliamentary secretary at the NUWSS
headquarters in London. Her name and picture (and those of 58 other women and
men's suffrage supporters)
are on the
plinth of the
statue of
Millicent Fawcett in
Parliament Square, London, unveiled in 2018.
Left to right: Catherine E. Marshall, Sir George Paish, Jane Addams, Cor. Ramondt-Hirschmann, Jeanne Melin – Emergency Peace Conference at the Hague "Conference for a New Peace" in 1922
Marshall was born on 29 April 1880 in Harrow on the Hill.[3] Her
father, Francis Marshall, taught mathematics at Harrow School and her mother
Caroline had also been a teacher.[3] She
was educated privately and then at St Leonards School in Scotland for three
years.[3]
Marshall inherited her interest in the Liberal Party although she would
later become disillusioned that their values of equality did not include
women, She joined the London Society for Women's Suffrage but she did not
get involved. By 1908 her father had retired and they moved to the Lake
District where Marshall and her mother joined the National Union of Women's
Suffrage Societies (NUWSS) and created the Keswick branch. Marshall was
demonstrating what became best practice by establishing a stall in Keswick
market to sell suffrage literature and raise awareness.[2] In
1911 she joined the core group at the heart of the NUWSS working with Kathleen
Courtney who had been elected honorary secretary. Catherine led the
press department and represented the group at a meeting in Stockholm.
When Edith Palliser was ill she took over as parliamentary secretary
skilfully inspiring local groups to lobby their M.P.s whilst she applied
direct pressure to key figures. Palliser resigned and Marshall took on her
role. The NUWSS was effectively led by Courtney and Marshall. Marshall was
involved with senior Liberal party politicians who claimed to support
women's suffrage but in effect did little. In August 1913 she returned to
Keswick and stayed until the following February.[4]
In February 1915 the Women's International Congress took place in The Hague.
This was a conference she had helped organise. Marshall was convinced that
peace could be established by recognising the consent of the people and
refusing models built of force and power. In March 1915 she resigned from
her positions with the NUWSS.[4] She
established her country's part of the Women's International League for Peace
and Freedom.[5]
She was an organiser for the No-Conscription Fellowship.[6] She
started a relationship with Clifford Allen, Chairman of the No-Conscription
Fellowship, who was imprisoned as a conscientious objector three times. In
1917 he became so ill that he was released from prison and he and Marshall
set up house together, Marshall was also ill, but from overwork. Marshall
hoped that their relationship would continue, but Allen ended their
partnership.[5]
Marshall recovered from her overwork threw herself again into ensuring
peace. She was a delegate in Zurich at the Women's International Congress.
The congress attracted delegations from many of former countries who had
been at war. The congress was able to review the model for the new League of
Nations.[5]
Following the formation of the League of Nations, Marshall spent a lot of
time in Geneva working for the Women's International League for Peace and
Freedom. This was an influential group and Jane Addams was to get a Nobel
prize for her work with them. Marshall moved on in the 1930s to help people
who were escaping from the growth of the Nazis in Germany.[2]
Her papers are held at the National Library of Ireland.[7]
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