Torturing Women in Prison. Vote Against the Government
A woman in a prison dress is held in a chair by a warder and a man in a frock coat while a bespectacled man pours liquid down a tube in her nose; 'Votes for Women' is scratched on the cell wall. The headline 'Torturing Women in Prison' is the loaded label for forcible feeding, and the closing instruction, 'Vote against the government', turns the scene into a voting order.
- Date
- 1910
- Period
- Pre-1914
- Made by
- Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU), London; printed by David Allen & Sons; artist not named on the poster
- Region
- Western and Central Europe
- Country
- United Kingdom
- Medium
- Poster
- Issuer type
- Movement
- Regime
- Asquith Government
- Leader
- Herbert Henry Asquith
- Audience
- Domestic public
- Purpose
- Persuade or win support
- Themes
- Gender and suffrage, Elections and party politics
- Event
- British Suffrage Campaign
- Techniques
- Name-calling
- Source
- Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are
- Source
- Library of Congress, retrieved September 29, 2026
- Rights
- Public domain (published in Britain c. 1909-1910, before 1931; LoC gives no rights restriction)
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division, Washington, D.C., POS - Gt Brit .A01, no. 7; LC-DIG-ppmsca-56873.
Text on the object
TORTURING WOMEN IN PRISON [small framed notice on the cell wall beneath a crown and 'E R': illegible] Votes for Women [scratched on the cell wall] PUBLISHED BY THE NATIONAL WOMEN'S SOCIAL AND POLITICAL UNION 4 CLEMENTS INN STRAND W.C. & PRINTED BY DAVID ALLEN & SONS Ld 180 FLEET ST E.C. [small printer's mark at lower right: illegible] VOTE AGAINST THE GOVERNMENT
