Suffragists -- United States; Women -- Suffrage -- United States
Another young woman, an aviatrice, was seized by the coat collar and
thrown to the pavement for trying to keep hold of her banner. Her fur
cap was the only thing that saved her skull from serious injury. As it
was, she was trampled under foot and her face severely cut before we
could rescue her with the assistance of a sympathetic member of the
crowd. The sympathetic person was promptly attacked by the policeman
for helping his victim to her feet. There were many shouts of
disapproval of the police conduct and many cheers for the women from
the dense crowd.
By this time the crowd had massed itself so thickly that we could
hardly move an inch. It was perfectly apparent that we could neither
make our way to the Opera House nor could we extricate ourselves. But
the terrors continued. Women were knocked down and trampled under foot,
some of them almost unconscious, others bleeding from the hands and
face; arms were bruised and twisted; pocketbooks were snatched and
wrist-watches stolen.
When it looked as if the suffocating melee would result in the death or
permanent injury to some of us, I was at last dragged by a policeman to
the edge of the crowd. Although I offered not the slightest resistance,
I was crushed continuously in the arm by the officer who walked me to
the police station, and kept muttering: “You’re a bunch of
cannibals,—cannibals,—Bolsheviks.”
Upon arriving at the police station I was happily relieved to find eve
of my comrades already there. We were all impartially cursed at; told
to stand up; told to sit down; forbidden to speak to one another;
forbidden even to smile at one another. One by one we were called to
the desk to give our name, age, and various other pieces of
information. We stood perfectly silent before the station lieutenant as
he coaxingly said, “You’d better tell.”—“You’d better give us your
name.”—“You’d better tell us where you live—it will make things easier
for you.” But we continued our silence.
Disorderly conduct, interfering with the police, assaulting the police
(Shades of Heaven! assaulting the police!), were the charges entered
against us.
We were all locked in separate cells and told that we would be taken to
the Woman’s Night Court for immediate trial.
While pondering on what was happening to our comrades and wondering if
they, too, would be arrested, or if they would just be beaten up by the
police and mob, a large, fat jail matron came up and began to deliver a
speech, which, ran something like this:
“Now, shure and you ladies must know that this is goin’ a bit too far.
Now, I’m for suffrage alright, and I believe women ought to vote, but
why do you keep botherin’ the President? Don’t you know he has got
enough to think about with the League of Nations, the Peace Conference
and fixin’ up the whole world on his mind?”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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