On this day, 13 August 1880, suffragette and union organiser Mary Macarthur was born in Glasgow. She founded the National Federation of Women Workers, and led a strike of 2,000 women across London in the summer of 1911.
Macarthur was a leading figure in the working class wing of the suffragette movement. As such she opposed World War I, and opposed voting rights being given just to wealthy women, which made her unpopular with middle class suffragettes. The middle class wing of the movement aimed to achieve voting rights only for property owning women.
Pictured: Macarthur addressing a crowd of strikers https://www.facebook.com/workingclasshistory/photos/a.296224173896073/2056291997889273/?type=3