Maud Joachim’s Hunger Strike Medal comes to GWL
In September, Glasgow Women’s Library launched a public fundraising appeal to enable us to purchase a hunger strike medal awarded to suffragette Maud Joachim in 1909 by the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU). The medal, previously in a private collection, was up for auction at Bonhams in London on 3rd October 2023.
Maud Joachim was arrested, with the claim that she had, “conducted herself in a disorderly manner and committed a breach of the peace” in Dundee on the 20th October 1909, along with Adela Pankhurst, Helen Archdale, Catherine Corbett and Laura Evans. They had interrupted a meeting led by Winston Churchill the day before, the 19th October, (when interviewed later he called them ‘a band of silly, neurotic, hysterical women‘) by leading a crowd and shouting ‘This way! Votes for Women!’ Maud went to prison where she was released after a four day hunger strike.
We knew that raising the money for a successful bid for Maud’s medal would be a challenge, but we did it! Media coverage in The Guardian and on BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour helped, and the response was overwhelming.
Our winning bid was £32,500, and with the added Buyers’ Premium of £9,100, the total owed to Bonhams was £41,600. With a grant from the National Fund for Acquisitions* secured of £13,200, this left us to fundraise a massive £28,400 to meet the costs. We raised exactly £28,500, with 544 people donating. This is exceptional crowd-source fundraising, and we would like to thank everyone who donated for their generosity.
We were also thrilled to be contacted by several members of the Joachim family, who lent their full support to our campaign, and are all delighted that Maud’s medal is now in the collection at Glasgow Women’s Library.
GWL Co-Directors Adele Patrick and Sue John (who lead the fundraising campaign) collected Maud’s medal from Bonhams in person on 11th October. Sue reflected, “It was a privilege to finally hold Maud’s medal–such a small and humble item, but with huge significance in suffrage history. It was an emotional moment, and a reminder of the bravery of generations before us. Maud’s medal will be treasured at Glasgow Women’s Library–a symbol of resolve, hope, celebration and activism in the past, present and into the future.”
In September, Glasgow Women’s Library launched a public fundraising appeal to enable us to purchase a hunger strike medal awarded to suffragette Maud Joachim in 1909 by the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU). The medal, previously in a private collection, was up for auction at Bonhams in London on 3rd October 2023.
Maud Joachim was arrested, with the claim that she had, “conducted herself in a disorderly manner and committed a breach of the peace” in Dundee on the 20th October 1909, along with Adela Pankhurst, Helen Archdale, Catherine Corbett and Laura Evans. They had interrupted a meeting led by Winston Churchill the day before, the 19th October, (when interviewed later he called them ‘a band of silly, neurotic, hysterical women‘) by leading a crowd and shouting ‘This way! Votes for Women!’ Maud went to prison where she was released after a four day hunger strike.
We knew that raising the money for a successful bid for Maud’s medal would be a challenge, but we did it! Media coverage in The Guardian and on BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour helped, and the response was overwhelming.
Our winning bid was £32,500, and with the added Buyers’ Premium of £9,100, the total owed to Bonhams was £41,600. With a grant from the National Fund for Acquisitions* secured of £13,200, this left us to fundraise a massive £28,400 to meet the costs. We raised exactly £28,500, with 544 people donating. This is exceptional crowd-source fundraising, and we would like to thank everyone who donated for their generosity.
We were also thrilled to be contacted by several members of the Joachim family, who lent their full support to our campaign, and are all delighted that Maud’s medal is now in the collection at Glasgow Women’s Library.
GWL Co-Directors Adele Patrick and Sue John (who lead the fundraising campaign) collected Maud’s medal from Bonhams in person on 11th October. Sue reflected, “It was a privilege to finally hold Maud’s medal–such a small and humble item, but with huge significance in suffrage history. It was an emotional moment, and a reminder of the bravery of generations before us. Maud’s medal will be treasured at Glasgow Women’s Library–a symbol of resolve, hope, celebration and activism in the past, present and into the future.”
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NewsTranscript
00:00 My name is Sue John, I'm the co-director at Glasgow Women's Library. We're here really
00:12 just to hear the story of how Glasgow Women's Library came to be in the possession of a
00:16 wonderful newly added artefact, a Hunger Strike medal awarded to the suffragette Maude Joachim.
00:24 We became aware of the medal in September and we had an email from Bonhams, the auction
00:31 house, to alert us to an upcoming online auction of 111 different lots and they were all related
00:40 to suffrage memorabilia in the possession of a private collector who was ready to get
00:45 rid of her collection. And Bonhams contacted us because amongst these 111 lots were two
00:52 Scottish specific related artefacts. The most important one was this Hunger Strike medal.
00:59 Now Maude Joachim wasn't a Scot, she was born in Paddington in London, however she was part
01:06 of a really important action that saw her and some other suffragettes arrested in 1909.
01:12 And Maude Joachim worked in Aberdeen and she worked up in Dundee as well as part of her
01:18 suffragette activism. And one day on the 19th of October 1909 she was arrested with some
01:24 other suffragettes including Adela Pankhurst for disrupting a speech by Winston Churchill.
01:32 He was the MP for Dundee and he was making a speech so they interrupted his speech with
01:38 the plea for votes for women and causing a breach of the peace and so on. They were arrested,
01:45 she went to court and she was imprisoned and they went on Hunger Strike. And Hunger Strike
01:50 as a tactic was relatively new, in fact it was brand new, only weeks before it had been
01:56 employed for the first time by suffragettes in prison. So she was one of the very earliest
02:01 Hunger Strikers. So she served time in Dundee prison and was then released. And because
02:08 she was a member of the Women's Social and Political Union, the WSPU, they gave medals
02:14 to all their activists who were imprisoned and went on Hunger Strike. So this medal came
02:21 on the market, it had a valuation of an anticipated hammer price of about £18,000 so we knew
02:28 that we would have to raise a lot of money to be able to afford this. This was new territory
02:33 for us, everything at Glasgow Women's Library, our museum collection, all our archives and
02:39 all our books have all been donated, so 30 plus years, three decades of donated materials
02:45 and we've never had an acquisitions budget. So new territory for us, so it was exciting
02:51 but we knew it would be a challenge. And fortunately we were able to launch a public appeal to
02:57 be able to purchase this medal and the response was absolutely astounding. We had in the end
03:05 544 individuals contributing money to buy the medal and the hammer price of the medal
03:12 was £32,500 so we did really well to raise that money. We were fortunate enough to be
03:20 given a grant from the Scottish Government National Fund for Acquisitions who were very
03:24 generous as well and very quick in turning over that grant application to enable us to
03:30 secure this medal. And it was a knife edge, we had a rival bidder, we still don't know
03:35 who that was, we did check with all the museums in our network to make sure they weren't interested
03:39 in the medal but thankfully we secured it and we're so happy that the medal is here
03:47 in Glasgow Women's Library. It's very apt because Glasgow Women's Library is the only
03:51 accredited museum in the whole of the UK that's dedicated to women's history and we're also
03:56 a designated recognised collection of national significance so to have it here is a privilege
04:01 for us, it makes sure that this medal is safe. In a public collection it's accessible, it'll
04:08 be on public display from January here in an exhibition that we'll be having so people
04:14 will be able to see it and be able to read and hear more about it as well. Maude Joachim
04:21 was an amazing activist and she went on to be imprisoned several other times including
04:26 when she was force fed later in her activism so on the medal there's an added bar that
04:32 was given to people that were force fed in prison, it was added by the WSPU and we can
04:38 see from the medal that she was force fed on the 1st of March 1912 and that was a stint
04:43 in Holloway prison so a later time frame in her activism but it just adds to the poignancy
04:52 I think of this very small, humble, beautiful artefact that as I say is a privilege to have
04:58 in our collection now.
05:00 [Music playing]
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