In June 2018 the small team at Swindon Suffragette organised a festival to celebrate the centenary of the enfranchisement of (some) women and the contribution to the cause made by Swindon born suffragette Edith New. Women who were over the age of 30 and met a property qualification were granted the vote, however it would be another 10 years before women received electoral equality with men.
Edith moved to Polperro in Cornwall after her retirement from teaching. Her sister Ellen also bought a property in the village. Edith moved in with her sister after she rented out her cottage to a family who had been bombed out of London during WWII. Ellen died in December 1949 and Edith in January 1951. They are buried together in the cemetery just outside Polperro village.
The grave of Edith New and her sister Ellen
This impressive obelisk monument is the New family memorial in Christ Church churchyard. Remembered on this memorial are Edith’s parents and three of her siblings.
The New family memorial
Frederic James New was a clerk in the railway village. He married first Sarah Sophia Ball in 1870 and they had one child Frances Jane born the following year. Sarah died either in childbirth or shortly after and was buried in this family plot.
Frederic and several other members of the New family were Freemasons and it is likely the bereaved family received some help from that organisation. Frances won a place at the Royal Masonic Institution for Girls in Battersea. She died on October 27, 1889 and was buried with her mother.
Meanwhile, in 1872 Frederic married Isabella Frampton. They had five children, including Ellen, Frederick and Edith. Sadly, a daughter Annie Isabella died in 1876 aged 5 months and a son, Henry James Earnshaw died on February 6, 1879. These two babies are also buried here.
On February 19, 1878 Frederick was walking along the railway track to meet with his friend who lived at Toothill when he was struck by a train and killed. The inscription on this memorial indicates it was paid for by his colleagues in the GWR.
We know that Isabella never remarried and raised her three surviving children alone. She taught music to private pupils at her home and she had a property that she rented out. We know that she was supportive of Edith’s work in the campaign for women’s suffrage and that Edith came back to Swindon to recuperate at the family home in Lethbridge Road after one of her prison sentences.
The last person remembered on this memorial is Isabella. The inscription reads:
Her ways are ways of
Pleasantness and all
Her paths are peace.
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