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Suffrage Colors and Alleged Suffrage Jewelry

by Kenneth Florey

There are three errors or misrepresentations that have surfaced recently on eBay about the official colors of the suffrage cause and the meaning of these colors in extant suffrage memorabilia, especially jewelry. These errors are: (1) that the official colors of the suffrage movement were green, white, and violet; (2) that these colors stood for (G)ive (W)omen the (V)ote; and (3) that these jewelry items served as a "secret code" among women to indicate that they supported the movement but were "afraid" to reveal their sympathies to their husbands and sons.

These errors, from my understanding, were articulated in a nationally circulated antiques magazine in 2002 and have appeared in at least one book on antique jewelry and on several sites on the Internet. As a result, there have been several jewelry dealers selling items with these three colors as suffrage, without any period authentication. Some have even promoted pieces as suffrage with only two of the above colors, assuring potential bidders that the third color "was added later."

The following is an attempt to set the record straight.

In both England and America, there was never one official suffrage organization—there were many. The most prominent in England was the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU), headed by Emmeline Pankhurst, who is generally considered to be the most influential of all of the English suffragists. In America, the largest group was the National American Woman's Suffrage Association (NAWSA), of which Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton were leaders.

Many of these groups had colors that emblazoned their logos and memorabilia. No group, however, had as its official colors green, white, and violet. What may be the source of confusion is that the WSPU did use purple, white, and green (which were generally listed in this order by WSPU members). In fact, these three colors became so associated with that organization and suffrage in England that most people of the period, men and women, were aware of the connection.

One might argue that purple is violet and violet is purple, what's the difference? The point is that the WSPU considered the color to be purple, not violet, and constructed a symbolism accordingly. Diane Atkinson, one of the leading contemporary scholars on the suffrage movement, edited a book, Suffragettes in the Purple, White, and Green London 1906-1914, which served as a catalog at an exhibition of suffrage memorabilia at the Museum of London and which discusses the symbolism. Atkinson notes that the color scheme was devised by Mrs. Pethick-Lawrence, treasurer and co-editor of the weekly newspaper Votes for Women. In the spring 1908 issue of that paper, Pethick-Lawrence explained the symbolism of the colors:

"Purple as everyone knows is the royal colour. It stands for the royal blood that flows in the veins of every suffragette, the instinct of freedom and dignity...white stands for purity in private and public life...green is the colour of hope and the emblem of spring."

In other words, the woman who devised the scheme in the first place indicated that the colors stood for freedom and dignity (purple), purity, and hope, not for "Give Women the Vote" (violet). Moreover, she intended these colors not to be a "secret code" for the movement, but a symbol by which the organization would be identified in the public's eye. As Pethick-Lawrence further explained:

"The colours enable us to make that appeal to the eye which is so irresistible. The result of our processions is that this movement becomes identified in the mind of the onlooker with colour, gay sound, movement, and beauty."

Because these colors were designed to be not secret and private but rather open and public, the WSPU exhorted women to "wear the colors" and show the support for the movement. Prior to one demonstration, Pethick-Lawrence announced that they had "several hundred banners in purple, white, and green. The effect will be lost unless the colours are carried in the dress of every woman in the ranks." She was so successful in placing these colors before the public eye that even men opposed to suffrage were made aware of the connection, as they were intended to be.

One of the purposes of the colors was to show the public how deep the sentiment for suffrage was in England. In antisuffrage postcards of the era, many male artists draped their caricatures of suffragettes (the English term) in banners and sashes of purple, white, and green, presumably assuming that even the enemies of the movement could identify a suffragist by her colors.

Sylvia Pankhurst, daughter of Emmeline Pankhurst, was more or less the official artist for the WSPU. She used the colors to create not only banners but also memorabilia for the public, including badges and tea sets. In his 1979 biography of his mother, Sylvia Pankhurst, Artist and Crusader, Richard Pankhurst mentions several times his mother's use of the official colors of the movement in her designs. For example, in describing the famous Holloway brooch, given to those who had been imprisoned for the sake of the cause, Pankhurst notes that his mother "designed it in the Suffragette colours, purple, white and green."

The colors appear on badges and buttons put out by the organization, generally accompanied by the initials "WSPU" or the words "Votes for Women" (never "Give Women the Vote"). Because of the popularity of the colors, they often appear on dresses and other wearing apparel. In some cases, as noted by Elizabeth Crawford in her well-researched book The Women's Suffrage Movement: A Reference Guide 1866-1928, the colors do appear on some jewelry items of the period without any accompanying text. But she cautions that "something of a mythology has gathered around the concept of `suffragette jewelry,' fostered by auction houses and dealers in secondhand jewelry who like to claim that interesting association for any piece in which the colours purple, white and green feature."

While she notes that such pieces were manufactured, it is "very difficult to identify them with any certainty as `suffragette'; amethysts, pearls, and demantoid garnets or emeralds were very commonly used in Edwardian jewelry."

Two items to be noted: (1) the three colors were very common to the period and would have been present in jewelry even without the suffrage movement, and (2) once again, the official color of the movement is described as "purple," not violet.

If this was the situation in England, what can be found in America? Could it have been possible that American suffragists, unlike their English counterparts, created an official color scheme of green, white, and violet and developed a secret code based upon it? Even here the answer must be an unequivocal "no!"

The purple, white, and green of the WSPU did make it to America but in a limited fashion. The scheme was adopted by the Women's Political Union (WPU), which was one of the smaller organizations here. You can also see the three colors in materials put out by the Connecticut Women Suffrage Association, of which Katharine Hepburn's mother was president. Alice Paul's National Woman's Party (NWP) or the Congressional Union modified the scheme to purple, white, and gold. Paul, however, was associated with the militant wing of the cause, and her methods were confrontational rather than conciliatory. It is highly doubtful that she would have endorsed any "secret code" involving a color scheme for women who were too timid to announce their support of suffrage to their husbands.

Concerned with Paul's militancy, Carrie Chapman Catt of the NAWSA banned the color purple at demonstrations, fearing that the public would associate her organization with the NWP. In so doing, Catt obviously felt that the public was quite aware of the relationship between certain colors and the cause and how enemies could manipulate that relationship. Apart from some usage elsewhere, it was not the English purple, green, and white color scheme that was prominent in America but that of yellow or gold, often combined somehow with black either as a border or as a printed message.

In her book Selling Suffrage: Consumer Culture and Votes for Women, Margaret Finnegan traces the use of yellow back to 1887, when Kansas suffragists, campaigning for a suffrage amendment in their state, adopted the yellow ribbon as their "distinctive sign," borrowing the color from the state flower, the sunflower. She notes that the color caught the attention of other workers throughout the country such as Mary Livermore, and that Massachusetts and Pennsylvania suffragists quickly created their own version of the sunflower badge. By 1896, NAWSA, the main suffrage organization in America, was selling sunflower stationery and pins. Yellow, notes Finnegan, quickly became an official color.

American suffragists adopted many of the merchandising methods of their British counterparts and, in the decade or so that preceded the passage of a national suffrage amendment in 1920, also opened up shops and conducted bazaars where suffrage memorabilia was sold, often, but not always, in the color or colors of the sponsoring organization. As Finnegan points out, these bazaars "sent a message of defiant unity to individuals inside and outside the movement," and that the products they sold included an "iconography united by color."

The only problem with yellow as a color (it was also combined at times with white or with blue and white) is that it was so common that it did not create the impact on American society that purple, green, and white did in England. Too many buttons and badges for other causes or events employed yellow, so any item in yellow did not immediately identify the wearer with the suffrage movement unless there was a suffrage slogan printed on the piece. Gold was sometimes substituted for yellow, but that color was even more generic, especially for jewelry items.

To sum up, color played a significant role in the history of suffrage. No suffrage group, however, officially or unofficially, used the colors green, white, and violet (as opposed to purple). "(G)ive (W)omen the (V)ote" was never put forth as a "secret slogan" by any known organization. If it came from a private source, one wonders how women found out what that code meant, since it was intended to be so secret. "Give Women the Vote" was not a well-known phrase in any area of the movement, if, indeed, it was ever used at all. The phrase by which suffragists were known was, of course, "Votes for Women." And finally, some organizations were conservative and law abiding, while others were confrontational. But all groups were united in their concern to publicize the cause and to publicly show solidarity.

There was a profusion of buttons, ribbons, and jewelry items that were issued for the cause. Many jewelry pieces consisted of enameled bars that indicated the name of an organization or contained a suffrage slogan. Some jewelry was issued in England without any such marking, but again, the problem is to differentiate between a suffrage piece and any piece of jewelry of the period that contained those common colors. Even genuine pieces of suffrage jewelry were not intended to involve a secret code but rather to identify the wearer with a color scheme commonly recognized and to indicate public rather than secret support.

It is conceivable that an ignorant local jeweler, confusing the colors of purple and violet, could have made some pieces using the latter color, selling them as symbolizing "Give Women the Vote." Even if such pieces were made, however, and there is no evidence that they were, the newly imposed symbolism of these misinterpreted colors would not have been known beyond a very limited and unknowledgeable circle.

If a dealer tries to sell you an item in a green, white, and purple or violet-like color, claiming it to be suffrage, you have a right to demand full substantiation of that claim, preferably in the form of a period advertisement for that piece. Again, the three colors are so commonly used in jewelry that their mere appearance on an item is an indication of nothing.

Finally, perhaps a word or two should be said about a recent claim that suffragists often wore jewelry that included the symbol of a chain, sometimes combined with a lock, to indicate their oppression. The WSPU in England did issue a silver pin, the famous Holloway or "portcullis" piece, which was given to suffragists who had been incarcerated at that famous prison. The brooch, designed by Sylvia Pankhurst, is a modification of the portcullis symbol of the House of Commons and features a prison gate with chains at either side. The original version of the House of Commons may be viewed on line (www.parliament.uk/).

The problem with identifying the chains on the WSPU item with the oppression of women is that they were taken from the Parliament design, where no such symbolism was intended. The National Women's Party in America adopted the idea of a prison brooch and distributed it to American women who had also been imprisoned on behalf of the cause. Reproductions of both pins were later made.

The chain symbol by itself, however, with or without an accompanying lock, was never used as an icon by any suffrage organization. Its appearance was limited to these two prison pins. While the connection of chains and the oppression of women seems a plausible one, suffrage organizations simply did not issue "chain" or "lock" jewelry, nor do these objects appear by themselves on any of their other memorabilia.

As far as commercial manufacturers go, chains and locks are traditional romantic symbols as evidenced by the phrases "unchain my heart" and "you hold the key to my heart." One could easily imagine jewelers making a suffrage piece with either of those symbols, but there is scant evidence that they ever did. Recently, a dealer on eBay described a linked bracelet as suffrage simply because he saw those links as the chain of women's oppression.

Again, if you are tempted to buy something with a chain or a lock that is advertised as suffrage, ask the dealer for proof that it is what he or she is claiming it to be. What specific proof other than someone else's "expert" opinion does that dealer have that the chain or lock on the piece is definitely suffrage related and not an object used in some other non-political context?

There were a number of journals aimed at suffrage sympathizers, including Votes for Women, The Suffragist, and The Woman's Citizen that included advertising. No ad for chain or lock suffrage jewelry ever appeared in these papers nor is there any mention of any "secret code," especially one involving a corruption of the official colors of the movement. Without wide-scale publicity within the movement itself, the symbolism of any alleged suffrage icon would have been obscure to the average woman.

Prices for genuine suffrage items are very high, and it becomes tempting for many jewelry dealers to be highly imaginative when describing their stock. Distrust anyone who tells you that "Give Women the Vote" rather than "Votes for Women" was the slogan of the suffrage movement. It simply isn't true. Now, as in the past, let the buyer beware.