Holloway Jingles.
Inscribed by the Holloway Chaplain
[Prison reform] John, Nancy A. editor. Halloway Jingles. Written in Holloway Prison during March and April, 1912. Collected and Edited by N.A. John, Glasgow. Published by the Glasgow branch of the WSPU. [Glasgow?]: [1912].
12mo.; modern morocco-backed marbled boards, original printed wrappers bound-in.
First edition of this collection of writings and poetry by suffragettes imprisoned after the organized window breaking in London in March 1912, including contributions by Laura Gray and Emily Wilding Davison. Collected and published by the Glasgow branch of the WSPU.
A compelling association copy, inscribed by Father James McCarrroll, Roman Catholic chaplain to Holloway Prison at the time, and mentioned in one of the poems: Fr. Mc. C. to Marjorie MacLaughlin, Breeze Mount Coleraine. McCarroll, Roman Catholic chaplain to Holloway Prison 1908 to 1916, is referred to in a poem in the collection written by Kathleen Emerson.
But who is this now comes in view,
His smiling face cheers others too?
Father McCarroll, “here’s to you,”
The only Man in Holloway.
From a Protestant family, by 1911 Emerson was a widow, living with her parents in Dublin. She was secretary of the Irish Women’s Franchise League and in March 1912 took part in the window-smashing raid in London. She was sentenced to two months’ imprisonment - spent in Holloway - and contributed two poems to Holloway Jingles.
This passage is marked in the text with vertical lines.
Laura Gray (“Lavender Guthrie”) composed the following critically noted verse, also present in this volume. The dedicatee, “D.R.” is thought to be Dorothea Rock.
Beyond the bars I see her move,
A mystery of blue and green,
As though across the prison yard
The spirit of the spring had been.
And as she lifts her hands to press
The happy sunshine of her hair,
From the grey ground the pigeons rise,
And rustle upwards in the air,
As though her two hands held a key
To set the imprisoned spirits free.’
(see http://womanandhersphere.com /tag/ holloway-jingles/).
Editor Nancy John, a member of the Glasgow WSPU in Holloway, reportedly “hadn’t even hit a window…yet got [a] two months” sentence.
Rare: OCLC records four copies in North America – at Indiana, NYPL, Vassar College and the Huntington Library – but none inscribed.
(#4658738)
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