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The Actresses' Franchise League played an important role in the suffrage campaign of the Edwardian era. The League's Play Department pioneered the development of a feminist protest genre, using drama as a means of influencing public opinion. By 1913, the League had matured to the point that it sought the establishment of a "women's theatre" on a permanent basis, although its initial experiment in 1913 was aborted by the outbreak of World War I. After the start of the war, the energies focused upon the vote issue were channeled into an effort "to show men that we women are of use to the country." This article surveys the evolution of the League in the final years of peace, when the institution of a permanent women's theatre seemed a distinct possibility, focusing on the activities of such prominent League members as Lena Ashwell, who organized concert parties for troops on the firing line, and Inez Bensusan who provided dramatic entertainment for enlistees in training camps in England as a means of keeping the League alive and viable through the war years. Ironically, while their contributions may have persuaded some men that women deserved the vote, a chief victim of the seismic shifts necessitated by the war was feminism itself, which appeared a spent force in the decade of the 1920's. Forgotten too was the extraordinary wartime record of women with strong suffragist connections-a record that the article seeks to explore in detail.
The week of 8 December 1913 marked an apogee in the brief life of the Actresses' Franchise League (AFL). The League had been founded in 1908 by a group of pro-suffrage performers, one of a number of similar organizations established by professional women along occupational lines. Among the AFL's stated aims was the promotion of support for the cause of female enfranchisement through participation in public parades, demonstrations, and pageants. The League also pledged to render assistance to a broad spectrum of suffrage societies, whether moderate or radical, by presenting playlets and sketches as a means of raising funds for the cause. Whether written to order by members of the League or by its sister organization, the Women Writers' Suffrage League, these dramatic presentations proved immensely popular and quickly became a staple...