Adeline Mary Chapman

Adeline Mary Chapman ( Chapman; 27 August 1847 – 20 January 1931), first married name Adeline Guest, was an English campaigner for women's suffrage. She was a suffragist, and opposed the militancy of the suffragettes. Having been an early member of the Women's Social and Political Union, she was a member of the Central Society for Women's Suffrage from 1901. Unhappy with what she perceived as the ineffectiveness of the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies (NUWSS), the main suffragist organisation, she was the founding president of the New Constitutional Society for Women's Suffrage (NCS). The aim of the NCS was to lobby government, campaign against the governing Liberal Party candidates (as the party was then broadly anti-women's suffrage) and to explicitly "abstain from public criticism of other suffragists". From 1916, as president of the NCS, she attended the Consultative Committee of the Women's Constitutional Suffrage Societies: the aim of the Consultative Committee was successfully realized in the Representation of the People Act 1918 which gave the right to vote to women aged over 30 for the first time. With the rights for some women to vote obtained, the NCS dissolved in June 1918. Biography Chapman was born on 27 August 1847 in Roehampton, Surrey, England, to David Barclay Chapman (1799–1891), a wealthy banker and his second wife Maria (née Chatfield; born 1810). She was brought up at Downshire House, a large house in Roehampton, and was educated at home alongside her many siblings by governesses. On 23 April 1867, Chapman married Arthur Edward Guest (1841–1898). From 1867 to 1874, Arthur was the Conservative Member of Parliament for Poole. Together they had two children; their daughter Mildred (1868–1942), who would go on to marry Colonel J. D. Mansel, was a suffragette. By 1881, the marriage had failed and Adeline petitioned for divorce, citing her husband's adultery: however, the law was not on her side and her case was dismissed. The marriage ended instead in 1898 when Arthur died.