Suffragettes’ secret prison diaries: History on toilet paper

Walking around a familiar museum can be similar to visiting an old friend. The physicality of ephemera, once held in the hand of someone from another generation, and not meant to last, is deeply moving and can soothe the heart.

London Museum has the world’s largest Suffragettes collection, and back in 2010 I was involved in preparing some of the objects for a display area devoted to the Suffragettes’ struggle to gain the vote for women.

I love the set of playing cards, made by the Suffragette Kitty Marshall, for games of patience while serving time in Holloway Gaol in 1910. She found four postcards inside a prison library book and cut them up into small squares. She made black ink from a stick and red ink from another library book. One of the ways she kept her activity secret was to fill her cell peephole with a plug of pulp – made from toilet paper and a little milk.

But of particular interest to me are the diaries, letters and sketchbooks that were written on toilet paper, passed between incarcerated Suffragettes, and eventually smuggled out of the prison building.

They take a while to comprehend at first. They appear to be small, brown, unattractive pieces of paper you could easily miss, but once you stop and understand the miracle of their survival, the story that they communicate stays with you. Our social history curator Beverley Cook told me that for her “they represent the spirit of comradeship that enabled imprisoned Suffragettes to endure prison conditions, hunger strike and force feeding”.

These fragile historic items were perhaps not intended to be kept, but now that they are in the museum’s collection, they have the power to transport you to another person’s world.

As a paper conservator, sensitive items that are deteriorating due to long-term exposure are concerning. Especially when you are part of the team who put them on display. Recently, I looked afresh at the toilet paper prison diary and sketch book by Suffragette Florence Hull. I was concerned that the top page of the stack seemed to be darker than the page beneath because of exposure to light and air. This object had been on display in the galleries for almost 20 years.

It is such a fragile item but one that deserves to be seen. Painfully and delicately, in the museum’s collections, a handwritten diary had survived, written covertly on prison issue toilet paper 100 years ago. The paper appears unlike the toilet paper that we know today.

In the paper historian’s ‘bible’ – Papermaking, the history and technique of an ancient craft by Dard Hunter – the author refers to a French publication of 1718 as the first written mention of toilet paper. But, historically, the use of toilet paper goes back much further than this, perhaps even to 589 CE when paper used for “toilet purposes” was mentioned in a Chinese text. It wasn’t until the mid-19th century that toilet paper was being commercially mass-manufactured and sold.

The diaries, sketchbook and letter in our collection show that the toilet paper of the early-20th century was very different to what we now use. It was only in the mid-20th century that toilet paper became softer, two ply and splinter free. That last quality doesn’t bear thinking about for too long.

The act of writing on a couple of sheets of my own toilet paper has filled me with optimism because the Holloway issue toilet paper is very different in quality and finish. When it comes to conserving the Suffragette writings, I hope to test out methods of washing, perhaps using the suction table or placing it on a wet blotter so that the paper can be cleaned with support, and the words made legible once again.

The Suffragettes went to violent lengths and were imprisoned because they believed their cause was just – something society on the whole now generally agrees with. They must all have reacted in different ways to the experience of being locked up, and the documents they smuggled out are evidence not only of their worries, but also the ingenious ways they found to distract themselves.

One example is Kitty Marion’s very touching letter to a fellow inmate, also written on toilet paper. In the letter she expressed concern that her hair was falling out, and attached a lock of her own red hair.

Before I was employed by London Museum, I trained and worked as a fine art conservator, treating quite different types of objects. When I came for my interview I was asked how I would manage working on the bus tickets, food packets and other pieces of everyday ephemera in the London Collection. I naively answered that I was interested in caring for the objects as material things and that I was not concerned with their worth. Now, I know that this city’s social history collections are invaluable treasures. Sometimes seemingly insignificant sheets of scribbled notes tell extraordinary human stories which are certainly worth preserving, sharing and passing on.

Rose Briskman is Paper Conservator at London Museum.