Methven campaigned for women's suffrage for many years and has been described as "a very active worker for the cause". As honorary secretary of the Edinburgh National Society for Women's Suffrage, she was a prolific writer to newspapers and
local authorities to raise awareness and support for women's suffrage. She raised funds, organised petitions and took part in peaceful demonstrations as a
suffragist. She latterly became disillusioned with this approach, and joined the more militant Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU) in 1906. She participated in
suffragette protests and was arrested in London in 1911.
Edinburgh National Society for Women's Suffrage Methven was elected to the executive committee of the Edinburgh National Society for Women's Suffrage in December 1895 and subsequently became its honorary secretary. She worked closely with its founder and president
Priscilla Bright McLaren until McLaren's death in 1906. In 1897, the Society affiliated to the new
National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies and Methven was one of the Society's two representatives on the NUWSS Parliamentary Committee. Methven was a member of the Society's Special Appeals Committee, which was involved in producing a national petition for women's suffrage to be presented as part of the Parliamentary Franchise (Extension to Women) Bill in May 1896. There were 257,796 signatures on the petition by the time it was submitted, including more than 50,000 signatories from Scotland. Despite this, the bill was not discussed in the
House of Commons. In April 1896, Methven had written to
Brechin Town Council asking them to petition
Parliament in favour of the Bill. One
councillor, a Mr Laing, proposed a vote but no seconder could be found. According to Pedersen (2017), "campaigners such as Jessie Methven were clearly aware of the importance of [press] coverage in educating the wider populace". Methven corresponded regularly with local and national
newspapers, often writing to thank editors for raising the profile of women's suffrage through their coverage of meetings. As secretary of the Society, her name was attached to reports, articles and letters to the newspapers and she had a relatively high profile in the Scottish press. Methven was named as a "memorialist" of an article on "assaults upon a wife", drafted by the committee of the Edinburgh National Society for Women's Suffrage and published in
The Women's Signal, a "weekly record and review for ladies", on 16 February 1899. It noted that "these names are all honoured ones in Edinburgh, and indeed some of them throughout the kingdom." In 1901, a circular letter signed by Methven and
Mrs McClaren was reported on in a number of Scottish newspapers, expressing disappointment at the indifference shown by political associations to the question of women's suffrage. It suggested that the recent failure of the
Scottish Liberal Association to include women in their resolution in favour of '
manhood suffrage' was a result of their fear that "all women will vote
Tory". Methven raised a resolution at the Society's 1904 annual meeting, "that women should refuse to work for any
parliamentary candidate unless he publicly pledges himself to vote for the extension of the franchise to women". The resolution was not passed but the committee agreed to "urge" its members not to support candidates who did not support women's suffrage.
Militancy and the WSPU After years as a committed "constitutional suffragist", Methven became increasingly disillusioned by the lack of progress. After Priscilla Bright McLaren's death in November 1906, many of the Society's members flocked to the recently formed Edinburgh branch of the WSPU, "even Jessie Methven, the society's long-standing secretary, joined the militants". On 21 November 1911 Methven was one of 223 protesters arrested at a WSPU demonstration at the House of Commons, to which she had travelled with five other women from Edinburgh (
Elizabeth and Agnes Thomson,
Edith Hudson,
Alice Shipley and
Mrs N Grieve. The demonstrations followed the "torpedoing" of the
Conciliation Bill, proposed legislation which would have extended the franchise to women with property.
The Scotsman recorded that she had been "for many years hon. secretary of the older Suffrage Society, and worked under Mrs Priscilla Bright McLaren". Reports of her arrest in the Scottish press contained variant spellings of her surname, including Methuen (The Scotsman) and Mothuel (
Dundee Courier). She is listed on the Roll of Honour of Suffragette Prisoners 1905-1914 as JC Methuen. Methven was an active member of the WSPU, continuing to write to newspapers, selling copies of
The Suffragette newspaper, and contributing regularly to its £250,000 fund. In 1911, she donated a hand
printing press to the Edinburgh branch. ==Death==