THE SUFFRAGETTES.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXV, Issue 16488, 2 March 1914, Page 8

THE SUFFRAGETTES.

BLACKBURN WAKENED UP. MILITANTS FIRE CRIMEAN GUN. The suffragettes in Blackburn, Lancashire, created a great scare a few nights ago, states a cable message to Australian newspapers.. In the city park is a huge, cumbersome cannon, which was captured from the Russians in the Crimean war, ' and which, for the last sixty years, has stood in its present position. The militants saw an opportunity of making some use of the old gun. Having carefully cleared the bore of its accumulation' of gravel and stones they rammed home a heavy charge of powder, and then applied a light to the touch-hole. The explosion that followed shook the whole city, and people flocked into the streets in the darkness, fearing that some direful -disaster had occurred at one of the coal mines in the neighbourhood. .Luckily no damage was done though it is hard to say what the consequences might have been had the old muzzle-loading field pieco been blown to smithereens, and its fragments had been sent firing in all directions. Attached to one of the trees in the vicinity was a long -strip of calico, onwhich was inscribed, “ Wake up, Blackburn. The Labour party, which claims to stand for freedom and justice, supports a Government that tortures women under the infamous Cat and Mouse Act-.”