Love makes as many was developed during a writer’s residency at NT Quarry Bank, as part of the 2018 Lost Voices program, marking the centenary of partial women’s suffrage. For a woman to gain the vote in 1918, she had to be over the age of thirty, and be (or be married to) the head tenant of a rateable property. These provisions meant that women only made up around 40% of the electorate that year.
Love makes as many follows five women living and working around Quarry Bank mill during the cotton shortage of October 1918. The First World War will end in a fortnight, with a general election following soon afterwards. Two of these five women are eligible to vote in that election; three are not. Three of the women are mill workers, about whom few facts remain to us, while two are part of the Greg family, who owned Quarry Bank, and about whom much more detail survives. The interspersing stories, set in 2018, are based on real uncanny experiences which National Trust staff and volunteers were able to share from their time at Quarry Bank.
Martha Gratrix is one of only a dozen female mill workers to gain the vote at Quarry Bank in 1918. Martha is a 55-year-old widow, and lives at Oak Cottages, very close to the mill. Her story contains a memory of Nancy Johnson, who was instrumental in setting up the Co-operative shop at Quarry Bank.
Beatrice Greg is part of the family who own Quarry Bank. At 58, she is eligible to vote, as, like Martha, she is head tenant of her household, the mill’s old apprentice house. She has been living there eight years, in the company of her housekeeper, Minnie Longworth. Before entering Beatrice’s employment, Minnie had a son, Jack, born out of wedlock after an affair with a Canadian sea captain – but Minnie will not tell Beatrice about Jack until after his early death. When Minnie dies herself, in twenty years’ time, Beatrice will follow just a month later. The local newspaper will quote the Greg family’s statement that the pair had been devoted to one another for nearly thirty years, and that the one death had certainly hastened the other.
Emily Mottishead is a mill worker at Quarry Bank. She is not eligible to vote in 1918; although old enough, at 41, she is neither a head tenant, nor married to one – nor will she ever be. She lives at Styal Green, in her father’s house, and soon she will move in with her sister and her sister’s new husband. Emily’s story was inspired by some graffiti, which can still be seen in the mill clock tower, pencilled in an unknown hand. It reads: J. Venables died Sunday March 17th 1918 at Manchester Infirmary. Buried March 21st Wilmslow Cemetery. Taken ill Saturday noon at the mill. Found in boiler house, about 5.30pm, March 16th
Madge (Margaret) Greg is Beatrice Greg’s niece. At 26, she is too young to vote in 1918. Recently returned from work as a VAD in France, she will remain at Quarry Bank for a few months, before departing to undertake medical training in London. After qualifying as a surgeon, she will eventually marry another doctor, becoming stepmother to his existing children. Madge will never give birth to children of her own, but will continue to work as a doctor throughout her married life.
Jessie Morton is a mill worker at Quarry Bank. At 28, she is too young to be eligible to vote in 1918. Born Jessie Barnshaw, she grew up at Oak Cottages, but moved to a larger house after her marriage to Fred Morton, a gardener, while he was on leave from active service in autumn 1917. Fred’s name can be found on a list of ‘absent voters’ from the December 1918 general election, indicating that by that date he had still not returned home from the war.
by Beth Underdown
As part of a National Trust writer’s residency at Quarry Bank, Beth Underdown was commissioned to write a series of short texts responding to the Lost Voices exhibition marking the centenary of partial women’s suffrage. The resulting work, Love makes as many, was performed at part of a promenade event at Quarry Bank on 6 October and at the International Anthony Burgess Foundation on 16 October as part of the 2018 Manchester Literature Festival.
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Copyright © Beth Underdown
Manchester Literature Festival would like to thank Arts Council England, Manchester City Council, Trust New Art and the Centre for New Writing at the University of Manchester for their generous support.
