Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1917-11-09
MESSAGES PROTEST
FORCIBLE FEEDING
White House Deluged With
kilograms Regarding Miss
Paul's Treatment
DENIAL BY AUTHORITIES

WASHINGTON, Nov. o.
While the White House was being del
uEed with telegraphic protests from all
over the country. Alice Paul. OF Philadel-
phia, militant suffragist was forcibly fed
for the fourth time today. Authorities at
the United States Jail where Miss Paul is
a prisoner for having led a band OF suf-
frage pickets TO the White House gates In
sisted that Miss Paul accepted the treat
fnent without resistance and that her physl-
cal condition was good, except for nerv-
ousness." Rose Winslow, Of New York a
fellow prisoner OF Miss Paul, was also
forcibly fed again today for the third
time.
Mrs Dora Lewis, of Philadelphia, now
acting chairman of the National Woman's
party while Miss Alice Paul is Imprisoned,
today wrote a letter TO Commissioner
Gwynne Gardner bitterly protesting against
the forcible feeding of Miss Paul and Mise
Winslow.
She lays upon Commissioner Gardner the
/ Responsibility for Miss Pauls life. she says,
because officials at the jail 70 whom pro-
tests have been made have continually re-
ferred the suffragists TO people higher up
Mrs. Lewis has been In Washington ens
gagged in the campaign Of the Natlonai
Woman's party for the ballot for some
months and has been arrested, sentenced
and imprisoned at Occopuan for her enorts
for the cause"
Messenger after messenger bore to the
White House today kilograms of protest
against the forcible feeding of Miss Paul
and Miss Winslow. and President WILSON,
who was later in the day to receive leaders
of the conservative wing Of the suffrage
movement was informed. Whether he
would interfere by pardoning the women
or in some other way was matter OF great
doubt however. The militant leaders
scoffed at the Jail announcement that the
prisoners took the treatment without re-
sistance declaring that the admission of
the authorities that both were nervous in
dicated i'll effects. Miss Helen Paul sister
of Alice Paul, became so apprehensiNe over
the situation that she wired to their mother
to come to Washington at once For months
Miss Paul has been semiinvalid ana
many of her associates express doubt that
she can survive forcible feeding, although
the jail doctors declare she can.
DR. ]. A. Cannon. chief jail physician,
who superintended the feeding OF the wom-
en-. said that he did not consider their con-
dition critical or even serious He SAID
that both Miss Paul and Miss Winslow took
the tube through which liquid nourishment
is administered without protest and that
so long as they continue their hunger strike
they will be fed regularly three times every
day.
Miss Alice Paul. who is a frail woman,
Weighing ninety-five pounds thirty-one
years old. became seriously i'll about week
ago and was sent to the jail hospital There
she was offered a diet of milk and eggs,
but refused to partake of II unless her six
women suffrage companions, whom she
said were weak and hungry from the
effects of the prison fare. also were al
lowed milk and eggs or permitted to pur-
chase other food for themselves
This demand being refused by the prison
authorities, Miss Paul went on hunger
strike. II was not her first experience,
for she had Joined Miss Emmeline Pank-
hurst, the noted English woman suffragist
in a hunger strike in the English Jail
several years ago.
Miss Alice Paul claims the other suf-
frage prisoners, like herself, are being
starved and broken in health by the bread
coffee, pork and cabbage diet. Salt pork
and cabbage, she claimed was the diet
eighteen times in thirteen days.
superintendent Zinkhan of the Jail, said
today: h'y ~ e. .
''If these women, don't eat. II is their
own fault. They are given every attention.
have no statement other than this to make
now"