# The March of the Women
**The March of the Women** is a choral march composed by Ethel Smyth in 1910 to words by Cicely Hamilton, written for the British women's suffrage movement and dedicated to the [Women's Social and Political Union](https://www.edgepedia.org/womens-social-and-political-union) (WSPU)[1](https://imslp.org/wiki/The_March_of_the_Women_%28Smyth%2C_Ethel%29). It became the anthem of the WSPU and, more widely, of the women's suffrage movement in the United Kingdom and elsewhere[2](https://www.surplusvalue.org.au/McQueen/history/March%20of%20the%20Women.pdf).
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Composer and lyricist | Ethel Smyth (1858–1944), music; Cicely Hamilton (1872–1952), words[1](https://imslp.org/wiki/The_March_of_the_Women_%28Smyth%2C_Ethel%29) |
| Composed | 1910; key of F major, one movement[1](https://imslp.org/wiki/The_March_of_the_Women_%28Smyth%2C_Ethel%29) |
| Original scoring | Female chorus (SSAA), unaccompanied; also printed for unison voices[1](https://imslp.org/wiki/The_March_of_the_Women_%28Smyth%2C_Ethel%29) • [3](https://www.loc.gov/resource/music.mussuffrage-100221/) |
| Dedication | To the Women's Social and Political Union[1](https://imslp.org/wiki/The_March_of_the_Women_%28Smyth%2C_Ethel%29) |
| First performance | 21 January 1911, Pall Mall, London, by the Suffrage Chorus[1](https://imslp.org/wiki/The_March_of_the_Women_%28Smyth%2C_Ethel%29) |
| First publication | 1911, London: Breitkopf & Härtel (Plate E.S.4)[1](https://imslp.org/wiki/The_March_of_the_Women_%28Smyth%2C_Ethel%29) |
| Melody source | Based on a folksong from the Abruzzo region of Italy[4](https://blogs.loc.gov/music/2022/03/ethel-smyth-and-the-march-of-the-women/) |
## Origin
Smyth had been indifferent to suffrage until she was persuaded to attend a speech by [Emmeline Pankhurst](https://www.edgepedia.org/emmeline-pankhurst), founder of the WSPU, and was inspired to join the cause[4](https://blogs.loc.gov/music/2022/03/ethel-smyth-and-the-march-of-the-women/). She put her professional projects on hold and committed two years of her life to the WSPU[4](https://blogs.loc.gov/music/2022/03/ethel-smyth-and-the-march-of-the-women/). Her contribution as a musician took the form of a trio of choral works, *Songs of Sunrise* (1911), consisting of "Laggard Dawn", "1910", and "The March of the Women"[4](https://blogs.loc.gov/music/2022/03/ethel-smyth-and-the-march-of-the-women/) • [5](https://www.ucd.ie/music/t4media/TMR10.HMillington.pdf).
Smyth based the melody on a folksong from the Abruzzo region in Italy, and Hamilton, a suffragist best known for her feminist play *How the Vote was Won*, wrote the words to fit the already-composed music[4](https://blogs.loc.gov/music/2022/03/ethel-smyth-and-the-march-of-the-women/). Smyth herself noted the difficulty of that order of work, telling the crowd before the premiere: "The poem was written after the music was composed, and that is about one of the most difficult things to do in this world"[4](https://blogs.loc.gov/music/2022/03/ethel-smyth-and-the-march-of-the-women/). The song opens with the line "Shout, shout, up with your song!" and runs to four verses[6](https://tile.loc.gov/storage-services/service/music/mussuffrage/mussuffrage-100005/mussuffrage-100005.pdf) • [7](https://cardinalscholar.bsu.edu/server/api/core/bitstreams/80072503-8bc5-4dbb-a345-4c122bd2f4fb/content).
## Early performances
The march was first heard in public on Saturday 21 January 1911, at a social event at Suffolk Street Galleries held to welcome activists imprisoned after Black Friday, the WSPU demonstration of 18 November 1910[8](https://www.londonmuseum.org.uk/collections/v/object-722981/the-march-of-the-women/). IMSLP records the same date as the first performance, by the Suffrage Chorus, at a ceremony on [Pall Mall, London](https://www.edgepedia.org/pall-mall-london)[1](https://imslp.org/wiki/The_March_of_the_Women_%28Smyth%2C_Ethel%29). A suffragette choir was drilled in the song by the composer for weeks beforehand[4](https://blogs.loc.gov/music/2022/03/ethel-smyth-and-the-march-of-the-women/).
Two months later, on 23 March 1911, the song was launched at a mass WSPU meeting at the [Royal Albert Hall](https://www.edgepedia.org/royal-albert-hall), where speakers included Emmeline Pankhurst, Christabel Pankhurst, and Mrs Pethick-Lawrence[9](https://catalogue.royalalberthall.com/Record.aspx?id=PERF19110323&pos=8&src=CalmView.Performance). Pankhurst ceremonially presented Smyth with a baton, and Smyth conducted the whole gathering in singing the march[9](https://catalogue.royalalberthall.com/Record.aspx?id=PERF19110323&pos=8&src=CalmView.Performance). Smyth recalled processing up the center aisle of the Albert Hall in her Mus. Doc. robes beside Mrs Pankhurst, with organ and "a cornet to blast forth the tune"[4](https://blogs.loc.gov/music/2022/03/ethel-smyth-and-the-march-of-the-women/). At the song's formal presentation to the WSPU earlier that year, Pankhurst thanked Smyth, saying "no one could feel as deeply as I do the gratitude for her services to the women's cause"[5](https://www.ucd.ie/music/t4media/TMR10.HMillington.pdf).
## Use by the suffrage movement
The song was sung at rallies, meetings, marches, and presentations, and became the de facto anthem of the suffrage movement in England[10](https://www.loc.gov/collections/womens-suffrage-sheet-music/articles-and-essays/highlighted-sheet-music-selections/). It was often sung by imprisoned suffragettes and by crowds keeping vigil outside prisons during hunger strikes[10](https://www.loc.gov/collections/womens-suffrage-sheet-music/articles-and-essays/highlighted-sheet-music-selections/). Crowds gathered outside women's prisons sang suffrage anthems including "The March of the Women" and the women's "La Marseillaise", demonstrations that prisoners found cheering[11](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/0966369X.2023.2249260).
**The Holloway episode.** In March 1912 Smyth threw a stone through the window of the Colonial Secretary, Lord Harcourt, as part of a WSPU window-breaking campaign intended to fill Holloway Prison with at least 100 suffragists, and received a two-month sentence[4](https://blogs.loc.gov/music/2022/03/ethel-smyth-and-the-march-of-the-women/). According to an account by the conductor Sir Thomas Beecham, Smyth in 1912 leaned out of her cell window at Holloway and conducted "The March of the Women" with a toothbrush as her fellow inmates processed around the quadrangle[5](https://www.ucd.ie/music/t4media/TMR10.HMillington.pdf). The Library of Congress blog presents this as legend[4](https://blogs.loc.gov/music/2022/03/ethel-smyth-and-the-march-of-the-women/), and the image has become one of the most repeated representations of Smyth, later immortalized by the sculptor Christine Charlesworth[5](https://www.ucd.ie/music/t4media/TMR10.HMillington.pdf).
## Publication and later musical life
The score was published in 1911 by Breitkopf & Härtel in London, and a libretto appeared the same year from The Common Cause Publishing Co. Ltd. of Manchester[1](https://imslp.org/wiki/The_March_of_the_Women_%28Smyth%2C_Ethel%29). The Library of Congress holds the sheet music in its Women's Suffrage in Sheet Music Collection, where it is in the public domain[3](https://www.loc.gov/resource/music.mussuffrage-100221/). Arrangements listed by IMSLP include versions for piano made by the composer, for viola, and for mixed chorus[1](https://imslp.org/wiki/The_March_of_the_Women_%28Smyth%2C_Ethel%29).
Smyth reused the tune in her own work: the overture of her comic opera *The Boatswain's Mate* (1913–14) quotes "The March of the Women", along with "1910", in place of the conventional assortment of themes from the opera's score[4](https://blogs.loc.gov/music/2022/03/ethel-smyth-and-the-march-of-the-women/) • [12](https://openresearch.surrey.ac.uk/esploro/outputs/conferencePresentation/Ethel-Smyth-Music-and-the-Suffragette/99513913402346?institution=44SUR_INST). The song remains a fixture of concerts marking women's history; a 2025 arrangement for violin and orchestra by Esther Abrami, recorded by the Radio-Symphonieorchester Wien, runs 2 minutes 33 seconds[13](https://classical.music.apple.com/gb/recording/ethel-smyth-1958-pp29-1795435357).
## References
1. [The March of the Women (Smyth, Ethel), IMSLP](https://imslp.org/wiki/The_March_of_the_Women_%28Smyth%2C_Ethel%29)
2. [The March of the Women (McQueen, surplusvalue.org.au)](https://www.surplusvalue.org.au/McQueen/history/March%20of%20the%20Women.pdf)
3. [The march of the women, Library of Congress, Women's Suffrage in Sheet Music Collection](https://www.loc.gov/resource/music.mussuffrage-100221/)
4. [Ethel Smyth and "The March of the Women", In The Muse, Library of Congress (2022)](https://blogs.loc.gov/music/2022/03/ethel-smyth-and-the-march-of-the-women/)
5. [Hannah Millington, "'1910': Ethel Smyth's Unsung Suffrage Song", The Musicology Review 10 (2021)](https://www.ucd.ie/music/t4media/TMR10.HMillington.pdf)
6. [Dedicated to the Women (sheet music PDF, Library of Congress)](https://tile.loc.gov/storage-services/service/music/mussuffrage/mussuffrage-100005/mussuffrage-100005.pdf)
7. [WAHL dissertation, Cardinal Scholar, Ball State University](https://cardinalscholar.bsu.edu/server/api/core/bitstreams/80072503-8bc5-4dbb-a345-4c122bd2f4fb/content)
8. [The March of the Women, London Museum collection](https://www.londonmuseum.org.uk/collections/v/object-722981/the-march-of-the-women/)
9. [WSPU Meeting, 23 March 1911, Royal Albert Hall performance archive](https://catalogue.royalalberthall.com/Record.aspx?id=PERF19110323&pos=8&src=CalmView.Performance)
10. [Highlighted Sheet Music Selections, Women's Suffrage in Sheet Music, Library of Congress](https://www.loc.gov/collections/womens-suffrage-sheet-music/articles-and-essays/highlighted-sheet-music-selections/)
11. [Reclaiming space: enacting citizenship through embodied protest during the British suffragette movement, Taylor & Francis](https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/0966369X.2023.2249260)
12. [Ethel Smyth, Music, and the Suffragette Movement, University of Surrey](https://openresearch.surrey.ac.uk/esploro/outputs/conferencePresentation/Ethel-Smyth-Music-and-the-Suffragette/99513913402346?institution=44SUR_INST)
13. [The March of the Women (arr. Abrami), Apple Music Classical](https://classical.music.apple.com/gb/recording/ethel-smyth-1958-pp29-1795435357)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Society and history › Politics and government › Elections and representation › Electoral systems and principles › Suffrage › Suffrage memory and culture › Suffrage music and song*
*Initially written Sep 17, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*
License: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license