One hundred years ago this week, Melbourne's feminist, suffragist weekly, The Woman Voter, was aghast at the way in which the first Australian wounded of the war had just come home (disembarking in Melbourne) without officialdom paying them any kindly attention.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
"RETURNED SOLDIERS"
"The soldiers who go away are heroes; the wounded soldiers who return are a nuisance, to be.bundled away to their homes, or to hospital, or to other states, as quickly as possible, regardless of comfort or provision of money or food.
"The treatment meted out to wounded New South Wales and Queensland soldiers and their nurses, who arrived aboard the Kyarra and were bundled into the Sydney express anyhow, was brought before the Parliament [last week] but the only answer of the minister was: 'The matter is being looked into!' "
However, the crusading votes-for-women weekly had noticed one war cloud with a silver lining.
"THE DAILY MAIL CONVERTED BY WAR"
"Lord Northcliffe, the owner of the Daily Mail and many other London papers, has always been strongly opposed to woman suffrage. But the war has enlightened him as to the ability of women to help in moulding the world, and so we find the Daily Mail saying: 'At the end of the war, all those thousands of women who have awakened to their usefulness and their intelligence and their powers will insist on the enfranchisement of those powers; they will insist on a partnership with us men in the shaping of the new and better world we must mould out of this awful crucible.' "
