Good Luck to All General Election Candidates

Today is 4th July 2024, the date of the General Election. We wish all candidates the very best of luck , especially remembering our Patrons, former M.P.s Peter Kyle for Labour and Maria Caulfield for the Conservatives, both of whom are candidates for election today.  Our Green Patron, Caroline Lucas has recently stood down from her service as a member of Parliament. We thank her…

Mitchie Alexander’s Poem for Mary Clarke

This powerful and moving poem was written by Cllr Mitchie Alexander and read by her at a special meeting of Brighton & Hove City Council on 14th December 2022. She read it in support of the motion to posthumously award Mary the Freedom of the City.  Mary Clarke 1862-1910 The First Suffragette to die for the cause “I wear my purple sleeves with pride, You…

Freedom of the City for Mary

Mary Clarke was posthumously awarded the freedom of the city of Brighton and Hove at a special council meeting at Hove Town on  Thursday 14 December 2023. This followed a wonderful Reception for trustees of the Mary Clarke Statue Appeal and supporters, hosted by the Mayor Jackie O’Quinn. Briony Goulden, Mary’s great-great-niece, and a trustee of the Appeal, accepted the honour, assisted by her daughters…

Invitation to Award of Freedom of the City on 14 December

  Mary Clarke is to be honoured by the posthumous award of the Freedom of the City, a wonderful tribute. The award is to be made at a special  meeting of Brighton & Hove City Council at 3.30pm on Thursday 14 December at Hove Town Hall. Mary Clarke Statue Appeal Trustee Briony Goulden, and her two daughters Sophie and Lena, will receive the award on…

Marion Bance writes about Mary Clarke for the Appeal

Local historian Marion Bance recently kindly offered to write an article about Mary Clarke for the Preston Pages and other associated free neighbourhood magazines. It was published last month. The link is below. http://www.prestonpages.com/brightonhistory/recognising-heroine We are so grateful to Marion and to the magazine editor who generously agreed to run the story, despite the fact she’d published something about Mary in September 2020.  Please read…

The Forgotten Sister – A Talk 11.00am on 26 November 2022

There will be a very informal talk about Mary Clarke on Saturday 26th November at 11.00am, on the ground floor of the Jubilee Library in Brighton, entitled “The Forgotten Sister”. It will be led by our Chair of Trustees Jean Calder and will be followed by discussion. The staff at the Jubilee Library invited us to help mark the United Nation’s annual  International Day for…

Mary Cakes’ Launched at Balfour School Summer Fair

Balfour Primary School’s Summer Fair, on July 16, was the setting for our first school stall and cake sale. Organised by the Mary’s Lamp group of Year 4 girls, it raised more than £60 in aid of the Mary Clarke Statue Appeal, selling ‘Mary Cakes’, our version of traditional fairy cakes.  The Mary’s Lamp girls’ group was set up by River Isaac, our first Child…

Birthdays, Breakfast Cereals and Women Who Shredded the Rulebook

Twins Izzy and Sophia Kilburn are our two most recent Child Ambassadors. They recently celebrated their 13th birthday and very generously, asked family and friends to consider a donation to the Mary Clarke Statue Appeal instead of birthday presents. They raised a hugely impressive £95. We are so grateful to the girls and their parents and hope they had a wonderful birthday. The twins are,…

Child Ambassadors Question the Council on 25th November

This Appeal is pledged to remember 18th November, the anniversary of ‘Black Friday’, the notorious day in 1910 when three hundred suffragettes were attacked outside Parliament as they tried to petition Prime Minister Asquith. Three women died as a result of the violence that day, the first of whom was Mary Clarke. Another key commemorative date for us is the 25th November. This is the…

Mary Clarke Statue Appeal