Led by River Isaac, our first Child Ambassador, they sold cakes, badges and pamphlets, 

ran a netball competition and handed out leaflets – and in a few short hours raised this wonderful amount. 

The group were ably assisted by Isaac Abatan (20), our very first student ambassador, who lives locally, but studies at Loughborough University. 

The ambassadors were supported by volunteers Paula Isaac, River’s mum, and Tunde Abatan, Isaac’s dad.

We are so grateful to them all and to the school students, parents and teachers who supported them. Children and adults alike must have spent hours baking. We know the very successful competition involved meticulous planning by the girls.

We hope that others will consider organising cakes sales, coffee mornings and other fundraising events for Mary.

As regular readers will know, the Appeal recruited River as our first Child Ambassador, during the period of COVID lockdown when she asked us to help her teacher to organise an on-line sculpture class about Mary Clarke. Since then she has helped us with fundraising events and lobbied councillors on our behalf.

Inspired by Mary’s example, she set up the girls’ group called “Mary’s Lamp”, which is growing and developing with the support of the school.

All our ambassadors are inspired by Mary’s courage. River tells us she was particularly struck by Isabella McKeown’s words after Mary’s death, when she told fellow suffragettes not to mourn Mary in silence, but to “..take the torch from her and light the darkness”. These striking words have fired many people’s imaginations, including that of our sculptor.

Denise Dutton’s design for the statue shows Mary standing tall, but laying down a lamp for others to pick up. We hope that many other young people (boys as well as girls) will take up the challenge, to secure equal rights, in particular the rights of women and girls, as well as respect for democracy.

marvellous donation to the Appeal. River Isaac and her Mary’s Lamp girls’ group at Balfour School have organised a cake sale at the school, ably supported by teachers and parents. 

Many hours of baking resulted in record sales, with huge numbers of enthusiastic school students involved. The group has now made a donation to the Mary Clarke Statue Appeal of £150.39, having also voted to make a smaller donation to homeless people as well. 

We are so grateful to them and hope that others (including grown-ups) will consider organising cakes sales and coffee mornings for Mary.

We recruited River (10) as our first Child Ambassador, during the period of COVID lockdown when she asked us to help her teacher to organise an on-line sculpture class about Mary Clarke. Since then, along with other young ambassadors, she has helped us with fundraising events, lobbied councillors on our behalf and appeared on television.

Most importantly, inspired by Mary’s example, she has set up a girls’ group called the “Mary’s Lamp Group”. This is growing and developing with the support of the school. The group arranged a power point presentation about Mary which was delivered by them in school assembly. As a result a huge number of girls and boys now know about this previously forgotten heroine. The group also helped organise a stall at the school’s summer fair, making and selling “Mary Cakes”.

River and the others have been very inspired by Mary Clarke’s  courage. In particular, River tells us, she was struck by Isabella McKeown’s words after Mary’s death, when she told fellow suffragettes not to mourn Mary in silence, but to “..take the torch from her and light the darkness”. These striking words have fired many people’s imaginations, including that of our sculptor.

Denise Dutton’s design for the statue shows Mary in the last days of her life, standing tall, but having laid down a lamp for others to pick up. 

We hope that many other young people (boys as well as girls) will take up the challenge, to secure equal rights, in particular the rights of women and girls, as well as respect for democracy.

Ambassador. She is River Isaac who is 8 years old and in year four at Balfour Primary School in Brighton.

We first came across River during lockdown at the height of the pandemic, when she and her mother Paula contacted our chosen sculptor Denise Dutton to ask if she could help with an online art lesson about the proposed sculpture. River had read an article about Mary Clarke during the Christmas holidays and wanted to know more about her. This led to an online interview with Denise Dutton and Jean Calder led by River’s class teacher Nick Huxley which was played to the class, all of whom were working from home. River also put together a PowerPoint presentation for the class.

River’s interest in the suffragettes is not new. Two years ago, River attended a class trip to Preston Manor at which the children were encouraged to dress up as Victorian or Edwardian servants. River dressed as a suffragette rather than a maidservant because she wanted to highlight the importance of women’s struggle to vote.

When the maquette of Mary was first displayed at the Jubilee Library, River was  amongst the first to view it, along with her mother Paula and sisters Esther and Kitty. Over the summer, River and her family supported fundraising events the Appeal held in the Pavilion Gardens – even in pouring rain. 

Jean Calder, who is the Appeal’s Chair of Trustees, said: “River has demonstrated her ability to influence others for the good. She has a thirst for knowledge, a love of outdoor activities and, young as she is, a track record of supporting local charities. We have been struck by her passion for women’s rights and equality, her enthusiasm to learn about the suffrage struggle and her keenness to inform others about it. This is why we asked her to be our first Child Ambassador. We are so glad she agreed.”

River says she has been inspired by the design of the statue, which, amongst other things, has a lamp placed at Mary’s feet and quotes local suffragette leader Isabella McKeown’s instruction to the grief-stricken women at Mary’s 1911 memorial service in the Royal Pavilion “not to mourn” but to “take the torch from her and light the darkness…”.

River said: “I want to be a part of the  Appeal.  Mary Clarke was the first suffragette so brave that she died for women’s right to vote. I think she deserves a statue to remember her. I want to pick up the lamp depicted in the statue, that Mary has laid down. I want to take it up and continue girls’ and women’s fight for equality.”

The trustees hope River’s appointment will encourage others to take up this role. They hope to appoint ambassadors in as many schools as possible, to raise awareness of Mary Clarke and the local suffragette movement, encourage related educational activities and spark discussion about women’s rights and democracy.

Cllr Alan Robins, the Mayor of Brighton & Hove received it on behalf of the Appeal and the people of Brighton & Hove in a brief socially-distanced ceremony on the evening of Friday 11 December 2020 at Brighton Town Hall. A more elaborate event to welcome the figure had had to be cancelled.

The Mayor thanked Denise Dutton saying he was “honoured” to receive the maquette. Chair of Trustees Jean Calder also thanked Denise for the maquette and expressed gratitude to the Council for its support and generosity in helping to fund the maquette and the planned statue. Jean also conveyed the Appeal’s thanks to the Mayor for his “unstinting support”.

The next day, on the 12 December 2020, the charity’s trustees met the sculptor once again to launch its Christmas Appeal, aimed at funding the next phase of the campaign. The time-limited appeal will last from 12th December to the 31st January and will aim to raise £5,000 in the first instance as  “A Gift for Mary”.  

December was a very significant month for Mary. Born in December, she spent her last birthday in Holloway Prison. Released on 23rd December 1910, she died of a brain haemorrhage on Christmas Day.

The maquette represents Mary released from prison, in Brighton, a day or two before her death. 

She wears a suffragette sash and on her left arm carries a last few copies of Votes for Women, the suffragette newspaper she regularly sold in Brighton. The front page of the November 1910 issue depicts the events of ‘Black Friday’, when, a few days before she was arrested and imprisoned,  she and hundreds of other women were assaulted by police. 

Mary wears the Hunger Strikers’ medal and walks with gentle dignity over the implements used in forcible feeding, which are imbedded in the surface of the plinth. Her clothing, accurate for the period, subtly references her background as an artist, her love of flowers and her time in prison. She gestures towards a lamp at her feet which she has placed there for others to pick up. This refers to the words of Isabella McKeown spoken after Mary’s death “Her they must not mourn in silence. They must take the torch from her and light the darkness…”.  Mary’s hand is positioned low, so that children can hold it.

A low plinth carries the above quotation from Isabella McKeown and others from  Emmeline Pethick-Lawrence and Mary’s sister Emmeline Pankhurst – as well as Mary’s own courageous words: “I am glad to pay the price for freedom..”

Emmeline Pethick-Lawrence’s statement about Mary as the “..first woman martyr who has gone to death for this cause..”, provides another iconic quotation on the sides of the low plinth, while Emmeline Pankhurst’s moving words: “She is the first to die. How many must follow…” are etched into its surface, curving around the line of the feeding tube embedded in the bronze. 

Those wishing to give a special ‘Gift for Mary’ can do so online via Local Giving or PayPal. Please invite your friends to visit our website or go directly to https://localgiving.org/charity/mary-clarke-statue-appeal/ or https://www.paypal.com/gb/fundraiser/charity/3881341. If they wish they can send cheques to The Mary Clarke Statue Appeal, c/o the Regency Town House, 13 Brunswick Square, Hove BN3 1EH. 

Following months of discussion, research and painstaking work in miniature, our wonderful sculptor Denise Dutton has completed the rough plaster line maquette of Mary. She is now in the process of preparing a resin copy and a mould for the final bronze. 

Denise has faced many challenges. She has had to work from only 5 photographs, some of which are of poor quality and none of which depict Mary’s whole body. In addition to that, we set her the difficult task of depicting someone who was both frail and self-effacing, but at the same time, strong and formidably brave, a shy leader, a ‘martyr’ with a wry sense of humour.

We asked Denise to tell the story of Mary’s life and death, expressing her gentle dignity and calm strength as well as her courage and determination. The agreed design depicts Mary after leaving prison, two days before her death. She gestures towards a lamp at her feet which she has left for others to pick up. Her hand is held low, so that children can hold it and pose for photographs (we suspect many will want to rub the lamp and make wishes). The lamp references the statement by Isabella McKeown, made at Mary’s memorial meeting in the Royal Pavilion. She said “Her they must not mourn in silence. They must take the torch from her and light the darkness…”

Mary wears a suffragette sash and on her left arm carries a last few copies of Votes for Women, the suffragette newspaper she regularly sold in Brighton. The front page of the November 1910 issue depicts the events of ‘Black Friday’, 18th November 1910, when she, like so many other women was injured by police violence. Mary was deeply distressed at the suffering of women that day, many of whom were subjected to sexual abuse.

Mary wears the Hunger Strikers’ medal and walks across the implements used in forcible feeding, which she ignores and which are imbedded in the surface of the plinth. Her clothing, accurate for the period, subtly references Mary’s background as an artist, her love of flowers and her time in prison. The pattern on the skirt includes the ‘prison arrow’ which was used on convicts’ clothes and was carried with pride on suffragette banners.

The low plinth carries Mary’s words “I am glad to pay the price for freedom..”, with the above quotation from Isabella McKeown, as well as Emmeline Pethick-Lawrence’s statement that Mary was the “first woman martyr who has gone to death for this cause.”  Just days after Mary’s death, her grief-stricken sister Emmeline Pankhurst wrote: “She is the first to die. How many must follow…”. Those words will be on the surface of the plinth, curving around the line of the feeding tube embedded in the bronze, bringing the two sisters together.

Mary Clarke was the first suffragette to give her life for women’s right to Vote but, there is no public memorial to her anywhere in the UK. Brighton, where she lived and worked, has few memorials for women and no statues other than of Queen Victoria. 

The Mary Clarke Statue Appeal was set up in late 2018 to fund a statue of Mary Clarke, as a symbol for the city of women’s rights, equality and democracy. The Appeal aims to site the statue in  or very near the Royal Pavilion Estate, where the suffrage movement had strong historic links. The hope is to place it in the garden near the Museum entrance, where it can easily be seen by every school party, resident and visitor. The Appeal needs to raise £60,000.

The Mary Clarke Statue Appeal is pleased to announce that in the past month:

• Charity status has been achieved
• Brighton & Hove City Council has granted the £10,000 previously pledged to fund a bronze maquette (model) of the planned statue
• a sculptor has been chosen, following a short competition for the commission between three excellent sculptors

Denise Dutton MRSS from Leak in Staffordshire has been appointed to make the initial bronze maquette of Mary Clarke and then, provided the funding can be secured, to make the statue. Denise studied sculpture at the prestigious Sir Henry Doulton School of Sculpture in Stoke-on-Trent. She has worked on numerous commissions, both public and private over the past 24 years.

Her works include: the suffragette Annie Kenney, unveiled in December 2018 in Oldham;  the Land Girls and Lumber Jills memorial statue at the National Memorial Arboretum at Alrewas which was unveiled in 2014 by The Countess of Wessex; a portrait bust of Sir Neville Mott Nobel prize winner for physics, at the Mott Building, Cambridge; and a life size equestrian statue of the last Maharajah of India, Duleep Singh, unveiled by Prince Charles.

Denise said:

“I will be pleased to work with the trustees of the Mary Clarke Statue appeal and to be a part of realising their mission in bringing the memory of Mary’s life story to others through the statue. The making of a sculpture goes further than a sheer physical task it’s also about the artist’s engagement with the subject. I feel empathy with Mary, for what for she endured through her life and what she fought for. These emotions will be ever present during the realisation of the commission.”

Jean Calder, the Chair of the Appeal said:

“We are delighted that Denise has agreed to take on this commission. She is a fine sculptor with experience of producing inspirational commemorative work. She also has an excellent understanding of the suffrage movement because of the work she did on the sculpture of Annie Kenney.”

“At Mary’s memorial service in Brighton, local suffragette Isabella McKeown said “Her they must not mourn in silence. They must take the torch from her and light the darkness…”. We are asking local people to take up the torch and support this campaign to commemorate Mary and the ideals for which she gave her life – freedom, democracy and equal rights.”

To donate, click the Donate button above. To support the Appeal in other ways contact jeancalder.mcsa@gmail.com.