The impact of WWI on Scottish
women
Military, Medical and Workforce
Before the war...
• Various things restricted women and work;
marriage was one as was the perceived ‘role’ of
women, particularly true of the middle classes.
• Women mainly worked in DOMESTIC SERVICE
and in Dundee, the JUTE INDUSTRY.
• The war allowed women to, temporarily, step
into jobs vacated by male workers serving in the
armed forces or employed in heavy industries
under the dilution scheme.
Military contribution
DILUTION – The need for increased armaments
production prompted change. The process
was ‘diluted’ in other words broken down into
smaller jobs so that women who were not
experienced in engineering could complete
the job.
Munitionettes
• Dangerous work due to fumes and risk of cordite
explosion - ‘devil’s porridge’.
• In total, 61 workers died from poisoning and 71
from explosions.
• Gretna was a case in point. At its height 9000
women and 5000 men worked there. They lived
in a purpose-built village that connected with the
works via a light railway. 12-hour shifts were the
norm and the work was dangerous. Order in the
facility was maintained by the Women’s Police
Service.
By the end of the war...
• By 1917 it was calculated that one in three
working women were substituting male
workers’ jobs.
• By the end of the war 31,500 women were
working in the munitions industry alone.
IN
Medical contribution
“My good lady, go home
and sit still”
•
•
•
Elsie Inglis pioneered the Scottish
Women’s Hospitals. She had been a
campaigner for the vote. She
proposed field hospitals near the
front. Rejected by the British she
found a more positive response from
the French and Serbian governments.
She raised money and organised the
setting up of field hospitals. The
Scottish Women’s Hospital served
throughout the war in both Serbia
and France. Sent 1000 female
doctors, nurses, drivers and orderlies
over to the battlefields. The French
one treated over 10,000 service men.
Mairi Chisholm worked in front-line
hospital - awarded Order of Leopold
1915 by the King of Belgium.
• 1916 the Glasgow Herald reported that, ‘the
nation is indebted to them.’
The Impact of WWI on women at
home
Rent strikes
More employees = more housing
needed
• Housing conditions in tenements were poor,
one or two rooms (single ends).
• Demand was high so landlords put their rent
prices up. Anyone who could not pay it was
evicted.
• Coupled with food shortages that increased
the prices of food.
• Landlords were accused of being
UNPATRIOTIC!
!!ACTION!!
• South Govan (Glasgow) Women’s Housing
Association, which was created to protect
tenants from rent rises.
• Secretary was Helen Crawfurd, a suffragette
and anti-war campaigner, who along with
others, such as Mary Barbour, Agnes Dollan
and Jessie Stephens, took on the landlords.
The 3 Stages of Action
NON-PAYMENT of rent increases in Govan.
• Blocked sheriff’s officers carrying out evictions - crowded
stairwells and ‘bombed’ sheriff officers with bags of flour - ‘Mrs
Barbour’s Army’.
How did Landlords react?
• Threatened court action leading to eviction, fines or prison.
RENT STRIKE - May 1915. 25,000 tenants in Glasgow. Also in
Aberdeen/Dundee.
• Accused landlords of being anti-patriotic - ‘Fighting the Huns at
Home’
STRIKE SPREADS & LEADS TO MASS DEMONSTRATION
• By Nov supported by men on strike at Fairfield’s and Beardmore’s
shipyards.
• Mass demonstration in George Square to support 18 tenants due in
court.