Constance Georgine (Gore-Booth) Markievicz (1868 - 1927)

Constance (Gore-Booth) Markievicz is Notable.

Constance (Gore-Booth) Markievicz was a part of the Suffragette Movement.

Constance Georgine Markievicz, Countess Markievicz was an Irish Sinn Féin and Fianna Fáil politician, revolutionary nationalist, suffragette and socialist. In December 1918, she was the first woman elected to the British House of Commons, formed the first Dáil Éireann. She was also one of the first women in the world to hold a cabinet position (Minister for Labour of the Irish Republic, 1919–1922)

One thing she had in abundance—-physical courage with that she was clothed as with a garment.

Seán O'Casey

Constance Gore-Booth was ^[1] born at Buckingham Gate in London, the elder daughter of the ^[2] Henry Gore-Booth, 5th Baronet and Georgina, Lady Gore-Booth née Hill

Constance Gore-Booth decided to train as a painter, but only one art school in Dublin accepted female students. She went to study at the Slade School of Art in London In 1892, It was here she joined the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies (NUWSS). She than moved to Paris and enrolled at the Académie Julian where she met Count Casimir Markievicz her future husband,who was also an artist.^[3] Casimer and Constance Gore-Booth were married in London on 29 September 1900 making her Countess Markievicz.They had one daughter Maeve, at Lissadell in November 1901.

Casimir Contance and Markievicz moved to Dublin in 1903 the Countess gaining a reputation for herself as a landscape painter. She founded the United Artists Club^[4] along with artists Sarah Purser, Nathaniel Hone, Walter Osborne and John Butler Yeats 1905.The league brought together many patriots and future political leaders. Sarah Purser, whom the young Gore-Booth sisters first met in 1882, when she was commissioned to paint their portrait, hosted a regular salon where artists, writers and intellectuals. In 1906 Constance Markievicz rented a small cottage in the countryside around Dublin. The previous tenant was the poet Padraic Colum who had left behind old copies of The Peasant and Sinn Féin the Countess read these publications with great intrest.

Constance Markievicz became involved in politics in Ireland. She joined both Sinn Féin and Inghinidhe na hÉireann ('Daughters of Ireland'), a revolutionary women's movement founded by the actress and activist Maud Gonne.In 1909 Constance Markievicz founded ^[5] Fianna Éireann, a para-military nationalist scouts organisation.^[6] Contance was jailed for the first time in 1911 for speaking at an Irish Republican Brotherhood demonstration organised to protest against George V's visit to Ireland. During this protest Markievicz handed out leaflets, Dear land thou art not conquered yet participated in stone throwing at pictures of the King and Queen and attempted to burn the giant British flag taken from Leinster House, eventually succeeding, but James McArdle was blamed and imprisoned for one month , despite Constance testifing in court that she was responsible.Her friend Helena Moloney was arrested for her part in the stone throwing incident and became the first woman ever to be tried and imprisoned for a political act since the time of the Ladies Land League

Constance Markievicz took part in the ^[7]1916 Easter Rising as a member of the Irish Citizen Army (ICA),Constance held the rank of an officer giving her the right to carry arms ,they held out for six days, finally giving up when the British brought them a copy of Pearse's surrender order. The English officer, Captain Wheeler (aka Major de Courcy Wheeler), who accepted their surrender was a relative of Constance Markievicz.They were taken to Dublin Castle and the Conatance was then transported to Kilmainham Gaol. Constance was the only one of seventy women prisoners who was put into solitary confinement. At her court-martial on 4 May 1916, the Countess pleaded not guilty to taking part in an armed rebellion...for the purpose of assisting the enemy, but pleaded guilty to having attempted to cause disaffection among the civil population of His Majesty and she told the court, I did what I thought was right and I stand by it. She was sentenced to death, but General Maxwell commuted this to life in prison on account of the prisoner's sex.It was widely reported that she told the court, I do wish your lot had the decency to shoot me. The prosecuting counsel, William Wylie, later to be appointed a High Court judge in 1924, wrote to his daughter and alleged that she said I am only a woman, you cannot shoot a woman and that she had never stopped moaning the whole time she was in court.

In 1918, she was jailed again for her part in anti-conscription activities.Constance Markievicz was elected for the constituency of Dublin St Patrick's in the 1918 general election, this made her the first woman elected to the British House of Commons. However, in line with Sinn Féin abstentionist policy, she would not take her seat in the House of Commons.

Constance Markievicz was in Holloway prison, when her colleagues assembled in Dublin at the first meeting of the First Dáil, the Parliament of the revolutionary Irish Republic. When her name was called, she was described as being imprisoned by the foreign enemy (fé ghlas ag Gallaibh).She was re-elected to the Second Dáil in the elections of 1921.Constance Markievicz served as Minister for Labour from April 1919 to January 1922,she became both the first Irish female Cabinet Minister and at the same time, only the second female government minister in Europe. She was the only female cabinet minister in Irish history until 1979 when Máire Geoghegan-Quinn was appointed to the then junior cabinet post of Minister for the Gaeltacht for Fianna Fáil.

She died at the age of 59, on 15 July 1927^[8], possibly of tuberculosis contracted when she worked in the poorhouses of Dublin or complications related to appendicitis. In 1913 her husband moved to Ukraine, and never returned to live in Ireland, although they did correspond. Her husband and daughter and stepson were by her side when she died. She is buried at Glasnevin Cemetery, Dublin.