Marjery Bryce

Marjery Bryce
Born	18 June 1891
Died	8 June 1973
Other names	Marjery Vincentia Bryce, Marjorie Annan Bryce; birth name Margaret
Occupation	actor
Known for	riding as Joan of Arc in suffragette parades
Father	John Annan Bryce, Liberal MP

Marjery Bryce (1891 - 1973) was a British suffragette and actor, who rode dressed as Joan of Arc in WSPU parades in support of votes for women.

Family

Born Margaret Vincentia^[1] on 18 June 1891 in Marylebone, London,^[2] to politician father John Annan Bryce and mother Violet L'Estrange.^[3]

Bryce was variously known as Marjery, Marjorie or Marjery Vincentia and Marjorie Annan.^[4]

She had two brothers and a sister three years younger,^[5] Rosalind L'Estrange,^[6] known as 'Tiny'.^[7] One brother, Nigel, died at the age of seventeen. Her other brother Roland, was later to be one of the commissioners in 1922 to lay out the borders for Yugoslavia.^[8]

Her father was Liberal MP for the Inverness Burghs, voted against the Conciliation Bill which was to give some women the franchise and wrote letters to the press against women's suffrage.^[5] Her mother, Violet held the opposite view and was a cousin to Countess Markievicz and Eva Gore-Booth, both activists for women's rights.^[8]

Bryce remained single.

Role in Women's Suffrage movement

Bryce joined the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU) parade at the age of nineteen^[5] was portraying 'the perfect woman' ^[9] riding on a white horse dressed in full armour with a banner in the style of Joan of Arc,^[4][10] leading the forty thousand strong Women's Procession on 17 June 1911,^[11] before George V's Coronation. Her sister Rosalind "Tiny" Bryce was dressed as a page and led the horse's bridle.^[5] This demonstration was to encourage support of the proposed Conciliation Bill, which would have given the franchise to women who owned property.^[7]

The image of Saint Joan was seen to represent 'the militant women's ideal....in every act of hers they recognize the same spirit as that which strengthens them to risk their liberty and endure torture for the sake of freedom'.^[7] And the leaders of WSPU, Emmeline and Christabel Pankhurst, Emmeline Pethick-Lawrence and Mabel Tuke led the parade, with groups of women's trades and professions, or, like Bryce, dressed as famous women from the past.^[5] Christabel in particular felt the image of Joan of Arc included the willingness to undertake physical hardship and emphasised the martial (masculine) qualities as an image of fighting for a cause of right.^[12] This was summed up a ' the loveliness of simplicity, purity, courage and militancy' which Bryce was acting in this parade and was an image used by WSPU as a symbol.^[13]

suffragette procession 1911

The Museum of London has the original copyright image of Bryce as Joan of Arc cited in many of the references above.^[14]

In other suffragette parades, Joan of Arc was also portrayed by Elsie Howey.^[15]

Acting career

Bryce played the London stage for example, in the role of Nina Zarechnaya in The Seagull (1919), appeared in The Cloud that Lifted (1932) after performing in Other Gates in the Grafton Theatre, London in 1931,^[16] and was the Red Queen in Alice in Wonderland (in 1938 and again in1947).^[5]

In 1927 she took the role of 'The Spirit of Henley' in the Henley Historical Pageant.^[17]

Her entry in 1939 'The Spotlight' theatrical casting directory describes her as a straight, comedy or character performer.^[4]

Bryce was later known for her roles in Agatha Christie's Ten Little Niggers (1949),^[18] appearing in BBC Sunday-Night Theatre (1950s)^[19] and appeared in a BBC series The Bell Family (1951 ).^[20]

Death

Bryce died on 8 June 1973, in Fulham London.^[2][4]

References

1. "Margaret Vincentia Bryce". thepeerage.com. Retrieved 11 October 2019.
2. "Margery Bryce". IMDb. Retrieved 11 October 2019.
3. "Violent L"Estrange". thepeerage.com. Retrieved 11 October 2019.
4. "OrnaVerum - Margaret (Margery / Marjorie) Vincentia Bryce". ornaverum.org. Retrieved 11 October 2019.
5. Atkinson, Diane (2018). Rise up, women! : the remarkable lives of the suffragettes. London: Bloomsbury. pp. 256, 529. ISBN 9781408844045. OCLC 1016848621.
6. "Rosalind L'Estrange Bryce". thepeerage.com. Retrieved 11 October 2019.
7. "The Suffragette Marjorie Annan Bryce representing Joan of Arc: 1911". Museum of London Prints. Retrieved 11 October 2019.
8. "The Violet who transformed Garinish". The Irish Times. Retrieved 11 October 2019.
9. Betterton, Rosemary (1996). An Intimate Distance: Women, Artists, and the Body. Psychology Press. p. 49. ISBN 9780415110853.
10. Tickner, Lisa (1988). The spectacle of women : imagery of the suffrage campaign, 1907-14. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. p. 327. ISBN 0226802450. OCLC 17233993.
11. Mayhall, Laura E. Nym (2003). The militant suffrage movement : citizenship and resistance in Britain, 1860-1930. [Oxford]: Oxford University Press. p. 88. ISBN 9780195347838. OCLC 57144473.
12. Mayhall, Laura E. Nym (2003). The militant suffrage movement : citizenship and resistance in Britain, 1860-1930. [Oxford]: Oxford University Press. p. 87. ISBN 9780195347838. OCLC 57144473.
13. Hill, Leslie (2018). Sex, suffrage and the stage : first-wave feminism in British theatre. London: Macmillan International Higher Education. p. 157. ISBN 9781137509239. OCLC 1104035820.
14. "The Suffragette Marjorie Annan Bryce representing Joan of Arc: 1911". Museum of London Prints. 001466. Retrieved 11 October 2019.
15. Pankhurst, Sylvia E (Estelle Sylvia) (2015). The suffragette : the history of the women's militant suffrage movement (Dover ed.). Mineola, New York: Courier Dover Publications. p. 367. ISBN 9780486804842. OCLC 907495327.
16. "Margery Bryce". IMDb. Retrieved 11 October 2019.
17. "Oxfordshire History Centre blog". www.oxfordshirehistory.org.uk. Retrieved 8 August 2021.
18. Ten Little Niggers, retrieved 11 October 2019
19. BBC Sunday-Night Theatre (TV Series 1950–1959) - IMDb, retrieved 11 October 2019
20. The Bell Family (TV Series 1951– ) - IMDb, retrieved 11 October 2019