Many suffragettes went on hunger strike in prison and were forcibly fed by prison doctors. A number of the hunger strikers published descriptions of their experiences in horrifying detail: the pain and sickness they endured, the injuries they sustained in struggles with prison staff, the humiliation of the procedure. It’s easy to characterise the men who were willing to inflict such suffering on the women as amongst the villains of suffragette history, particularly when they are viewed in the light of the suffragettes’ powerful testimonies.   Dr Ernest Hasler Helby has the unenviable distinction of being the first prison doctor to forcibly feed suffragettes when the procedure was used on the hunger strikers for the first time in 1909 at Winson Green Prison, Birmingham, where he was medical officer. The suffragettes were in no doubt that he was to blame for the forcible feeding in Winson Green. They protested outside his home while their comrades were still in prison. After thei...