Prisoners (Temporary Discharge for Ill-Health) Act 1913

And then over and over, we see different ways that each group is reacting and evolving and changing.

And Later, the government passed what was known as the Cat and Mouse Act, where once the suffragettes published these letters describing what they experienced being force-fed, there was public outcry.

It was so, so inhumane what these women were enduring in jail.

And so it did not make the government look particularly good in the eyes of the public.

And then after a few days on hunger strike, the suffragettes would be released.

And then as soon as they were recovered, they would be rearrested to serve out their sentence.

So that was the cat and mouse act.

And it just made a jail sentence almost interminable because you go on a hunger strike, you leave, you come back over and over this endless cycle.

To address the ongoing issue of hunger strikes without releasing prisoners permanently, the government passed the Prisoners Temporary Discharge for Ill Health Act in nineteen hundred and thirteen.

This law became widely known as the Cat and Mouse Act.

It allowed the authorities to release hunger-striking women when their health became dangerously poor, but only temporarily.

Once the women had recovered their strength, they were required to return to prison to complete their original sentences.