Did the women in your family change history? To celebrate 100 years of voting for women in the UK, Findmypast have opened up their most essential records so you can trace your inspiring female ancestors.

You can access all UK birth, marriage and death records as well as the UK census records completely FREE until 8 February. Plus, they’ve just released a brand new collection of Suffragette records and they’re also FREE.

https://www.findmypast.co.uk/suffragettes/

The Suffragette Collection consists of more than 3,000 Metropolitan Police and Home Office records, many of which are now available online to the public for the first time. It has been launched to mark the 100th anniversary of the passage of the 1918 Representation of the People Act, the act that gave property owning women and female graduates over the age of 30 the right to vote for the first time in British history.

This release marks the first phase of this ground-breaking collection and additional records will be added throughout 2018. The collection brings together the stories of women from all classes who actively supported women’s suffrage, either by attending demonstrations and meetings or opting for militant “direct action”.

Researchers can expect to find photographs, cabinet office papers, calendars of prisoners and Home Office papers on suffragette disturbances and prosecutions. The collection also includes an index of women arrested between 1906 and 1914, the official police watch list recording the details of over 1,300 militant suffragettes, reports of prison conditions, force-feeding, police surveillance and much more.

Note: The new Suffragette Collection will remain FREE through until Thursday 8 March 2018 (International Women’s Day).