The Sheffield Female Political Association was the first women's suffrage organisation in the United Kingdom.[1]
The reason as to why this group was formed was due to the 1832 Reform Act explicitly banning women from voting, as it defined a voter as a male person.
The group was founded in February 1851 by several Sheffield women who were also active in the Chartist movement, led by Anne Kent and Anne Knight.[2] It also gained the support of Isaac Ironside's local Central Democratic Association.[3]
The association passed a resolution written by Abiah Higginbotham[4] in support of the suffrage of adult women, and persuaded George Howard, 7th Earl of Carlisle to submit this as a petition to the House of Lords.[5] This probably inspired Harriet Taylor Mill to write The Enfranchisement of Women.[6]
Later in 1851, feminist activists Jeanne Deroin and Pauline Roland wrote to the group for support while imprisoned in France.[7]