She and Mary Leigh were surprised to find their destruction was celebrated, and they were pulled triumphantly by lines of suffragettes on their release from prison in 1908.

[3][4] In the early 1900s, New left her teaching career and began working as an organiser and campaigner for the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU).

[citation needed] When they were released from prison in August 1908, a parade was held in their honour by a delegation of suffragettes that included Christabel Pankhurst.

That year the WSPU and the rival NWSPU both took shops in Hawick and the police had to intervene when the crowd began to shake the speaker's carriage.

[14][15] In the 2015 film Suffragette, a character partially based on New is portrayed by English actress Helena Bonham Carter.