In contemporary usage, "suffrajitsu" describes the suffragettes' techniques of visible 'self-defence, sabotage and subterfuge' against the police and other aggressors, whilst promoting the benefits of jujitsu as a 'free activity' and a form of self-defense for dealing with both domestic violence in the home, and public attacks to women.

[1][2] The term "suffragette" was first used in 1906 pejoratively by the journalist Charles E. Hands in the London Daily Mail describing female activists working for women's suffrage, in particular members of the WSPU.

The latter, however, embraced the term and used it to distinguish their own, radical and militant approach from that of more staid and law-abiding "suffragist" organisations such as the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies.

[3] The term 'Suffrajitsu' was coined by an anonymous English journalist in a widely republished article first issued in March 1914 and has subsequently been re-popularised by the Suffrajitsu: Mrs. Pankhurst's Amazons graphic novel series (2015).

Flora Drummond, known as 'The General' for wearing a military style uniform, Helen Ogston, Teresa Billington-Greig and Maud Arncliffe Sennett were each known to carry around whips, to intimidate opponents.

[4] Ju-jitsu was first demonstrated in London in 1892 by Tetsujiro Shidachi and later promoted in England by the Bartitsu founder and practitioner Edward Barton-Wright, who introduced Asian martial arts to the middle-classes between 1899 and 1902.

In the interest of women practitioners and writing in the Daily Mirror in 1903, Evelyn Sharp called for 'women [to] take the special ladies classes offered by (former Bartitsu Club instructor Sadakazu) Uyenishi in Golden Square'.

"[5] Coupled with the heightened position of Japan as a nation state after the Anglo-Japanese Alliance and the victory over Russia in 1905 based partly on the word of the Japanese army claiming Judo was their secret weapon and hyperbolic claims of jujutsu teachers and sportswriters, there was an inclination in Edwardian English society to learn about 'jiu-jitsu', and the art was taught to young women at Girton College and Newnham College.

Performers and publicists like the strongman Eugen Sandow, promoted Jujitsu for women in his magazine on physical culture as a form of 'rational exercise' which supported 'feminine grace'.

Indeed, in 1913 Edith Garrud's dojo was used as a base for militant suffragettes fleeing from pursuing policemen; hiding their protest implements and changing into jujitsu uniforms gave them the veneer of respectable sportswomen.

[16] Jujitsu was initially demonstrated and promoted as a style of self-defence, but after the death of women like Mary Jane Clarke and the Conciliation Bills fiasco, the WSPU began to employ more militant forms of protest such as midnight raids on parliamentarians homes as well as nationwide arson and bombing campaigns, albeit the latter two categories of action were only carried out against unoccupied properties.

The Suffrajitsu phenomenon has been portrayed in a variety of modern media including: In the United States, Japanese instructors such as Yae Kichi Yabe in Rochester, New York began teaching jiu-jitsu to Americans.

President Theodore Roosevelt was a vocal advocate of jiu-jitsu training as a way of fostering manliness in American men and preparing United States soldiers for battle.

The work whilst only showing basic partnered stretches, was taken up for self-defense against 'mashers',[20] with journalist Priscilla Leonard writing how Hancock relayed that 'In Japan the women are not weaker, and in this country they have no right to be [either]'.

Suffragettes and upper-class socialites often viewed learning martial arts as engaging in female empowerment, unlike boxing whilst working-class women used combat sports, mostly wrestling in vaudeville productions and self-defence where necessary.