Statue success for Leicester Suffragette Alice Hawkins

Alice Hawkins led the Suffragette movement in Leicester and was jailed five times for her efforts

A statute to a Leicester woman, jailed five times for her part in the Suffragette movement, will be built after an anonymous donor came forward.

The £80,000 needed for a monument to Alice Hawkins was given in one donation from a city businessman.

Ms Hawkins, a shoe machinist, helped lead the Suffragette campaign in Leicester and gave speeches in London.

Her grandson said the statue would be in recognition of all the women who fought for universal suffrage.

The anonymous donor had originally pledged some of the funds needed for the artwork but was moved to donate the full amount after watching the film Suffragette.

A plaque to Alice Hawkins is on the Equity Shoe factory, which remained in business until 2008

Ms Hawkins' grandson, Peter Barratt, said the donor had "made dreams and ambitions come true".

"The statue will feature Alice but it is in recognition of all the women in the Leicester Suffragette movement 100 years ago, to gain a basic human right that that we all have today."

Ms Hawkins left school in Stafford in 1876 to start work as a shoe machinist, later joining Equity Shoes, which encouraged workers to take part in political activism.

From there she joined the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU) and was one of 18 women to be jailed when they were charged by mounted police in Hyde Park in February 1907.

After her time in prison, she organised meetings and protests in Leicester, inviting Sylvia Pankhurst and helping form the city's section of the WSPU.

She died in 1946, aged 83, and was buried in an unmarked pauper's grave.

Mr Barratt said he was now inviting ideas from artists for the statue and hoped it would be put up in about 18 months' time.