Lillian Metge

Lillian Margaret Metge (née Grubb; 22 June 1871 – 10 May 1954) was an Anglo-Irish suffragette and women's rights campaigner. She founded the Lisburn Suffrage Society, which she left to become a militant activist, leading on an explosion at the Anglican Lisburn Cathedral in Ireland. She was imprisoned briefly, and awarded a Women's Social and Political Union Hunger Strike medal. She continued her campaign, albeit peacefully, during and after World War I.

Personal life Born Lillian Margaret Grubb in Belfast, Ireland on 22 June 1871 her parents were linen merchant Richard Cambridge Grubb of Cahir Abbey, County Tipperary and Killeaton House, County Antrim and his wife, Harriet Richardson. She had two brothers, Cameron and Richard. The latter of whom became a veterinary surgeon. She was born into a wealthy family who made their fortunes from the linen industry. then in England at Shrewsbury briefly, then Dublin, and the aim for improvements across social classes.

Despite that, there was a view among many Ulstermen that women were not able to manage the complex politics of Ulster and Home Rule and so should not be allowed to vote, and that it was not a general demand, but just came from an active few. Some local women's groups were content with aiming for the same property requirements as men rather than for universal suffrage. Metge's own views on these matters were not clearly recorded. There were a number of Irish and Ulster suffrage groups, and attempts to unite their efforts. Metge wrote articles for the Irish Women's Suffrage Federation (IWSF) movement's newsletter, the Irish Citizen.

On 31 July 1914, Metge, carried out a plan to bomb the Anglican Lisburn Cathedral, later when she found out it was suffragettes she said 'suffragettes – the brutes!' and called Metge a 'mad militant'.

Any local sympathy was further lost when the government stated they would raise local (tax) rates to cover the cost of repairing the Cathedral's damage. and went on hunger strike. Metge was awarded a Hunger Strike Medal "for Valour" by the WSPU, with its green white and purple ribbon, and a date on the bar of 10 August 1914.

Metge's Hunger Strike Medal is now held in the Lisburn Museum.

Some women were granted the right to vote after the War in 1918, and Metge gave up her activism in 1920 (not long after her daughter Gwendoline committed suicide). She moved from Lisburn to Shrewsbury for a while, then went to live in Dublin.

Metge herself died on 10 May 1954 in Dublin. She is buried in Deansgrange Cemetery, Dublin.