“Lady Constance was seriously ill at the time as the result of her prison experiences, and unable to defend herself. I therefore undertook the task of vindicating her veracity. Before making any public statement on her behalf I was anxious to find out what steps had been taken by the Home Office to investigate the matters referred to in her statement, and I hoped by a friendly intervention to secure a full and impartial inquiry into all the circumstances of her treatment by the prison officials.
“I have had several communications with the Home Office on the subject, and owing to the retirement of Mr. Gladstone and the appointment of a new Home Secretary, they have necessarily been protracted over a considerable period. My attitude throughout has been entirely conciliatory, and the only claim which I have made was that in the interests of justice, charges of this nature should be submitted to a full and impartial inquiry which would, of course, involve a separate examination of both the parties concerned. This claim has been refused by the Home Office on the grounds that the prison officials have been closely interrogated, and that as they deny entirely every one of the charges made, ‘no useful purpose would be served’ by granting my request.
“In the absence of such an inquiry as I asked for, the matter must be left to the opinion of unbiassed minds. I desire, however, to say that nothing which I have been able to learn has in any way shaken my belief in the substantial accuracy of my sister’s account. The idea that her charges can be disposed of by the bare denial of the persons against whom they are made, is not likely to commend itself to anyone outside the Home Office, and no amount of denial can get over the following facts:--
“1. Lady Constance Lytton, when imprisoned in Newcastle, after refusing to answer the medical questions put to her and adopting the hunger-strike, received a careful and thorough medical examination, which disclosed symptoms of ‘serious heart disease,’ and on these grounds she was released as unfit to submit to forcible feeding.
“2. Three months later ‘Jane Warton,’ when imprisoned at Liverpool, also refused to answer medical questions or to take prison food. On this occasion she was entered in the prison books as having refused medical examination, and was forcibly fed eight times. Such medical examination as took place during the forcible feeding failed, according to the medical officer’s report, to disclose any symptoms of heart disease, and she was eventually released on the grounds of loss of weight and general physical weakness.