Special Collections & Archives: Snapshots from the Archives

Snapshot from the Archives: Black History Month 2024

In honour of this year’s Black History Month, Roehampton’s archivists introduce us to some remarkable women who studied or taught at  Froebel, Southlands and Whitelands colleges as far back as 100 years ago.

In the 1930s, both Froebel and Southlands Colleges hosted students from Nigeria. Ayodele Taylor, from  Lagos, joined Froebel in 1931 and graduated in 1934. The following year, Southlands College welcomed another student from Lagos:  Augusta Modupe Bolade Williams, known as Ibirauke, who graduated in 1938 (pictured above with some fellow students). She appears to have enjoyed her time in London, overcoming the problems caused by cultural differences between her home in Nigeria and life and study in England. Ibirauke wrote an insightful and amusing article on "Life in Nigeria" for the 1936 College magazine, in which she addresses, with wry humour, some of the popular misconceptions held by British people about Africans: 

“When talking about Africa, many people seem to forget that it is a continent and not a country, and therefore expect one African to know all about the whole continent. This is quite impossible and is just like asking a Frenchman to tell you all about Scandinavia and Denmark or other European countries. The East African is very different from the West African…Nigeria alone … has more than four tribes, each speaking a different language from the other.”

However, Ibirauke admits to harbouring her own preconceptions about this country:

 "I must admit that I was taken aback by the beautiful sights in London, although I was rather disappointed at some of the buildings like Westminster Hall and Abbey, as I came like Dick Whittington, expecting to find the streets of London paved with gold." 

She goes on to describe what life is like in her home town, where people mostly wear Western clothes rather than tribal robes, and the buildings are all modern including a brand new University (but one exclusively for male students – girls only being allowed to train to be nurses or teachers). The full article is available to read in the Southlands College Archive (the first page is reproduced below).

Ibirauke’s presence at Southlands inspired the College Principal, Miss Wood, to invite a special Nigerian dignitary to visit the College when he was in town for a royal event. In the College Report for 1936-7 Miss Wood writes:  

“Old students may be interested to know that we had a distinguished visitor to the College in the person of the Ladapo Ademola, Alake of Abeokuta Western Nigeria. His photograph became well-known in the newspapers shortly after the Coronation of King George VI, which he came to England to attend. He came to the College on a beautiful afternoon at the end of May, followed by his attendant who carried the umbrella above him. He rules in the part of Nigeria from which our student comes.”

The Alake with Miss Woods

The following decade, Southlands was host to a student from Ghana (then known as the Gold Coast). Florence Wilson Addison came here in her twenties to train as a teacher, just after the end of the Second World War in 1945. Miss Woods writes warmly of her in this testimonial: 

“Miss Addison’s work has been outstanding from the beginning. This is in part due to the sound training she had received before coming to England, but her personal qualities have also been responsible. She is deeply interested in educational ideas and is capable of applying them in the classroom. She is concerned with the real welfare of the pupils and able to secure their ready co-operation. The children are always actively and happily engaged in learning.
It has been a pleasure to the College to have Miss Addison as one of its students for the last two years. She has been a little older than most of the English students and has come out as a leader among them. She has been elected one of the College Curators [chief student officers] and has contributed a good deal in the students’ self-government of the community. She is very intelligent and should go a long way in the teaching profession.” 

Miss Woods’ prediction that Florence would go a long way, turned out to be correct – with a reach that extended far beyond teaching. Following her return to the newly independent Republic of Ghana, in 1958 Miss Addison became the only woman in Ghana’s Delegation to the 13th session of the UN General Assembly, where she was also the Rapporteur for the Draft International Covenants on Human Rights, Report of the Third Committee. 

Florence Addison (centre) with the Ghanaian delegation (Photo credit: UN Photo/MB).

In the Queen’s Birthday Honours 1960, Florence Wilson Addison was one of only 6 Ghanaian civilians to be awarded an MBE. As Senior Education Officer for the Ghanaian Government, her award was, appropriately enough, for services to education.

Whitelands College: Ida Amy Louisa King and Constance Cummings-John

Born in Trinidad in 1881, Miss Ida King taught English at Whitelands from 1921 to her retirement in 1941. Before that she studied Medieval and Modern Languages at Girton College, Cambridge - quite possibly the first Black woman, certainly one of the first, to study there. 
The 1922 Whitelands Annual notes ‘Miss King teaches voice production and takes a great interest in the dramatic work’. She certainly did the latter, leading drama groups in schools and founding the Old Whitelanders’ Dramatic Society.  The domestic bursar at the time recorded in her memoirs of Miss King: ‘Her brilliant brain is, I’m afraid, probably beyond my powers to attain – though she has touched me, as well as our girls, indeed everyone in her orbit, with her determination to widen our knowledge of literature and philosophy.’
After retirement, she devoted herself to the service of others: from helping girls in a remand home and refugees, to coaching local children, as well as finding the time to lecture at Homerton College, Cambridge (I94I–42). She died in 1968 aged 88, leaving  a lasting legacy at Roehampton. Read the full story of her life on the Whitelands College pages.

Whiteland’s first Black student was probably Constance Cummings-John (nee Horton), who attended the college in 1935-1936. The annual newsletter for November 1935 records: ‘There are six Indian students and our first student from West Africa.’ 

Constance Horton (pictured above with fellow students) came from Sierra Leone and had taught for a couple of years in Freetown before arriving at Whitelands for further teacher training. She would go on to have an extraordinary career as an educationalist and pioneer of women’s rights, as well as being an active local politician. In the 1930s and 1940s she was also a prominent figure in the network of international Pan-Africanists. Elected mayor of Freetown in 1966, she became the first black African woman to lead a city government on the continent. Her Times obituary in March 2000 describes her as a ‘campaigner for African women’s rights.’ Thanks to Roehampton’s subscription to the Times Digital Archive, you can read the full obituary here (login required). 

Roehampton University is proud to celebrate the contributions of all of these influential Black African and Caribbean women not just to our colleges’ histories, but to the history of the world. 

With thanks to contributors: Gilly King (Southlands), Gemma Bentley (Whitelands), Kornelia Cepok (Froebel and University Archivist).