I am trying to learn more about the African-Caribbean community in
Scotland during the 1800s (particularly the late 1800s - 1880s and
1890s). I believe there was a community of black folks in Edinburgh,
many students who attended the University of Edinburgh. I am
interested in learning about 2 or 3 important Africans or Caribbeans
living in Scotland at the time. (I know of Archibald Johnson, who
wrote about black folks in Europe during the 1890s. He lived in
Edinburgh.) I'm also interested in a listing of 5 - 7 articles or
books that talk about Black Scottish history during this time.
Thank you -Hello kyraeh
This is an interesting topic but it's difficult to find you a good
answer. Is it right to assume you don't want African-Americans
included? There are at least three important black North Americans who
spent time in nineteenth century Scotland, and I also know of one
eminent African who studied in Edinburgh in the nineteenth century,
but before the 1880s.
I wonder if you could also clarify your requirements about books and
articles? As I live in the area, I phoned the Edinburgh Central
Library (both the Scottish Department and Edinburgh Room). The
librarians I spoke to didn't know of any books on Black Scottish
history and one said it was a "gap in the market".
We would like to offer you a useful answer so any guidelines you can
add would be really helpful.
Many thanks - LeliLeli-ga
Thanks for your questions. While I'm curious about three important
North American black folks who went to Scotland, the focus is on
Africans or Caribbeans who were in Scotland in the 1800s.
For the book citations, it doesn't have to be a book devoted
exclusively to Black Scottish history, but should have at least a
chapter covering the topic. If you are in Edinburgh - the university
there may have an African Studies department, which may have a
insights or reading list. The article should be exclusively on the
topic.
Thank you -
I came across a partial reference to a disseration by Dr. June Evans
called "African/Carbbeans in Scotland: A Socio-Geographic Study
(1996), but can't find any other information here in US. Wonder if
it's a Scottish reference.Firstly, many apologies for being so slow about getting back to you.
This week I'm going to make an all out effort to get a helpful
response from someone at the university - if they haven't all
disappeared on their summer holidays. I found nothing really useful
online and unfortunately no sign that any of the African Studies
people specialise in areas overlapping with your interests.
The dissertation by June Evans turns out to be a 1996 Edinburgh Ph.D.
thesis.
"African/Caribbeans in Scotland : a socio-geographical study / June
Evans.
Main Author: Evans, June.
Brief Description: African/Caribbeans in Scotland : a
socio-geographical study /
1995.
Thesis: Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Edinburgh, 1996."
There are two copies in Edinburgh University Library's "special
collections" department but apparently they don't do inter-library
loans overseas. It might be worth asking them if there is any way
round this but please note that they are closed this week.
http://www.lib.ed.ac.uk/resources/collections/specdivision/
It was interesting to me to discover that 19th century Scotland was
seen as a relatively welcoming place for African-Americans to come and
study - but finding out about people arriving from Africa and/or the
Caribbean is proving difficult. However - I really would like to find
out more so I'll keep trying!
Did you read about the African-Caribbean community in Edinburgh in a
book by Archibald Johnson? Were there any names/place names/university
departments etc. that could provide further clues?
I'll report back to you later in the week.
LeliDear Leli-ga
You have been most helpful with the Dr. Evans reference! I've been
searching for weeks.
Yes, it is difficult to find information on African and Caribbeans. I
would, then, like to modify my question, if possible. If you already
have references on African Americans in Scotland during the 1800s,
that would be fine and acceptable to me.
I very much appreciate your help to date!
KyraehThat's very kind of you, Kyraeh! I found your message just I was just
getting ready to post some of my bits and pieces in the comment
section - so now I've added on the African Americans at the end and am
posting in the official answer spot.
This has been very interesting research and I've been intrigued and
motivated by the challenge of finding anything much at all. As well
as the net, I’ve used a book called “Staying Power” by Peter Fryer and
a small leaflet called “Roots: the African Inheritance in Scotland”,
abbreviated as RTAIIS.
===========================================
PEOPLE WHO MIGHT HAVE MET ARCHIBALD JOHNSON
AFRICAN/CARIBBEANS IN EDINBURGH 1880-1900
===========================================
After digging out scraps and hints from here and there, I think the
African/Caribbean university community which Archibald Johnson would
have found in Edinburgh must have overlapped with the “Afro West
Indian Literary Society”. In 1900, this society sent two (or three?
see below) delegates to London for the first Pan-African Conference,
which had only thirty delegates overall. There is frustratingly little
information available, but one interesting member of the AWILS was
John Alcindor, a Trinidadian like the other Edinburgh delegate(s) and
Henry Sylvestre Williams, organiser of the conference.
JOHN ALCINDOR
Born Port of Spain, Trinidad 1873 – died London 1924
Graduated from Edinburgh University medical school in 1899 with
first-class honours in three subjects. He was one of the delegates
from the “Afro-West Indian Literary Society” to the 1900 Pan-African
Conference, moved to London and practised there as a doctor till his
death in 1924. [Fryer]
See picture bottom left here:
http://www.andlin.co.uk/Bfuture/menu_history13.htm
He was a founder member of the African Progress Union (1918)
http://www.stanford.edu/group/SHR/5-2/rossum.html
Jeff Green is cited as the source of Fryer’s information. At the time
“Staying Power” was published, he was anticipating that the material
on Alcindor would appear in:
Pan-African Biography
Edited by: Robert A. Hill
Binding: Paperback, 232 pages
Publisher: African Studies Association
Published Date: 08/01/1987
List: USD $25.00
ISBN: 0918456592
Green also mentions Alcindor on this page:
://www.google.co.uk/search?q=cache:AgW16Pp_sOwJ:www.blackpresence.co.uk/html/jeff_green.htm+%22john+alcindor%22&hl=en&ie=UTF-8
WILLIAM MEYER
William Meyer, another medical student from Trinidad, was also a
delegate from Edinburgh to the 1900 conference. He “attacked
pseudo-scientific racism”. [Fryer]
RICHARD AKIWANDE SAVAGE
Things are complicated by evidence that Dr. Richard Akiwande Savage
was the “second” delegate, not John Alcindor.
List of delegates including:
"Dr. R. A. K. Savage, M.B., Ch.B., Delegate from Afro-West Indian
Literary Society, Edinburgh, Scotland
Mr. Meyer, Delegate Afro-West Indian Literary Society, Edinburgh,
Scotland"
http://docsouth.unc.edu/neh/walters/walters.html
“The Edinburgh University Afro-West Indian Literary Society led by
Dr. Richard Akiwande Savage” [in 1900]
http://www.mainlib.uwi.tt/oprepweb/notes.html
See also:
http://diaspora.northwestern.edu/cgi-bin/WebObjects/DiasporaX.woa/wa/displayArticle?atomid=461
"Du Bois' 1900 lecture was attended by Trinidadian delegates from the
Afro-West Indian Literary Society of Edinburgh University."
http://www.chronicleworld.org/archive/issue_09/html_09/9_8_2equ.htm
There was an exhibition at the University of the West Indies in which
included a certain amount of material on the AWILS and I wonder if you
might be able to find out more from them:
http://www.mainlib.uwi.tt/oprepweb/notes.html
Fryer says of African/Caribbean students throughout Britain that there
is not “much known about their organizations, all of which seem to
have been of purely local scope until 1917.”
In 1913 there was an estimate of 70 African students in London and “a
good proportion of West Indians”.
There is no mention online of the AWILS in the archives of student
organisations in Edinburgh University Library.
SAMUEL JULES CELESTINE EDWARDS
Born in Dominica in 1858, he stowed away on a French ship while still
a boy, then moved to Britain sometime in the 1870s, “plunged into
activity in the temperance movement in Edinburgh and spoke on the
movement’s behalf elsewhere in Scotland.” He was an “anti-freethought
Christian” and a “staunch upholder of human rights and brotherhood”.
[Fryer]
He left Scotland around 1880 for Sunderland but maintained contact
with people north of the border. In August 1893 he lectured in
Glasgow, Edinburgh and Aberdeen where he was associated with the
founding of a new society: the “Society for the Recognition of the
Brotherhood of Man”.
http://digilib.nypl.org/dynaweb/digs/wwm9729/@Generic__BookTextView/246
http://www.everygeneration.co.uk/blueplaques/nomination2.htm
"Fraternity, which ran from July 1893 to February 1897 as the
‘Official Organ of the Society for the Recognition of the Brotherhood
of Man’, was edited by Celestine Edwards, who played an active role in
what would in contemporary terminology be termed anti-racial and
anti-discriminatory practices, along with a strong emphasis on
humanist values, then coined ‘anti-caste’. He spoke widely at
anti-slavery meetings, and became known as ‘the Negro lecturer’."
http://athena.bl.uk/collections/nl28.html
He wrote "From Slavery to a Bishopric"
http://docsouth.unc.edu/edwardsc/edwards.html
THEOPHILUS EDWARD SAMUEL SCHOLES
Born in Jamaica about 1854 - died about 1937
Theophilus Scholes was a doctor who trained in Edinburgh, London and
Belgium. He went as a missionary physician to the Congo for five
years, was associated with the African Training Institute in Wales and
spent some time in Nigeria. He arrived back in Britain in the late
1890s and “wrote three far-sighted critical studies of British
imperialism and racism”, two under the pen-name Bartholomew Smith.
Fryer suggests we may get some feeling for the experience of black
students in Britain at this time from Scholes’ last book, “Glimpses of
the Ages”. He describes “calculated and systematic bearishness and
boorishness” by white students. Though the book is more about London,
a “great northern university” is mentioned.
"He was Jamaican, born c.1854, died c.1937 in England. He studied at
the Guiness-Grattan Missionary School in London, c.1879-1881(at any
rate it was a seminary founded by Dr. Guiness). Afterwards, he took a
medical degree at University of Edinburgh, c. 1881-1885."
http://genforum.genealogy.com/scholes/messages/57.html
From the British Library catalogue:
[1] The British Empire and Alliances: or, Britain's Duty to her
Colonies and subject races.
SCHOLES. Theophilus E. Samuel
pp. viii. 415. E. Stock: London, 1899. 8o.
[2] Glimpses of the Ages; or the “superior” and “inferior” races,
so-called, discussed in the light of science and history.
SCHOLES. Theophilus E. Samuel
pp. xvii. 409. John Long: London, 1905. 8o.
[3] Sugar and the West Indies.
SCHOLES. Theophilus E. Samuel
pp. 19. E. Stock: London, [1897.] 8o.
http://blpc.bl.uk/
The story of noteworthy African/Caribbean people in 19c Scotland is
almost always one of spending a few years in a university city and
then moving on, possibly to London. I'd relate this to the overall
Scottish context, where it is not unusual for ambitious people to be
drawn towards the greater choice and opportunity “down south”.
Although we gather from Scholes’ writing that there were many
encounters with racism for black students in all parts of Britain,
London was at least a vast city with some ethnic diversity. Alcindor,
Scholes and the American George Rice all went to work there as
doctors.
Edinburgh was a much smaller, more conservative place, though it did
have strong links with Africa via the huge numbers of Church of
Scotland missionaries coming and going from one continent to the
other. This is believed to have attracted African students to the
city. [RTAIIS]
Glasgow was a bigger city than Edinburgh, a port with a history of
slave-trading and, later, of sailors hired in the Caribbean being paid
off once their ship had docked in Scotland and left to fend for
themselves. (This shows up to some extent in the “Poor Relief” records
of the 19c.) Numbers are not available, but there would undoubtedly
have been far fewer African/Caribbean people than in London.
=================================================================
OTHER AFRICAN/CARIBBEAN PEOPLE OF SOME IMPORTANCE IN 19c SCOTLAND
=================================================================
Until late in the 19th century most African/Caribbean students
wanting to study in Britain came to Scotland or London, as the
long-established English universities of Oxford and Cambridge would
only admit members of the Church of England. (London University was
established in the 1830s.)
We must hope that there were some people more welcoming than the
students described by Scholes. Here are a couple of cheerier comments
on 19c Scotland:
In Glasgow in 1998, Toni Morrison said she was glad to be invited
because at one time it was "one of the few places in the world where
African Americans could gain a higher education".
"Why did Douglass spend so much time in Scotland? Scotland was home to
more radical anti-slavery opinions, and Douglass found he was very
much welcomed. In 1833, the Glasgow and Edinburgh Emancipation
Societies were formed as a result of the abolition of slavery in the
British West Indies. With this involvement, these groups went further,
calling for the abolition of slavery worldwide, but particularly in
the United States."
http://britishhistory.about.com/cs/individualplaces/a/021801a.htm
JAMES AFRICANUS HORTON
James Beale Africanus Horton 1835 – 1883, born in Sierra Leone/Liberia
"Horton was the first African graduate of the University of Edinburgh
(MD 1859 - dissertation 'On the medical topography of the west coast
of Africa'). He became head of the Army Medical Dept. in the Gold
Coast and also practised privately. He published a number of
scientific papers and ground-breaking book of sociology/history, West
African Countries and Peoples (1868), which was reprinted in facsimile
with an introduction by George Shepperson in 1969. He is commemorated
by the University of Edinburgh by a plaque in Buccleuch Place,
Edinburgh."
http://www.everygeneration.co.uk/blueplaques/nomination2.htm
"Africanus Horton was a surgeon, scientist, soldier, and a political
thinker who worked toward African independence a century before it
occurred.
Born James Beale Horton, he grew up on Gloucester Village, the son of
an Ibo recaptive who worked as a carpenter […]While a student, he took
the name "Africanus" as an emblem of pride in his African homeland."
http://www.sierra-leone.org/heroes3.html
See also:
http://www.westafricareview.com/war/vol3.1/taiwo.html
http://www.cpa.ed.ac.uk/edit1/15/omniana.html
Horton wrote:
The Diseases of Tropical Climates and their treatment. With hints for
the preservation of health in the tropics.
HORTON. James Africanus Beale
London, 1874. 8o.
Guinea Worm, or Dracunculus: its symptoms and progress ... and radical
cure.
HORTON. James Africanus Beale
London, 1868. 8o.
Letters on the political condition of the Gold Coast since the
exchange of territory between the English and Dutch governments, on
January 1, 1868; together with a short account of the Ashantee War,
1862-4, and the Awoonah War, 1866, etc.
HORTON. James Africanus Beale
London, 1870. 8o.
The medical topography of the West Coast of Africa; with sketches of
its botany.
HORTON. James Africanus Beale
London, 1859. 8o.
Physical and Medical Climate, and Meteorology of the West Coast of
Africa, etc.
HORTON. James Africanus Beale
London, Edinburgh [printed], 1867. 8o.
West African Countries and Peoples, British and Native, ... and a
vindication of the African race.
HORTON. James Africanus Beale
London, 1868. 8o.
http://blpc.bl.uk/
ANDREW WATSON
Born Georgetown, British Guiana 1856.
Andrew Watson came to Glasgow University and was a successful
footballer.
"He was the son of a sugar merchant from Glasgow, Peter Miller, and
Rose Watson, about whom little is known except that she probably came
from Demerara in French Guyana, a major sugar plantation near the
northern tip of South America.
[…]
As a [football] player, Watson plied his trade at full-back, and first
played for Park Grove, near Ibrox, before leading the world-renowned
Queen’s Park to three Scottish Cups. After the thrashing of England in
1881, he joined the London Corinthians.
This was a remarkable coup. The Corinthians were regarded as one of
the most exclusive gentleman’s clubs in the world, with only 50
members, yet here they were admitting a Scot of Pan-American origin.
[…]
Andrew Watson, Glaswegian aristocrat, gentleman, pioneer of amateur
football and scourge of the English. And a black man to boot. How on
earth were we ignorant of him for so long?"
“Tale of black Scotland captain should have spread further” by
Jonathan Coates
The Scotsman July 12, 2003
http://news.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=647922003
register (free) to read
Andrew Watson
http://www.archives.gla.ac.uk/gallery/awatson/watsontext.html
http://www.archives.gla.ac.uk/gallery/awatson/default.html
http://www.archives.gla.ac.uk/gallery/awatson/studies/matric.html
http://www.archives.gla.ac.uk/gallery/awatson/watteam.html
WILLIAM DAVIDSON
Born Kingston, Jamaica 1786, hanged in London 1820.
Fryer says Davidson studied in Edinburgh from the age of 14; some
websites say it was Glasgow. At one point he studied maths at Aberdeen
University.
“One of the two black men who played a prominent part in the British
radical movement during the regency.”
William Davidson
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/davidson_william.shtml
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/PRdavidson.htm
http://www.portsunlight.org.uk/gallery/artists/davidson.htm
http://www.aambh.org.uk/html/kids.htm
TIYO SOGA
Born in Gwali in 1829, died 1871.
Soga studied in Glasgow to prepare for ordination into the Church of
Scotland. He was the first black Presbyterian minister in South
Africa. He went back there in 1857, shortly after his marriage to a
Scot, Janet Burnside. As well as translating the Bible into Xhosa, he
started a translation of Pilgrim’s Progress which was completed by one
of his sons.
“The first black ordained minister in South Africa, Tiyo Soga, found
the words and rhythms to bing the Holy Book to the Xhosa.
[…]
Soga also made a habit of collecting fables, proverbs, legends and
folklore. Later, when he sent some of his children to be educated in
Scotland, grief-stricken he compiled a small notebook of 62 "short
pithy maxims for their future guidance" which he called "The
Inheritance of my Children". In it he exhorted them never to be
ashamed that their father was an African and their mother a Scot.”
http://www.suntimes.co.za/2000/05/14/lifestyle/travel/travel02.htm
Tiyo Soga sent two (?) of his sons from South Africa to Dollar Academy
(high school) in Clackmannanshire, Scotland around 1870. The “advice
book” he gave them reminds them to honour their mother, a good
“Christian Scotchwoman” but to “take your place in the world as
coloured, not as white men”. There have been descendants of his
studying or teaching in Dollar ever since. [RTAIIS]
Other descendants of his still live in the Eastern Cape.
His wife returned to Scotland with four of their seven Children after
her husband’s death.
http://www.gospelcom.net/dacb/stories/southafrica/soga1_tiyo.html
http://www.gospelcom.net/chi/DAILYF/2001/11/daily-11-21-2001.shtml
http://lists.anc.org.za/pipermail/anctoday/2001/000020.html
http://www.shelllife.co.za/travelnewsresults.asp?story=851&jstate=12
CHRISTOPHER JAMES DAVIS
Born Barbados around 1840
He studied medicine at Aberdeen then went to London to work as house
physician at St. Bartholomew's Hospital. During the Franco-Prussian
War he went to France to help starving and fever-stricken peasants. He
died of smallpox aged 31. He graduated from Aberdeen some time from
1860 on.
http://library.wellcome.ac.uk/collections/srcwarpre1914.shtml
THOMAS JENKINS
Born on the Guinea Coast? Late 18C?
Jenkins is the only notable 19c African I have heard of who lived a
longer chunk of his life in Scotland, even though he too went abroad
eventually. He had been abandoned in Hawick at the age of 14 when his
owner/benefactor (?) died and was said to be the son of a king on the
Guinea coast. He educated himself in, among other things, Greek, Latin
and mathematics, while earning his keep as a farm labourer in the
Scottish Borders. Then, somehow, the Duke of Buccleuch was persuaded
to provide Jenkins with his own school-house after he was turned down
for other jobs as a teacher.
Later, in the 1820s, he attended Edinburgh University and then went to
Mauritius as a missionary.
He is mentioned on the EU library site, and Fryer gives information
from a book called:
Colour, Class and the Victorians
Douglas Lorimer
Leicester UP (1978)
For context, you have to know that the area is to this day a
conservative rural mostly white area. Even in the 2001 census the
number of people there identifying themselves as having an African or
Caribbean ethnic background was far smaller than for Scotland as a
whole.
http://www.gro-scotland.gov.uk/grosweb/grosweb.nsf/pages/file5/$file/key_stats_chbareas.pdf
ABDULLAH ABDURAHMAN
South African of Indian ethnicity.
"In 1888 he went to Glasgow University, where he obtained the M.B.,
Ch.M. medical degree in 1893.
In 1895 he returned to South Africa and acquired an extensive practice
in Cape Town, among both Coloured and White people. In 1904 he was
elected to the Cape Town City Council, and was the first Coloured
person to become a Councillor […] and was largely responsible in
establishing a system of school medical instruction for the Cape
Province. In 1905 Dr. Abdurahman founded and was president of the
South African Native and Coloured People's Organization, later known
as the African People's Organization.
[..]
In 1934 he was appointed a member of the coloured People's
Fact-finding Commission and served on the Cape Coloured Commission of
1937. He died in Cape Town in 1940."
http://www.aim25.ac.uk/cgi-bin/search2?coll_id=4653&inst_id=16
================
BOOKS & ARTICLES
================
There are various possibilities for books and articles worth checking
out on the following webpages. Some use the word British or Britain in
the title, but may not actually have anything about Scotland. (I speak
from experience!) The Peter Fryer book does have a few interesting
bits and pieces you can find by working your way through the index.
When you look at these pages I think you’ll realise why I believe
there’s a real shortage of literature on your topic. It’s hard to
imagine there’s a good supply of material on 19c black Scottish
history not mentioned on these lists:
http://www.casbah.ac.uk/surveys/archivereportGLAS.stm
http://www.lib.ed.ac.uk/resources/collections/specdivision/cas.shtml
http://www.britishcouncil.org/studies/bibliography/22.htm
http://www.stir.ac.uk/Departments/HumanSciences/AppSocSci/SSP/Robertson/47JA/outline02ok.htm
(scroll down to ‘ethnicity’)
http://www.ed.ac.uk/centas/other.html
http://www.ed.ac.uk/centas/op.html
http://education.guardian.co.uk/Print/0,3858,4518729,00.html
Possibilities I pulled off the lists:
Duffield, Ian, 'Identity, Community and the Lived Experience of Black
Scots from the late 18th to the mid-19th centuries' in Immigrants and
Minorities 11 (1992), 105-129.
Journal home page
http://www.frankcass.com/jnls/im.htm
Scotland Africa '97 archive. (Records of a year-long Scottish
programme and festival 'to strengthen existing ties between Scotland
and Africa and to create new channels of understanding and
co-operation'.) 1997.
(In Edinburgh University Library archives)
The Early African Presence in the British Isles: An inaugural lecture
on the occasion of the establishment of the Chair in English and
African Literature at Edinburgh University. Professor Paul Edwards
1990 pp 25 2.50/US$ 4.75
Edwards, M. Who Belongs to Glasgow: 200 years of migration (Glasgow
City Libraries, 1993).
And I found this description of June Evans’ dissertation:
“first in-depth study of the historical relationship between Scotland
and the African diaspora and its 20c realities”. [RTAIIS]
Also - don't bother with a book by Billy Kay called "Odyssey". There's
nothing relevant in it.
=================================
AFRICAN-AMERICANS IN 19C SCOTLAND
=================================
"The first African American known to have studied at the University of
Glasgow was James Smith, who graduated MD in 1837, and was, according
to the New England Journal of Medicine, "the first black American
physician to receive university training" anywhere in the world."
http://www.gla.ac.uk/publications/avenue/32/na2.html
JAMES McCUNE SMITH
"Dr. James McCune Smith (1811-1865)
First American Negro to earn a medical degree, 1837 (University of
Glasgow). Negroes were denied admission to U.S. medical schools at the
time. First black to operate a pharmacy in the United States."
http://www.mclibrary.duke.edu/hot/blkhist.html
"On this date in 1813, James McCune Smith was born. He was an
African-American physician and abolitionist.
From New York City, he received his early education at the African
Free School. Though his academic credentials were exceptional Smith
was barred from American Colleges because he was Black. Smith entered
Glasgow University in Scotland in 1832 earning three academic degrees,
including a doctorate in medicine. He also gained a reputation in the
Scottish anti-slavery movement as an officer of the Glasgow
Emancipation Society.
In 1837, following internship in Paris, Smith returned to New York
City where he started a medical practice and pharmacy. His reputation
as the first degree-holding Black physician gave him a prominent
position in the city’s Black community."
http://www.aaregistry.com/african_american_history/1602/Intelligence_personified_James_McCune_Smith
"The first African American known to have studied at the University of
Glasgow was James Smith, who graduated MD in 1837, and was, according
to the New England Journal of Medicine, "the first black American
physician to receive university training" anywhere in the world."
http://www.gla.ac.uk/publications/avenue/32/na2.html
see also:
http://www.glasgow.gov.uk/html/about/glasgowmag/october02/pdf/p10oct.pdf
GEORGE RICE
"Dr. George Rice was a black American, born c.1848, who studied
medicine at Edinburgh under Joseph Lister and became an eminent
doctor. He moved to Plumstead where he met and married Florence Mary
Cook, the daughter of the Surveyor to the Woolwich Union, in 1881. In
1887 he was appointed Medical Superintendent of the Woolwich Workhouse
Infirmary where he worked for seven years. The Workhouse, which later
became St. Nicholas Hospital, Plumstead, has now been demolished
except for the Doctors' House where Rice may have lived. Later he was
appointed Doctor at the Sutton Workhouse Schools and became a
specialist in the treatment of epilepsy. He lived with his wife and
daughter at 50, Egmont Road, Sutton until his death in 1935. When his
daughter Lucinda died in 1967 it was fortunate that the house clearer
was black because he took an interest in the family photographs and
papers that he found there and deposited them with the London Borough
of Sutton."
http://www.greenwich.gov.uk/council/publicservices/blackhist.htm
"Dr.George Rice was born in Troy, New York on 21st June 1848, the son
of George Addison Rice, a contractor who managed the catering for a
steamship company. Denied access to Columbia University’s College of
Physicians in USA, he moved to Paris. But, because of the outbreak of
the Franco-Prussian War, he moved on to Edinburgh in 1870, where he
studied medicine under Joseph Lister. In 1877 he applied for the post
of Medical Superintendent at the Woolwich Union Workhouse Infirmary in
Plumstead. Five candidates were interviewed for this important post
but George Rice was chosen."
http://www.lmal.org.uk/uploads/documents/greenwich_pack.pdf
photographs
http://members.lycos.co.uk/antersite/present/caripres.htm
ELIJAH McCOY
"His father's ties to Britain proved useful as young McCoy pursued his
education. As a boy, he was fascinated with tools and machines. At the
age of 16, he traveled to Edinburgh, Scotland, to serve an
apprenticeship in mechanical engineering. In Edinburgh, McCoy won the
credentials of a master mechanic and engineer."
http://www.africawithin.com/bios/elijah_mccoy.htm
"Elijah McCoy (1843~1929) was the inventor of a device that allowed
machines to be lubricated while they were still in operation.
Machinery buyers insisted on McCoy lubrication systems when buying new
machines and would take nothing less than what became known as the
real McCoy. The inventor's automatic oiling devices became so
universal that no heavy-duty machinery was considered adequate without
it, and the expression became part of America culture (although some
argue it has other origins).
Elijah McCoy was born in Colchester, Ontario, Canada, in 1843 to
George and Mildred McCoy. His parents were escaped slaves, who had
fled from Kentucky and made it to Canada, riding the Underground
Railroad.
[...]
His parents saved enough money to send their fifteen-year old son to
Edinburgh, Scotland, to serve an apprenticeship in mechanical
engineering."
http://www.ideafinder.com/history/inventors/mccoy.htm
"As a boy, Elijah showed exceptional mechanical abilities. At the age
of 15, his parents decided to send him to Edinburgh, Scotland to
pursue a Mechanical Engineering apprenticeship. This was at a time
when it was difficult for Negroes to obtain the same kind of training
in the United States of America."
http://www.blackhistorysociety.ca/McCoy.htm
FRANCIS CARDOZO
"A few years later [than Smith] Francis Cardozo, who was elected South
Carolina's secretary of state in 1868, the first black state official
in South Carolina's history, began a three year Arts course at
[Glasgow] University, during which he won prizes in Latin and Greek."
http://www.gla.ac.uk/publications/avenue/32/na2.html
ROBERT S DUNCANSON
"Robert S. Duncanson was a major landscape artist and the first black
muralist. He was born in upstate New York in 1821. His father was
Canadian of Scottish descent and his mother was a free Black woman who
was reared in Cincinnati, Ohio.
Duncanson's potential was recognized by the Western Freedman's Society
(an abolitionist group) and he was sent to Glasgow, Scotland to study
art around 1840."
http://www.iisistersartgallery.com/evolutions.htm
FREDERICK DOUGLASS
"Douglass would remain in the British Isles until April 1847. During
some twenty months there, he travelled extensively throughout Britain
and Ireland. He also spent a large amount of time in Scotland, staying
there for much of the first half of 1846, returning again in July,
September, and October of the same year.
Why did Douglass spend so much time in Scotland? Scotland was home to
more radical anti-slavery opinions, and Douglass found he was very
much welcomed. In 1833, the Glasgow and Edinburgh Emancipation
Societies were formed as a result of the abolition of slavery in the
British West Indies. With this involvement, these groups went further,
calling for the abolition of slavery worldwide, but particularly in
the United States. The Scottish groups supported William Lloyd
Garrison, the leader of the American Anti-Slavery Society who also
visited Britain in 1846."
http://britishhistory.about.com/cs/individualplaces/a/021801a.htm
Back in Glasgow in 1860
http://www.csustan.edu/english/reuben/pal/chap3/douglass.html
IRA FREDERICK ALDRIDGE
Ira Frederick Aldridge – studied in Glasgow, performed in Edinburgh
in 1827
http://www.aaregistry.com/african_american_history/1020/A_classic_actor_Ira_Frederick_Aldridge
Other African American Visitors to Scotland in the 1840s and 1850s
http://www.bulldozia.com/douglass/fellows.html#intro
Sources:
Staying Power: The History of Black People in Britain
Peter Fryer
Pluto Press (1984)
Title: Roots : the African inheritance in Scotland.
Imprint: Edinburgh : City of Edinburgh Museums & Galleries, 1997.
ISBN: 0905072790
Pagination: [8] p. : col. ill., ports. (some col.) ; 20 x 20 cm.
Catalogue of an exhibition held in the City Art Centre, Edinburgh, 24
May - 12 July 1997.
http://www.nls.uk/catalogues/online/index.html
Plus a lot of searches on google, with search terms like
African Afro Caribbean
19c "19th OR nineteenth century" 1880s Victorian
Scotland Edinburgh Glasgow Aberdeen
university society community etc.
Checking Scottish university and library sites.
Scotsman newspaper archives.
As you can probably tell, I got rather hooked on this question, since
I was both fascinated and irritated by the scarcity of information.
But I found absolutely no reference to Archibald Johnson's time in
Edinburgh and wonder where you read about that.
Please feel free to ask if there is some particular point you would
like me to (try to) follow up. Just use the "clarification" button.
Good luck with your research!
Regards - Leli
November 21st, 2008 - Posted in hznj.com | edit |
