The Ladies of the Committee (Introduction)

Women were actively agitating for the vote and equal or greater representation in many areas of British life when an all-female Committee was appointed to investigate the concentration camps created during the Anglo-Boer War (1899-1902) in South Africa. 

This new series of posts will look at the women who were part of that group. *

The leader, Millicent Garrett Fawcett, is perhaps the most famous. In 2018, she became the first woman to be commemorated with a statue in Parliament Square in London, unveiled by then Prime Minister, Theresa May.

Perhaps less well-known are the other members. They were Lucy Deane, Lady Alice Knox, Dr Jane Waterson, Dr Ella Scarlett and Katherine Brereton.

Emily Hobhouse brought the appalling conditions in the camps to wider knowledge in Britain and the world at large. Her explosive revelations caused outrage in the general public and embarrassment to the UK Government. **

Like Emily, the members of the Committee were progressive women in that era of struggle for feminist representation and advancement, but they weren't all compatible in their beliefs and ideals so the dynamic would have been an interesting one and Emily herself was not included or consulted.

All of them hailed from the respectable upper classes but if one bases success, achievement and historical recognition as being given the accolade of an entry in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, only three of them - Fawcett, Deane and Waterston – are included in the ODNB. 

(Image source unknown)

* Although often called the Fawcett Commission or Ladies Commission, it was not a Royal Commission in the true sense.

**  See my two previous posts about teachers for the camps and a book about Emily Hobhouse.

Rebel Englishwoman: The Remarkable Life of Emily Hobhouse

Amazon

Mention “concentration camps” and most people will immediately think of the Nazis and places like Auschwitz, Bergen-Belsen, Dachau, Ravensbruck and many others.

But once there were other concentration camps with very British-sounding names such as Balmoral and Belfast, Howick and Nigel. There was even one called America. These were located in South Africa during the Boer War of 1899-1902.

These camps were imposed by the British, under the command of Lord Kitchener, on the civilian population of South Africa. Initially set up as “refugee” camps they soon deteriorated into squalid and disease-infested open-air prisons. The numbers of women, children and elderly or sick men who died in tents in appalling conditions vary depending on your choice of reference material and which statistics you choose to believe, or whether they even bother to include the many thousands of unknown innocent black and mixed race individuals who were also incarcerated in separate camps after being swept up in this now largely forgotten war. Officially, it is said at least 27,000 died, but the record-keeping is unreliable and the figure is more likely to be over 50,000. 

Emily Hobhouse was the Englishwoman who first alerted the world to the horror of these camps. For her efforts, she was labelled as “hysterical” and even a traitor. Although she did have the support of a small group of influential liberal friends, she was overwhelmingly vilified, despised and loathed in her attempts to bring to light the conditions in the camps. In England and around the Empire no-one wanted to believe that the British were capable of such inhumanity, especially towards the families of their enemy. When she tried to return to South Africa, she was deported.

Eventually, her actions did bear fruit and there was a softening in attitude although the hierarchy did not include Emily when the suffragist, Millicent Fawcett, headed up a commission of ladies to visit the camps for themselves and recommend improvements. 

Emily made it her life’s purpose to promote the rights of women and the cause of peace at all costs, and her actions are beautifully detailed in this magnificent biography by Elsabé Brits. With the aid of family archives hitherto unavailable to other biographers, the author reveals new information and delves deeply into the character of this committed and admirable woman.

Even after the Peace of Vereeniging in 1902, the camps continued for a long time as Kitchener’s “scorched earth” policy meant there were no homes or farms for many to return to. Her efforts to create work for women and girls by way of introducing lace-making and spinning and weaving schools were remarkable. In spite of poor health and diminished funds, Emily continued to travel endlessly promoting peace and finding ways of helping those affected by war. 

During the First World War, she again embarrassed the British by flaunting European travel restrictions in order to liaise with senior Germans in attempts to organise a peace process, for which she was castigated severely and narrowly escaped imprisonment. After the war was over, she organised food for thousands of Germans left to starve in Leipzig. 

In spite of her enormous humanitarian efforts and commitment to peace, even today she still remains a controversial character with some (mostly conservative male) historians. Emily certainly had her faults in obstinacy and a refusal to compromise her ethics and beliefs, but the best summation of her came from her friend General Jan Smuts, Prime Minister of South Africa:

"Let us not forget Emily Hobhouse. She was an Englishwoman to the marrow, proud of her people and its great mission and history. But for her patriotism was not enough. When she saw her country embark on a policy which was in conflict with the higher moral law, she did not say: ‘My country, right or wrong.’ She wholeheartedly took our side against that of her own people, and in doing so rendered an imperishable service, not only to us, but also to her own England and to the world at large.

For this loyalty to the higher and great things of life she suffered deeply. Her action was not understood or appreciated by her own people … Emily Hobhouse will stand out … as a trumpet call to the higher duty … and loyalty to the great things which … bind together all nations as a great spiritual brotherhood …"

  

Today, Emily is still revered by descendants of the Boer women and children she strove to help and after she died in 1926, her ashes were buried at the base of the National Women’s Monument in Bloemfontein.

A five star biography about a five star woman.

Detail - National Women's Monument, Bloemfontein
(Emily Hobhouse witnessed this very scene and worked with the sculptor in its design.)

"The only bright spot in camp life"

Much has been written about what are often called the first concentration camps, being those set up by Lord Kitchener during the Boer War in South Africa and into which were herded many thousands of Afrikaner women and children after the land was laid waste through his scorched earth policy.

National Women's Monument, Bloemfontein, South Africa

Emily Hobhouse, whose ashes are buried at the foot of this memorial, is especially famous for bringing to light this shameful practice: appallingly run camps riddled with diseases, little shelter, inadequate water, food and clothing. The mortality statistics are that nearly 28,000 Afrikaners died in these camps between 1899-1902 with more than three-quarters of them aged less than sixteen.

Outrage erupted in Britain. Kitchener argued the camps were essential to stop the women supporting their men out in the field by way of supplies and intelligence, while politicians tried to soften matters by saying they were necessary to save the helpless families of the enemy who had been abandoned and left to starve by their men, leaving them easy prey to marauding black Africans.

In an attempt to placate the furore, the British Government appointed a ladies committee headed by Millicent Garrett Fawcett to report on the camps. Although she corroborated most of what Hobhouse had reported, her report had a harsher tone as she felt much blame fell on the women themselves because they had chosen to involve themselves in the war and were often more violently opposed to British domination than their men so they had to expect the consequences, also that they contributed to the deaths of their own children through ignorance and superstition.

To reinforce the policy that incarceration in the camps was purely for the safety of the women and children, the British Government initiated a program of education. This is covered in some detail by Eliza Reidi in an article, Teaching Empire: British and Dominions Women Teachers in the South African War Concentration Camps. *

“The picture of dead and dying children drawn by Hobhouse and backed by the mortality statistics was replaced by one of happy schoolchildren, ‘bright, pretty, and keen to learn’.”

But there was more politics at play here than altruism. The British Government wanted to crush the backward-looking culture of the Afrikaner people, force them towards a modern Imperial future and to make them speak English. And so the daughters of England and the Empire were recruited to carry out this important task.

Shields Gazette, 6 November, 1901.
“Ladies ... may be sure of a courteous reception from the parents
and every provision will be made for their comfort.”

A salary of 100 pounds a year and a return passage, plus food and accommodation included made this an attractive proposition for many. Some applicants would have been passionate do-gooders or die-hard British Imperialists or feminists, some were governesses, others simply wanted out of a restrictive life or a thirst for adventure (and possibly a husband), or they could be struggling single women or widows fallen on hard times.

Reidi’s article gives an overview of the recruitment processes and its challenges, with brief summaries of some of the women from Britain, Canada, Australia and New Zealand who travelled to South Africa. Some remained there, some died before their contracts were up, but most seem to have just disappeared from the records. Perhaps some will be found through judicious genealogical searching, but most resources available on these teachers are scarce or non-existent. Although there were between 300-400 of them, they are just more of the frustrating will o’ the wisps of female history. Given that these were often well-educated and literate women, where are the diaries or journals or biographies that would throw greater light on their experiences? 

Only one seems to have been rediscovered. Canadian E. Maud Graham published a book in 1905, and this has been recently been re-published and edited in a new edition by the University of Alberta Press, but the book is a little expensive and is not universally available in libraries. (Unfortunately, the original 1905 version has not as yet found its way onto the treasures at Internet Archive.) Another Canadian was writer Florence H. Randal Livesay who manages to score a few lines here and there on Canadian websites but not much else.

 

Find it on Amazon.com

An Australian contingent departed in the SS Medic from Melbourne on 31 July 1902, and their story is briefly detailed at the bottom of page 22 of this educational publication of the Australian Department of Veterans Affairs - but without specific names.

Australian teachers before departing for South Africa, 1902

The February 2015 newsletter for National Boer War Memorial Association (pages 9-10), lists several of these Australian women and puts out a request:  

“We encourage anyone with knowledge of these women, especially descendants, to let us know what happened to them.”

Ida Robertson was just one example. The daughter of a solicitor from Deniliquin, New South Wales, she had been inspired to travel to South Africa after the death of her brother. Much detail about his service and death can be found in this newsletter of the Hay Historical Society, but what happened to Ida eventually is not known.

Twenty women sailed from New Zealand and the caption attached to this photograph on the NZ History website lists the names of all of them. Interestingly, the accompanying article has this to say:

“Once the camps were dismantled the teachers found jobs working at schools in the towns or countryside. Most decided to remain in South Africa after finishing the term of their appointment. Only six of the 20 teachers returned to New Zealand and those that did found that their lives had been forever changed by their experiences in South Africa.”

The 'Learned Eleventh' from New Zealand

As world attitudes change, not only have these stories slipped into the usual fog of women’s history, they are at risk of disappearing permanently as the old “white” South Africa fades from modern consciousness with new emphasis on previously neglected black history. ^ 

Still, for taking on the challenge and doing what they thought was the right thing within the parameters of their time and place, these women remain worthy of recognition. They provided what Emily Hobhouse said was “the only bright spot” in the horrors of concentration camp life. Here, you can read the memoir of an Afrikaner child, Hester Johanna Maria Uys, who had fond memories of a Miss O’Brien teaching her English and knitting. 

There are a number of books by and about Emily Hobhouse. She even had a South African naval ship named after her during the apartheid era.

An extensive collection of images on this Pinterest page.

You may be lucky to find specific women’s names by searching for reports on lady teachers for South Africa via various newspaper archives online, including British Newspapers or TROVE.

* The English Historical Review

Vol. 120, No. 489 (Dec., 2005), pp. 1316-1347

Published by: Oxford University Press

Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3491042

^ The equally horrendous black concentration camps of this war are now starting to be researched and written about.