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Title: A Short History of Newnham College Cambridge
Author: Gardner, Alice
Language: English
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A SHORT HISTORY OF NEWNHAM COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE
PUBLISHERS.
[Illustration: colophon]
CAMBRIDGE.
LONDON: MACMILLAN & CO., LIMITED
GLASGOW: MACLEHOSE, JACKSON & CO.
[Illustration:
By Mrs. F. W. H. Myers.
Henry Sidgwick
]
A SHORT HISTORY
OF
NEWNHAM COLLEGE
CAMBRIDGE
BY
ALICE GARDNER, M.A. (BRISTOL)
FORMERLY LECTURER AND FELLOW OF NEWNHAM COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE
AUTHOR OF "THE LASCARIDS OF NICÆA," "THEODORE OF STUDIUM," ETC.
_WITH TEN ILLUSTRATIONS_
CAMBRIDGE
BOWES & BOWES
1921
TO THE HONOURED MEMORY
OF A. J. C. AND H. S.
COPYRIGHT
PREFACE
This little book is primarily intended for present and past students
of Newnham College and for the numerous friends who have been helpers
or sympathetic spectators of its early progress. At the same time I
venture to hope that it may prove interesting and suggestive to a wider
circle of persons practically or theoretically concerned in movements
for the higher education of women.
Of the deficiencies of this short history, no one could be more fully
aware than the writer herself. But for the expressed wish of the
Council of Newnham College, it would never have been attempted, nor
could it have been written at all without the kind co-operation of
friends, who, like myself, had known the College from the inside. I
would especially thank the present Principal, Miss B. A. Clough, and
the Registrar, Miss E. M. Sharpley, for supplying me with information
and with kindly criticisms throughout my task. It has been gratifying
to realize that the Publisher is son of an early friend of the College.
One of the chief difficulties in writing the history of a comparatively
young institution, and one raised by the labours, forethought, and
sacrifices of many "pious founders and benefactors" is that the range
of view possible to any former student and teacher must necessarily
be limited. I have felt deep regret in realizing how many honoured
helpers have--for lack of space--not even been mentioned. Similarly,
among the former students whose labours, scientific, literary, and
practical, have brought credit to the College, I have necessarily shown
most appreciation of those with whose work and influence I have been
personally best acquainted. Every past student will have to supplement
the story with recollections from her own experience.
I trust that, at least, I shall have brought home to many the
conviction that Newnham College is unique, in the character and
motives of its first founders, in the steady devotion to its best
interests of successive governors, teachers and students, as also in
its relations--complicated, but near, we may hope, to a solution--with
the University under the protecting shadow of which it has grown to
prosperity. My hope for this little work is that, besides helping to
justify the existence of the College in the eyes of the world, it may
in some measure preserve in its members the knowledge of our best
traditions in the past and inspire a confident hope for the future.
ALICE GARDNER.
BRISTOL, _April, 1921_.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. INTRODUCTORY. NEWNHAM COLLEGE IN IDEA. 1871-1880 1
II. NEWNHAM COLLEGE IN ADOLESCENCE. 1880-1881 33
III. NEWNHAM COLLEGE IN PROGRESS. 1881-1892 57
IV. NEWNHAM COLLEGE IN PROGRESS. 1892-1900.
PRINCIPALSHIP OF MRS. SIDGWICK 84
V. NEWNHAM COLLEGE IN PROGRESS. 1900-1914 109
EPILOGUE. 1914 AND AFTER 135
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PROFESSOR HENRY SIDGWICK. (Photogravure Plate.) _Frontispiece_
From a photograph by Mrs. F. W. H. Myers.
FACING PAGE
MISS ANNE J. CLOUGH AND THE FIRST FIVE STUDENTS 2
MISS MARION KENNEDY 16
MERTON HALL, 1872-1874 26
MISS ANNE J. CLOUGH. (Photogravure Plate.) 54
From a photograph by Mrs. F. W. H. Myers.
MRS. HENRY SIDGWICK 72
From the portrait by J. J. Shannon, R.A.
NEWNHAM COLLEGE 86
The Entrance Gates.
NEWNHAM COLLEGE, 1920 100
General View of the Building and Grounds.
MISS KATHARINE STEPHEN 112
MISS B. A. CLOUGH 138
For permission to reproduce the two illustrations of Professor Henry
Sidgwick and Miss A. J. Clough thanks are due to Mrs. F. W. H. Myers;
also to Messrs. Bassano for the use of their photographs of Miss B. A.
Clough, Miss Katharine Stephen and the general view of the College.
A SHORT HISTORY OF NEWNHAM COLLEGE
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTORY. NEWNHAM COLLEGE IN IDEA
In tracing the history of educational institutions and of other
foundations existing for the public good, we find it necessary to
distinguish those that had and those that had not a definite beginning.
Some of our colleges and great schools have--so to speak--sprung,
adult and armed, from the brain of their founder--or possibly from
the conjoint thoughts and efforts of a few generous and like-minded
patrons. Their birthdays are easily determined. Their continuity can
be traced both in material persistence and progress and in moral
and intellectual development and adaptation to changing conditions.
Others--and prominent among them the subject of this sketch--came
into being so gradually that their length of days may be variously
calculated. To the past students of Newnham College, the beginning
seems to be most naturally and fittingly associated with the day when
a comparatively small dwelling house was first opened, in Cambridge, by
Professor Sidgwick and a small group of friends, and placed under the
wise and devoted care of Miss Clough, for the accommodation of a few
young women who wished to give their time to serious study under the
tuition of such University professors, lecturers, and private teachers
as might be willing to further their desire for higher education.
Incorporation as a College was not to come for nine years, nor any
measure of distinct recognition by the University for ten years. But
no Newnham woman would reckon our beginnings from 1880 or 1881. An
antiquarian spirit might fancy that the germs were in the room in Mr.
Clay's garden, where lectures were first delivered to women students
and others. But student life and university instruction had for us its
first embodiment in the little community of five, and their teachers
and helpers, whose relations with Cambridge began in 1871.
This settlement of Miss Clough and the five students was the small
beginning out of which grew an institution which many hundreds of women
now regard with passionate loyalty, and which no opponents or doubters
can venture to despise. To understand its origin we need to go back a
little and consider how and why the movement towards higher education
for women was then beginning to take form, and why it came to be
specially associated with Cambridge.
[Illustration: MISS ANNE J. CLOUGH AND THE FIRST FIVE STUDENTS.]
It would be partly true and partly false to regard the objects of
those who practically founded Newnham College as identical with those
of the leading champions of the political and legal rights of women.
Of course, as might naturally be expected, many of those who, through
breadth of sympathy and hatred of injustice, gave the greater part
of their lives and energies to the removal of female disabilities,
public and private, were very ready to respond to the demand for higher
education for girls and women. One need only think (looking at the
leaders of thought in the middle of last century) of John Stuart Mill
(a benefactor to the Cambridge Lectures Association and to similar
enterprises) with the philosophic school which he represented and led.
The advocates of political liberty and those of higher education for
women used to a large extent the same arguments, and the securing of
one end favoured the prospects of the other. Those who held that women
were on the eve of obtaining greater rights and responsibilities were
bound to show sympathy with the cause of education; they could quote
the words of Samson Agonistes: "What were strength without a double
share of wisdom? Vast, unwieldy, burdensome." And on the other hand
every movement made in the direction of sound education for women told
in favour of opening spheres of usefulness and conceding rights as to
property and personal liberty which uneducated women might possibly
have abused. Among the earlier friends of Newnham, probably by far
the larger number were warmly attached to the franchise movement,
especially when it came within the range of practical politics. At
the same time, advocates of higher education were unlikely to be
possessed--as were a few excellent and high-minded women--by the idea
of the suffrage as a panacea for all women's grievances or a necessary
condition of any step towards social betterment. Necessity and common
sense prescribed caution to the pioneers who were directing their
efforts to obtain some measure of university education for women able
to profit thereby.
And indeed there was nothing revolutionary in the movement towards
higher education for women. True, the education of girls and women
had not till then been considered an object to be sought on a large
scale. But there had been educated and even learned women in England,
in the days of the Renaissance and Reformation, though there can be
little doubt that--in the higher circles, at least--a check came with
the frivolities of the later Stuart court. But without going into
uncertain historical details, it is noticeable that in the early part
of the nineteenth century, such different persons as Sydney Smith and
Mrs. Hannah More became eloquent advocates of more serious education
for girls than they commonly received. The arguments of these and
like-minded reformers were not thrown away. It is beyond question that
in many parts of England, in early and middle Victorian days, there
were high-minded, intellectual, and accomplished women conducting
girls' schools on reasonable principles and with good mental and moral
results; and a good deal of the highest education in girls' schools
was given by men--sometimes of considerable standing and ability.
The position of a private governess was not remarkably dignified or
lucrative (_vide_ the experiences of the Brontes); but there were some
such private teachers who did excellent and much appreciated work.
Still the course of a girl who had inward longings for intellectual
culture was often hard; and harder still was that of young women who
had a liking for literature and art, combined with a distaste for
unvaried domestic interests or social routine. The happiest were those
who had sympathetic elder brothers at College, who could talk over
their difficulties with them and recommend books. Such was eminently
the position of Miss Clough herself. Her education--discursive and not
without lacunae--had been a home education, her chief mentor an Oxford
brother, whose mind and tone of character it is superfluous here to
describe. It was in great part to help those who, like herself, had
had aspirations after knowledge and culture, and who, unlike herself,
had not always had sympathetic homes, that she and other pioneers in
Cambridge desired to secure facilities of continuous study under the
direction of capable and inspiring teachers.
It may be advisable to indicate briefly the different ways in which
efforts were made to meet the existing wants, some of which led up to
the goal of university education for women.[1]
[Footnote 1: In this part of the subject, and indeed throughout my
task, I am constantly indebted to the _Memoir of Anne J. Clough by her
Niece, B. A. Clough_. This book ought to be familiar to all interested
in educational movements, since Miss Clough, while most closely
associated with the University side of the movement, was throughout her
life collaborating with great sympathy and insight with those at work
in other departments.]
(1) The first step was the establishment of larger and better schools,
and provision for more advanced teaching. Queen's College, Harley
Street, first presided over by F. D. Maurice, was founded in 1848 and
is still at work; Bedford College (now a College of London University)
was founded in 1849; the North London Collegiate School and Cheltenham
College (which both maintain their position as schools of first-rate
standing) in 1850 and 1858. There were started, besides, some colleges
expressly for women intending to become teachers (the Maria Grey, Home
and Colonial, etc.). At present the need of some serious training in
the art of teaching is widely recognised. In the early days of the
Women's Education Movement, a young woman had often practically to
choose between gaining more knowledge, and learning to make the most of
the little which she had. This difficulty is now much diminished, if
not entirely removed.
(2) But almost more important than the new foundations, started
generally by private effort, was the successful attempt to secure
some kind of government inspection of girls' schools and the
synchronizing responsibility undertaken by the Universities of Oxford
and Cambridge in admitting girls to the Local Examinations. In 1864,
the Schools Inquiry Commission were requested to include in their
task the inspection of Girls' Schools. The result was a revelation
of superficiality, narrowness, and general inefficiency which awoke
a portion at least of the educated public to the need of reform. The
result of the new experiment (1865) of admitting girls to the Cambridge
Senior and Junior examinations showed similar defects. Many generations
of Newnham students have been amused to hear among the recollections
revived at the annual Commemoration, how it was once seriously proposed
to lower the standard of arithmetic to suit the capacity of the
girls. Happily the suggestion was not followed. The notion that women
cannot do hard sums was one of the "hasty generalizations" as to the
constitution of the female mind, "with the wrecks of which," it was
afterwards said, "the whole shore has been strewn."
The deficiencies of the schools were largely due to the fact that no
opportunities of education were available for intending teachers. The
more enlightened schoolmistresses had to struggle against masses of
prejudice, indifference and materialism in the minds of parents and
of the public, and many of them were eager for improvement. In 1866,
the Society of London Schoolmistresses was formed for mutual help
and encouragement, and similar societies were established in various
localities, which lent support to the efforts of well-wishers in the
Universities and elsewhere.
(3) Then again there were early schemes for lectures to women in
different parts of the country, and these have branched out and become
more effectual than any measure for educational improvement among
persons for whom residence at a university was impossible. Here, as
in many regions, Miss Clough was a pioneer, and this branch of work
brought about the connection of Cambridge with one side of the movement
and led directly to the starting of what grew into Newnham College.
The body which accomplished the chief initial work in the matter
of local lectures for women was "The North of England Council for
improving the Education of Women." To the organization of this
society, Miss Clough gave much thought and attention, especially in
1867 and the following years. It was formed from an amalgamation of
societies having the same object, in Liverpool, Manchester, Sheffield,
Leeds and Newcastle. Among Miss Clough's colleagues on this Council
were Mr. (afterwards Canon) and Mrs. Butler, Mr. (now Lord) Bryce,
Mr. F. W. H. Myers, and Mr. (afterwards Professor) James Stuart. It
was Mr. Stuart who, after his experience in the North of England,
proposed and brought about in 1873 the organization of local lectures
by the Universities. It is needless to go into the history of the
subsequent development of University Extension. Begun primarily in the
interests of women, it was extended to meet the needs of busy men with
free evenings, working people, and all who wished in their leisure to
prolong their education and gain culture.
(4) The work of the North of England Council led to a further step
in the early development of what I have called "Newnham College in
Idea," viz. the founding of the Cambridge Higher Local Examination.
The request for an examination for women over eighteen came from the
Council and was supported on the ground that it was desirable to have a
definite and intelligible test for teachers, with some means of giving
system to the lecture movement as far as it affected women, and of
directing the reading of girls who had left school. It had originally
features which became modified with changing principles of education.
There was at first a group of subjects considered essential as the
foundation of liberal education and optional groups, some of which
candidates had to take in order to secure a certificate. In course of
time the groups were increased in number and larger choice allowed
while the necessary preliminaries were diminished.
The examination was first held in 1869, when thirty-six candidates
were examined in two centres.[2] As this examination was from the
first supposed to be one the reading for which would prove interesting
and profitable to adult women, it is not surprising that it should
have been eagerly used by the advocates of university education for
intending teachers as a test of fitness for real university study.
Later it became one of the school examinations taken by girls in the
upper forms, and when the Tripos examinations were opened to women
certain portions were accepted in lieu of the Previous Examination.
The connection between Newnham and the Higher Local Examination was
maintained for many years, certain scholarships being always awarded
on its results, though the multiplication of other facilities for
university qualification has now loosened the tie. In the early days
Newnham College owed much to the Syndicate for Local Lectures and
Examinations, and to the courtesy and devotion of the successive
Secretaries (Rev. G. F. (Bishop) Browne and Dr. Keynes) and to the
fostering care which they bestowed on the young movement.
[Footnote 2: _Memoir of A. J. Clough_, p. 130.]
Here an auxiliary agency may be mentioned which was of real service to
young women desirous either of passing the new examination or simply
of understanding how and what to read for their own benefit: the
scheme of instruction by correspondence, started and kept vigorous for
many years by the late Mrs. Peile, wife of the highly respected tutor
and afterwards Master of Christ's College. Among the instructors by
correspondence were many distinguished members of the University. The
curricula were designed with a view to the requirements of the Higher
Local Examination, but subjects were handled freely and suitable books
were recommended. This last necessity was partly met by a loan library
for women.
These steps were gradually leading up to a possible university
education for women. At first sight, our beginnings may seem to have
a non-academic and amateurish air. And part of what was accomplished
in these early days would meet with scant approval from modern
advocates of equal chances for women with men in learning and the
learned professions. Inspection of schools by government is now by
many regarded as a necessary evil. Popular courses of lectures without
regular sequence or adaptation to the previous attainments of those
who attend them suggest superficiality and lack of scientific method.
Instruction by correspondence is by many associated with cram of the
lowest sort. But to those who read the correspondence of the founders
of these institutions, or whose memory carries them back to the
days when they were not only novel but a very godsend to labourers
at self-education, the whole movement wears a different aspect. All
methods of imparting knowledge are apt to degenerate into tricks for
hiding ignorance; even respect for universities and learned men may
become mere toadyism. But the early forms, though now a little outworn,
did indicate and partly supply a genuine need, and led on to even
better things--especially to academic training and advanced study for
women.
(5) The general movement towards university education, on the other
hand, begins with the inauguration of a series of lectures in Cambridge
itself, somewhat like that already started in the north, but wider in
scope and capable of being continued for the instruction of women far
beyond the educational standard prescribed by the Local Examinations.
This had its beginning in a drawing-room meeting held in Prof. and Mrs.
Fawcett's house, late in 1869.
If these beginnings seem less dignified than those of Colleges erected
for students and organized from the first on University lines, it
may be remarked that, after all, the beginnings of Newnham bear some
analogy to those of the early European universities, including the
English. Perhaps in all the greatest centres of learning there has
been first the great teacher--then the scholars who flock to sit at
his feet. Colleges and social student life and hostels and regulated
grades of teachers and taught are an aftergrowth. So, we may say, the
first Newnham students came to Cambridge because great teachers were
there; it was not that suitable teachers came because the students had
shown a demand for them or for collegiate houses and collegiate life.
The university extension lecturers might be useful and stimulating
missionaries of culture, but their greatest service was to kindle a
desire to go and drink at the fountain-heads. The mountain could not
come to Mahomet, but many touched by prophetic zeal might make all
efforts to come to the mountain.
The first step taken as a result of the historic meeting referred to in
Prof. and Mrs. Fawcett's house, was the formation of a society to be
called _the Association for promoting the Higher Education of Women in
Cambridge_.
The first executive consisted of Mr. (afterwards Dr.) Bonney, Mr. (Dr.)
Peile, Prof. F. D. Maurice, Mrs. Adams, Mrs. Bateson, Mrs. Fawcett,
Mrs. Venn; the Secretaries were Mr. Markby and Mr. (afterwards
Professor) Henry Sidgwick; the Treasurer Mrs. Bateson. Early in 1870, a
list of lectures was brought out. Although these lectures were supposed
to be for women reading for the Higher (then called the Women's)
examination, they were given by men generally of the highest standing
in the University, such as the university members of the Executive just
mentioned, besides Professor Skeat, Prof. J. E. B. Mayor, Dr. Peile,
Prof. Cayley, Dr. Venn, Mr. Marshall and other eminent persons. It may
be that some of these lecturers were decidedly "over the heads" of such
of the students as had had an indifferent schooling and were only just
commencing adult study. But the fault--if such we should call it--was a
good one. As a rule, the partly self-taught are more ready to grapple
with difficulties than such as have hitherto had the paths of progress
made gradual and easy; and the very fact of being more or less in
contact with a master mind was rather stimulating than depressing.
These lectures were originally given in a building kindly lent by Mr.
Clay, standing in the garden of his house a little off Trumpington
Street.
Besides the lectures specially arranged in connection with the
new scheme, a large number of lectures given by Professors of the
University were, by their special permission, opened to women. In
those days the professorial lectures formed, generally speaking, a
less important part in the teaching of the University than they do
at present. This was not, of course, due to any inferiority in such
lectures, but to the want of correlation in the instruction provided
by the several colleges and by the University. As this correlation
became more effectual, the privilege given to women students of
attending professorial lectures became more and more advantageous
to them. Twenty-eight professors acceded to the request of the
Association, as well as two lecturers who delivered their lectures
in University buildings. University Professors and Lecturers were,
generally speaking, bound to admit all members of the University
to their lectures without fee, but were allowed to charge fees to
non-members. Women students came, of course, under the second head, but
as a rule the Professors admitted them without fee, as if they were of
undergraduate status. The gradual opening up of lectures given on the
Intercollegiate system in the halls or lecture-rooms of the various
colleges began, as will be seen, a little later.
But besides the special lectures to women and the professorial
lectures provided for members of the University, a very necessary
element in Cambridge teaching consists in private tuition--of students
taken individually or in small groups. In Classics and Mathematics,
especially, such "coaching" is necessary both for backward and for
advanced students. Among the earlier supporters of the Women's
Education movement were a good many brilliant teachers who, in their
generous belief in the cause, were ready to give instruction to women
students often in a far more elementary stage than the men they
ordinarily taught. Fees were naturally paid to the private teachers,
but in many cases, while the cause was yet poor and struggling, these
fees were returned to the Treasurer.
The students who required the more advanced lectures and tuition were
generally those who, having passed the Women's Examination, aimed at
a real University course. Tripos students were among the very first
generation of Cambridge women--though those who read with a view to
triposes could never feel quite sure, till near the end of their three
years, whether the examiners would think it consistent with their
functions to admit women and declare what class they attained.
This great object had already been approached on independent lines by
the founders of Girton College. Miss Davies had conceived hopes of
founding an actual college in which the Cambridge degree examinations,
pass and honour, might be taken by women, and in 1869 such a college
was started at Hitchin. The intellectual ideals and standards of the
two wings--so to speak--of the movement were not identical. Time
and with it changes in the demands of the degree examinations at
Cambridge--indeed at both Universities--have brought them pretty
close together. The very good reasons at the bottom of both programmes
are easy to recognise. Miss Davies considered that any requirements
made from women different from those demanded from men would certainly
be lower. If women avoided Greek and the other subjects of which boys
were supposed to learn something at school, an impression would be
created that women were allowed graduate or quasi-graduate status on
easier terms than those imposed on men. On the other side there was, in
the minds of Sidgwick and others who became the founders of Newnham, a
great contempt of the "Poll" as well as of the "Little-go" as marking
a very low standard of intellectual achievement. At the same time, a
more concrete mind like Miss Clough's deplored the inconvenience and
waste of time which might keep an adult woman who had not learned
classics or much mathematics at school, studying the beginnings of
these subjects in school-boy fashion when her mind was more adapted
to other studies. Again there was the fear--groundless enough as
experience has proved--lest the girls' schools should be "classicized"
and modern studies in them discouraged. In point of fact, Cambridge
University now demands of candidates for the Previous Examinations
only the very minimum of ancient languages, and the boys' schools have
been de-classicized to a further extent than might have then seemed
possible. In the long run, the different schemes proved to be very
similar in results. The Little-go Greek did no harm to those who took
it. Honestly taught (as, unfortunately, is not always the case with
a compulsory subject), it has often given to the learner sufficient
knowledge to be of real service in later studies. A small amount of
rivalry at the outset has not hindered the progress of the two Colleges
side by side in co-operation and mutual goodwill.
[Illustration: MISS MARION KENNEDY.]
But before the first tripos student had definitely entered on her
career, another great step had been taken: the opening of a house
for the residence of women who had been attracted by the educational
facilities of Cambridge and desired to devote themselves there to some
course of serious study. The securing of a house for students had
become necessary in the eyes of Mr. Henry Sidgwick, and foremost among
the many and great services which he rendered to the College (then
hardly existing even in idea) was that he persuaded Miss Clough to come
and take charge of the resident students. A house was found in Regent
Street, and in the autumn of 1871 Miss Clough and five students began
their common life there, and initiated a new stage in the movement.
Long years afterwards, when Newnham was large and flourishing, with
four Halls of residence, a large party up for Commemoration met to
explore the cradle of this College, which was the more easily done
as the house had become a hotel (The Bird Bolt Temperance Hotel). Two
of the original five (Mrs. Marshall and Miss Larner) pointed out to
the students of that day the one room which served as dining-room and
as common study for these pioneer students; the other sitting-room
used in the afternoon for lectures, overlooking Parker's Piece, where
they, without a scrap of garden, could envy the boys playing on the
Piece; the small rooms which were their bedrooms. The first generation
had little elbow-room, no games, a scanty library, a non-luxurious
_ménage_, and very little of what is now considered necessary freedom
in work and play. Yet they seem to have been exceedingly happy. They
felt, and the feeling remained for at least a dozen years, that they
were pioneers. The lectures given by greater men than any they had ever
seen before; the pleasures of intercourse, especially for those who
had found little intellectual sympathy at home; the long walks over
the Gogs or along the Cam, more enjoyed in pre-hockey, pre-bicycling,
even pre-tennis days than now; the associations of an ancient and
beautiful town; the sympathy shown by the generous men and women who
had adopted their cause: all these things must far have outweighed
the passing inconvenience of straitened accommodation and even the
painful consciousness that the eye of the world and yet more of his
wife was upon them, for better and for worse. But perhaps above all, in
later days, these pioneer students felt most thankful to think that in
that house they had enjoyed the constant presence of Miss Clough and
frequent intercourse with the leaders of the movement, particularly of
Mr. Henry Sidgwick.
It may seem superfluous as well as presumptuous for the present writer
to dwell on the characteristics of the two leading persons in the early
days of the College (or the college-embryo) seeing that their lives
and characters have, as already said, been portrayed in biographies
which are never likely to be surpassed. Perhaps, however, a little
space may be given to those peculiarities which, in both characters,
left a permanent impression on the College as a whole, especially
since they exhibit traits of an almost opposite description, yet
united to produce a great result. In one respect they were alike: in
what may be called fundamental sincerity and whole-heartedness, along
with wide ranges of interest. Readers of Sidgwick's life and writings
cannot but be impressed with his absolute fidelity to any course which
had shown itself worthy of approval, his careful attention to every
opinion and principle which had any reasonable justification, his
loyalty to personal convictions in avoiding any possible compromise
with mental tergiversation. He had lately given up his fellowship from
conscientious motives. He abstained from identifying himself with
any form of institutional Christianity, while fully acknowledging how
such Christianity had worked for good, and tolerating the attitude of
those who were able for the sake of true religion to accept religious
formulae with reservations of their own. In politics, he generally
went with the more progressive Liberals, though fully able and always
ready to grasp the situation of those who took different standpoints.
The efforts and the personal sacrifices which he made in the cause
of women's education were not inspired by any one-sided attachment
to the cause either on a personal or on a theoretical side. He held
no fixed theory as to the equality and similarity of the sexes in
mental powers, but was in favour of assisting legitimate efforts,
removing unreasonable limitations, and postponing the decision as to
whether women _can_ do this or that by giving them the opportunity and
awaiting the result. When the result proved favourable to his reasoned
expectations, he was naturally pleased, but on all subjects he ever
kept an open mind. For persons handicapped in the race of life, by
sex, nationality, or poverty, he was always ready to discover new
prospects of successful effort. His family life had made him acquainted
with women of exceptional gifts even before his marriage with Miss
Eleanor Mildred Balfour in 1876, a happy event for Newnham as well
as for himself. The frequent presence of a man of his calibre in the
incipient college was of inestimable benefit to the early students.
He was to them a champion of their cause and a model of sincerity and
reasonableness, and to many a very helpful teacher. A larger proportion
of students in the early days than later took up some branch of Moral
Science--in which he directed their work. And to others he was helpful
on the educational side by his encouragement of good literature--which
may at times have tended to retreat into the background in favour of
severely scientific study. Beyond all this there were traditions among
the early students of his extraordinary power in bringing home to them
the necessity of maintaining a high standard of order, patience and
power of suspending judgment.
It has been said that in some respects Miss Clough presented a marked
contrast to Dr. Sidgwick. This contrast may be partly described by
saying that he saw things more in the abstract, she in the concrete.
Not that he looked only at general principles and she at isolated
instances (for both took large views without neglecting the single
examples), but still the distinction was evident. Both had risen by a
painful process of mental and moral self-culture above conventional
views as to the world and man's place in it, but in Sidgwick the
search was chiefly inspired by a passion for truth, in Miss Clough
by a desire to promote individual happiness. She naturally referred
questions to present cases. Thus--if certain subjects were said to be
necessary as preliminaries to a University course, she would at once
think whether _A._ or _B._ would be the better for having studied Latin
or Mathematics. She allowed for diversity of all kinds among students
and other persons with whom she had to do. A rule was important to her
as touching actual cases, not the cases as exemplifying the rule. She
was strong physically and indifferent to discomfort and hardship in all
that she undertook. Yet she had no belief in asceticism, and exhorted
her students to "take the little pleasures of life." It was her own
idea to begin hockey at Newnham, then a most novel suggestion, which
brought at first some ridicule and even disapprobation from select
circles. She naturally understood and liked some of her students better
than others--but even those who had less than others of her special
intimacy were at times pleased and stimulated by finding how much of
her goodwill they possessed and how she had plans for their future. If
her character broadened and mellowed with years, it was not that she
was ever intolerant or unsympathetic, but that she responded to the
affection and respect of those who knew and appreciated her. She, too,
had a sense of humour which enlivened the community from the beginning,
and the respect with which both her name and her character were held
in the highest University circles more than counteracted an occasional
innocent unconventionality in her social intercourse.
It may seem almost invidious to choose some and omit others among
the earliest friends of Newnham, in awarding due meed of praise and
gratitude, but certainly the two who have been lightly sketched here
were undoubtedly the foremost of Newnham's benefactors. Early students
will remember others who have passed away: the Miss Kennedys, with
their kind and gracious hospitality, and care for the rather homeless
persons who ranked among "out-students"; Mr. Coutts Trotter, who was
Chairman of the Council, and left his library to the College; Mr. W.
H. H. Hudson, who was financial adviser and auditor for 33 years; Mr.
Archer-Hind, who placed his refined scholarship at the disposal of
mere beginners in Greek, was always willing to make one lesson swell
out into two--and took no fees; Mr. Main, the standby of the earliest
students of Natural Science; Mr. Marshall, who created and directed
an enthusiastic devotion to the study of Economics; Mrs. Bateson,
who originally dispensed the lecture tickets to students entering
their course, and whose parties at St. John's Lodge were highly
appreciated;--and many more.
The students who were first attracted to the opportunities for women
in Cambridge were, as a rule, somewhat more mature, though less well
instructed, than those of later times. There were exceptions in this
latter respect, as in the case of the late Miss Edith Creak, well known
in the educational world, who was the daughter of a schoolmaster,
and who passed successfully both the mathematical and the classical
triposes at the age of nineteen. Another of the original five was
Mrs. Armitage (_née_ Bulley), who has written much on early English
antiquities and is an authority on Barrows. Among the first to take
Triposes were Miss Paley (now Mrs. A. Marshall) and Miss Amy Bulley,
who were successful in the Moral Sciences Tripos in 1874, Miss Mary
Kennedy, afterwards Mrs. R. T. Wright, in the same Tripos in 1875,
and Miss Felicia Larner who took the Historical Tripos in 1875. These
ladies were all examined by private favour of the examiners, the
greatest care being taken that all formalities should be duly observed.
Only, they were admitted after passing certain Groups of the Women's
Examinations instead of the Previous Examination, and, in one or two
cases, were allowed a longer time of preparation than the University
regulations prescribed.
The exaggerated dread of triposes and admiration for those who
achieved them makes an amusing feature in early Newnham days. It would
now seem absurd for a college to exult over second class honours.
But every successful student helped to destroy some of the "hasty
generalizations" repeated outside as to women in triposes, the first
being that they would fail or else break down in health. When they
succeeded and remained vigorous, it was said that they might get
through but would not get first classes. When they obtained first
classes in the newer triposes, it was declared that they would never
get a first class in classics or mathematics. The death-blow to all
these hypotheses came in 1890, when Miss Philippa Fawcett's name was
read in the Senate House as "above the Senior Wrangler." There was
a kind of poetic justice in this event, as Miss Fawcett's parents
had been earnest and effectual helpers of the movement from the very
beginning.
[Illustration: MERTON HALL, 1872-1874.]
This, however, is to anticipate events. During the early days in Regent
Street, good work was being done, and the students had a happy life,
but they were cooped in a small space, and the friends of the movement
had to seek both a larger home and more funds to sustain it. From
1872-1874, Miss Clough and the students found a congenial house of
residence behind St. John's College. This was Merton Hall, an old manor
house with a very pleasant garden and other attractions. Here something
like collegiate life was first begun--with a debating society, games
(with limitations) and various collective interests. Another house
in Trumpington Street was hired to accommodate the overflow of
students. A few who had been attracted by the lectures, but for some
reason were unable or unwilling to enter a hall of residence, formed
a kind of outer circle. These "out-students" were made to feel less
of outsiders by the kind and hospitable attention bestowed on them by
Miss Marion Kennedy. Their number tended to diminish, as membership
of a college or hall came to be desirable on social and disciplinary
grounds. When the College was more definitely constituted, all who
wished to become regular students were obliged to reside either in a
Hall of Newnham or with parents and guardians, exceptions only being
allowed in the case of women above the undergraduate age.[3]
[Footnote 3: Here it may be noted that a different arrangement obtains
at Oxford, where there is a Society of Home Students who are not
attached to any College or Hall.]
Meantime arrangements were being made to secure a more permanent place
of residence. To meet what had become a necessity, it was proposed to
form a Company, which, after the choice of a site near the village of
Newnham, was called the Newnham Hall Company. There was, however, a
singular absence of commercial acquisitiveness or speculation in the
Society which bore this financial designation. A good deal of the money
subscribed came from benefactors who so far from seeking profit from
their investments continued their gifts for many years. Mention may
be made of Miss Ewart, Mr. and Mrs. Stephen Winkworth, Miss Bonham
Carter among other munificent benefactors.[4] A good many well-wishers
who could not give princely contributions were ready to make the
venture of faith and to subscribe for shares. The result was that
in 1875 Newnham Hall was opened and Miss Clough with the students
entered into residence. They had during 1874-75 occupied a dwelling in
Bateman Street where Miss Clough had ingeniously secured the use of
a house-and-a-half which she made into one. Newnham Hall was a Queen
Anne building, of red brick, which has mellowed after its forty years.
The architect, Mr. Basil Champneys, took a strong personal interest in
its original plan and subsequent extension. Those who knew it when it
was simply Newnham Hall (later called the _South_, now the _Old Hall_)
must feel a little regret that its imposing south front--intended to
be the actual front--is only seen by a minority of casual visitors. In
fact, no one knew in '75 in what direction, if in any, it might have to
expand, and there is a story current that in the plans, the possibility
was considered of transforming it--if a hall for women students proved
a failure--into two ordinary dwelling-houses.
[Footnote 4: A list of Benefactors is in preparation.]
The College, formally so-called, came into existence by the
amalgamation of the two societies, "The Association for the promotion
of the Higher Education of Women in Cambridge" (more briefly called
the "Lectures Association") and the "Newnham Hall Company, Limited,"
in 1880. The new title adopted was "The Newnham College Association
for advancing Education and Learning among Women in Cambridge." Before
this time, the "College" only existed in idea, but that existence, as
we have seen, was a very real one. Even when it attained its first
permanent habitation, it was--for a college--small, as in 1876 there
were only about thirty students besides the out-students. But it had a
respectable, academic-looking exterior, and life within was vigorous.
Among the residents was Miss Paley, now Mrs. Marshall, whom the
students with pride regarded as their earliest don, one of the first
five, and one of the earliest to take a tripos. She proved a very
successful teacher of Political Economy, a popular subject among the
early students, many of whom were ambitious of some career of social
activity. Classical students were few, but very eager. Miss J. E.
Harrison and Miss K. Corfe took their tripos in 1879. Natural Sciences
were pursued with ardour and success, partly through the liberality of
St. John's College in admitting Newnham students to their laboratory
before the Newnham laboratory was built. The first student to obtain
a first class was Miss Ogle, afterwards Mrs. Koppel, in 1876. It is
gratifying that her daughter afterwards became a Newnham student, and
has made herself educationally useful in South Africa. Mathematics held
its own. The Historical Tripos, when separated from the Law, attracted
several students. Those who took Moral Sciences, as already said,
enjoyed the special attention of Mr. Sidgwick.
These candidates were all, of course, examined informally, _i.e._ by
special favour of individual examiners. It was from the first desired
by Mr. Sidgwick that any student who showed, by marked success in the
Women's Examination or in any other way, that she had real aptitude
for intellectual culture, should be encouraged to proceed to a Tripos.
But in the early days the Tripos students were not the only ones
who were capable of good intellectual work. Some, as has been said,
for one reason or another, did not follow the lines then laid down
for Triposes, and the variety was--socially and intellectually--an
excellent thing for the students. Specialization in study is often
bound to have a narrowing effect. But by student friendships, young
people learn to care for things in heaven and earth that will never lie
within their special province. It is a good thing for Cambridge, and
consequently for Newnham, that there is no such iron bar fixed there
between Sciences and Arts, as often, in other educational institutions,
tends to prejudice and narrowness. There may be, before definite lines
are fixed, tendencies to too much diffusion; this, however, was
prevented by the general system of tuition.
As yet, in 1879, there were not many resident tutors to settle the work
of students in their several departments. But competent University men
were always ready to put their knowledge and experience at the service
of a student choosing her University course. Indeed the helpfulness
of men on whom the students had no claim, is one of the brightest
features, even of the bright days of Newnham's beginnings.
Newnham Hall had from the first a fairly large garden, not very
minutely laid out,[5] but large enough for tennis, for which game
an ash court was made. A gymnasium, in the pre-games period, seemed
a necessity, and was erected and opened in 1877. Before that time,
students had been allowed to go at stated times to the gymnasium in the
town, and strange now to relate, some did so with great enthusiasm. But
the interest in indoor gymnastics declined with the greater facility
for out-door sport, of which more later on.
[Footnote 5: The present writer enjoyed one evening the privilege of
being deputed, with some other students, by Miss Clough, to drive out
some cows who had strayed into the garden.]
Newnham Hall was more in the country then than the College is at
present. It must be remembered that married dons with their families
were a comparatively new institution, the residential quarter to
the west did not exist at this time in Cambridge, and certainly
Newnham was in the pleasantest part of Cambridge for country walks.
"Constitutionals" are now out of favour, but the early students enjoyed
the "Grantchester Grind,"--especially when the marsh-marigolds were
out, and the Madingley Woods with their blue-bells, and the Roman
Road in blue flax season; and the Backs were very near; there were
nightingales too whose nocturnal songs were by some found almost too
penetrating. There was an atmosphere, in town and country, favourable
to cheerfulness, to the formation of friendships, to the development of
intellectual and social activity, to the enlargement of opportunities
for women in forwarding the betterment of the world. It was a time of
hope for youth, seen not only in the pioneer students, but in those
champions of their cause, some themselves young, some older, whose
efforts for the next generation were ever strenuous and cheerful, none
the less so for the experience of resistance from old-world inertia and
the dead weight of prejudice which only patience and wisdom could ever
prevail to lift.
CHAPTER II
NEWNHAM COLLEGE IN ADOLESCENCE
The early part of the eighties was full of events for the women
students of Newnham and their supporters. In these years they obtained
(1) a fixed legal constitution; (2) a second hall of residence, and
other much needed buildings; (3) gradual increase of facilities
for study, especially in the opening of Cambridge College lectures
to women; (4) more important still, a large measure of University
recognition, and (5) greater opportunities of educational and social
work for past students. These several lines of progress may here be
taken in order, except the fifth, which I reserve for the next chapter.
(1) It has been mentioned that when the necessity arose of increasing
accommodation for women students, an amalgamation was in 1879 discussed
of the _Association for the Higher Education of Women in Cambridge_
with the _Newnham Hall Company_. The Memorandum and Articles of
Association were drawn up before long, and Newnham College came into
existence and was registered in the spring of 1880. The constitution
was not entirely according to the character of an Academic institution,
being under the financial control of the Board of Trade. There was
a provision that no profits should accrue to members of the College
in the legal sense of the word _members_, though members might
receive remuneration for work done for the College. The Ordinary
Members consisted of the first promoters of the College, with large
subscribers to its funds afterwards; Associate Members (helpers and
benefactors, not to be confounded with the present Associates); and
Honorary Members, mostly teachers and helpers of the students. The
government rested with a Council, to be elected at a general meeting
of Members of the College, four going out annually in rotation,
but re-eligible. The executive officers were to be a President,
Vice-President, and Secretary. The President and the Principal were to
be _ex officio_ members. There was as yet no systematic representation
of quasi-graduate students, but the resident lecturers were as a rule
entitled to vote as ordinary or as honorary members.
We shall see later on in what respects this Memorandum of Association
came to be regarded as inadequate. In point of fact, it marked progress
in stability, and worked very well for many years. The Council
generally consisted of persons enthusiastically devoted to the
interests of the College, and many of them able, by their experience
on educational bodies or by their social influence, to assist in its
development along the best lines.
(2) Materially, the great event of 1880-81 was the completion and
opening of the second Hall of Residence, the North Hall, as it was
called, the name South Hall being given to the earlier Newnham Hall.
The ground on which it was built was on the other side of a narrow
road. In the daytime, when gates could be kept open, passage from one
Hall to the other was easy, but at night, for privacy's sake, it was
necessary that they should be closed. This, of course, was a check to
late evening parties for cocoa, chat, or dancing, among the students
belonging to separate Halls, and the concession of one open evening
a week hardly met the difficulty. There seemed to be a danger lest
_Hall_ feeling might endanger devotion to the College as a whole, and
one might expect that the fact of the Principal residing in the older
building and only a Vice-Principal in the newer might seem to imply
some kind of inferiority. Any danger of the kind was avoided by an act
of generous devotion on the part of two promoters of the College which
could hardly have been foretold.
The great services of Dr. Sidgwick to the incipient College have been
alluded to, though they are far too wide and various to be severally
recorded.[6] His wife, formerly Miss Eleanor Balfour, had for some
years been a very able treasurer and member of council. She had given a
scholarship to Newnham in Mathematics, her own chief subject of study
at that time. They lived a quiet, scholarly, but sociable life in their
house at Hillside, at the beginning of the Chesterton Road. At this
moment, when anyone of less standing in the University and the world
generally could hardly have met the emergency, Mrs. Sidgwick agreed to
come and preside in the new Hall, with the title of Vice-Principal,
and Mr. Sidgwick came to live there also, thus giving up his privacy
and the company of most of his books. The arrangement was the more
successful in that Miss Gladstone also took up residence in the North
Hall as her secretary. The name of Gladstone brought distinction with
it. Miss Helen Gladstone had resided as a student of English and
Political Economy for one year with the Sidgwicks and for two years in
Newnham Hall, and was deservedly popular both with the students and
in the University world outside. Students who entered the College,
and were taken into the new Hall, cherished ever after the memory of
these two years as a halcyon time--in which they enjoyed listening
to good talk and associating with interesting persons more than
during any other period of their lives. At the end of two years, Miss
Gladstone became Vice-Principal, resident in the North Hall, a post
which she held for many years, and in which her well-known geniality,
cheerfulness, and whole-hearted devotion to her task and to the
students under her care found abundant scope and recognition.
[Footnote 6: Including financial help. Miss B. A. Clough (in the life
of A. J. C.) mentions how when treasurer, Mr. Sidgwick used to fail
to present the coal and gas bills. There was a legend in Newnham Hall
that once when Miss Clough wanted a new frying-pan, she had to apply to
Mr. Sidgwick for the money. On one occasion when furnishing the house
in Regent Street, he gave up a continental holiday for the sake of the
cause.]
It was under the same roof as the North Hall that the much needed
lecture rooms were raised. There were at first three. Later when a
large number of small rooms for private teaching were made in the
Pfeiffer Building, two of the lecture rooms proper were knocked into
one, thereby giving the College one room large enough to accommodate
(if desks were removed) about a hundred people. It was chiefly by
pressure from Miss Gladstone that an infirmary or hospital was built,
adjoining the North Hall, but with its separate entrance. This has
often proved useful in checking the spread of infectious ailments among
the students or the servants. A chemical laboratory had already been
erected in the garden at a respectful distance from the original Hall.
Its equipment was mainly the task of Miss Penelope Lawrence, afterwards
headmistress of Roedean School, Brighton. A laboratory for the study
of Biological subjects was provided in the town in 1884, a disused
Congregational chapel being adapted to the purpose. Mrs. Sidgwick
and her sister, Miss Alice Balfour, were the principal donors, and
the laboratory was appropriately named after their brother, Francis
Maitland Balfour, whose promising and already distinguished career had
been cut short by an accident in the Alps. For many years, these two
laboratories formed the training ground of a large number of students,
who did much to supply the demand for improved science teaching in
schools and colleges for girls. In the Chemical Laboratory Miss Freund
and in the Balfour Laboratory Miss Greenwood (now Mrs. Bidder) and
Miss Saunders presided for many years, carrying on both teaching and
research. (Both Miss Freund and Mrs. Bidder were former students of
Girton.) In course of time, the opening of the University laboratories
to women students rendered these buildings less necessary, and they are
at present let for University purposes.
With the increase in the number of students, further buildings became
necessary. The South Hall (formerly Newnham Hall) had been designed
with a view to possible extension, and in 1882, a west wing was built,
containing rooms for about twelve more students. The ground floor of
this building was devoted to a well-planned Library, at that time
a great desideratum. The equipment of the College as to books had
originally been scanty. Perhaps the need of books was, for a time,
not altogether to be deplored, as the early generation of students
realized the necessity of procuring their own books or of inducing
generous friends to assist them in that direction; and many gave books
as a parting present to the College. A moderate-sized common-room in
the Old Hall (since divided into two rooms for students) was the first
library, but was soon outgrown. But when something larger was required,
the new Library (now the Reading Room of the Old Hall) both served its
purpose till the books again outran the accommodation, and afforded
a delightful morning room for study, as well as space for occasional
social parties.
(3) During the late 'seventies and the early 'eighties, women students
were informally admitted to privileges which greatly facilitated their
work, and in particular many College lectures were opened to them.
Their own lectures--before the building of Sidgwick Hall--were given
in the rooms belonging to the Young Men's Christian Association, near
the old Post Office, a central but somewhat noisy situation. The larger
rooms in this building were of good size and convenient, but the
class-rooms were less so, and to many students their first introduction
to Greek Tragedy or to English Law will always be associated with the
striking of a hammer on the blacksmith's anvil. The new lecture rooms
at Newnham had not this drawback. The professorial lectures were
generally given in rooms now absorbed in the University Library. In
some, women were allowed to come into the gallery, where their presence
was not easily discerned. But meantime, as already mentioned, some of
the Colleges were ready to accept suggestions as to admitting women
to the Inter-collegiate Lectures. The first of the Colleges to admit
women to lectures in its own hall was Christ's. In the summer term of
1876, eight students of Newnham College (some working at classics,
others at history) were admitted to a course of lectures on the
Punic Wars given by Mr. (now Professor) J. S. Reid in the temporary
dining-hall of Christ's. Great efforts were made to meet the somewhat
exacting demands--in those days--of social propriety. Thus these
students were obliged always to be chaperoned by a responsible lady,
and as Miss Clough had in the early days few colleagues to lighten her
responsibilities, the task usually fell on her. Needless to say, she
never represented this as a grievance, though the lectures were three
times a week, the hour inconvenient, and the weather generally wet. She
was only too glad to help in a new departure, and, as she said (with
reminiscences of her brother and Dr. Arnold), she always found Roman
History interesting.
King's was the next College to admit women. Trinity not till a little
later. It may be noticed, without any disparagement of the lecturers
who obtained these concessions, that in the case of those already
lecturing to women according to the previous arrangements, it was more
convenient to have seats assigned to the women in the College lecture
rooms or halls than to give the same lecture to their men pupils in
College in the morning and to the women in a room belonging to the
Young Men's Christian Association, or even in Newnham College, in the
afternoon. Nevertheless Newnham owes gratitude to the Lecturers and
to the Fellows of Colleges who showed, in many cases, both zeal and
courtesy in meeting the women students' needs. With regard to the
undergraduates, it may be remarked that though at first some showed a
curious amazement mixed with bashfulness at their strange visitors,
they soon accustomed themselves to the change, and showed almost always
a spirit of courtesy and good sense. As more accommodation came to be
provided by the University--irrespective of College distinctions--in
the New Divinity Schools and the New Lecture Rooms, access to lectures
became easier for women, as for other non-members of the University.
Another great advantage which the students obtained in these years
was permission to read in the University Library. They could not be
admitted without referees, such as were demanded from non-university
persons, but the Principal was always accepted as one referee, so that
the student candidate had to find one only. Fees--very moderate--were
paid by the College when a student had been specially advised to read
in the Library. Formal admission was granted for the morning only, but
a student who for any special reason wished to read in the afternoon as
well could easily obtain permission.
Another privilege gradually obtained without any special effort was
that of being examined in the Inter-collegiate Examinations popularly
called _Mays_. As all Cambridge men and women know, examinations of
students in their first and second years are held in most subjects
at the end of the summer term, to test their knowledge and power of
expressing it. These are not directly under any University board, but
are given by the lecturers on the subjects they have been teaching,
in various Colleges, during the past year. The "Mays," in spite of
drawbacks, have often been of great value, in giving confidence to
industrious but despondent students, and in warning those whose
progress was unsatisfactory. The fact of having been through a certain
course, examined on the subject, and marked with the undergraduates,
emphasised the fact to the women students, the undergraduates, and the
world at large, that the work done at Newnham and Girton was really of
University standing.
(4) All these steps led towards what was necessary in order that the
work of the College should be solid and permanent--the recognition
by the University of the existence of women students and women of
what I have called quasi-graduate status. It may be said--it was
said, and still is said when further demands are made--that women had
the real thing, why trouble about the artificial trappings? Women
could become well-educated, even learned; those who had studied at
Cambridge were the better esteemed in educational circles, and they
were free from many tiresome responsibilities that weigh on full
members of the University. But to this was answered: that the path
to good education and sound learning is still more thorny than it
need be; that the world, which often has to distribute educational
posts and distinctions, does not care for education without a
degree; that the position of the women, held only by courtesy, was
insecure. A scrupulous examiner might at any time decline to examine a
tripos-candidate whom he was not bound to examine, and any University
lecturer might refuse to allow women at his lectures. At the same time,
women who "brushed the flounce of all the sciences," and flitted about
like bees for intellectual honey, might easily pose as University women
and bring real students into disrepute. Finally: if there _were_ duties
as well as privileges exacted from the children of Alma Mater, women
would hardly be found unwilling to accept them.
Matters came to a crisis at the end of the year 1880. In the winter
1879-1880 (the triposes came, then, at various periods of the year),
Newnham and Girton obtained first classes in three triposes, the most
conspicuous case being that of Miss C. A. Scott of Girton, who in the
Mathematical Tripos had obtained (by the usual informal examination)
a place equal to that of the eighth wrangler. These successes seemed
to give a _reductio ad absurdum_ to the common arguments about the
inferiority of the "female mind," to set the mark of success on the
methods followed at both Colleges, and to suggest the inexpediency--if
not injustice--of withholding from women the title which should give
them status and improve their prospects in the academic world. It
may be mentioned that, in 1878, London University had obtained a
supplement to its Charter empowering it to admit women to its degrees,
a step which marked both a recognition of the claims of educated
women and an abandonment of London's first tentative measures in
providing examinations for women. It had for some time admitted women
to a "General Examination," closely resembling the Matriculation,
but allowing more option as to subjects. This might be followed by
examinations for certificates of Higher Proficiency, which could be
taken, without further fee, with the General, or in any subsequent
year. It was a very useful examination for girls who had left school
and in continuing their studies at home wished to take up one subject
or another, together or at intervals, according to convenience. The
weak points were that the syllabus did not sufficiently correspond
to the men's to give any guarantee as to standard demanded and
attained--and far worse: that there was nothing progressive about the
"Special" examinations, there being only one examination held in each
subject. When the degree examinations were thrown open, a good many
Cambridge women took the London B.A. or M.A. _after_ their triposes
in order to have some title to present to the academic world. But--as
London degrees examinations were then arranged--such work generally
involved the consumption of much time on other than specially chosen
lines on the part of any Cambridge Tripos student. The fact that it
was desired and achieved gave proof--if fresh proof were needed--of
the actual market value to educated women of the letters denoting a
certain standard of mental equipment. London University was then, it
may be added, a University only in name. The teaching tested in its
examinations had been obtained by solitary students reading privately,
by residents in various provincial Colleges, and by members of those
Colleges in London--University, King's, Bedford, and Westfield, which
were ready to take their place as Colleges of an actual teaching as
well as degree-granting University--as London became in 1900. The
provincial Universities (Manchester, Birmingham, Bristol, etc.) all
admitted women to their degrees early, if not at their first opening.
But to return to Cambridge. The movement of 1880 was taken up in
various quarters, notably in the North of England. Petitions were drawn
up and sent to the Senate of the University praying for degrees for
women. That originated by Mr. and Mrs. Aldis of Newcastle declared:
"That the present plan of informal examination is unsatisfactory, and
that consequently the undersigned persons interested in the Higher
Education of Women pray the Senate of the University to give women the
right of admission to the degree examination and to degrees." Three
other memorials were presented. The Executive Committee of Girton
College, after pointing to the satisfactory results of several years'
experience, desired the University to "take their case (that of the
Students) into serious consideration, with a view to their formal
admission to the B.A. degree." This was, of course, different from
the Newcastle petition in being of the nature of a compromise, since
it did not ask for the M.A. which would have involved a share in the
government of the University. A similar half-way measure had previously
been adopted with regard to Nonconformists, to whom the B.A. had been
allowed some time before they were admitted to the M.A.
The third petition is that which specially interests us in the history
of Newnham College, as it was that of the Lectures Committee, out of
which--as already related--Newnham College took its beginning. This
document, like that of Girton, appeals to the result of experience,
though not to experience of exactly the same kind. It expresses a
desire that a stable form may be given to the plan of instruction
and examination already being carried on, and also a preference that
some option should be allowed as to the Previous Examination; and
unwillingness (not refusal) to prepare women for the Ordinary Degree.
A fourth memorial, much to the same general purpose as the last, was
signed by a hundred and twenty-three members of the University.
The result of the Memorials was that a Syndicate was appointed, a
memorable discussion on its proposals held in the Art Schools, and
the "Graces" drawn up to be submitted to the whole Senate. Among
the staunchest supporters of the proposals were the venerable,
whole-hearted helper of the cause, Prof. Benjamin Hall Kennedy, Dr.
(later Bishop) Browne, Prof. Cayley, Dr. (now Prof.) H. Jackson,
Prof. J. E. B. Mayor, Dr. Peile, and Mr. Coutts Trotter. These
names sufficiently refute any accusation of youthful flightiness or
overstrained liberalism in the character of the movement.
As the _Graces_ have formed from that time the basis of Newnham College
as an institution sanctioned by the University, and as their purport is
not always clearly apprehended, it may be as well to transcribe them
in full, excepting only such as relate to financial and subordinate
regulations:
1. Female students who have fulfilled the conditions respecting length
of residence and standing which Members of the University are required
to fulfil may be admitted to the Previous Examination, and the Tripos
Examinations.
2. Such residence shall be kept (_a_) at Girton College or (_b_) at
Newnham College, or (_c_) within the precincts of the University under
the regulations of one or other of these Colleges, or (_d_) in any
similar Institution within the precincts of the University, which may
be recognised hereafter by the University by Grace of the Senate.
3. Certificates of residence shall be given by the authorities of
Girton College or Newnham College or other similar institution
hereafter recognised by the University in the same form as that which
is customary in the case of Members of the University.
4. Except as provided in Regulation 5, female students shall before
admission to a Tripos Examination have passed the Previous Examination
(including the Additional Subjects) or one of the examinations which
excuse Members of the University from the Previous Examination.
5. Female students who have obtained an Honour Certificate in the
Higher Local Examination may be admitted to a Tripos Examination,
though such certificate does not cover the special portions of the
Higher Local Examinations which are accepted by the University in lieu
of parts or the whole of the Previous Examination; provided that such
students have passed in Group B (Languages) and Group C (Mathematics).
6. No female student shall be admitted to any part of any of the
Examinations of the University who is not recommended for admission by
the authorities of the College or other institution to which she has
been admitted.
7. After each examination, a Class List of the female students who have
satisfied the Examiners shall be published by the Examiners at the same
time with the Class List of Members of the University, the standard for
each Class and the method of arrangement in each Class being the same
in the two Class Lists.
8. In each class of female students in which the names are arranged
in order of merit, the place which each of such students would have
occupied in the corresponding Class of Members of the University shall
be indicated.
9. The Examiners for a Tripos shall be at liberty to state, if the case
be so, that a female candidate shall have failed to satisfy them or has
in their opinion reached a standard equivalent to that required from
Members of the University for the Ordinary B.A. degree.
10. To each female student who has satisfied the Examiners in a Tripos
Examination, a Certificate shall be given by the University stating
the conditions under which she was admitted to the examinations of the
University, the Examinations in which she has satisfied the Examiner,
and the Class and place in the Class, if indicated, to which she has
attained, in each of such examinations.
It was further provided that these arrangements should hold, in
the first instance, for five years. Rules were laid down as to the
conditions under which any future Hall of residence might be recognised
by the admission of its students to Triposes.
The result of the voting on the Graces was looked forward to by both
sides with hope and fear. The result was a triumphant majority for the
women's cause, 331 to 32. The small number who actually voted against
the Graces does not, of course, imply that the number of objectors
was insignificant, for, in fact, a good many opponents withdrew early
as from a lost cause. From that time, Feb. 24th, 1881, counted as the
great day of the College to be remembered by all succeeding generations
of students, who have been annually reminded at Commemoration how well
their friends had fought for them, how a special train had been run
from London to accommodate favourable members of Parliament, and with
what joy and thankfulness the news had been received in the College and
telegraphed to friends at a distance.
The cause for congratulation was very real. If things had gone
otherwise, it is difficult to see what the future of women's education
in England would have been. Oxford was temporarily behind Cambridge in
the movement, and a set-back at Cambridge would certainly have damaged
prospects in the sister University, and, in fact, throughout England.
Women would have been debarred from sharing in the best that University
education in England can give, and would have been cut off from the
historic sources of sound learning and of moral and intellectual
inspiration.
A perusal of the Graces will show that though they gave all that was
immediately needed, they did not satisfy all the actual or possible
desires of the promoters of women's colleges. Outsiders, as before
mentioned, already wished for full membership to be granted. To many
this seemed a premature project. Yet those were right who foresaw that
a desire for more complete membership was certain to come by and by. In
1881 there were few, if any, of the women quasi-graduates able to take
an active part in University work. Some apprenticeship, under the wing
of Alma Mater, might seem at least desirable. Again, the views held
by Girton, that conditions of examinations such as those relating to
preliminary qualifications and the Pass degree, ought from the first to
have been the same for women as for members of the University, might be
urged with some force. As already shown, the objection to compulsory
Classics and Mathematics, even up to the standard of the Previous
Examination, on the part of some of the founders and supporters of
Newnham College was due, not to a preference for easier conditions, but
from a fear of a detrimental effect on schools. In point of fact, so
many other alternatives than those of the Previous Examination and the
Higher Local are now offered that neither of these examinations is much
favoured in the best schools that send girls up to the Universities.
As to the Pass Degree: the suspicion with which it was regarded by the
Newnham pioneers has already been noticed. The objection to it is not
that it is bad in itself: many attempts have been made to render a pass
course interesting and profitable to men who have not physical strength
or intellectual persistency to embark on an honours curriculum, or who
wish to reduce their academic duties in order to follow some social or
intellectual hobbies. But there has always been the danger of demanding
a very small amount of intellectual work and tolerating men who have
no leaning towards academic pursuits, and to whom the University is
chiefly attractive by reason of its scope for athletics and for genial
life in comradeship. There was as yet, and it is to be hoped there
will be permanently, no place in the women's colleges for the society
woman without intellectual aspirations. Such an element would have been
difficult to deal with, and would not have been successful from any
point of view. True, Newnham never wished to discourage either students
of discursive mind and original ideas and plans, or those who--through
defective early education or delicate health--shrunk from a tripos
course. In fact, some students whose presence and work in the College
have proved eminently beneficial to themselves and to Newnham, have
preferred to take a mixed course of study. For the rank and file, it
is now supposed that the numerous triposes afford sufficient choice.
If, at the end of her second year, a student is judged to be unable to
proceed further on tripos lines, she is expected to go down, unless her
studies are judged to be sufficiently serious and profitable for giving
special leave to continue them. The equivalent of a pass degree is, as
already stated, and as set forth in No. 9 of the Graces, only awarded
to a student who has narrowly escaped failure. It may also be noticed
that a failure, for a woman, leaves no chance of a second trial.
The Graces gave a real and substantial benefit to women students
and--indirectly--to those who had been, informally, through a tripos
course at Newnham. These latter did not obtain University recognition
of any sort, but their names and tripos places were recorded in the
Girton and Newnham Calendars, and this served as evidence of their
standing to the educational world. When Trinity College, Dublin, for a
few years (as will be hereafter related) granted an _ad eundem_ B.A.
or M.A. to Oxford and Cambridge women who had taken final honours
examinations, those who had done so previous to the Graces (as will be
hereafter noticed)[7] were admitted with the others. For some reason,
those who many years later drew up the Representation of the People Act
of 1918 felt obliged to draw the line more strictly and to limit the
vote to those women who had obtained the equivalent of a degree since
1881.
[Footnote 7: See page 110 seq.]
There were no heart-burnings caused by the comparatively narrow
range of the privileges given by the Graces, partly because it was
always felt that more would come quietly as time and occasion should
dictate. The resident staff, as such, obtained no recognition. No
woman could sit on a board of studies, nor lecture formally in an
academic building. Privately, the opinion of Newnham lecturers was
sometimes asked on a question as to curricula, and women of distinction
occasionally lectured and sometimes drew large audiences, while--in
course of time--some undergraduates were advised by their tutors to seek
admission to the lectures of a Newnham specialist. For some years there
was no ground for formal extensions of privilege. And it was believed,
and was to be proved again afterwards, that in the situation in which
Newnham found itself, it was unwise to demand privileges that were not
almost certain to be granted.
[Illustration: MISS ANNE J. CLOUGH.]
In fact, the crowning triumph of the Graces marks the success of the
policy of Miss Clough, Dr. and Mrs. Sidgwick, Miss Kennedy, and the
other founders of the College: a policy of winning great things by not
standing out for lesser ones, of pertinacity in following a large if at
first vague programme, and of conciliation and "sweet reasonableness"
towards those who looked askance on the whole movement. It must be
observed that all the Founders were deeply imbued with love and
reverence for the University, and that the students were brought up to
regard it as almost an Alma Mater--at any rate, as a noble and worthy
corporation, to which they owed a deep debt for its past doings, and
for what it had always stood for in the nation and in the world, a
debt increased by the privilege granted to them of living within its
precincts and learning wisdom from its most distinguished sons. There
was no "battering at the gates." The pioneers of the Women's Colleges,
so far from tolerating any notion that the University would suffer
from granting their requests, would have felt it a thing worth much
labour and many struggles if they could in any way add to the great
repute and dignity which Cambridge had, among Universities, enjoyed
from far-back times.
CHAPTER III
NEWNHAM COLLEGE IN PROGRESS
The time between the recognition of Newnham College by the University
of Cambridge, in 1881, and the deeply mourned death of its chief
founder and first Principal, in February 1892, is one of expansion and
progress, both as regards the actual College buildings and the various
activities of past and present students, especially in educational and
social work.
The building of the North Hall has been mentioned, and also the
increase in size of the South Hall, with the building of a library, not
adequate to the subsequent needs of the College, but sufficient for the
number of students then in residence, and afterwards very useful as a
reading room and a supplementary library for duplicate books. In 1885
a fives court was erected on the north side of the College buildings.
Meantime, a third Hall was projected, and, owing to the munificence of
various benefactors, constructed on a liberal scale, and was ready for
opening in 1888. It may be mentioned that one benefactor, Mr. Stephen
Winkworth, earned the gratitude of subsequent students by granting a
special sum to provide for the building of students' rooms of somewhat
larger dimensions than the smaller ones in the other two Halls. Mr.
and Mrs. Winkworth, old friends of Miss Clough, had taken interest in
Newnham from the beginning, and their only daughter had been a student
there.
As we are thus brought to the consideration of students' rooms, I might
mention a line of progress initiated by the students themselves, and
afterwards followed up by the authorities. In early days a separate
study for each student had not been contemplated. This is another
difference between Newnham and Girton, since, in the latter College,
the collegiate idea had been more prominent from the first, and each
Girton student had her bedroom and sitting-room, however small. In the
first abode of Miss Clough and her five students all slept in _bona
fide_ bedrooms and worked sitting round a common table. In the early
Newnham Hall more arrangement was made for privacy in study. Each
student had her little writing table and sufficient book-shelves in
her room. But the common sitting-rooms were used for most of the day,
and not many rooms occupied by individual students were suitable for
receiving company. Even little tea-parties among the students were of a
very picnicky character. But when the ambition of the students was set
on making a study-bedroom into a study first and a bedroom in a very
secondary place, ingenuity provided facilities. Although the matter may
seem _infiniment petit_, I consider that among Newnham pioneers the two
students who accomplished this revolution should hold a place. One of
them bought a large piece of chintz, and undisturbed by the jests of
some of her comrades and the amused criticism of Miss Clough, devised
a covering for bedstead, chest of drawers and other pieces of bedroom
furniture. The other, of more definitely artistic taste (it was in
the days of "Patience" and of the so-called _aesthetic_ movement for
soft colours and flowing lines) procured a piece of sage-green cloth
or cretonne, and effected a similar revolution. Already in the large
corner rooms something like a cubicle arrangement had been devised.
The evident preference of the students for harmoniously, if simply,
furnished rooms and for the preponderance of the idea of study over
that of mere rest was followed out in furnishing new rooms as they were
required. Old oak hutches, bureaux, the drawers of which might hold
clothes, bed-coverings of a character suitable to that of the room,
also pretty wall-papers of the kind Morris had lately invented, were
procured for the students generally. Thus students came to take more
pleasure in their rooms, into which they could invite one another, and
sometimes friends from outside, though the common sitting-rooms were
still the usual place for receiving guests. I think I am not wrong
in saying that Newnham here started a practice subsequently followed
in almost all houses of residence for women students. Certainly the
first head of Somerville, when visiting Miss Clough, showed interest
in the study-bedroom system. The desire to make the one room assert
its diurnal rather than its nocturnal character was not new. Dickens
had already ridiculed it in describing the "rooms" of Dick Swiveller.
But the solution of the problem on principles of both convenience and
beauty was, perhaps, first found in Newnham Hall during the early days.
I would pass to another--far more important--subject touching the
relation of the students to the building in which they resided: it
has puzzled some people how it has come about that with all the
building, a chapel has never formed part of Newnham College. The
subject is a delicate one, and I only take it up here because of the
very erroneous and sometimes damaging explanations that have been
assigned for the omission. Worst of all to those familiar with the
leaders of the movement is the supposition that to them religion was
a matter of indifference. For those who really knew Miss Clough, and
others whom, while they still live, it seems indecent to mention--any
such accusation is not only false but absurd. Miss Clough's religion
was one that illuminated all her work and gave her strength and
patience to carry it on. She was, besides, sincerely attached to the
Church of England. At the same time, having lived in America, and
mixed with persons of very varied religious opinions, she had early
become very widely tolerant of the manifold ways in which a religious
spirit manifests itself in different circles and different types of
character. She had also seen the bad results of any attempt to force
young people into religious observances which had become for them
unmeaning or distasteful. Again: she had known vicariously, if not
personally, the ferment of the Tractarian movement at Oxford, and the
wave of scepticism that seemed to follow or even to accompany it. Also
any disposition in her to avoid whatever might suggest the taking up
of a distinctly denominational or even interdenominational attitude
in the government of the College was strengthened by the distinctly
anti-sectarian principles of vigorous and powerful supporters. Possibly
at that time, more than at the present, any definite recognition of
religion or provision of religious services seemed impossible apart
from some denominational bias. The well-meant attempt of one founder of
another women's college to provide chapel services on undenominational
lines had foundered on the quicksands of theological controversy, and
well-nigh wrecked the College--till it was saved by the singular tact
and sympathetic insight of its new Principal. When Miss Clough first
came to Cambridge, she began, as we have seen, not with a College, but
with a moderate-sized household, and her arrangements were those of an
ordinary Christian house, including family prayers. There was no need
in Cambridge, as in a country district, to provide Sunday services. A
rule was laid down, at first, that students were expected to inform
the Principal of the place of worship they chose to attend, but this
proviso was intended rather to give the Principal the right to make
such inquiry than to impose any restrictions on the students. Miss
Clough always regarded religious teaching and observance as belonging
to the family rather than to any educational establishment, and she
thought it essential to allow students to keep up their ties with any
church to which they or their parents might belong.
In some ways the absence of a religious centre to the College may have
been a disadvantage, but if so, the fault was rather in the times than
in any persons. In point of fact, there has never been wanting a strong
religious element in Newnham life. At the same time the atmosphere has
been favourable to interchange of religious ideas among persons of
various types and experiences. No student was made unpopular by her
religious views unless she asserted them in an aggressive way. Most
religious movements in Cambridge (and there have been many) since the
beginnings of the College have made their influence felt within its
precincts, and a large number of past students have devoted their lives
to distinctly religious work, especially in distant lands, and such
always look to the staff and students of their College for sympathy and
encouragement.
This digression seemed necessary to correct prevalent misconceptions.
To return to the general growth of the College in the eighties:
attached to the new Hall of residence as its dining-hall was a
beautiful College Hall, much larger than either of the other
dining-rooms, and suggestions were made that the Staff with the
students in all three Halls should dine together. This arrangement was,
however, not easily compatible with the plan of division for tutorial
purposes into three Halls. One desirable addition was a well-equipped
kitchen. For a time the two Halls on the north side were supplied from
the new kitchen; but much later, when the new Hall to the west, Peile
Hall, was built, a large central kitchen was constructed, and all four
Halls were provided from it, the food being wheeled to each in covered
trolleys and received on hot tables in the several Halls.
The opening of Clough Hall, as the new and largest Hall was named, was
a great occasion for Newnham. It was a pleasant summer day (June 9th,
1888), and many friends came from a distance. On the same day a degree
was to be granted to the son of the Prince of Wales (Prince Albert
Victor), and the Prince of Wales (Edward VII.) with the Princess and
the three young Princesses paid a visit to the College. The students
welcomed them with song in the new dining-hall, a ballot having first
been taken among them as to who were the best representative students
to present bouquets. This is probably the first and last occasion on
which, in Newnham, a critical decision had to be made as to beauty,
physical vigour and becoming dress. The royal party walked across the
garden from the new Hall to the Principal's own rooms. Next followed
a delightful ceremony which betokened both the respect and affection
felt for one of the most assiduous helpers of the College and the
beginnings of a new vista for Newnham in the endowment of Research--the
presentation to Miss Marion Kennedy of a sum, which her friends had
raised, to found a Studentship bearing her name, as an endowment for
post-graduate work. There had been since 1882, by the generosity of
the Hon. Selina Bathurst, a fund for encouraging advanced work in
Natural Science, and it seemed eminently fitting that the possibility
of promoting learning of any kind should be associated with the revered
name of Kennedy. But perhaps the most moving event of that day was
almost unpremeditated. The old students who had come from a distance,
with those in residence, had a social supper in the large new Hall,
after which Miss Clough, overcoming the reticence with which she
habitually covered her deepest feelings, allowed all present to see
more of her ideals and hopes, with her trust in their realization, than
some of them had as yet known to be part of her character.
The new buildings necessitated a new nomenclature. The points of the
compass were rejected in favour of the names of the founders. North
Hall, which had been inaugurated by Mrs. Sidgwick's Vice-Principalship,
became Sidgwick Hall, the new Hall was named Clough Hall, the South
Hall--not being connected with any founder so intimately as with Miss
Clough herself--retained a portion of its prestige in the title of
the Old Hall. Other names of founders and benefactors were reserved
for later additions to the College. Miss Clough herself took up
residence in the Hall which bore her name. Miss Gladstone was still
Vice-Principal in Sidgwick Hall; Miss Jane Lee, a very earnest scholar
of Italian literature, entirely devoted to the best interests of
the College, became head of the Old Hall, also with the title of
Vice-Principal. This title for the person presiding over one particular
Hall, and giving special attention to the needs of the students in that
Hall, became somewhat misleading, and has since been replaced by that
of Tutor, to which (in the Cambridge Colleges) it roughly corresponds.
The Vice-Principal in each Hall had much more to do with house-keeping
arrangements than later on, when more unity in this respect had been
achieved and a regular Steward appointed. The Vice-Principals presided
at table in their several Halls, corresponded with the parents of
students, arranged, within the limits of a few simple laws, rules
for the discipline of the students, read prayers in the morning; in
fact, were generally responsible for the social, physical and moral
requirements of the students. As, when there were only two Halls,
Miss Gladstone held the office in Sidgwick Hall for many years, she
imparted to it a certain character, and for a long time _the_ V.-P.
was a title regarded as almost individual to her. The separation into
Halls, inevitable for a time, had, in Miss Clough's estimation and
perhaps in reality, a very decided advantage. Students in one Hall
naturally saw more of one another than of those in other Halls; Old
Hall especially was somewhat cut off from the two others, so long as
the public road ran between. And for games, clubs, and other social
purposes, it was often a help to have a natural division into the three
Halls. The larger societies--such as the Debating Society, the Musical
Society, and some others, as well as the more regular of the Games
Clubs--belonged to the College as a whole. The teaching arrangements
were, of course, always made for the whole College and not separately
for each Hall.
From about this time the social activities of the students, both those
resident in College and those who had gone back to their own homes
or taken up definite work, showed themselves in many ways. In 1880
an effort was made to keep up in those who had gone down the College
spirit and College interests. The result was a society called the
Newnham College Club, rather an unfortunate name, since it was not
a club properly so-called, having no local habitation; it sometimes
became confounded with the Ladies' University Club, and students were
debarred from entering by the fear of expense. The "Club" prepared
students' minds for the official College Roll which superseded it
in 1919. The founders and officers of the Club (among whom those
especially active in its initiation and development were Miss Julia
Sharpe, Miss Olive Macmillan (Mrs. MacLehose), Mrs. Corrie Grant (_née_
Adams)), deserve the gratitude of the College for having, by means of an
annual _Newnham Letter_, with information as to College developments,
births, marriages, deaths among old students, fresh appointments,
etc., and by regular meetings in London, kept alive in a large and
growing number of former students the memory of their Alma Mater and
her interest in the doings of her children. In after times it was
interesting to see how, when a member of the Club who had gone to live
in Central Africa or New Zealand visited her old haunts, she was found
to be far better informed as to the lines of recent progress than some
who had never left England.
In another direction Newnham took the lead, this time on the direct
initiation of Miss Clough, in the formation of a teachers' agency
for qualified women who had taken a College course. The governesses'
agencies of those days opened their doors to stronger and to feebler
applicants. Heads of schools and families desiring well-educated
teachers were constantly writing to Miss Clough, and it seemed time to
start a registry on collegiate lines. She communicated the project to
a few former students engaged or interested in education, and they at
once formed a committee, invited the co-operation of Girton, the Oxford
Colleges, and the graduated women of London University, and started
what became the Association of University Women Teachers. From ten or a
dozen members it has increased to over 2800. The idea of this Society,
as compared with the ordinary registry, was that the Secretary, a
University woman and in close touch with Universities, should keep
herself personally informed as to the credentials and careers of
applicants; that she should make sure of the eligibility of the posts
offered; and that she should be able to offer advice to young teachers
as to applying for posts and making changes when, but not before, it
seemed expedient; and that the expenses should, as far as possible, be
defrayed from the ordinary subscriptions of members. Further, and this
was a point of much importance, it was intended that the Association
should watch over the interests of women teachers, and should interest
itself in educational questions generally. The secretaryship has been
held by various University women--for many years by Miss Alice Gruner,
whose experience and untiring devotion to the work made her a most
valuable adviser both to those who offered and those who were seeking
educational posts. It is now filled by Mrs. Brough (_née_ Lloyd), and
has offices at 108 Victoria Street, Westminster.
Miss Clough never lost her interest in school teaching and teachers,
of any and all types. At one time she arranged for parties of Newnham
students to visit some of the elementary schools in Cambridge and
give amateur lessons--chiefly that they might know what the inside of
an elementary schoolroom was like--partly because, as she entirely
believed, education and mutual acquaintance are the great factors for
breaking down class distinctions. Meantime, a body of energetic Newnham
students (led by Miss E. P. Hughes, Miss A. M. Adams and others) were
eager to help in the education of working men. For many years a school
was kept up in St. Matthew's Schoolroom, Barnwell, for men who were
known not to go to church on Sunday mornings, but who wished, during
those hours, to learn some of the elements which--in those days--many
adults had never acquired. Miss Clough was much interested in the
scheme, and once or twice came down to speak to the men, though she
was anxious that no student should, in taking part in the work, give
up time that she required for Sunday rest. The school was for some
years vigorously carried on by the late Principal, Miss Stephen. While
it lasted, it certainly did good work on both sides. The classes were
conversational, and many students learned at least something of working
men's life and ambitions. It died down partly owing to the irregularity
necessitated by the alternation of terms and vacations, partly to the
activities of a new clergyman, who was not without hope of inducing men
to go to church on Sunday mornings.
The interest which Miss Clough always felt, and which she imparted to
a good many students, in elementary teachers and their work was shown
in certain experiments, novel as they seemed then, though precursive
of greater things. She was anxious that those teachers who had a hard
and often a dull life, and whom she knew to be often most conscientious
and zealous in their profession, should see something of a different
life, and especially of University life, and in particular that they
should enjoy some rambles among the old Colleges of Cambridge, and
hear lectures from Cambridge teachers. The Summer Meeting of the
Extension Scheme was not as yet, unless one counts it as beginning in
these Newnham gatherings. Certainly it originated in the circle of
educational pioneers to which Miss Clough belonged, and some of the
earliest "Extension Students" were successors to those who had come up
under the early scheme. In the summer of 1885 two men and two women
from the northern counties (the women being both elementary teachers)
received bursaries from the Lectures Association in the north that
they might come for three or four weeks' study in Cambridge. The
women were accommodated in Newnham, and though their teaching had
been otherwise provided for, Miss Clough commended them to the care
of some of the younger lecturers, who did the chaperoning required in
those more exacting days, and gave what social and friendly help was
required. In 1887 Miss Clough undertook a similar experiment on her own
account. A party of about fourteen women teachers in elementary schools
were accommodated for three weeks in the Red Houses which formed the
interim abode of students while Clough Hall was in process of building
and were not required during the Long Vacation. In 1889 and 1891 the
experiment was repeated, the teachers being received into the Old
Hall. Certain of the younger lecturers gave them lectures in History
and Literature, and in some of the subjects (Latin, Logic, etc.) with
which they were struggling for their examinations, while the Natural
Science lecturers took several of them into the laboratories and for
botanical excursions. The lecturers and students of Newnham acted up to
the College reputation for hospitality, and Miss Clough herself visited
them and invited them to see her in her private room. The grievances of
teaching in the days of half-time pupils and dearth of money and books
for teachers were poured into sympathetic ears. After the Annual Summer
Meeting of University Extension Students had been fairly set on foot
these sectional meetings became merged in the general one, and there
was no need for such special gatherings at Newnham, but the College,
when the Meeting was in Cambridge, has always received a number of
Extension Students as paying guests, and lecturers and other Newnham
officials have taken pains to make the visit profitable, so that many
came year after year and always cherished an affection for Newnham
above and beyond that which they felt for Cambridge.
[Illustration: MRS. HENRY SIDGWICK.]
This movement was one from above--originated by the Principal and
worked mainly by the Staff. But the one which brought Newnham generally
most closely into contact with what one may call socio-educational
work was the Women's University Settlement in Southwark. The idea
of "settlements" is familiar nowadays, and the original character
and object of such institutions has much changed and developed
since the first experiment was begun by the inspiration and intense
activity of Arnold Toynbee. The primary notion of a _settlement_ was
of an abode in the poorer districts of a town where men of culture,
engaged in various occupations, might make their home, devoting their
leisure to the society and to the amusement or assistance of poorer
neighbours. While this ideal is more or less preserved in the numerous
settlements--some connected with particular churches or colleges,
others quite independent--to be found in London and in others of our
big towns, perhaps the possibility of uniting outside professional
duties in the daytime with attention to social evils and their remedies
in the evenings has not been permanently realized in any. Certainly in
Settlements of women, the self-regarding part of the work has become
chiefly educational: the training of the worker by instruction in the
principles of economics and the history of social legislation. The
Settlement in Southwark was throughout of this description. Though
it has been carried on by women from other Universities as well as
Cambridge women, the first thought of such an enterprise arose in
Cambridge after an interesting meeting of the Society for Discussing
Social Questions. This society of Cambridge ladies, including
Girton and Newnham students (founded chiefly by the efforts of Mrs.
Marshall), held, Feb. 4th, 1887, an interesting meeting at which Mrs.
Samuel Barnett, wife of the Warden of Toynbee Hall, and Miss Alice
Gruner--lately a historical student of Newnham College--read
interesting papers on _Settlements_. Miss Gruner had already begun
work of the kind in London and was anxious to find helpers. Several
students were inspired to initiate a Settlement; Miss Gruner consented
to allow her undertaking to be taken over as the nucleus and became the
first Warden. Girton was appealed to and also the Oxford Halls. The
result was the formation of a Committee and the acquiring of a house
in Nelson Square, London, S.E., Miss Gruner having laid her finger on
the very spot afterwards marked most darkly in Sir C. Booth's _Life and
Labour of the People_. The history of the Settlement, the development
of its various activities, the links which it formed with other
agencies, religious and secular, in combining for the betterment of
conditions among the London poor, the schemes adopted by its residents
and afterwards taken up by public authorities, do not belong, except
indirectly, to the history of Newnham College, yet the Settlement has
certainly been a factor in the life of many students, and it is not too
much to say that what was first discussed within the walls of Newnham
has been successfully worked out in many parts of England and, indeed,
in some distant lands. Many University women besides Newnham students
have worked there, and one may suppose that in a sense the movement was
"in the air" and would in any case have come into active existence.
Yet Newnham may enjoy some of the credit of the work done in Southwark
and of the excellent Wardens provided in the persons of Miss Gruner,
Miss Sewell, Miss Gladstone, and the present head, Miss M. M. Sharpley.
Workers and officers of much devotion and ability have been supplied by
Oxford and the London University, and Settlements of a somewhat similar
kind form adjuncts to other Universities, such as Bristol, Leeds and
Birmingham.
If Newnham was making its way, as learner, as teacher, and as worker,
in the field of social enterprise, the same is even more true in that
of education. A large proportion of the students during the time now
under consideration adopted the teaching profession. Technical training
was not insisted on by head mistresses, nor by the Government, and most
young women plunged into educational life to sink or swim--some of
those who might have sunk emerging after a term or two to take a course
of training. The head for many years of the Maria Grey Training College
was a University woman (Miss Alice Woods of Girton) and the first head
of the Cambridge Training College was from Newnham--Miss E. P. Hughes.
Meantime, the standard of attainment in girls' schools was rapidly
rising, as women who had received a University education took up posts
in them and imbued their pupils with a desire to come up some day to
Cambridge. At first, former students had often to work as assistants
under Heads of a different and older type, but this was not always a
disadvantage, as the older, partly self-taught, mistresses, both of
public and private schools, sometimes showed an admirable power of
blending the new life which young University teachers brought into the
schools with the good traditions of the last generation. In course of
time head mistresses were generally appointed from assistants who had a
good "degree or its equivalent," and the bonds between schools and the
University thus became stronger.
In 1890 the College had again a festive occasion--on the attainment by
Miss Philippa Fawcett of a place in the Mathematical Tripos above the
Senior Wrangler. The scene in the Senate-house is one that will live
in the memory of all who were present. It is pleasant to be able to
say that no discordant note was struck. As Miss Fawcett passed out,
with Miss Clough leaning on her arm, the undergraduates formed a line
on either side and gave a hearty cheer. The event was celebrated at
Newnham by a dinner in Hall, at which Mrs. Fawcett was present, and
also Dr. Hobson, Miss Fawcett's tutor in mathematics. In the evening
her student friends decorated the doorway with lamps, and as there
was just then a piece of waste ground at the west-end of the College
grounds, it was possible to make a bonfire, and to carry the Senior
Wrangler round it, and in the light of the fire to call on Dr. Hobson
for a speech. Miss Clough was quietly happy, and all present felt that
there was something of poetical justice in the occurrence. Professor
and Mrs. Fawcett had been, as we have seen, pioneers in the movement
for women's education; they had also been warmly attached to Miss
Clough, as, in a more filial way, their daughter had been for many
years. Miss Fawcett herself, besides being one to whose brilliant
mathematical powers the highest academic honours were due, was a
singularly suitable person for this high distinction, in that she
exemplified so many of the qualities popularly supposed to be absent
from the character of a University woman. She was modest and retiring,
almost to a fault--trying though not always successfully, to counteract
the impression made by her personality, so as to appear like a very
ordinary person--not known to many, but loved as well as admired by her
intimate friends. As the subsequent career of Miss Fawcett is not well
known, it may be stated here that after the second and more advanced
part of the Mathematical Tripos (in which she obtained the highest
honours) she held for a year the Marion Kennedy Studentship already
referred to, and wrote on a problem involving advanced mathematical
research. She subsequently acted as Mathematical Lecturer at Newnham,
but feeling, as her father had felt before her, the call of national
service above all inducement to academic pursuits, she accepted a
Government appointment and went out to help organize education in
the Transvaal. After a period of assiduous work in Johannesburg, she
returned to England and was appointed a Principal Assistant in the
Education Department of the London County Council, a post of much
importance and responsibility. Miss Fawcett served for some years on
the Council of Newnham College, and has maintained a constant interest
in its welfare.
To return to the history of the College: in February 1892 it had to
sustain a loss which was hardly less a blow from having come in the
ordinary course of nature. Miss Clough was 72 years old in the January
of that year. She had to most people looked about the same age for
many years, as her hair had whitened early, and the vivid look in her
eyes never suggested old age. The portrait of her by Shannon, painted
in 1890, gives a better impression of her than Richmond's portrait of
1882.[8] The latter shows, perhaps, more strength, the former more
sweetness. But neither can possibly give an adequate interpretation
to a face so speaking and changeful. Shannon's is a sympathetic study
of calm, benevolent, but alert old age, suggestive of ripe experience
and of a patient outlook on life. It hangs in the College Hall with
the portraits of Prof. and Mrs. Sidgwick and Miss Kennedy, all of them
pleasing and profitable reminders to the students, at their meals,
debates, and dancing, of the character as well as the appearance of
those to whom they owe their present happy opportunities.
[Footnote 8: Now hanging in the Old Hall Library. The expression is
stern, and it was caricatured in _Punch_ as "The very ready
letter-writer; won't I give it him?" She remarked to a former student
that she wished she could have had some young friends to talk to whilst
it was being painted. "But didn't the artist talk to you, Miss Clough?"
"Yes, on subjects as to which we did not agree."]
During the later part of her life Miss Clough had been obliged to let
some of her work be lightened, and to give the management of Clough
Hall to Miss Katharine Stephen, who had formerly been Miss Gladstone's
secretary; but she still kept an eye on everything that happened in
the College, and many things far beyond. Miss Clough had always felt
a deep interest in the colonies, and she kept up a correspondence
with past students who had made educational ventures in many distant
parts. As one of them said, "her interest in us seemed to vary directly
as the squares of the distances," though certainly those nearer to
Cambridge would not have accepted such a formula. Such schemes as the
mixed education for blacks and whites in Jamaica, the starting of a
loan library in tropical Australia, the opening of a boarding-school
for aristocratic girls in Siam, aroused her warm interest and often
called forth wholesome advice as well as sympathy. She was always able
to enjoy a quiet country holiday in vacation time. The pleasures of
friendship brought her comfort and enjoyment all her life, during the
latter part of which she had the companionship of her niece--daughter
of the brother to whom she had owed so much in her early intellectual
development--and much care and solicitude from some of the lecturers
and of the elder students. She may be said to have died in harness. The
last time that she appeared at a meeting for students was to interest
them in Mr. Morant's educational efforts in Siam. One of the last
visitors from abroad whom she received, lying on a sitting-room couch,
was a lady from Australia who could bring tidings of a University
hostel managed by a former student. Miss Clough was not sure that this
student was working on the best lines, and was anxious to hear about
her and to send her a message of kindly warning.
The end came quietly on February 27th, 1892. To very many it seemed
as if the world could never be quite the same without her. Certainly
the College, however wisely and generously conducted, was bound to
follow new courses. Yet in a sense Miss Clough was _felix opportunitate
mortis_. She had lived to see her work set on a stable footing; she
might safely leave it in the hands of those like-minded with herself;
and she was spared the pain of friction and later of bitter opposition
which the College and its promoters had to suffer in seeking a
permanent place within University borders.
Miss Clough's kinsfolk showed great breadth of mind, generosity, and
appreciation of her own desires and feelings, in arranging that the
funeral should be rather of a collegiate than of a family character.
She had expressed a wish that her remains should rest in a churchyard
rather than a cemetery, and as she possessed a little property in the
parish of Grantchester, the burial was in the pleasant ground attached
to the church there. A simple slab was afterwards erected with name,
date, and the words: "After she had served her generation by the will
of God, she fell on sleep." The first part of the service was, by the
kind offer of the Provost and Fellows of King's College, read in the
beautiful chapel of that College, the services of which had been to
her, for many years, a perpetual solace and aid. The Staff of Newnham
walked behind the coffin. The Chapel was crowded with members of the
University and a great number of former students from all parts of
England. The following Sunday (the First in Lent) it fell to Dr. Ryle
(now Dean of Westminster) to preach a sermon, and the subject suited
to the season and also to Miss Clough's character and work suggested
his text: "Endure hardness, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ." His
reference was very appreciative and delicate. Perhaps it might have
struck some hearers that though Miss Clough would have thoroughly
appreciated the idea of service in the Christian army, she might not
have considered that she had "endured hardness" as much as many others.
Her strenuous efforts and personal restrictions were so entirely
dictated by the needs of her cause and of the individuals in her
charge, that there was no place for asceticism in her life, though much
for plain living and high thinking.
The figure of Miss Clough must necessarily look large in the history
of Newnham College, since she was both its principal founder and its
first head. But it would be useless labour to compare her with other
founders and heads. Her objects and her way of obtaining them were
peculiar to herself in her particular _milieu_. When she was removed,
others who had supported her were ready to follow up her work, perhaps
on more consistently stated principles, with somewhat more of theory in
the background. But there were some ideas at the basis of the College
recognised only by those who had caught her spirit, either by working
under her in life or by imbibing the moral and intellectual atmosphere
which for a long time has kept the College sound and wholesome. The
mental and moral debt of the present College to her, and to those one
may call her disciples, has been more or less manifest already, and
will appear more evident in the sequel.
CHAPTER IV
NEWNHAM COLLEGE IN PROGRESS, 1892-1911--PRINCIPALSHIP OF MRS. SIDGWICK.
The loss of Miss Clough seemed to remove the College from its
early--one might say heroic--period to the regions of ordinary history.
Yet there was something uncommon in the circumstances under which her
successor was appointed. At the Council Meeting after Miss Clough's
death, a strong wish was expressed that Mrs. Sidgwick, who had already
once given up, with her husband, the privacy of home life, might be
induced to become the second Principal. Newnham wanted them, and they
came; making, as one would expect, the very least of any personal
inconvenience involved in once more giving up their house. As Sidgwick
said to a friend,[9] "What we feel most strongly is that after Miss
Clough's death it is the duty of all who have given their minds to
Newnham to 'close ranks,' and take the place that others assign to one.
We hope it will be for the good of the College."
[Footnote 9: _Life_, p. 515.]
For a short time Mrs. Sidgwick was obliged to live a divided life, part
at Hillside, part at Newnham. But in December 1893 the Principal's new
quarters were ready, and she and her husband moved into them.
These new quarters had been partly provided by a very timely bequest. A
short time before, Mrs. Emily Pfeiffer, the poetess, and her husband,
visited Cambridge, and were much pleased with what they saw of Newnham
and with the hospitality of Miss Clough. Mrs. Pfeiffer died soon after,
and her husband did not long survive her. Their money was left in
great part to societies and buildings for the benefit of women, and of
this the sum of £5000 was adjudged to Newnham College. There were some
legal difficulties, soon overcome, but a hindrance remained in the fact
already mentioned, that a public pathway divided Sidgwick Hall with
Clough Hall from the Old Hall.
What was desired was to connect the two parts of the College by a block
of buildings containing students' rooms, and, as finally arranged, a
suite of rooms for the Principal, a set of small lecture or "coaching"
rooms, a large room for the Staff, to serve as a kind of Combination
Room, and a Porter's Lodge. This could not be done without closing
the public foot-path. Fortunately, a new carriage road parallel to
the former foot-path was greatly needed for communication between the
town and the country beyond the College. Such a road, if made, would
compensate the public for the loss of the foot-path. Newnham College
was naturally willing enough to give up a strip along the north side of
its grounds as a contribution to the road. But others were less willing
to give up portions of their ground, without which the scheme could not
have been carried through. After much discussion, a very satisfactory
solution was reached. A broad road, now called _Sidgwick Avenue_, was
made, largely at the expense of Professor and Mrs. Sidgwick, with
some help from other friends, and the path was closed. There was a
curious interregnum, after the dividing fences of the Hall gardens
had been removed and before the path had become private, during which
tradesmen's boys used to loiter, basket on head, as they passed through
to the Grange Road, and watch the students' games at hockey or tennis.
When Sidgwick Avenue was complete and the path closed, this anomaly
naturally ceased.
In the archway under Pfeiffer Building, forming the main entrance to
the College, were placed a pair of beautiful bronze gates. These were
presented by past and present students, in memory of Miss Clough. They
bear the Clough Arms, and the decoration is a combination of floral and
foliate. The designer was the architect of all the College buildings,
Mr. Basil Champneys. It was said at the preliminary meeting that in
future every student would have Miss Clough brought to her mind on her
first entry into the College and her departure from it. Unfortunately
this cannot be carried out in practice, for though the Gates are the
only means of ingress or egress after dark and form the principal
entrance to the College as a whole, there are other entrances to three
of the Halls which are used by day.
[Illustration: NEWNHAM COLLEGE--THE ENTRANCE GATES.]
Thus the suite of rooms above the Memorial Gates formed the
dwelling-house of Professor and Mrs. Sidgwick, a somewhat inadequate
"Master's Lodge" for a large and rising College, but pleasant in
outlook and sufficient in size for all immediate requirements. Needless
to say, the hospitable traditions of Hillside were maintained at
Newnham, and members of the Staff had opportunities of occasionally
meeting very interesting guests who came from far and near.
The Principal's life was a full one. Besides being Principal of the
College she was its Bursar--an office which she only resigned at
the end of 1919, to the regret of those who realized how much the
financial success of the College has owed to her care and thought.
Careful and even abstemious in all personal expenditure, she was always
ready to entertain suggestions of new ventures. But besides this, she
kept an eye on everything that happened in the College. She took all
opportunities of coming to know the students personally, by frequently
dining in hall, inviting students to her drawing-room and to breakfast,
attending debates and little entertainments, and by making the College,
both during her husband's lifetime and afterwards, an evidently large
factor in her life. His presence, while he lived in the background, was
always a help and a stimulus. If he made sacrifices in giving up his
private house, he made many more in the time he devoted to the College
at large and to students in particular. But with him and his wife, as
with the first Principal, such sacrifices were so much the order of the
day as hardly to be recognized as such, and were only fully appreciated
in later years.
One sacrifice made by Mrs. Sidgwick for the good of the College was
the restriction of the time she could now give to the work of the
Society for Psychical Research. She maintained the interest she and her
husband had long felt in the Society, and took part in its meetings
and various proceedings. But she never encouraged such interest among
the students, since she knew how many unsteady heads have been turned
by a superstitious dabbling in the occult. It would be difficult to
over-estimate the advantage to the Society of having persons of such
complete sanity and scrupulous balance of mind as the Sidgwicks among
the investigators.
We have noticed as one of the additions to the College in connection
with the Pfeiffer Building a Combination Room for the Staff, including
all women Lecturers and resident Fellows. Later on its functions were
transferred to its present quarters, the room next the College Dining
Hall--a pleasant room with two fireplaces and a door opening on the
garden--the original Combination Room being made use of partly as a
committee room, partly as a reading and coaching room for students.
Work among both students and past students had meantime been
facilitated by the gift in 1898 of a well-designed library building,
for which the College has to thank the liberality of Mr. and Mrs.
Yates Thompson. The Library is admirably adapted to its purpose, with
section recesses divided off by bookcases and conveniently arranged
tables, while beauty of proportion, the excellence of the woodwork,
and the elaborate mouldings on the ceiling (of the principal Printers'
Arms of the sixteenth century) give it an artistic as well as academic
character. When (1907) nearly ten years after its opening, its space
proved insufficient for the books belonging to the College, the same
benefactors most generously doubled it in size, providing staircases
and a fine east window.
The supply of library books grew and prospered at least in proportion
to the general progress of the College. Many of the original promoters
were literary men and book-lovers, and their gifts and bequests,
besides the money annually spent out of the College income, made the
necessary extension just noticed necessary, and tended to make the
College a more desirable place for old students--especially such as
were engaged in educational or literary work--in which to spend part
of the summer vacation. Some friends were anxious that the Library
should have interesting books of a non-special character. Mrs. Stephen
Winkworth, already mentioned, whenever she had enjoyed some new work
of biography or general literature, used to send a copy of it for the
Newnham Library. Mr. Coutts Trotter, Miss Clough's kind adviser in
the early days, bequeathed the bulk of his books to Newnham College.
The same was done by Mary Bateson, of whom we shall have more to say
presently. There never was a time when there was not an influx of
books of various kinds. Provision was made for a steady supply by the
assignment to the Library Committee every year of a sum proportional
to the number of students. Most books, on conditions, might be taken
out for parts of the vacations. The Library Committee consists of
representatives on the Staff of all the principal subjects studied and
other lecturers, whose duty it is to submit the names of books required
by the students whom they direct. The Library has thus been kept up to
date, and has also continually been enriched by special gifts. Thus a
Dante Library was formed in memory of Miss Jane Lee, already mentioned;
a clock was given by a generation of students going down, the case
being designed by one of them; guests gave books on their departure.
The catalogues were carefully kept, and if any slackness in returning
books was observed, great vigilance was used to recall them. The care
of the Library was for many years in the hands of Miss Katharine
Stephen.
It had been the wish of early friends--especially of Miss Kennedy--to
attach permanently to the College as many as possible of the past
students. This had been done to a certain extent, as already shown,
by the Newnham College Club. Another plan, still adhered to, is to
invite all students who belonged to specified periods, to come up
to Commemoration Dinner on or about February 24th--a practice more
or less observed in the Colleges of the University. But in addition
it was the aim of the founders to bring the old students into the
Constitution, so that the responsibility for the College should
eventually be to a greater extent in their hands. With this object in
view, the Constitution was revised, and in 1893 a new body of members
was created chosen from the old students and called Associates (not
Associate Members, who were a separate class of members qualified by
subscriptions). In this year all past students were requested to
send in the names of those twenty among their College contemporaries
or friends whom they considered most fitted to aid the causes of
"Education, learning, and research." To the first twenty who obtained
the greatest number of votes the Council added ten, and the number was
increased by annual election of three till it reached 48, after which
time three were to resign every year and three others to be chosen by
co-optation. The Associates were full members of the College, and as
such took part in the election of the Council, and still, under the
later Constitution, elect members of the Governing Body. They meet
in Cambridge every year, and coming as they do from various centres,
contribute new ideas and points of view. At first, as might naturally
be expected, most of the resident Staff were placed on the list. It
includes many women who have reached some degree of eminence in their
several lines of activity and also usually some research fellows.
There was in these years a growing desire to provide opportunities
for what may be called post-graduate work, though the term is not
strictly applicable. There had been, as we have seen, students doing
advanced work before the foundation of any research fellowships. The
studentship connected with the name of Miss Marion Kennedy had given
opportunity for a successful Tripos student to look about her, try some
manageable piece of work, and either find some fresh line to follow
up in the field of science or letters, or else enter the teaching
profession with a wider view of her functions than could generally
be found in one who had never advanced in her studies beyond the
undergraduate stage. Studentships in the Natural Sciences were, from
1881, awarded from time to time to students of post-graduate status
from the Bathurst Fund already mentioned. But something involving a
longer period of independent study was clearly desirable. Critics of
the women's education movement were wont to assert that women might
do fairly well in Triposes and in educational work afterwards, but
that they contributed nothing of any significance to the advancement
of knowledge. This "hasty generalization" needed removing. It was,
however, no mere spirit of feminine rivalry, but a generous impetus to
labour in intellectual fields, to satisfy one's own thirst for truth,
and to help in the building up of the sciences--whether natural or
human--that inspired the promoters and labourers in this new field
of College activity. The most eager and influential in this movement
was a member of the College eminently marked by a keen delight in
research for its own sake, and by a desire that Newnham should be able
to hold its own in the highest kind of University work among all the
Colleges of the world--Mary Bateson. Under her influence the first
research fellowship was given by Mrs. Herringham, and was thrown
open to public application in 1900. Friends of the College and the
students themselves were stirred up to raise funds for more research
fellowships. The number is now four, and they are awarded by a special
committee and tenable for three years. The stipend was originally
sufficient to pay the expenses of a woman resident in the College,
though a small amount of lecturing or tuition was held to be compatible
with the duties of the fellow.[10] The first Newnham students to hold
a research fellowship were Miss J. E. Harrison and Miss G. L. Elles
(1900). The former had already acquired celebrity by her archaeological
works--especially her _Myths and Monuments of Ancient Athens_--and had
been invited to occupy rooms in Newnham, where she speedily created a
keen interest among students and many of the Staff, first in classical
archaeology and later in anthropology. Miss Elles is well known as a
geologist, and had already been teaching at the Sedgwick Museum under
Professor Hughes.
[Footnote 10: But owing to the depreciation of money these stipends
have become inadequate, and unless the endowment can be increased the
number of research fellows will have to be diminished.]
With the research fellowships it has been possible to retain at Newnham
advanced students whose researches have made a solid contribution to
knowledge. Though it may seem invidious to make a selection, mention
may be made of the researches of Miss E. R. Saunders (partly in
co-operation with Mr. Bateson) into the laws of Variation; the study
of floral pigments by Miss Wheldale (Mrs. Onslow); that of animal
psychology by Miss E. M. Smith (Mrs. Bartlett); and in widely different
fields, Miss Maud Sellers' valuable work in rescuing and making public
the records of the Merchant Adventurers of York; that of Miss Paues, in
unearthing a Middle-English Bible; Mrs. Temperley's (_née_ Bradford)
studies in Tudor Proclamations and other legal antiquities; and, not
least, the wide range of Miss Mary Bateson's work in Mediaeval History,
chiefly monastic and municipal.
Mary Bateson was so much the prime mover in the development of Newnham
work for the advancement of learning, and some of the teachers who
stimulated and directed her efforts were so evidently epoch-making in
the lives of Newnham students; also her tragically sudden death in
1906 cut short such a remarkably promising career and evoked so much
sympathy with Newnham throughout the University, that a few more words
may be devoted to keeping her memory fresh. Her father (Master of St.
John's College) and her mother--much distinguished in her zealous
efforts for the betterment of women--were old friends of Miss Clough
and the College; her elder brother, Mr. William Bateson, is well known
for his remarkable work on heredity. Mary Bateson began independent
research in the Monastic Civilisation of the Fens, even before she took
the Historical tripos, in which she naturally obtained a good first
class. Her literary activity in the production of articles for learned
periodicals, and later very substantial books, was immense. At the
same time, her zeal in the cause of her own College never faltered.
For many years she was ready to do what teaching was offered to her
on her own lines, and she did it exceedingly well. But her great
task in the College was to produce a noble discontent. She cared far
less that the students should take good places in their examinations
than that they should come to understand what sound learning really
means, and should share her own delight in the search for undiscovered
truth. Broad in her sympathies with all honest workers, genial in her
manners, remarkably constant and helpful in her friendships, and withal
scholarly to the backbone in her tastes and ambitions, she stands out
as one of the leading figures of our College. Two main influences
determined her course: first, that of Professor Creighton, afterwards
Bishop of Peterborough and subsequently Bishop of London, who came to
Cambridge in 1885, and began a new departure in History of the kind
that appealed to Mary Bateson's mind and character. She became attached
to his family, and he inspired her with the ambition which he felt
for himself when he prescribed for his epitaph the words, "He tried to
write true history." After Dr. Creighton's departure from Cambridge,
the teacher from whom she derived most inspiration and with whom she
sometimes collaborated was the distinguished writer, Professor F.
W. Maitland--also a most effective teacher and helper of historical
students at Newnham and in the University generally. Miss Bateson's
researches into _Borough Customs_, as well as her previous volumes on
the _Records of the History of Leicester_, earned her an honourable
place among standard historians of mediaeval institutions, while her
small book on _Mediaeval England_, and her admirable account of the
"Colonization of Canada" in the seventh volume of the _Cambridge Modern
History_, may always be recommended confidently to the general reader.
Mary Bateson was deeply interested in politics and a strong advocate
for women's suffrage, on behalf of which, in a deputation to the then
Prime Minister (Sir H. Campbell-Bannerman), she made an exceedingly
able and trenchant speech. But she cared far more that women should
progress in knowledge and capacity than in political power. The great
esteem in which she had been held was shown in the large attendance of
University men and former students at the funeral service in St, John's
Chapel, and in the readiness with which the proposal was received, at
a meeting in St. John's in the following May, of a memorial to her in
Cambridge, which took the appropriate form of an additional Research
Fellowship. This fellowship bears her name, and is generally--_ceteris
paribus_--given to a former student engaged in some branch of
historical research.
An earlier loss--happily not so permanent--was sustained in 1896 when
Miss Gladstone, owing to the rapidly declining health of her father,
felt bound to resign her College post for family duties. Miss Gladstone
had not only, as already shown, become a most valuable element in the
life of the College by her geniality and devotion to the duties she had
undertaken. She also, in the eyes of the world, raised the reputation
of the College, since an institution must be of _some_ significance
if the daughter of one of the most eminent men in the country, having
access to the most brilliant and interesting society, thought it
worth while to give up--for most of the year--the delights of such
an attractive home for the service of a College for women.[11] Miss
Gladstone had of late been not only Vice-Principal (Tutor) in Sidgwick
Hall, but Secretary to the Education Committee, a position which
brought her into constant communication with most of the resident
lecturers. In a sense, the loss could not be entirely repaired, though
Miss Stephen succeeded her as head of Sidgwick Hall. Miss Stephen had
originally come to Newnham as Secretary to Miss Gladstone, and had
become very popular with the students, especially in helping in their
political debates. She had also, as we have already said, the charge
of the Library, in which she seemed to know the exact place of every
important book. As she was a daughter of Sir James Fitzjames Stephen,
the distinguished judge, and a niece of Leslie Stephen (who was induced
more than once to come and give a delightful lecture to the students),
she helped to continue the traditions of public and intellectual
eminence which the students have always found in the records of their
benefactors. In memory of Miss Gladstone's vice-principalship, the
students raised money to build an annexe to the dining hall of Sidgwick
Hall which, since the opening of a new wing in 1884, had proved
insufficient for peace and comfort. Another and important addition to
the College was the block named after others of the founders, Kennedy
Buildings. Now that there were resident fellows and several research
students, it was desirable that in some part of the College buildings
there should be suites of two rooms, allowing more accommodation for
books and more opportunities for entertaining than could be easily had
in any of the three Halls. In 1899, through the remarkable generosity
of several friends, the freehold of the land on which the College
stands was bought.
[Footnote 11: Mr. Gladstone twice visited his daughter in Newnham
College: once while he was out of office but intensely popular--on
which occasion he was entertained at a genuine students' tea-party; the
second time when she was Vice-Principal in Sidgwick Hall.]
But meantime, during a period of prosperity, Newnham had to experience
its first serious set-back, a set-back only paralleled in the week
during which these lines are being written: the Senate of the
University of Cambridge refused a petition to grant to Girton and
Newnham students who had been successful in the triposes the title of
degrees.
The movement had mainly arisen in 1897 to meet a difficulty springing
from the inability of the world to understand that a certificate
stating that a woman had attained the standard required for a degree
in honours is really as good a guarantee of attainments as the letters
B.A. to which every poll man is entitled. The handicapping was
serious. At the same time, more definite status was earnestly desired.
The first suggestion of a granting of degrees was at once dropped.
Various compromises were made by friends and opponents: in those of
the former there was the suggestion of a titular B.A. and a real M.A.
for women--too moderate and well reasoned to find many supporters.
Another--widely taken up, but naturally unacceptable to all who were
intimately and sympathetically concerned with higher education for
women--was of a degree-granting University for women only, called in
advance "The Queen's University," and styled by Professor Maitland
in a brilliant speech on the other side as "Bletchley Junction
Academy." This would have been even less of a real University than
the original non-teaching University of London, since that at least
had programmes of study and fixed standards, whereas the new one was
to accept the standards of existing Universities. It is not certain,
however, whether this impracticable scheme ever came into anything like
definite form.
[Illustration: NEWNHAM COLLEGE, 1920--GENERAL VIEW.]
The Grace finally proposed by the second Syndicate appointed for the
purpose was as follows:
"The University shall have power to grant by Diploma, Titles of
Degrees in Arts, Law, Science, Letters, and Music to women who, either
before or after the confirmation of this Statute, have fulfilled the
conditions which shall be required of them for this purpose by the
Ordinances of the University, and also shall have power to grant by
diploma the same titles _honoris causa_ to women who have not fulfilled
the ordinary conditions, but have been recommended for such Titles by
the Council of the Senate: provided always that a title granted under
this section shall not involve membership of the University."
It was seen by many opponents and by some supporters that this Grace,
if passed, would not have been a final settlement. But it would have
removed an undoubted grievance. And in course of time, when the world
had become accustomed to women vigorously and successfully engaged
in the administration of colonial and provincial universities, full
membership might have come in later without much controversy. The
most striking speeches on the women's side were made by the late
master of Trinity (Dr. Butler), Professor Maitland, Mr. (afterwards
Professor) Bateson, and Professor Sidgwick. The speeches on the other
side generally insisted, without much relevance, on the limitations of
the female mind and the female physique, the impossibility of women's
desire for University life and learning existing apart from a wish
to copy and rival the other sex, and the like.[12] What the mind of
Newnham, at its best, thought on the matter is ably expressed in a
flysheet written by our Secretary, Miss Marion Kennedy, on the eve
of the voting. I quote the later portion: "One appeal I should like
to make to those whom we still regard as our friends, though for the
moment they are opposed to us. It is that they may not be led to think
that a separate University for women can be the true solution of the
difficulty.
[Footnote 12: For the recommendations of the Syndicate and the chief
speeches see _Cambridge University Reporter_ for March 1st, 1897, and
for March 26th, 1897.]
"Can we imagine what the position of such an institution would really
be? If it were merely a body for conferring degrees without holding
examinations, its degrees must be given alike on the examinations
of Cambridge, Oxford, and Durham; all the other Universities having
opened their degrees. For the two latter I cannot judge, but I venture
to ask any Cambridge man if he would care to bear a title which was
given indiscriminately on the examination of his own University and on
those of Oxford and Durham.[13]... If, on the other hand, a Women's
University held its own examinations, its standard could not possibly
command the same respect as those of the older universities, nor could
it give the inspiration which comes only of ancient tradition. As the
Master of Trinity so well put it in his speech in the Senate House,
generation after generation must be trained before any such comparison
could be possible, and I fear the time must be measured not only by
generations but by centuries. I think there is no doubt that if an
attempt was made to found a Women's University, disappointment would
be in store for any who would expect it to lay down a separate course
or courses of study adapted to the supposed requirements of women.
It would on the contrary be driven to follow the lines of the old
University course even more closely than women are now required to do,
as the only chance of giving its degrees any practical value. This
leads to another point on which I think that a few of our opponents
have not treated us quite fairly. It has been said that women wish to
take the Cambridge course merely because they aim at imitating men.
Surely this assumption is hardly justified by the facts. May it not be
believed that women honestly seek to share what long experience has
decided to be the best training for the mind?
[Footnote 13: Of course now that Oxford and Durham admit women to
degrees this argument cannot be transferred to the present crisis.
(Dec. 1920.)]
"It seems to me we are far more likely to allow fair play to whatever
mental differences exist between men and women by giving them
impartially the best training and affording them every opportunity to
develop their separate powers afterwards, than if we falsify the result
through a diversity of training which must tend to obscure natural
differences by overlaying them with artificial ones. I am well aware,
however, that when all is said, differences of opinion will remain, and
I only wish to express, once more, a hope that difference of opinion
need not become intolerance; that however this question is settled,
we shall all be true to the noble and hitherto unbroken traditions of
Cambridge that by-gones are by-gones, and that the morrow of a conflict
here always finds victors and vanquished ready to join hands without
any lessening of mutual regard and respect. Nothing would grieve me
more than to have had any share in so carrying on the discussion as to
render this more difficult. MARION GRACE KENNEDY."
But for the time the voice of "sweet reasonableness" was drowned in
angry clamour. Some opponents of the College used their influence with
the undergraduates, and especially the athletic element. Ridiculous
stories were set about that the women intended to press on to admission
into the Colleges. Aged and often very worthy men who had long been
out of touch with the University but retained the right to vote in
its proceedings flocked up to "save the University" from the dreaded
feminine invasion. Friends of Newnham and Girton mustered likewise, but
the result was obvious from the beginning. The motion was defeated by
1713 to 662.
The set-back was felt severely, not so much by reason of the
weight of the adverse vote, as because of the hostility that had
unexpectedly come to the surface, and the unmannerly way in which,
led by undergraduates' love of a "rag," it was manifested. Happily,
the feelings described by Miss Kennedy were still characteristic of
Cambridge, except in its worse moments. Next term, when the Newnham
authorities came to discuss the wisdom of asking lecturers who had
taken the opposite part to continue their permission to women pupils,
it was found that some at least would have been indignant if not asked
to do so.
One good result of the unfortunate conflict was that it brought the
two women's Colleges, Newnham and Girton, nearer together. There
was generosity in the yielding by Miss Davies, Dr. Cunningham, and
other notable supporters of Girton, of points which their Colleges
had generally held with some tenacity. Newnham and Girton worked
hand-in-hand during the conflict and in the steps by which the mischief
done was gradually repaired.
Happily, since the generations of undergraduates and women students are
short-lived, the episode became to many as if it had never been. This,
however, was impossible in the case of the members of the resident
staffs. It made, or should have made, each of them "a sadder and a
wiser man" in future dealings with the University.
Before long Newnham had to suffer a greater loss, by the death of
its protagonist in this and many other conflicts, as well as its
ever-generous benefactor and friend: Professor Henry Sidgwick.
Something has already been said both as to what he did and what he
resigned for the good of the College, and yet more might be dwelt
on as to the importance to students and staff of having him amongst
them. Even those who were unable to appreciate the character of his
mind, felt that he possessed a distinction they had known, if at all,
in very few others. To those who attended his lectures, read his
books, or listened to his talk, he was felt to excel all others in
absolute devotion to truth and duty, in breadth of view, in moral and
intellectual patience and forbearance, while this lofty character was
always consistent with a keen sense of humour, and a human interest in
all his surroundings. He had led an active life, though always liable
to be troubled with insomnia. In May 1900, his doctor discovered an
internal complaint which required an early operation. The operation
was supposed to be successful, and after a short time he was able to
go for drives and to enjoy the society of friends. But he was never
deceived as to the nearness of the end, which came when he was staying
with his brother-in-law, Lord Rayleigh, on August 28th, 1900. As it
was mid vacation there was no funeral service in Trinity or elsewhere
in Cambridge, but one attended by the family and a few friends in the
church at Terling, in which churchyard he was buried.
It is, as already said, possible for all students to realize at once
the benefits which the College owes to Sidgwick, and the greatness of
his mind and character, by reading the life written by his wife and
his brother Arthur. Very soon after the funeral Mrs. Sidgwick returned
to Newnham, and the members of the Staff still in residence realized
that this terrible loss to her did not involve the loss of her to the
College, but that she would be to it at least all that she had been
before.
A meeting was held soon after to decide how Professor Sidgwick should
be commemorated in Cambridge. A University lectureship was founded
with the proceeds of a general appeal, and a contribution to this was
made from a special fund contributed by former students of Newnham;
this fund also provided for an annual Sidgwick Memorial Lecture at the
College. The lecturer has in each case been appointed by Mrs. Sidgwick,
and has generally so far been some man personally known to Dr. Sidgwick
or interested in some of his own lines of thought. The first lecture
was given by Professor (now Lord) Bryce in November 1902. His subject
was "Philosophic Life among the Ancients," and many hearers felt--as
did the lecturer himself--that the kind of life he was portraying
had in no person been better exemplified than in Sidgwick himself. A
visitor to Newnham afterwards, standing in the middle of the garden,
quoted as appropriate to him the epitaph of Wren in St Paul's: _Si
monumentum requiris, circumspice_. But even that monument would be
insufficient for those who had known something of his mind and profited
by his labours.
CHAPTER V
PROGRESS, 1900-1914
The years which elapsed between the death of Professor Sidgwick and
the retirement of Mrs. Sidgwick from the principalship at the end
of 1910 were marked by progress on various lines. The increase of
demand for accommodation led to the building of a new Hall, with
connecting passages, at right angles to Clough Hall and Kennedy
Buildings, and facing the Grange Road. This is on much the same
plan as the other Halls, with some very pleasant common rooms, and
accommodation for another Vice-Principal (Tutor) and two lecturers,
besides about fifty-six students. The central kitchen, which--as
already stated--helped greatly to simplify and otherwise improve the
domestic arrangements, dates from the same time. Peile Hall was named
after Dr. and Mrs. Peile, whose portraits hang in the dining-hall.
Dr. Peile died on the very day on which the Hall was opened. It would
be difficult to exaggerate the value of the service rendered to the
College by Dr. Peile from its first beginnings till the day of his
death. He was constant in attending the Council, and was President for
many years. His wisdom in giving advice in difficulties was equalled by
his courage in defending the College in aspersions and attacks. He had
been an intimate friend of Professor Sidgwick and an eager promoter of
University reform. Mrs. Peile was intensely interested in everything
connected with the College till the loss of her eyesight and her
enfeebled health withdrew her from her former activities.
Another external addition to the College is the sunk garden, with
fountain, in the lawn immediately opposite the Memorial Gates. It was
paid for as part of the memorial above mentioned by subscriptions of
students past and present, and the stone margin has for legend: "The
daughters of this house to those that shall come after commend the
filial remembrance of Henry Sidgwick."
No further steps towards a request for degrees was made for many years
after the rebuff in 1897, but in the spring of 1904 a recognition of
the status of Tripos students came from an unexpected quarter--the
University of Dublin. There had been a party favourable to women
graduates in Dublin, and the Royal University of Ireland already
granted degrees to those women who had passed its examinations, among
whom were the students of Alexandra College, the head of which had
herself been a Newnham student. After the death of a very highly
respected but also very conservative Provost the authorities of
Trinity College admitted women to their degrees, and at the same time
offered an _ad eundem_ degree to all women who had passed examinations
qualifying for a degree at Oxford or Cambridge. Trinity College already
granted the _ad eundem_ degree to graduates of Oxford and Cambridge,
and this new step amounted to the recognition of the Tripos certificate
granted to women at Cambridge as the equivalent of a degree. The
result was perhaps surprising to its originators, but not to those
who really understood one of the reasons why women students at Oxford
and Cambridge had asked for degrees. Numbers of young women trooped
over as soon as possible after the results of their tripos were known,
to take the B.A. degree. Many others who if degrees at Cambridge had
been open to them would have been of M.A. standing took B.A. and
M.A. both at Dublin. A few, whose literary or scientific work had
made them worthy of a doctorate, were admitted to the higher degree.
The Dublin officials were apparently somewhat surprised and puzzled.
They generously applied most of the money raised by fees to the
establishment of a Hall of residence for women students in Dublin.
This privilege was open to Oxford and Cambridge women for a few years
only, since the object which the authorities of Trinity College,
Dublin, had in view was to provide for those women who had begun or
completed their courses elsewhere and could therefore not make use of
the opportunities which the College now offered to women. One great
advantage, however, had been derived by the general cause from the
temporary grant of Dublin: it had been made clear that the degree of a
respected University was, for women, really worth having. Busy women of
moderate means do not take long journeys and pay considerable fees (£10
for the B.A. and £20 for the M.A.) for a merely fanciful advantage.
Nor would the City Companies, which had granted certain scholarships
to Newnham students, have been willing to pay, as they did, the fees
for their scholars' Dublin degrees unless they felt sure that these
would be to such scholars' advantage. A good many head mistresses felt
it an advantage to be able to wear gown and hood, especially when some
of their assistants could already wear the academic dress of London or
of a Scotch or Welsh University. London did not grant its degrees to
Cambridge women without some further test, though it admitted those
who had taken Triposes to send in theses for a research M.A. degree
without the actual B.A. degree required in men students. The only women
who might have taken the Dublin degree, and had not much reason or
inclination to do so, were members of the Newnham Staff, whose
position was well understood by those around them. If, however, they
migrated during the time that the Dublin _ad eundem_ was open to them,
they sometimes found it desirable to take it.
[Illustration: MISS KATHARINE STEPHEN.]
Mrs. Sidgwick's principalship came to an end in December 1910. Though
Staff and students very deeply deplored her withdrawal, it was felt
that she was more than entitled to more leisure for scientific
pursuits, family enjoyments, and greater liberty generally. She was not
lost altogether to Newnham, since she retained for several years the
post of Treasurer (afterwards called _Bursar_), and after Dr. Peile's
death she consented to become President of the Newnham College Council.
The principalship was offered to Miss Katharine Stephen, who accepted
it and held it for nearly ten years. Mrs. Sidgwick moved into a house
separated from Peile Hall by the Grange Road only, and thus was easily
in touch with College affairs.
One more improvement--and a very important one--was made before Mrs.
Sidgwick's retirement: the determination of a fixed age for retirement
for the Staff and of a pension to follow. The salaries of all the
lecturers were raised and standardized. In the early days the pay had
been low, even according to the standard of that time, simply because
Newnham had not the funds at its disposal that better endowed Colleges
possessed. Still, as we have seen, a great deal had been done for
the promotion of learning and research, and some of the lecturers had
from time to time benefited by the endowments for this purpose. But by
the arrangements which came into force in 1910 the whole status and
earnings of the Staff were revised, and a contributory pension scheme
initiated, with a liberal provision for making the advantages of the
scheme retrospective in the case of lecturers of some years' standing.
Shortly after these reforms, others on a larger scale were projected,
and in a few years successfully accomplished. It was considered by
some past students that the Constitution of the College, though it had
worked well, was more fitted for the infancy of such an institution
than for its adult life. The subject was naturally one taken up and
discussed by the Associates at their annual meeting. Some Associates
who were connected with one or other of the provincial Universities
were anxious to introduce changes which would more or less assimilate
Newnham to such Universities. Others held that whatever changes were
made ought to be rather on a College than a University plan, and that
the wisest course would be to make Newnham, in general government
and arrangements, sufficiently like the Cambridge Colleges for it
to be able, if ever the happy day arose of its full recognition by
the University, to fall into line and take its place with the other
Colleges. The Associates chose a committee from among themselves
to draft a scheme, and to them were joined representatives of the
Council, including experienced members of the University, who gave
invaluable help, and the results they came to were successful in
meeting with a unanimous acceptance. The models chosen were chiefly
the smaller Colleges, but none were followed slavishly, and the scheme
when it emerged was found acceptable to the whole body of Associates.
The Council on this, as on similar occasions, was not above taking
suggestions from the past students and working on the lines thrown out.
The result was a petition for a Charter which, with the Statutes of the
College, became operative in the year 1917.
The main object of the Charter was to constitute "one body politic
and corporate by the name and style of 'the Principal and Fellows of
Newnham College'" with perpetual succession, a common seal, power to
sue and be sued in court, to hold and dispose of property and the like.
Its chief objects were defined as: "(_b_) to establish and maintain
at or near Cambridge a house or residence or houses or residences in
which female students may reside and study; (_c_) to provide a liberal
education for women by carrying on the work of the old Association with
such modifications as may from time to time appear desirable either in
its present situation or elsewhere in the town of Cambridge or County
of Cambridge; (_f_) to do all such other things as are incidental or
conducive to advancing education and learning among women in Cambridge
and elsewhere."
One point with regard to the new Charter and Statutes requires notice,
viz. the use of the name Fellow as applied to a member of "the one body
politic and corporate." Hitherto the title of Fellow had been attached
to the endowment for research for which funds had been collected as
already mentioned. The word Fellow in the Cambridge Colleges had always
connoted membership of a corporate body, but as Fellows of Colleges
were in general chosen for academic eminence or promise the name was
associated with the expectation of services in the advancement of
learning and research. This association with the title had influenced
the first champions of research for women, and in addition they desired
that these endowments should be used by women of high standing and
proved capacity in the sphere of learning to whom the status of Fellow
rather than that of Research Student was due.
But when under the new Charter the constitution of Newnham was to some
extent assimilated to those of the older Colleges, it seemed desirable
that members of the new Governing Body should have the name which in
Cambridge is associated with these functions. Therefore the name
Fellow was given to members of the Governing Body, and that of Research
Fellow to those who hold one of the special endowments for research. By
the provisions of the Charter some of the Research Fellows must always
be members of the Governing Body and therefore also Fellows.
To return to the government of the College as revised and established
by the Charter:
The ultimate authority in the affairs of the College is the Governing
Body. This comprises all full members of the Staff, a fixed number
of Research Fellows chosen by the Governing Body; representatives of
the Associates,[14] and certain "Founders and Benefactors" living at
the date of the Charter. The Council is a smaller body, and comprises
besides the Principal, the Vice-Principal, the Bursar, and one of the
Tutors, three members of the Senate of the University, elected by the
Governing Body, seven additional members of the Governing Body, and
three Founders and Benefactors alive in 1917.
[Footnote 14: See p. 91.]
Several points in the Charter will attract the attention of any
student of former times who may be reading this history. The changes
in nomenclature are, at first sight, puzzling. The use of the term
_Fellow_ has, as the most important, already been dwelt upon: that of
_Tutor_ as supplanting _Vice-Principal_ has also been noticed. There
is now but _one_ Vice-Principal, the numerous and important duties
associated with the former vice-principalship being discharged by the
Tutors superintending each Hall respectively. The Vice-Principal has
now the functions properly assigned to the title, since she is bound to
take the place of the Principal on necessary occasions, and especially
to be in residence in the College when the Principal is absent (except
in vacations). The term _Bursar_ replaces that of _Treasurer_.
There is something of the nature of representative government in the
election of Associate members on the Governing Body. The general
body of past students has recognition in that the Statutes provide
for the maintenance of a Newnham College Roll. The compiling and
keeping up of this Roll has involved considerable labour on the part
of the first registrar chosen to that office, Miss Edith Sharpley. It
has, as already said, succeeded to the "Newnham College Club," but
has recognised status. It now numbers a large proportion of former
students, and the College may confidently look to them to further its
interests and usefulness in all parts of the world.
Like the other Colleges, Newnham now has a Visitor, and the first
Visitors have been two successive Chancellors of the University of
Cambridge, Lord Rayleigh and the Rt. Hon. A. J. Balfour, respectively
brother-in-law and brother of Mrs. Sidgwick.
Another feature in the new Constitution that will strike past students
is the smaller proportion than formerly of members of the University
compared to the Newnham College officials. It must not, however, be
for a moment supposed that the College is not and will not continue to
be in many ways dependent on the changes and general progress of the
University. It will still be practically unable to take any important
steps without the advice of some members of the University who are
friendly to the College and its Staff. There will always be members of
the Senate on the Council of Newnham College, and for some years, it
is hoped, on the Governing Body. But beyond actual membership in any
body concerned in the government of the College, Newnham must always
hope to retain and even to increase the number of Cambridge dons and
teachers interested both in its students, who may be their pupils, and
in its lecturers, whom they regard as colleagues. In considerations of
this kind, law can only create and maintain possible relations. The
actual relations will, we trust, become modified as time goes on, and
this, even in spite of temporary drawbacks, in the direction of closer
co-operation and mutual respect between the men's and the women's
Colleges in work and in other helpful intercourse.
From some provisions in the Charter, and from the general progress
which has been traced, it must appear that the body of residents of
graduate standing in Newnham, including administrative officials,
lecturers, and Research Students and Fellows, had for years been
growing in importance and developing a corporate life. Junior to
the Staff and Research Fellows, but of post-graduate standing, are
those who hold the two or three research studentships which have been
mentioned, and of late years others who have completed the degree
courses have been enabled to stay on in Cambridge and carry on work in
the laboratories by grants from the Medical Research Council and the
Industrial Research Board. Of late, too, students with degrees from
overseas and from other British Universities have come to Cambridge
in increasing numbers to work for the recently established Research
Certificates of the University. These students, with their wider
interests and experience doing specialized advanced work in various
subjects literary and scientific, some of them resident in the College,
others living outside but connected with it, add a valuable element and
form a link between the generations.
Old students are encouraged to come up to read in the Long Vacation,
and thus keep up their old friendships and renew their old interests.
Sometimes, it is true, Newnham is almost too full, with visitors from
outside, to afford the peaceful time for uninterrupted and independent
work characteristic of the "Longs" of former days. Yet the visits of
distant friends is often stimulating as well as pleasant. Almost every
other year, since the University Extension Summer Meetings began--we
may almost say at Newnham's initiative[15]--some of the students have
been accommodated in Newnham. This is true, too, of the Vacation Terms
for Biblical Study; since those were inaugurated by Mrs. Sidgwick's
niece, Miss Margaret Benson, and intended chiefly as a help to school
teachers, the promoters naturally looked to Newnham for hospitality,
and many old students attend the courses. Learned societies of
mathematicians, historians and others have often come to England
from all over the world, and Newnham has been glad to entertain both
learned ladies and the wives of learned men staying in the Colleges.
Another kind of gathering may be mentioned, as somewhat original in
idea and very useful in practice. Several of the students of Natural
Science who, after taking their Tripos, had gone to teach in schools,
complained of the scarcity and inferiority of the apparatus at their
disposal. The lecturer in Chemical Science, Miss Ida Freund, arranged
that a company of them should come to Cambridge for a part of the Long
Vacation to learn how to construct the simpler kind of instruments for
themselves. The result was very satisfactory, and the teachers learned
not only how to make the best of the conditions under which they might
have to teach, but also how to keep abreast of the progress of the
Natural Sciences and of the methods of teaching them. It seemed natural
that on Miss Freund's lamented death in 1914 the Memorial to her
should take the form of a brief course of lectures by an experienced
teacher on the teaching of Physics. The summer meetings, at which these
lectures were delivered, helped to keep teachers from falling behind
in the general progress of knowledge and also to guide them in the
practical work of education.
[Footnote 15: See p. 71.]
One very large part of the story of Newnham has been as yet little
or incidentally treated in this history; the development of student
life and interests. At the beginning that was practically the whole
life of the community: there were no dons, and the Principal (without
losing separate and family interests) merged her life in that of the
young people who were under her care. Things were bound to develop in
both expected and unexpected ways. As more and more students came to
College, variety increased, and at the same time College was likely
to become more like a continuation of school. It would perhaps be
impossible to trace quite accurately any particular tone or character
or even standard of ability rising and falling in the annals of the
Newnham students. At first, as already suggested, there was sure to
be something of originality and enterprise. Girls were never sent to
College as a matter of course, and in many cases they had had hard work
in persuading their parents to let them come even for a slight taste
of College life. Certainly some came for a short spell and remained
for many years, though the fact of coming up without any definite
intentions often worked havoc with chances of academic success. There
were generally cultivated adult women grappling with subjects which
they ought to have mastered in childhood; and also very young students
striving after knowledge of a kind beyond their present reach. Possibly
these aberrations made student life more interesting. But they could
not fail to be diminished--though not even now eliminated--with the
growth of a more uniform standard in the curriculum of girls' schools.
The oldest student society was the Debating Society. It is said to have
had its first meetings under the medlar tree in Merton Hall garden. Its
rules were reduced to writing in the late seventies, though subjected
later to much revision. Its history--like all histories--would, if
written, show great fluctuations in energy, popularity, and capacity.
In the early days there was quite enough earnestness and desire to
convince the world--the Newnham world that is--of the truth or falsity
of certain propositions, political, moral or social. I believe that the
good rule against reading speeches was generally adhered to, but it
was sometimes avoided by the speech having been learned by heart, and
having thereby lost spontaneity without acquiring the possible merits
of a careful essay. The early generations of students were very kind
and tolerant to wearisome speakers, though the time rule was strictly
adhered to. The fatal fault of most debating societies--the desire to
be humorous rather than convincing--threatened at times to destroy
both qualities. But from time to time, capable speakers who really had
something to say arose to retrieve the character of the Society. In
1884 it suffered somewhat by the creation of another society, which
became almost co-extensive with the College, for discussing political
questions. The original Debating Society did not preclude itself from
politics, but it naturally left them to the other society, and was
apt to descend to what was somewhat trivial or else took refuge in
the paradoxical. Its temporary declines, however, were, as just said,
generally followed by reinvigoration. Meantime the Political Debating
Society, which met weekly (for the space of one hour only), kept up a
very lively interest in public affairs, and also gave more practice
in ready impromptu speaking than was possible in the general College
debates. It adopted all the forms of an imitation House of Commons,
with Speaker, Government, Opposition, and the like. Some older critics
were only in part sympathetic, considering that the association of
public interests with party disputes was detrimental to the formation
of unprejudiced opinions. On the whole, however, the great advantage
was secured of keeping a large number of students _au fait_ with the
chief political questions of the day. Additional instructiveness and
liveliness were imparted by the fact that students whose fathers or
friends were in Parliament occasionally "coached them up" in arguments
and prognostications. The society became slack after many years, owing,
I think, to the excessive burden thrown on a few students who were
responsible for preparing the weekly business, and was reorganized with
the forms of an ordinary debating society. It was suspended during the
War, but revived--as society, not as amateur parliament--after the
Armistice. It has since resumed the parliamentary form.
Besides the debating societies, each subject or group of subjects has
for many years had its meetings for reading and discussing papers
on Classical, Scientific, Historical, and many other subjects. Not
infrequently some distinguished man or woman from outside has been
invited to deliver a lecture.
The Choral Society began in the earlier days of Newnham, and long
enjoyed the devoted and very able direction of Dr. Mann, Organist of
King's College, and gave very successful concerts. The display of
musical talent in the College is anything but uniform. One year we had
a good orchestra of stringed instruments, and the same may occur again
from time to time. Meanwhile, a musical society, started in a much
humbler way by an industrious student who was desirous of "keeping up
her practice" and inducing fellow students to do the same and be ready
to play some piece to one another on Saturdays, has developed into
a considerable College club called after its foundress, The Raleigh
Musical Society. A good many students, too, have been members of the
Cambridge University Musical Society.
Astronomical interests have been cultivated in non-mathematical
students since the valuable gift of a telescope and small observatory
by Mrs. Boreham (daughter-in-law of the astronomer) in 1891. It was at
first placed on a mound to the south of Clough Hall, but when the view
from it was obstructed by the building of Peile Hall it was removed
to an open space at the far end of the College grounds. It was placed
under the curatorship of a mathematical scholar who had not only been
a high wrangler, but had had the advantage of having been brought up
in an astronomical atmosphere, Miss E. A. Stoney. Students with no
knowledge of astronomy were invited on certain evenings to see Saturn's
rings and Jupiter's moons. Their interest was attracted even to things
of the heavens which are visible to the naked eye. There was an
enthusiasm for "learning the constellations," instruction being given
by the expert to the ignorant. One night, when one of the mathematical
lecturers informed the students that the phenomenon was about to take
place described as "the Moon swallowing Jupiter," a large number of
students assembled on the lawn to watch the event. Happily it occurred
about 9 p.m. on a clear night. The act of swallowing was greeted by a
cheer--though whether the object cheered was Jupiter, the Moon, or the
lecturer who had given warning was not very clear. This little event is
mentioned as one of the many cases in which the common life of students
engaged in heterogeneous subjects has advantages of an educational as
well as of a social kind.
We have already mentioned the lectures on Literature which were at one
time given by first-rate men of letters to students of all faculties
four or five times a year. Attendance at them was never compulsory, but
the interest of the subject and distinction of the lecturer attracted
many, and this continued to be the case with the Sidgwick Memorial
Lecture. A student of natural science has expressed her deep debt to
the attraction to good literature which these lectures afforded.
Latterly the lectures given by holders of the new professorship of
English (Dr. Verrall and Sir A. Quiller Couch), which are open to other
than special students of the subject, amply provided for the objects
aimed at in the earlier Newnham lectures.
Naturally the societies or clubs that loom largest in the life of
present and the memories of past students are those connected with
games. Hockey, as already said, was started by the first Principal
herself, and it has remained for a long time one of the most prominent
of the games societies. The several Halls have their teams, and play
against one another; the College team plays against Girton and more
distant colleges and schools as well as other clubs; also matches are
played between past and present students. Fives is provided for by good
courts. Cricket is played in the summer term. Tennis had been with us
from the beginning of Lawn Tennis itself, and ash courts made the game
possible all the year round. Lacrosse was introduced a good deal later.
The introduction of bicycling during the middle nineties furnished a
new mode of exercise and stimulated exploration of the country.
There have been, of course, many smaller societies: Sharp Practice, to
make students ready in debate; boating, which has recently arrived at
having an eight of its own; others of names incomprehensible to any but
the initiated. In connection with the Women's Settlement in Southwark,
there has from its beginning been a society following its progress and
contributing to its funds. The visits of Residents in the Settlement
to explain to the students their work or some branch of it have been
very interesting occasions--especially in the days when Miss Gladstone
was Warden, and came to give a humorous account of her experiences,
professedly to the first-year students, practically to as many of the
students and staff as could crowd into the room.
Although there has not been till lately a formal dramatic society, any
dramatic talent among the students has generally revealed itself fairly
soon. The excuse of some worthy object to be served by threepenny
tickets has been made the occasion of extremely lively impromptu
performances. Especially the gift for melodrama has been displayed with
success and has often caused intense amusement. More serious plays, or
scenes from plays, have been exhibited from time to time, but those
have been most successful which had the least elaborate preparation.
It may be mentioned that Newnham students have taken part in serious
dramatic performances organized by members of the University; as in the
_Comus_, acted on the occasion of the Miltonic Tercentenary.
In other fields there has been collective activity among Newnham
students. There have been various religious societies, in most of which
Newnham students are combined with those of Girton and other Colleges.
In Newnham itself there have been societies for reading and discussing
religious and moral questions on Sunday evenings, the subjects being
sometimes theoretical, sometimes practical. There has been a branch
of a Church Society called "The Society of the Annunciation," which
had corporate Communion with Girton and some religious addresses
in a Cambridge church. But far the largest and most influential
is the _Student Christian Movement_, which has arisen from small
beginnings and now has vigorous branches all over the world. Connected
with this there has always been a collective and particular effort
towards missionary work. A good many Newnham students became Student
Volunteers, and some are doing excellent work abroad, especially in
schools and Colleges of a new type, requiring higher education, and
in medical practice. But the operation of the whole movement is too
well known to need description here. It has branched out into new
departments, and has changed both its qualifications for membership and
its relations to religious bodies at home and abroad, so as to become a
far more potent agency than formerly in all Colleges and among varied
types of student. Some of its leaders are frequently in Cambridge, and
are cordially received at Newnham as well as in the Cambridge Colleges
generally.
With regard to students and the political world. There had been a
Suffrage Society in the College from comparatively early times. It
has already been noticed how there had been among the early promoters
of higher education for women a good many who set great hopes on the
improvement of the position of women as citizens, and especially on
their acquisition of the parliamentary vote. There were, however, among
Staff and students of Newnham, several who felt much disgusted with
the lawlessness and general want of reason and sobriety with which, in
some quarters, the political cause of women was associated. A few, on
the other hand, though not among those in authority, were inclined to
go great lengths against the injustice and levity with which the whole
question was treated by Parliament and by the Government. Those who
desired and believed in the suffrage, but strongly disapproved of the
violent and illegal actions of the extreme wing, took an active part in
the orderly demonstrations organised by the law-abiding section of the
movement. Thus members of the Staff and of the student body walked in
the London processions and took part in the "Pilgrimage" of June 1912.
A very small number of former students carried their principles to the
extreme and suffered in consequence. But the attitude in general of
Newnham in the whole matter was one of decided conviction, combined
with patience and moderation.
Perhaps a few words should be said here as to the changes which were
made, or gradually came about, in the necessary rules for student life
and behaviour. It must always be remembered that fifty years ago, both
unreasoned etiquette and the opinions of reasonable men and women
recognised much severer rules for the general conduct of young women
than are in force to-day; also that in Cambridge, so much a city of
men, the standard of conventional propriety for women was stricter
than in most other places. Miss Clough and her fellow workers in the
early times were sometimes obliged, for the sake of security against
prejudice and gossip, to walk very warily, always, however, avoiding
the imposition of such restraints as would have impeded either good
work or the enjoyment of good health. It has been seen how Miss Clough
herself undertook the sometimes weary duty of chaperoning and minimized
its inconvenience, and in little restrictions of a social kind she
tried to impress on the early students that they were guests of the
University and also pioneers who might by their own behaviour improve
or spoil the chances of more liberty for those who should come after.
As time went on, many rules were relaxed, and those that now have to
be observed are laid down with the utmost care by the authorities,
special regard being paid to the opinions and counsel of those who have
to maintain order and discipline in the University and the Colleges.
The students themselves have never been discouraged from presenting to
the heads of their separate Halls or to the Principal any suggestions
as to possible modifications in domestic arrangement or in general
regulations. Machinery for this purpose has been devised and modified
from time to time. The students in residence choose (since 1911) a
Senior Student, and it is one of her duties to communicate their views
to the authorities. A joint committee of staff and students deliberates
upon proposed alterations. There is also a Hall senior student elected
by each Hall separately. It is generally recognised that great care is
still required in forbidding or sanctioning matters which to a newcomer
seem much more simple than they really are. The past prosperity of the
College has been in very great part due to a good understanding between
governors and governed, and this is still, in a sense, to be regarded
as the sheet anchor of the College in Cambridge. It seems to be
recognised in the Colleges of the University that the only way to avoid
excessive ebullitions of youthful spirit is to enlist on the side of
law and order some popular and leading spirits among the undergraduates
themselves. The same principle applies in women's Colleges, where
the students, as a rule (like public schoolboys), have learned, in
pre-college days, the necessity of rules and regularity. If Newnham
ever becomes a College of the University, the students will, of course,
be subjected to proctorial discipline, but the process would probably
be found not to involve any conspicuous changes in College life.
EPILOGUE
1914 AND AFTER
The outbreak of the Great War marks an epoch in the history of Newnham
as of other institutions at home and abroad. Its experience confirms
also the commonly repeated statement that in many things the results of
the war have proved very different from those anticipated either in the
event of success or of failure. One consequence confidently anticipated
was at least temporary decline. We were bound to suffer restrictions
and something of poverty, for the first item in which the so-called
practical man and woman economize is education. Yet we all see at this
moment that in spite of fiscal difficulties in public and losses in
private affairs, all our schools and colleges are full to overflowing.
Newnham participates in this experience, and is compelled to refuse
promise of admission to many qualified and promising students. The
reasons for this surprising fact are to be found partly in government
policy, partly in economic causes still awaiting elucidation; possibly
also in a genuine belief in education as a good thing for women as for
men.
One danger is to be apprehended: the lack of really well-prepared
students, owing to the comparative scarcity of able University women
who enter the teaching profession. Yet while these words are being
written, the course of events may take an opposite trend. The salaries
of mistresses in schools are raised to an unprecedented height, if
perhaps hardly more than is required to cover increased cost of
living. And the young women who have been serving the country in
administrative work or directing their energies to the land or to
domestic productiveness may, in course of time, find their way back
to the task of teaching, which, after all, has inspired a genuine
enthusiasm in many of our leaders. Early in the War, when some students
were feeling doubts whether patriotic duty might not bid them give up
their academic course for labour of a directly useful kind, the Right
Hon. H. A. L. Fisher gave in Cambridge a convincing address as to the
necessity of keeping up educational and academic work with a view to
the requirements of the future.
Any even slight account of what Newnham students of past days did
during the War would seem to be out of place here in that they did
it as individuals, not as a College.[16] Collectively, however, they
furnished, along with Girton, a hospital unit which did excellent work
in Belgium, France and Serbia, and later in Salonika. This unit was
organized under Scottish management by the Union of Suffrage Societies,
but there was, of course, no political aim in its operations.
[Footnote 16: A list of the various war work of Newnham students in
1914-19 is in process of preparation.]
Past students of Newnham were engaged in War Hospitals in many places.
At the same time some of the most competent Newnham mathematicians
were employed in making calculations to assist in the construction of
aeroplanes. A multitude undertook work in helping soldiers' families,
providing necessaries for hospitals, and housing refugees; while others
went in companies to gather in fruit and do other work on the land. In
London so many were engaged in government offices that a past student
in London in the summer of 1917, meeting College friends at every
turn, would salute each fresh face with: "What department are you in?"
Many took temporary posts in Universities and boys' schools. Those who
remained in Cambridge had much to do in teaching English to Belgians,
Serbians and other refugees, and in visiting wounded soldiers in the
First Eastern and other Hospitals.
The result of all this activity along unexpectedly opened lines cannot
yet be estimated. Certainly proof was given of the efficiency of
educated women in carrying on work that had never been open to them
before. In some regions (_e.g._ that of police work) it has been
agreed upon that even in normal times it is highly desirable that some
women should be employed. The issue must be awaited in patience.
It would, of course, be unworthy of the College to suppose that in
their activities these women were moved by a wish to better their
position and that of their College. Common humanity and genuine
patriotism were at the bottom of their efforts. But doubtless the
capacity and energy which they displayed helped indirectly towards
the grant of the Suffrage. It is a very notable thing that when the
Suffrage came, past students of Newnham and Girton of the qualified
age, who had the "equivalent of a degree," were adjudged capable
of using the parliamentary vote for the University of Cambridge.
Parliament was, however, not so liberal as Dublin had been, as it did
not recognise as "equivalent" the Tripos Certificates given before the
Graces of 1881.
One more change awaited the College at the end of the last academic
year, in the retirement of the Principal, Miss Katharine Stephen,
a loss much deplored, though Miss Stephen retains her seat on the
Council. Her devotion to the work she had undertaken, and the ability
with which she discharged it need no eulogies here. Happily, her place
has been filled by the niece and biographer of the First Principal.
Miss B. A. Clough has not only spent many years within the College
precincts and watched its continuous progress, with occasional
drawbacks, from comparatively early days; she has also been intimately
associated with its pioneers and has acquired an unrivalled knowledge
of the aspirations and the needs of student life. As, in old times, the
rule of a Foundress Abbess seemed sometimes to be best carried on by a
niece who had lived much in her environment, so we may hope good things
in future from the fact that our Principal is in more than name the
honoured successor of Anne Jemima Clough.
[Illustration: MISS B. A. CLOUGH.]
As these chapters were being written, the struggle was again begun
for membership in the University of Cambridge, and--as we know only
too well--the result was a failure, though not so crushing a failure
as the attempt in 1897 when the demands were far more modest. It is
not desirable to dwell on this event, but we hope we may accept the
assurance of many friends that it cannot be long before we obtain what
we are asking. Meanwhile we may console ourselves by thinking that
the Women's Colleges have earned the respect even of opponents, and
that there is no probability of their being deprived of the privileges
which they still enjoy. It would be unwise to pretend indifference to
our defeat. Yet we have full reason to celebrate our Jubilee in joy
and hope. For, after all, the treasure to seek which our pioneers
came to Cambridge fifty years ago, is in our possession and likely to
remain with us permanently. That treasure is Education: the opportunity
of learning from the best teachers; of co-operation with like-minded
learners; the opening up of opportunities of learning more of nature
and of man; fitness for doing whatever tasks the future may offer
to those who seek, like our first benefactors, a life of active and
intelligent service. That was their ideal and it may well continue to
be ours.
INDEX
Adams, Mrs., 13.
Adams, Miss A. M. (Mrs. Corrie Grant), 67, 69.
Albert Victor, Prince, Duke of Clarence, 64.
Aldis, Mrs., of Newcastle, 46.
Alexandra, Princess of Wales (Queen Alexandra), 64.
Archer-Hind, Mr. R. D., 24.
Armitage, Mrs. E. (_née_ Bulley), 25.
Associates of Newnham College, 91.
Association for Promoting the Higher Education of Women in Cambridge,
founded, 13; amalgamated with Newnham Hall Company, 33.
Balfour, Miss Alice, 38.
Balfour, Rt. Hon. A. J., 118.
Balfour, Prof. Francis Maitland (_see_ Laboratories: biological), 38.
Bateson, Mrs. Anna, 13, 14, 24.
Bateson, Miss Mary, 93 _seq._
Bateson, Dr. William, 95, 102.
Bathurst, Hon. Selina, 64, 93.
Bedford College, London, 6.
Birmingham University, 46.
Bonney, Rev. Dr. T. G., 13.
Boreham, Mrs., gives telescope to Newnham, 126.
Bristol University, 46.
Brough, Mrs. (_née_ Lloyd), 69.
Browne, Bishop G. F., Sec. to Syndicate for local lectures, etc., 11,
47.
Bryce, Lord, on North of England Council, 9; first Sidgwick Memorial
Lecture, 108.
Bulley, Miss Amy (Mrs. Brooke), 25.
Bursar, title of, 118.
Butler, Canon Geo., 9.
Butler, Mrs. Josephine, 9.
Butler, Rev. Dr. H. M., Master of Trinity, 102, 103.
Campbell-Bannerman, Sir Henry, 97.
Cayley, Professor A., 14, 47.
Champneys, Mr. Basil, 28, 87.
Chapel, why none in Newnham College, 60 _seq._
Charter of 1917, 115 _seq._
Clay, Mr. C. J., lends room for first lectures to women in Cambridge,
14.
Clough, Miss Anne Jemima, starts Newnham, 2; early education and
experience, 5; helps in work of Northern Council, 13; comes to
Cambridge, 18; her character and ideas, 22 _seq._; removes into
Merton Hall, 26; into Bateman Street, 28; into Newnham Hall, 28;
chaperones to lectures, 40; life in Newnham, 58, 59, 60, 64, 68
_seq._; success of her policy, 55, 76; last illness and death, 81;
funeral service in King's College Chapel, 81; Dr. Ryle's sermon, 82;
portraits, 78; debt of Newnham to her, 83.
Clough, Miss B. A., Fourth Principal of the College, 80, 138.
Clough Hall, Newnham College, 57, 64.
Club, the Newnham College, 67, 118.
College Hall (dining-hall), 63.
Combination Room, 85, 89.
Constitution of the College revised, 114.
Corfe, Miss K., 29.
Creak, Miss Edith, 25.
Creighton, Prof. M. (afterwards Bishop of Peterboro' and later of
London), 96.
Davies, Miss Emily, her aims, 15 _seq._; Head of College at Hitchin
and Girton, 16; working with Newnham for titles of degrees, 106.
Debating Society, 123 _seq._
Debating Society, Political, 124 _seq._
Degrees, titles of, movement for, 100;
defeated, 105.
Discipline, 132.
Dublin University (_see_ Trinity College).
Edward, Prince of Wales (King Edward VII.), 64.
Elementary Education, Newnham's interest in, 69 _seq._
Elles, Miss G. L., 94.
Ewart, Miss M. A., 28.
Extension Students, beginnings in Newnham, 71 _seq._
Fawcett, Prof. Henry, 12, 13.
Fawcett, Mrs. Millicent Garrett, 12, 13, 76.
Fawcett, Miss Philippa, 26, 76 _seq._
Fellow, changes in meaning of term, 116 _seq._
Fisher, Rt. Hon. H. A. L., 136.
Fountain in memory of Henry Sidgwick, 110.
Freund, Miss Ida, 38, 121 _seq._
Games and recreation, 128 _seq._
Gates, Memorial, 86, 87.
Girton College, 16, 46, 48, 51.
Gladstone, Miss Helen, 36 _seq._, 65, 66; retirement, 98.
Governing body, 92, 117.
Graces admitting women to Tripos examinations, 48 _seq._
Greenwood, Miss Marion (Mrs. Bidder), 38.
Gruner, Miss Alice, 74 _seq._
Harrison, Miss J. E., 29, 94.
Hitchin, College at, 16.
Hobson, Dr. E. W., 77.
Hudson, Prof. W. H. H., 24.
Hughes, Miss E. P., 69, 76.
Inter-collegiate lectures opened to women, 15, 40 _seq._
Jackson, Prof. H., 47.
Kennedy, Rev. Prof. B. H., 47.
Kennedy, Miss Marion G., 24, 27; Studentship in memory of, 64, 92;
appeal to the University, 103 _seq._; portrait, 79.
Kennedy Buildings, 99.
Keynes, Dr. J. N., Sec. to Cambridge Local Examinations syndicate, 11.
Kitchen, 63.
Laboratories: biological, 38; chemical, 37.
Larner, Miss F., 25.
Lee, Miss Jane, 65.
Library in the Old Hall, 38 _seq._; in New Hall, 89 _seq._
Little Go--_see_ Previous Examinations.
Local Examinations, 7, 9 _seq._, 11.
Local Lectures in Cambridge, 12.
London University admits women to degrees, 44 _seq._
Macmillan, Miss O. (Mrs. MacLehose), 67.
Maitland, Prof. F. W., 97.
Manchester University, 46.
Markby, Mr., 13.
Marshall, Prof. A., 14, 24.
Marshall, Mrs. A. (_née_ Paley), 19, 29, 74.
Maurice, Rev. Prof. F. D., 6.
Mayor, Rev. Prof. J. E. B., 14, 47.
Mays (Inter-collegiate Examinations), 42.
Merton Hall, 26.
Mill, John Stuart, a benefactor to women's education, 3.
Morant, Sir R. L., Educational Minister in Siam, 80.
More, Mrs. Hannah, advocates educational reform, 5.
Maria Grey Training College, 75.
Myers, F. W. H., on Northern Council, 9.
Newnham College, its beginnings, 1 _seq._; built, 28; Miss Clough
and students move into it, situation, early life, 31 _seq._;
Articles of Association, 33; Growth of buildings, 35 _seq._
Newnham Hall Company formed, 27; Amalgamation of Company with
Association, 33.
Newnham Letter, 67.
North Hall, 35, 37; _see also_ Sidgwick Hall.
North of England Council for Improving the Education of Women, 8.
Ogle, Miss Amy (Mrs. Koppel), 29.
Old Hall, 39, 65; _see also_ South Hall.
Paues, Miss Anna, 95.
Peile, Mrs. Annette, starts correspondence scheme, portrait in Peile
Hall, 11, 109.
Peile, Dr. John, Master of Christ's College, 13, 14, 47, 109.
Peile Hall, 63, 108 _seq._
Pensions to superannuated members of Staff, 118.
Pfeiffer, Mr. and Mrs., 85.
Pfeiffer Building, 37, 85.
Previous Examination (Little Go), 10, 17, 25, 47 _seq._
Queen's College, Harley Street, 6.
Rayleigh, Lord, 118.
Red House, the, 71.
Reid, Prof. J. S., 40.
Roll of the College, 118.
Ryle, Bishop H. E., 82.
Saunders, Miss E. R., 38, 95.
Schools, for girls formed, 6 _seq._
Schools Inquiry Commission, 7.
Scott, Miss C. A., of Girton, 44.
Sellers, Miss Maud, 95.
Senior Student, 133.
Settlement, University, in Southwark, 73 _seq._
Sewell, Miss M. A., 75.
Sharpe, Miss Julia, 67.
Sharpley, Miss E. M., Registrar, 118.
Sharpley, Miss M. M., 78.
Sidgwick, Arthur, collaborates in Life of Henry Sidgwick, 106.
Sidgwick, Prof. Henry, connection with Newnham, 2; on Association, 14;
finds a house for Students, 18; his character and influence, 20
_seq._, 30, 35, 55; in Principal's rooms in Newnham, 84; illness
and death, 106-7; Lectureship founded in his memory, 108, 127.
Sidgwick, Mrs. Henry (_née_ E. M. Balfour), 21; becomes
Vice-Principal, 36, 55; Principal, 84; life in Newnham, 87 _seq._;
portrait, 79; writes life of Prof. Sidgwick, 109; retires from
Principalship, 113; President of Council, 113.
Sidgwick Avenue, 86.
Sidgwick Hall, 39, 65, 99;
_see also_ Old Hall.
Skeat, Rev. Prof. W. W., 14.
Smith, Miss E. M. (Mrs. Bartlett), 95.
Smith, Sydney, a friend to women's education, 4.
Society of London Schoolmistresses, 8.
Societies of students, 66, 123 _seq._
South Hall, 35, 38, 57;
_see also_ Old Hall.
Stephen, Miss Katharine, 70, 79; Vice-Principal, 99; Principal, 113;
retirement, 138.
Stephen, Sir Leslie, lectures on literature, 99.
Stoney, Miss E. A., 127.
Students' rooms, changes in, 58 _seq._
Suffrage, Women's, 3 _seq._, 131 _seq._, 138.
Syndicate (Cambridge) for Local Lectures and Examinations, 11.
Temperley, Mrs. (_née_ Bradford), 95.
Thompson, Mr. and Mrs. Yates, 89.
Training College (Cambridge), 76.
Trinity College, Dublin, grants degrees to qualified Cambridge women
for a few years, 54, 111, 112.
Tripos Examinations--_see_ Graces.
Trotter, Rev. Coutts, 24, 47, 90.
Tutor, change of term, 118.
University Association of Women Teachers started by Miss A. J. Clough,
68.
University Library, women students admitted into, 41.
Venn, Dr. J., 14.
Visitor of the College, 118.
War work done by Newnham students, 137.
Winkworth, Mr. Stephen, 28, 58.
Winkworth, Mrs. Stephen, 28, 90.
Working men, school for, 69.
Young Men's Christian Association, lecture rooms in, 39.
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