Anne Clough

Anne Jemima Clough

Anne Jemima Clough (born January 20, 1820 in Liverpool , † February 27, 1892 in Cambridge ) was a British suffragette and campaigner for higher education for women. She was the first principal of Newnham College .

Life

Clough was born in Liverpool as the daughter of Welsh cotton merchant James Butler Clough and his wife Anne Perfect. She had three brothers and one was the poet Arthur Hugh Clough , who was married to Blanche Smith, a cousin of Florence Nightingale . In 1822 the family emigrated to Charleston , South Carolina . The older brothers went back to England at the appropriate age to attend school there and Anne Clough also traveled with her mother to England every few years to spend the summer with relatives and also to see the brothers. During her time in Charleston, she learned a lot about slavery and mostly studied at home because she was not allowed to attend public schools. After 14 years, the family returned to Liverpool in 1836 and Anne Clough never traveled back to the United States.

On her return to England, she began working as a teacher at the Welsh National School , which her father had co-founded. She also worked as a Sunday school teacher and taught older girls privately at home. At the same time, she was still studying at home, often under the guidance of her brother Arthur Hugh Clough, who was meanwhile studying at Balliol College . After her father's business went bad in 1841, Anne Clough opened a small school to earn money and to help pay off the family's debts. Her brother George died of yellow fever in Charleston in 1843 , where he ran business in America as a partner of the father. This was another setback as he had proven to be the only one in the family to succeed as a businessman. Her father returned from Charlston in 1844 sick and died a little later. Anne Clough then lived with her mother in seclusion in Liverpool. They were supported by Arthur. Anne closed her own little school in 1846 but continued to work for the Welsh National School and Sunday School.

After Ambleside Anne Clough moved with her mother in 1852. She had previously in London at the Borough Road and the school Home and Colonial worked, supported by her brother Arthur. In Ambleside she reopened a small school and taught about 20 students with other teachers. Her mother died in Ambleside in 1860. In the autumn of 1861 her brother Arthur became seriously ill. He traveled to Italy with his wife, where he died on November 13th. Anne Clough reached the family three days earlier. She returned to England, left her school in Ambleside in good hands and moved in with her widowed sister-in-law to take care of the children's education. She traveled a lot, lived in the house of her sister-in-law's parents or in the family home in London, and during this time she met many people. She befriended Emily Davies , Barbara Bodichon , Frances Buss, and more.

Anne Clough helped found the North of England Council for Promoting the Higher Education of Women alongside Josephine Butler and was secretary from 1867 to 1870 and president of the council from 1873 to 1874. This led to the introduction of local lectures by the universities. Exams for women had existed since 1869, and in 1870 Henry Sidgwick suggested that there should be lectures at Cambridge to help the female students. Women now came over long distances to attend the lectures. This gave rise to the desire to open a house to house the students at Cambridge University and Anne Clough became the first principal of this college, now Newnham College.

She started with five students in a house on Regent Street in Cambridge in October 1871, and by Easter in 1872 there were eight. Later that year she moved to a house called Merton Hall with the students , but as the number of students continued to grow, a new house had to be found. Newnham Hall the old building of what is now Newnham College was built for a sum of £ 10,000 raised by the Friends of Women's Education. The building was opened in 1875. But it had to be expanded quickly and Newnham College was founded in 1880 under Anne Clough as the first principal.

She was looked after at the end of her life by her niece Blanche Athena Clough, who had joined Florence Nightingale and her friend Edith Sharpley . Both were present when she died in Cambridge on February 27, 1892.

Honors

Detail of the memorial gate

Two portraits of Anne Clough hang in Newnham College, one of Sir William Blake Richmond and the other of James Jebusa Shannon .

The Edge Hill University has named a dormitory named Clough in honor of their contribution to higher education and the history of education in Lancashire.

Judy Chicago dedicated an inscription to Anne Clough on the triangular floor tiles of the Heritage Floor for her installation The Dinner Party . The porcelain tiles labeled with the name Anne Clough are assigned to the place with the place setting for Emily Dickinson .

literature

• Blanche Athena Clough: Memoir of Anne Jemima Clough , 1897.

Individual evidence

1. ^ A memoir of Anne Jemima Clough . London, New York, E. Arnold, 1897, pp. 16 .
2. ↑ ^{a b} Anne Jemima Clough | British educator . In: Encyclopedia Britannica . ( britannica.com ).
3. ^ A memoir of Anne Jemima Clough . London, New York, E. Arnold, 1897, pp. 31 .
4. ^ A memoir of Anne Jemima Clough . London, New York, E. Arnold, 1897, pp. 33 ff .
5. ^ A memoir of Anne Jemima Clough . London, New York, E. Arnold, 1897, pp. 94 ff .
6. ^ A memoir of Anne Jemima Clough . London, New York, E. Arnold, 1897, pp. 117 ff .
7. ^ ^{A b} A memoir of Anne Jemima Clough . London, New York, E. Arnold, 1897, pp. 167 ff .
8. ^ Brooklyn Museum: Anne Clough. In: brooklynmuseum.org. Retrieved December 6, 2017 . 

Web links

• Anne Clough in the database of Find a Grave (English)