In
1871, Henry Sidgwick, who taught at Trinity
College, established Newnham, a residence for women who were attending
lectures at Cambridge University. Anne
Clough was invited to take charge and by 1879 Newnham
College was fully established with its own tutorial staff. There
were thirty students at Newnham and twenty in two supplementary houses.
A further twenty-five students in lodgings.
Whereas Emily Davies at Girton
College insisted that her students studied the same subjects as
men and be expected to pass similar exams, at Newnham, Anne
Clough and Henry Sidgwick devised
special courses for its undergraduates. Sidgwick also opposed the
teaching of Greek and Latin, which formed a necessary preliminary
for a degree at Cambridge University.
Sidgwick had argued for a long time that classics had dominated boy's
secondary education and he did not want the same thing to happen to
girl's education.
After the death of Anne Clough, Eleanor
Sidgwick, the wife of Henry Sidgwick
and the sister of Arthur Balfour, became
its principal. Eleanor held the post from 1892 to 1910.
Early students at Newnham College included Katharine
Glasier, Susan Lawrence, Mary
Hamilton, Margery Corbett-Ashby and Philippa
Fawcett.
Newnham College in 1895.
(1)
In her book on Anne Clough, Blanch Athena
Clough explained how in the early 1870s Henry
Sidgwick gradually persuaded teachers at Cambridge
University to allow women to attend their lectures.
By
1873 twenty-two out of the thirty-four professors of the university
granted formal leave to women students to attend their lectures, and
a few years later this twenty-two had grown to twenty-nine. In the
case of several of the professorial lectures there were special reasons
against opening them to women, and, in particular, the admission of
women to the medical lectures was not asked for either at that or
any later time.
Gradually, also, women were admitted to lectures given in college
halls or lecture rooms. St. John's College, even as early as 1871,
permitted one of its lecturers, Mr. Main, to give instruction to women
students in the chemistry laboratory of the college, and this Mr.
Main constantly did, usually at an early hour, such as 8.30 a.m. before
lectures to undergraduates began.
(2)
In 1897 Henry Sidgwick was interviewed
about how Newnham College was established.
When,
in accordance with the general plan formed in 1870 for developing
the system of lectures for women in Cambridge, it became necessary
to find a lady to preside over the house destined to receive external
students, my first idea was to ask Miss Clough; and though her refusal
for a time turned my thoughts into other directions, I never doubted
that her acceptance of the post would be the best possible thing for
the new institution.
My desire for her co-operation was partly on account of her long devotion
to the improvement of the education of women; but it was partly due
to the fact that I thought she would be in special sympathy with the
plan on which the work at Cambridge to be conducted.
(3)
Mary Paley was one of the first students to join Newnham College in
October 1871.
In
October 1871, Mary Kennedy, Ella Bulley, Edith Creak, Annie Migault,
and I came to be with Miss Clough, and in the following term we were
joined by Felicia Larner, and one or two others. We lived very much
the life of a family; we studied together, we had our meals at one
table, and in the evening we usually sat with Miss Clough in her sitting-room.
We did our best to keep down household expenses: our food was very
simple; we all, including Miss Clough, not only made our beds and
dusted our rooms, but we helped to wash up after meals, and we did
the domestic sewing in the evening.
I believe we were all hard-working and well-intentioned, but during
that first year there was a good deal of friction between Miss Clough
and some of us. I think we were almost entirely to blame, and I never
cease to be astonished at our want of appreciation in those days.
We did not understand her at all. I believe if she had had more weaknesses
and limitations, we should have liked her better. We failed to see
the great outlines of her character, her selflessness, her strong
purpose, her extraordinary sympathy. She had some obvious faults of
manner, and these we did see and probably exaggerated. She did not
dress well, and she had a certain timidity and irresoluteness.
The venture of women's education in Cambridge was a new one: she was,
I think, a little afraid of us, and did not know what we might do
next. She had not had much to do with girls of our age before, and
perhaps she treated us too much like schoolgirls. She did not quite
enter into our notions of fun: perhaps she took things a little too
seriously, and so she did not gain our full confidence in those early
days.
(4)
A student who arrived at Newnham College in 1875 later recalled her
first impressions of Anne Clough.
In
the early days she was always nervous lest the students should attract
attention and criticism by any eccentricity in dress or conduct, for
her great desire was to be unnoticed, and to make it clear that this
little colony of women was harmless and inoffensive. Much of this
care and watchfulness seemed unreasonable to the students, and no
doubt Miss Clough pushed it to excess; but she probably did, by means
of it, avoid dangers which could hardly otherwise have been guarded
against.
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