Identity area
Reference code
Title
Date(s)
- 1926 - 1944 (Creation)
Level of description
Fonds
Extent and medium
Extent19 itemsForm of materialDocuments
Context area
Name of creator
Administrative history
The Anglican Church of Southern Africa, previously known as the Church of the Province of Southern Africa, is the province of the Anglican Communion in Southern Africa. Its primate is the Archbishop of Cape Town. The church includes dioceses in present day South Africa, Mozambique, Namibia, Angola, Lesotho, Swaziland and St. Helena.
An agreement was signed in 1937 between the Church of the Province of South Africa (CPSA) - now known as the Anglican Church of Southern Africa (ACSA) - and the University of the Witwatersrand, whereby the church's central record library was places on loan with the University. The library consisted of books, pamphlets, periodicals and manuscripts. The richness of the Anglican Church's manuscript collection is due to the efforts of the provincial archivists appointed by the church to collect material and transfer it to the university. The first, 1937-1957, was Father Osmund Victor, followed by Canon Cecil Thomas Wood from 1958-1979. Mrs AR Kotze then took over from 1979-2000, until Carol Archibald was appointed as Provincial Archivist in 2001.
Archival history
Immediate source of acquisition or transfer
These records were collected together by Canon C.T. Wood, Archivist of the C.P.S.A. and deposited in the Record Library in April 1973.
Content and structure area
Scope and content
This collection contains the records of Binyon, Deaconess Dorothy Clarke and Miss Imray, who reported on initiation rite for girls, including correspondence, notes and memoranda on the proposal to substitute a Christian circumcision school for the African tribal rites.
The Provincial Missionary Conference of 1938 set up the following committee to consider this question which included Father Amor, the Ven. Archdeacon Christelou, the Ven. Archdeacon Stainton, the Ven. Archdeacon Jenkin, the Rev. V.A. Hoddinott and the Rev. Father Rumsey, S.S.J.E. At Provincial Synod of 1939 the matter was discussed and it was decided to consider the question further. On the 18 December 1941 the committee produced a report on the initiation schools, which was to be submitted to the next Provincial Missionary Conference in 1943.
All the combined records relating to the Provincial Missionary Conferencecomprise 540 items covering the years 1892-1971 and are made up of minutes, correspondence, notes and memoranda. They give an interesting picture of the educational and missionary work done by the Anglican Church in South Africa and also illustrate the attitude of the church to the question of race relations and the emergent African nationalism.
Provincial missionary conferences were appointed by Provincial Synod, the organising body of the Anglican Church in South Africa, and the first such conference met in Queenstown in 1892. Succeeding conferences were held at Maritzburg in 1895, Johannesburg in 1906, Bloemfontein in 1909, Johannesburg in 1913, Grahamstown in 1923, Johannesburg in 1928, Port Elizabeth in 1933, Pretoria in 1935, Cape Town in 1936 and Bloemfontein in 1938. A Provincial Board of Missions was founded in 1898 to correlate and unify the various diocesan missions in methods of working, discipline, translations etc., Worked in close conjunction with the Provincial Missionary Conference and from 1939 appears to have taken over their functions. A further provincial body was set up in 1963 called the Provincial Commission for Administering the U.S.P.G. Grant Loan with the task of administering the R460,000 voted to the C.P.S.A. by the United Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, for the building of African and coloured churches in areas affected by the Group Areas Act.
Appraisal, destruction and scheduling
Accruals
System of arrangement
Conditions of access and use area
Conditions governing access
Conditions governing reproduction
Permission has to be obtained from the Anglican Church in Southern Africa.
Language of material
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Finding aids
Allied materials area
Existence and location of originals
Existence and location of copies
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Notes area
Note
Biographical and administrative history: Also committee was appointed by the society of Women Missionaries in June 1939, consisting of Miss Agnes Beale, Mrs.