British Online Archives

South Africa in Records from Colonial Missionaries, 1819–1900 was curated in association with the Bodleian Library.

This collection contains records compiled by the United Society Partners in Gospel (USPG), a UK-based Anglican missionary organisation that operates globally. From the eighteenth to the early twentieth century, the USPG went by the name of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts (SPG).

This collection contains letters and supplementary material relating to SPG missionaries who worked in South Africa during the period 1819–1900. These documents contain a wealth of information regarding the progress of the mission, financial concerns, and movements of people. The sources in this collection likewise detail the number of people who attended Anglican services. The papers provide students and researchers with unique insights into the evolution of the SPG. They also shed light on the broader diffusion of Christianity throughout South Africa.

When the heathen people found out that I was trying to do more for God, they began to despise me, and many of them tried to drive me away from their place. I nearly gave up the Evangelist work altogether.

Titus Mtembu, the first indigenous Anglican minister in Zululand.

Insights

The SPG records relating to Cape Town focus on the movements of people and money. They also cast light on how missionaries were viewed by local communities. Naturally, missionaries sought to convince people to attend church. These documents reveal exactly how many people did.

The records in this collection cover the period 1819–1900 and relate to Cape Town, Grahamstown, Natal, Zululand, and Kaffraria.

The SPG papers for Zululand reveal some of the challenges faced by Christian missionaries in South Africa, not least the fact that, typically, local chiefs were either wary of or resisted missionary activity. Indeed, there are countless examples throughout this collection of resistance to missionaries. Some of them resorted to distributing food so as to incentivise engagement with their activities and teachings.

Papers covering Natal and Grahamstown provide information regarding the movements of missionaries between dioceses and regarding their financial concerns. The papers also supply details of the progress made by SPG missionaries in these areas.