You may already have received a mailing about this, but this sounds like a fascinating project and an amazing bit of local history relating to Gorne Wood, once part of the Great North Wood. This is a project of Anna-Maria’s at Fourth Reserve
I think that the recent push has already put them over their target, but I would not be surprised if they push for a stretch one to get more of this story told. Do check it out if you can
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If you are interested in the early women’s movement for equal rights, Black history, activism in London/Lewisham, the Abolitionist movement against transatlantic slavery, or you simply love a really really good yarn then please check this out and donate. This first phase of the project is a collaboration with Road Works Media., a creative mentoring programme for young people in Lewisham.
The story in brief…but there is so much more.
In the 1840s Brockley Green (now Crofton Park) in Lewisham was a quiet rural Kentish hamlet consisting of a couple of farm houses, a public house, a pond and a mix of fields and woodland, with the now redundant Croydon Canal providing a pleasant backdrop to a picturesque landscape.
The Colgate Family
One of the families living in Brockley Green at this time was the Colgate family. George Colgate was the first cousin of William Colgate who started the Colgate toothpaste business in America, and he took on the tenancy of Brockley Green Farm in 1814 when he was 20 years old. After marrying Jane Love they went on to have five children, a son, George Junior and four daughters, Ellen, Jane, Elizabeth and Julia.
George Colgate Senior was a kind man who held dear the values of respect, fairness and non-discrimination. When he died in 1847 his wife shouldered the responsibility of managing the farm as their son had a debilitating illness, while the three oldest Colgate daughters, holding close their father’s values, became actively involved in a new movement called the Olive Leaf Circle.
The Olive Leaf Circle was a female led movement and a branch of the League of Universal Brotherhood founded by American abolitionist Elihu Burritt .
Elihu Burritt and the Olive Leaf Circles
Elihu Burritt was an important person in nineteenth century reform activities, and well known for his work to end slavery in America. He worked with leading figures such as politicians Richard Bright, and Richard Cobden as well as Victor Hugo, author of Les Miserables. Burritt organised the first three international peace congresses and served as U.S. Consul, appointed by President Abraham Lincoln.
The railway boom was in full swing in the 1840s and with the arrival of the passenger train came the opportunity for Burritt to travel around the UK and promote his message. He met with women across the country and took them seriously at a time when any potential activism was relegated to educating children at home. Burritt saw that women had power. He recognised for example that women made the decisions over what produce to buy for the home and so could make a stand against slavery by refusing to buy produce derived from slavery such as cotton and sugar. He also recognised that women were strong communicators and so could play a pivotal role in spreading the message of equal rights.
Among the women he met were the peace activists Jane, Ellen, and Elizabeth Colgate of Brockley Green Farm. The Colgate sisters, already active in the anti-slavery movement, started the first Olive Leaf Circle, with Elizabeth Colgate as secretary, and Jane Colgate as treasurer.
Burritt and the Colgate sisters established over one hundred local groups of female peace activists in all parts of Great Britain and Ireland in the 1850s.
Letters to Jane Colgate
Through correspondence between Anna-Maria Cahalane (Co-founder of Fourth Reserve) and Elizabeth Butler, the Great Granddaughter of Jane Colgate, a more detailed picture of the Colgate family and their role in the abolitionist and women’s movement in Lewisham in the mid 19th Century emerged and Elizabeth Butler gifted a bundle of letters to Anna-Maria written mainly from Elihu Burritt that provide fascinating details of the abolitionist movement as well as a moving insight in to Burritt’s love of Brockley Green in Lewisham.
‘That the broad Atlantic lies between us; and yet it seems as if I could see every step of the path across the fields from Peckham to your rural and romantic home. Yes! There is the very hill, the walk by the cemetery, the hedge, the style, the green fields, the cows feeding in the distance, the railway trains, the little cottages perched on the embankments, the little gardens of flowers, and there is the farmhouse..and there is the smile and the light of bright eyes, and there is Jane, and Ellen is by her side, and Elizabeth & little Julia. There now! Do you think the intervening distance has dimmed my memory of Brockley Farm, and its dear circle?’ Elihu Burritt to Jane Colgate 11th Dec 1844
Amongst the bundle of letters were two addressed to Jane Colgate from William Wells Brown, an American abolitionist, novelist, playwright, and historian. His novel ‘Clotel’ was the first novel published by an African-American. Born in to slavery, he escaped enslavement in 1834 and took refuge in the UK between 1849 and 1854 to avoid being captured and imprisoned in America under the Fugitive Slave Act 1850.
Letters from William Wells Brown to Jane Colgate
William Wells Brown came to the UK with his two daughters Josephine and Clarissa. He wanted to ensure they had an education that was denied to him and wanted to use the opportunity in the UK to lecture on the cruelty of slavery in his homeland. WW Brown was an engaging speaker who often used music in his speeches and presented a metal slave collar to the audience to highlight the barbarity of slavery.
It is no surprise that Jane Colgate and WW Brown were friends. From his letters to her we know that he visited Brockley Green in Lewisham, we know that copies of his novel ‘Clotel’ were given to Jane as a gift to share with others and we know that Jane supported him by arranging opportunities for him to speak publicly and he mentions her efforts to arrange a lecture for him in Deptford.
‘ I am much obliged to you for your kind effort to get a lecture for me at Deptford. I will have to put it off for the present. I will put up half a dozen of “Clotel’ and send them to you and you can dispose of as many as may be convenient and at your leisure. If I thought I should find you with half an hour to spare, I would run down on Friday and take the books myself. I feel more like taking them than sending them. However, should I not see you please give my kind regards to all your household when you return and believe me to be very sincerely your friend’ William Wells Brown to Jane Colgate Jan 25th 1854
Keeping the legacy alive
Lewisham has a proud and rich history of activism from women’s rights and the Suffragette movement in the early 1900s, to the 1977 Battle of Lewisham where thousands of residents countered a National Front march, marking a turning point against racial injustice in London.
However, little is known or celebrated about the Lewisham Olive Leaf Circle or the Abolitionist Movement of the mid 19th Century and the huge efforts between activists in the USA and the UK to abolish slavery.
The Fourth Reserve Charity aim to digitalise, archive and share the story of the Colgates, Elihu Burritt and William Wells Brown. Through this work we will protect and preserve Gorne Wood, the last remaining fragment of Brockley Green where these important activists once talked, plotted and planned together to change our world for the better.
For this first phase of the project we are fundraising to make a short documentary with Road Works Media. Road Works Media provide a creative mentoring programme for youths, giving them the chance to work on a film project. It is an ideal way to connect young people in Lewisham with this amazing heritage which is largely unknown. Please help us fund this first project phase and donate via the link below: