Record

LevelSub-sub-sub-fonds
Finding Number (Click this to view full catalogue structure)CMS/B/OMS/A5
TitleEast Africa (Kenya) Mission
Extent21 vols. of letter-books, mission books, and precis books, 27 files (including journals) and 24 boxes of original papers
Date1841-1934
DescriptionPapers of the East Africa mission kept under the CMS Committee of Correspondence and the Africa (Group 3) Committee up to 1934.
Access ConditionsFor preservation reasons, microfilm or digital copies are made available in place of the original documents.
Access StatusOpen, but subject to some access restrictions
Physical DescriptionThe archive reference numbers for the pre-1880 papers have been marked in pencil on the back of each individual item e.g. C A5 O10/3. Pencilled numbers on the front of the papers are the 1952 archive numbers which are no longer in use. The post-1880 papers are each individually marked in red ink, and this number, plus the year, comprises the reference for each item [e.g. G3 A5/1904/25].
Administrative HistoryCMS Kenya mission [called East Africa 1880-1885, Eastern Equatorial Africa 1886-1904, British East Africa 1904-1920]: Work was begun at Mombasa in 1844, Rabai in 1846 and at Frere Town from its founding in 1874. Other principal centres were at Mbale (1900), Kaloleni (1904), Wusi (1905), Nairobi (1906), Kabete (1900), Weithaga (1903), Maseno (1906) and Butere (1912).

Secretaries with primary responsibility for South and East Africa missions:
1836-1846 Dandeson Coates; 1847-1865 Henry Venn; 1868-1873 Edward Hutchinson; 1873-1880 Henry Wright; 1880-1881 Edward Hutchinson; 1881-1892 Robert Lang; 1892-1912 Frederick Baylis; 1912-1925 George Thomas Manley; 1926-1934 Handley Douglas Hooper

Secretary to the General Committee [The General Committee was responsible for main Society policy and its Secretary was considered primus inter pares. Henry Venn (a Secretary 1841-1872) acquired the title of Honorary Clerical Secretary and this was retained by his successors until 1922 when, having become anomalous, it was changed to General Secretary]:
1825-1846 Dandeson Coates [layman]; 1846-1872 Henry Venn; 1872-1880 Henry Wright; 1880-1895 Frederick Edward Wigram; 1895-1910 Henry Elliott Fox; 1910-1922 Cyril Charles Bowman Bardsley; 1923-1925 Herbert Lankaster; 1926-1941 William Wilson Cash

Lay Secretary [Financial Secretary]:
1820-1846 Dandeson Coates; 1846-1863 Major Hector Straith; 1859-1866 Colonel Michael Dawes; 1867-1881 Edward Hutchinson; 1869-1875 Major General Edward Lake; 1882-1887 General George Hutchinson; 1888-1894 Major General Clennell Collingwood; 1895-1907 David Marshall Lang; 1908-1909 Robert Maconachie; 1910-1921 Herbert Lankaster; 1922-1925 John Kinahan [acting]; 1925-1937 Louis Steele
Custodial HistoryPapers catalogued by: H. S. Cobb 1952. Hard copy handlist revised and expanded: Rosemary Keen 1980.
CopiesAvailable on microfilm and online.

Microfilm:
Church Missionary Society Archive, Section IV: Africa Missions, Parts 16-18.
Publisher: Marlborough: Adam Matthew Publications, 2004.
Location in the Cadbury Research Library: microfilm drawers B2 and C4-C6.

Digital publication:
Church Missionary Society Archive: Africa Missions: Kenya Mission.
Publisher: Adam Matthew Digital.
Access: by institutional subscription: free to members of the University of Birmingham and visitors to the Cadbury Research Library and other subscribing institutions.

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