Madeleine Shaw-Lefevre

Madeleine Septimia Shaw-Lefevre (6 May 1835 - 19 September 1914) was the Principal of Somerville Hall for its first 10 years, from 1879 to 1889. The hall became Somerville College, Oxford in 1894.

Family

Shaw-Lefevre was the seventh child and fourth daughter of Sir John George Shaw-Lefevre (1797-1879) and his wife Rachel Emily (née Wright) (1801-1885).

Her mother was the daughter of Ichabod Wright (1767-1862), of Mapperley Hall in Nottinghamshire. Ichabod Charles Wright (1795-1871) was an uncle.

Her father was briefly the MP for Petersfield in 1832-33, served as Under-Secretary of State for War and the Colonies in 1834, was then a Poor Law Commissioner until 1841, and then Vice-Chancellor of the University of London for 20 years, from 1842 to 1862, and finally Clerk of the Parliaments from 1856 to 1875. Her uncle Charles Shaw-Lefevre (1794-1888) was Speaker of the House of Commons from 1839 to 1857 and then ennobled as Viscount Eversley.

Her older (and only surviving) brother George Shaw-Lefevre (1831-1928) was Liberal MP for Reading from 1863 to 1885 and then for Bradford Central from 1886 to 1895. He was ennobled as Baron Eversley in 1906.

One of her four sisters Rachel married Arthur Hamilton-Gordon (1829-1912), son of the Prime Minister the 4th Earl of Aberdeen, who served successively as governor of New Brunswick, Trinidad, Mauritius, Fiji, New Zealand and Ceylon, and was created Baron Stanmore in 1893.

Early life

She was educated at home. Like her three other sisters, she never married.

Her brother's mother-in-law was Julia, Countess Ducie, wife of Henry Reynolds-Moreton, 3rd Earl of Ducie, who was involved in good works and may have influenced Shaw-Lefevre's own interest in public work. She became involved with the Metropolitan Association for Befriending Young Servants.

Somerville Hall

Shaw-Lefevre was appointed as the head of the new Somerville Hall in Oxford in May 1879. The new hall was named after Scottish mathematician and scientist Mary Somerville. Shaw-Lefevre only accepted the position on condition that the post would last for just one year. In the event, she remained head of the hall for 10 years.

She started at Somerville Hall in 1879 with 12 students based in a house on Woodstock Road in Walton Manor, purchased from St John's College, Oxford, which became known as "House". She ran the Hall along the lines established by Anne Clough for Newnham Hall, later Newnham College, Cambridge. The hall was non-denominational and had no chapel (the Anglican Lady Margaret Hall opened in the same year). The Hall expanded to West Buildings in 1885, later renamed "Park". She also became a trustee of Bedford College for Women in London from 1885.

Although women were reluctantly allowed to study at Oxford, they were not permitted to take exams until 1884, and could not graduate until 1920. The college admitted the first male fellows in 1993 and became fully co-educational in 1994.

One of the 35 students in her final year, 1889, was Cornelia Sorabji. Thirteen of the 82 students during her tenure achieved marks equivalent to a first-class degree. She was succeeded as Principal by Agnes Catherine Maitland.

Later life

Shaw-Lefevre retired in 1889, and lived in Surrey with her unmarried sisters.

She died in Farnham and was buried in Ascot.

References

• Enid Huws Jones, ‘Lefevre, Madeleine Septimia Shaw-(1835–1914)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 accessed 13 Nov 2015