From Adelaide Tambo
Author: Tambo, Adelaide
Date: May 17, 1962
Location: Cholmeley Park, England
Genre: Letter
Details
Adelaide Tambo, wife of exiled African National Congress (ANC) leader Oliver Tambo, requests King’s assistance in drawing attention to the abuses suffered by women leaders of the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa.1 No response from King has been located.
Dear Dr. King,
You may not remember from whom this letter comes from, but I will remind you a little my name is Adelaide Tambo (Mrs) we met at the home of Canon Collins (Christian Action) the last time when you were in London I was also one of the Sponsors of the function we held for you at the Africa Unity House.2 I had thought I would be in a position to write to you earlier but as a housewife who is a student and also doing political work there is always very little time to keep in touch with friends.
Once again the South African Government is hitting viciously at the Women’s leaders who are opposed to racial discrimination and the principle of “Apartheid” After the deportation of Mrs Mafekeng the mother of 11 Children, now Mrs Lillian Ngoyi our president has been banned from attending meetings for 5 years and also barred from leaving the township in which she leaves.3 So that he Cannot get near any industrial area to look for work to keep her family going Others who have been or rather who are Victims of this Cruel banning are Mrs Matomela a prominent Womans leader also Mrs Florence Mkhize and Florence Baard who were both with Mrs Ngoyi in the Mamoth South African Treason Trial which ended in March 1961.4 Because of all this bannings and other Arrests of Women’s leaders the A.N.C. Women’s League is Appealing to you to give Material help to the Organization and to use your influence so that other Sympathetic people Can also give Material help to enable the organization to help the deported and banned mothers and also to look after the Children of those arrested and to pay school fees and clothes those children {P.T.O.} whose parents had to go underground and those whose parents had to flee the country for political reasons.
I am enclosing some press cuttings and shall also be sending you some of our pablications and News letters.
Fondest Regards to you and your family
Yours in the South African Struggle.
[signed] Adelaide Tambo.
1. Adelaide Tambo (1929–2007), born in Vereeniging, South Africa, tried at fifteen to join the ANC after witnessing her grandfather being beaten by police. She eventually joined the ANC at eighteen and was soon elected chair of the local branch. In 1956 she married ANC leader Oliver Tambo. Following the Sharpesville Massacre and the banning of the ANC in 1960, the Tambos fled South Africa; Adelaide Tambo went to London while her husband went to Zambia. She was a founding member of the Afro-Asian Solidarity Movement in 1957 and the founder of the Pan-African Women’s Organisation in 1962. The Tambos returned to South Africa after the unbanning of the ANC in 1990. Four years later, she became one of the first democratically elected members of the South African Parliament.
2. King was in London from 28–31 October 1961 for a series of appearances. He spoke at the African Unity House, a center dedicated to promoting unity among African students, on 30 October. John Collins (1905–1982), a priest and political activist, was canon of St. Paul’s Cathedral for thirty-three years. In 1946, he founded Christian Action, an organization dedicated to connecting Christianity to economic, political, and social life. He also served as President of the International Defence and Aid Fund for Southern Africa.
3. Elizabeth Mafikeng (1918–2009), a long-time union leader, was vice-president of the ANC Women’s League. She was deported in 1959 after leading a large demonstration protesting laws requiring African women to carry passes. Lilian Ngoyi (1911–1980), politician and activist against apartheid, served as the President of the ANC Women’s League from 1953–1960.
4. Florence Matomela (1910–1969) served as an organizer for the ANC Women’s League and vice-president of the Federation of South African Women. Florence Mkhize (1932–1999) was one of the founding members of the United Democratic Front and an organizer of the South African Congress of Trade Unions. Frances Baard (1901–1997), an anti-apartheid activist, worked for the ANC Women’s League and later became secretary and treasurer of the League’s Port Elizabeth branch in South Africa. On 1 August 1958, ninety-one South Africans went on trial in Pretoria on charges they violated the state’s anti-communist laws. In 1961, the court in South Africa ruled that the state had failed to prove the ANC was communist. All of the accused were acquitted of treason.
Source: MLKJP-GAMK, Martin Luther King, Jr. Papers (Series I–IV), Martin Luther King, Jr., Center for Nonviolent Social Change, Inc., Atlanta, Ga.