PITTS THEOLOGY LIBRARY
ARCHIVES AND MANUSCRIPTS DEPT.
BUXTON, HAROLD JOCELYN, 1880-.
Scrapbooks, 1926-1957.
MANUSCRIPT COLLECTION NUMBER 207
EXTENT: .5 cubic ft. (1 small flat box and 1 half size letter box)
ACCESS: Unrestricted
REPRODUCTION: Scrapbooks may not be photocopied due to preservation concerns.
COPYRIGHT: Information on copyright (literary rights) available from repository.
CITATION: [identification of item(s)], Harold Jocelyn Buxton Scrapbooks, MSS 207, Archives and Manuscripts Dept., Pitts Theology Library, Emory University.
Biographical Note
Harold Jocelyn Buxton was born in 1880, the fourth of ten children to Sir Thomas Fowell Buxton III (1837-1915) and Lady Victoria Noel (d. 1916), the daughter of the first Earl of Gainsborough. He attended Harrow Trinity College in Cambridge, receiving his B.A. in 1903 and his M.A. in 1905. Buxton was made a deacon in the Church of England in 1904 and in 1906 was ordained as a priest. He served as a curate at the Durham Cathedral of St. Cuthbert in Bensham from 1904-1907. From 1907-1910, Buxton served in Rangoon, Burma as the Domestic Chaplain to the Bishop of Rangoon, then as a Railway Chaplain to the Additional Clergy Society. He returned to England in 1911, serving as Curate of Thaxted, then Vicar of Horley with Hornton in Oxford. With the advent of World War I, Buxton was appointed Head of the Medical Unit of the Lord Mayor's Fund with the Russian Army in the Caucasus and the Temporary Chaplain in France. With the end of the war, Buxton was appointed to Curate of Christ Church, Westminster and served as Secretary of the Armenian Relief Fund. He traveled to Jerusalem in 1926 to become the Chaplain of St. George's Cathedral and to Nicosia, Cyprus in 1927 to become the British Chaplain. In 1928 Buxton was made Archdeacon of Cyprus and Itinerating [sic] Chaplain of Syria in 1931. He was consecrated as the ninth Lord Bishop of Gibraltar in 1933 and served this diocese until his resignation in 1947, but remained in Gibraltar until 1948 as Acting Bishop until a replacement could be appointed. The Anglican Diocese of Gibraltar includes the Balkans, Greece, Italy, Malta, Portugal, Spain, the South of France, Southern Russia, and parts of Turkey. Buxton returned to England and served as Rector of Launton from 1949-1952, a Licentiate to the Officiate of the Diocese of Guildorf from 1952-1962, and joined the Diocese of London in 1963. He received the Sub-Prelate of the Order of St. John of Jerusalem in 1935, was made Knight Commander of the Royal Order of St. George by King George I of Greece in 1943, and received the Order of St. Sara, First Class, in 1945. Buxton authored several works involving his travels and experiences, including Travel and Politics in Armenia (1913), Substitution of Law for War (1925), Transcaucasia (1926), and A Mediterranean Window (1954). He died in 1976.
Harold Jocelyn Buxton came from a family famous for its philanthropy and social activism. His great-grandfather, Sir Thomas Fowell Buxton (1786-1845), served in Parliament and was noted for his investigations into social problems such as the management of the London Hospital, the abuses in the apprenticeship system, and the amendment of the penal code. He is most remembered for his collaboration with William Wilberforce (1759-1833) in the formation of the Anti-Slavery Society. It was Buxton's bill presented in Parliament in 1833 that resulted in the abolition of slavery throughout the British Empire and the establishment of Emancipation Day on August 1, 1834. His brother, Lord Noel Edward Noel-Buxton (1869-1948), the first Baron Noel Buxton, served as a liberal member of Parliament and later Minister of Agriculture under the Labour administrations of James Ramsey MacDonald. With his brother, Charles Roden Buxton (1875-1942) who was also a Socialist member of Parliament, Lord Noel-Buxton traveled to the Balkans in 1914 in an attempt to staunch the spreading world war.
Scope and Content Note
This collection consists of two scrapbooks of Buxton's experiences and travels during his tenure as Archdeacon of Cyprus and Bishop of Gibraltar. They contain photographs of Buxton with European royalty, prominent statesmen, and Anglican and Orthodox clergy. There are also numerous newspaper clippings featuring Buxton's travels before, during, and after World War II, as well as news items during this time. The scrapbooks also contain many ephemeral items documenting Buxton's travels including letters, itineraries, and invitations.
The first volume, entitled "Cyprus," was kept by Buxton during the years 1926-1932 while he was serving as Archdeacon of Cyprus in Nicosia and Itinerating [sic] Chaplain in Syria. Featured prominently in newspaper clippings is the uprising in Cyprus during the administration of Sir Ronald Storrs (1881-1955), Governor of Cyprus from 1926-1932. All items are in English except a program written in Greek and a notice of marshal law in Cyprus following the riots written in Greek, English, and Turkish. There are no loose pieces.
The second volume, entitled "Gibraltar," was kept by Buxton mainly during the years of 1933-1948 while he served as the ninth Lord Bishop of Gibraltar from 1933-1947. This second volume contains photographs, newspaper articles, and ephemera of Buxton's experiences and travels while Bishop of Gibraltar and is an inside view of the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939), the beginning and end of World War II (1939-1945), and the evolution of the political landscape in Eastern Europe. Newspaper articles are written in English, French, Serbo-Croatian, Romanian, Russian, Greek, and Spanish. This volume also contains a note from Thomas Kordl acknowledging Buxton's letter to Adolf Hitler in 1939 urging the German leader not to go to war as well as a confidential note from the British Consul General of Barcelona giving Buxton instructions for smuggling three escaped British prisoners of war out of Spain. A note on the front of the volume states that Buxton's sister, Mabel Crowdy, helped in collecting material for the scrapbook. There are three folders of loose material from the "Gibraltar" scrapbook.
CONTAINER LISTING
Box Folder Description Date
1 Cyprus Scrapbook 1926-1932
1 Gibraltar Scrapbook 1933-1957
Loose material
2 1 Spanish Civil War 1936-1938
2 2 Eastern churches 1935-1940
2 3 Publications ca. 1925-1940