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Born, 1853; acting stipendiary magistrate, Fiji, 1885-1886; elephant hunter in connection to the African Lakes Corporation, East Africa; actively engaged in the defence of the recently founded Nyasaland Protectorate and played a leading role in the establishment of British rule in the region; Commissioner of British Central Africa, 1897-1910 (title known as Governor of the Nyasaland Protectorate from 1907); Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society (RGS), 1891-1935; RGS Cuthbert Peek Award, 1898; Member of the Council of the RGS, 1913-1917; died, 1935.

Sharpe went to sea in the BLAZER, Captain Owen Stanley (1811-1849), in 1845. He entered the Navy in 1846 and sailed with Stanley in the RATTLESNAKE on her surveying voyage to Australia, 1846 to 1850. Two years later he was again appointed to the RATTLESNAKE, as mate, and sailed in her to the Arctic to relieve the expedition searching for Sir John Franklin. In 1854 he was promoted to lieutenant. From 1857 to 1859 he was in the MAGICIENNE and served during the Second Chinese War. He was promoted to commander in 1863 and in 1867 was appointed to command the WATERWITCH, hydraulic gun boat, during tests on her performance. In 1868 he was appointed to the LAPWING on the west coast of Ireland and then escorted the ships towing the new floating dock to Bermuda, continuing to the West Indies. He was promoted to captain in 1870 and from 1875 to 1878 commanded the Indian troopship CROCODILE. He retired in 1886, became a rear-admiral in 1887 and a vice-admiral in 1892.

Born, Jamaica, about 1700; apprentice to William Cheselden, surgeon at St Thomas's Hospital, 1724-1731; spent part of his apprenticeship in France, met Voltaire, and acquired a knowledge of French surgery; freeman of the Barber-Surgeons' Company, 1731; admitted to the Barber-Surgeons' Company, 1732; Surgeon, Guy's Hospital, 1733-1757; assisted Cheselden with his Osteographia, published 1733; acquired an extensive medical practice; resigned his course of anatomical lectures to William Hunter, 1746; Fellow, Royal Society of London, 1749; member, Paris Royal Society, 1749; continued to practise until 1765; toured Italy, 1765; died, 1778.
Publications include: A Treatise on the Operations of Surgery, with a description and representation of the instruments used in performing them, to which is prefix'd an introduction on the nature and treatment of wounds, abscesses and ulcers (London, 1739); A Critical Enquiry into the present state of Surgery (London, 1750); Letters from Italy, describing the customs and manners of that country, in the years 1765, and 1766. To which is annexed, an Admonition to gentlemen who pass the Alps, in their tour through Italy (printed by R Cave; sold by W Nicol, London, 1766).

Born in 1645, John Sharp had gained a BA and MA at Christ's College, Cambridge University, by 1667. He was successively domestic chaplain to Sir Heneage Finch, 1667-1676, prebendary of Norwich and incumbent of St Bartholomew's, London, and Rector of St Giles-in-the-Fields, 1675-1681. During this period he gained a DD at Cambridge, 1679. Sharp was appointed Dean of Norwich in 1681, and chaplain in ordinary to King James II in 1686. Shortly afterwards he was suspended for preaching sermons which were held to reflect on the policies of James II, 1686-1687. Sharp also refused to read the 1687 Declaration of Indulgence, which suspended the laws against Roman Catholics and Protestant dissenters. Following the accession of William III and Mary II in 1688, Sharp was made Dean of Canterbury and Commissioner for the reform of the liturgy and the ecclesiastical courts, 1689. He was created Archbishop of York in 1691 and a Privy Councillor in 1702, and acted as a Commissioner for the Scottish Union, 1707. Sharp died in 1714. A list of publications by Archbishop John Sharp may be found in the British Library catalogue.

Marjory Sharp (1882-1967) was a teacher and social worker, who was also active in the suffrage movement. A mother of eight children, she supported the family financially and enjoyed an international correspondence once they had grown up.

Born, 1653; assistant to the Astronomer Royal, John Flamsteed, at the Royal Observatory at Greenwich, 1684-1685, 1688 and 1690; clerkship in the King's shipyard at Portsmouth, 1691; returned to Little Horton, 1694, here he pursued mathematics, astronomy, and instrument making; died, 1742.

This company held shares in various companies of the Eastern and Associated Telegraph Companies Group. For further background on this group, see CLC/B/101-01.

Mrs Shannon was born in Sussex in 1896 and her family moved to Western Australia in 1903. Initially she trained as a teacher and taught in several schools in the Dalwallinu area. During the First World War following the appeal for nurses she trained as a nurse at Perth Public (now Royal Perth) Hospital from 1918 to 1921. Shortly after this she went to the UK to train in midwifery at Clapham Maternity Hospital, and it is to this period of her life and aspect of her career that this material chiefly relates. She returned to Western Australia late in 1923 and worked for some time at Perth Hospital until returning to school-teaching. She married William Arthur Shannon in 1927 and they lived at Walgoolan until 1937, where due to the remoteness from a hospital she would deliver local women's babies at their house. In 1942 she was asked to take care of newly born twin nieces who were not thriving, and notes on this are in the back of the exercise book (PP/SHA/4). Because of the shortage of nurses in wartime, Mrs Shannon returned to work, initially on an on-call basis but then full-time at the hospital in Dalwallinu doing both midwifery and general nursing, eventually becoming Matron. After that period her nursing was only voluntary and familial. More biographical details can be found in PP/SHA/8.

The Krishnarajendra Hospital was opened in Mysore (now Mysuru), India, in 1876. It was re-constructed in 1918 with accomodation for 250 in-patients. The hospital aimed to offer free treatment for the poor, regardless of caste, creed or colour. An out-patient department endowed by Hajee Sier Ismail Sait was opened in 1928. An Eye Department and a Children's Ward were opened in 1934. By 2004 the hospital was a Tertiary Referral Centre and Teaching Hospital attached to Mysore Medical College. The hospital has a total bed capacity of around 1330 beds.

The Mysore University Medical College was established first at Bangalore in 1924, and moved to new buildings at Mysore (now Mysuru) in 1930. In the 1930s, some graduates of the College went on to become Members of the Royal College of Physicians (London) and the Royal College of Surgeons of England. Some went on to further study and practice in the United States of America, and others stayed to practice in India. The College is attached to the teaching hospitals, Krishnarajendra Hospital and Cheluvamba Hospital.

No biographical information relating to G Shankar was available at the time of compilation.

Shakespeare Association

The Shakespeare Association was set up in 1914. One of the founders was Charlotte Carmichael Stopes. The association organised lectures on Shakespeare and drama.

The Association for Research into Restricted Growth was co-founded by Dr Sir William Geoffrey Shakespeare, 2nd Baronet, (1927-1996), a general practitioner who took an interest in the conditions causing restricted growth. He had achondroplasia, a genetic disorder that causes dwarfism or restricted growth. His son Sir Thomas William Shakespeare, 3rd Baronet (b 1966) also has achondroplasia. The Association became a registered charity in 1970.

Born, 1878; educated at Portsmouth Grammar School, 1889-1893 and King William's College in the Isle of Man, 1893-1896, and passed out of Sandhurst early in 1898; service in the Indian Army, mostly in Rawlpindi and Bombay, 1898-1904; transferred to the political department of the Government of India; Consul at Bandar-e-'Abbas and assistant to the Political Resident in the Persian Gulf, Sir Percy Cox, 1904; political agent in Kuwait, 1909-[1915]; series of explorations in the interior of Arabia, 1909-1914; Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, 1914-1915; died, 1915.

Mahduri R Kothari (1919-1985) was born in 1919 in Ranpur in Gujarat, India. She married Ratilal D Shah in 1936 and had two sons, Rajat and Gautam, who she brought up while continuing her studies and beginning her academic career. She was active in the field of education and research for over 40 years and published widely in the fields of educational administration and finance as well as psychology, testing and testing evaluation. She was also involved in work on mathematics, language learning, as well as continuing and special education. Towards the end of her life she became involved with the World Education Fellowship and was its president at the time of her death in 1985.

Shadwell Waterworks Company

The Shadwell Waterworks were started in about 1669 by Thomas Neale, who was groom porter to King Charles II and from 1678 to 1699 Master of the Mint. He leased land beside the River Thames in Shadwell from the Dean of St Paul's and installed a pump operated by horses to raise water from the Thames which was then distributed to neighbouring houses. In 1679 the works were enlarged and a second horse mill was added.

In 1680 Thomas Neale obtained letters patent from Charles II authorising him "to maintain, erect or new-build his Water-works and Waterhousel" near the River Thames in the parish of Shadwell and to make ponds, pipes, and cisterns to take water from the river to supply inhabitants within the Manors of Stepney and East Smithfield. Neale divided the undertaking into 36 shares most of which he sold. An act of Parliament in 1692 incorporated Neale and his partners as the "Governor and Company of the Water-works and Water-houses in Shadwell". Neale became the first governor.

The profitability of the Shadwell Waterworks vanished on the establishment of the West Ham Waterworks by Resta Patching and Thomas Byrd in about 1743. In 1745 they rented land in West Ham on the road between Bow in Middlesex and Stratford in Essex. An atmospheric engine was used to pump water from a creek branching from the River Lea. This was then sent east to Stratford and west to Bow, Bromley, Old Ford, Mile End Old Town, Stepney, Limehouse, Ratcliffe and Shadwell. Competition between the two waterworks was continued "with great virulence" and to the detriment of the profitability of both, until they came to an agreement in 1785 as to the demarcation of their districts. This was put into effect in 1792 by the purchase by the Shadwell Waterworks Company of the mains, pipes, and other personal property of the proprietors of the West Ham Waterworks, in Stepney, Limehouse, Ratcliffe, Shadwell, St George-in-the-East, Ratcliffe Highway, Wellclose Square, Wapping, the Hermitage, and parts of the parishes of Aldgate, St Katherine's and Whitechapel.

In 1750 the Shadwell Waterworks Company replaced their horsemills with an atmospheric engine. By 1756 two "fire engines" were in operation. In 1778 these were replaced by a Boulton and Watt steam engine, a second engine being provided in 1784. In 1798 a new Watt double acting engine was installed in the waterworks in Labour in Vain Street, Shadwell.

By this date the existence of the waterworks was threatened by a scheme to build wet docks in Shadwell, which required the demolition of over 2,000 houses in the area which would have rendered the waterworks uneconomic. In addition the water mains would have been cut by the entrance to the docks. In 1800 the London Dock Company agreed to purchase the Shadwell Waterworks for £50,000.

This was put into effect by an Act of Parliament 39 and 40 George III c.47. The London Dock Company also purchased the West Ham Waterworks in 1807. In the same year the East London Waterworks was constituted by a private Act of Parliament authorising the construction of waterworks on the River Lea at Old Ford. Another Act of Parliament in 1808 enabled the East London Waterworks Company to purchase the Shadwell and West Ham Waterworks from the London Dock Company, which had continued to supply water to the Shadwell area until that time.

At the time of the purchase by the London Dock Company of the property of the Shadwell Waterworks Company, the owners of two of the 36 shares could not be traced. The sum of £2,777 15s 6d which was reserved in the hands of trustees for the owners of these shares was not successfully claimed until 1869.

The most illustrious member of the family was Sir Lancelot Shadwell (1771-1850), last vice-chancellor of England. The eldest son of Lancelot Shadwell, a barrister and "an eminent conveyancer", Sir Lancelot was appointed a King's counsel in 1821. After a short parliamentary career lasting from 1826 to 1827, he took up the vice-chancellorship in 1827, a position which he held until his death.

The personal and business papers in this collection mostly relate to Sir Lancelot's son, Alfred Hudson Shadwell, a solicitor, who died in 1884. He inherited estates at Greenford and Northolt in 1857 from his uncle Charles Shadwell who was also engaged in the practice of law.

{References: Dictionary of National Biography, Vol.XVII; V.C.H. Middlesex Vol. IV}.

Several members of the Shadbolt family are mentioned in these documents, including Thomas William Mead Shadbolt of 12 St Andrews Hill, Doctors Commons, City of London, warehouseman; James Shadbolt of Tottenham, corn dealer; Charles Shadbolt of Edmonton, omnibus conductor; Hannah Shadbolt of Edmonton, spinster; Samuel Shadbolt of Yorkshire, railway servant, and Sarah his wife; and Sarah Maria Waller nee Shadbolt of Surbiton.

The church was formed in 1822 at Wellington Place in Stoke Newington and merged with Devonshire Square (Particular) Baptist Church in 1884. The building subsequently became the West Hackney Synagogue.

Born, 1874; educated Dulwich College, 1887; joined the mercantile marine, 1890, serving in the White Star Line, the Shire Line, and the Union Castle Line, and making several voyages round the world; fellow of the Royal Geographical Society of London, 1899-1922; junior officer on board the steam yacht Discovery, the newly built wooden barque which carried the members of the national Antarctic expedition of 1901-1904 to the Southern Ocean; took part in the first long-distance sledge journey into the interior Antarctica and was less than 500 miles from the south pole; secretary of the Royal Scottish Geographical Society in Edinburgh, 1904; as Liberal Unionist candidate for parliament at the general election of 1906; secretary of the Parkhead engineering works at Glasgow; British Antarctic expedition, 1907-1909; Awarded Special Gold Medal for Nimrod Expedition, 1909; imperial trans-Antarctic expedition, 1914-1917; propaganda mission on behalf of the Foreign Office in South America in late 1917 and early 1918; commission as major and put in charge of equipment for the winter campaign of the north Russian expeditionary force, based in Murmansk, 1918-1819; resigned his commission, Feb1919 and returned to business projects; died suddenly of a heart attack while on board the Quest at Grytviken, 1922.

Robert Millner Shackleton was born in Purley, Surrey, on 30 December 1909. He was educated at the Quakers' (Society of Friends) Sidcot School in Somerset and the University of Liverpool, graduating B.Sc. Geology with First Class Honours in 1930. He went on to research at Liverpool under P.G.H. Boswell on the geology of the Moel Hebog area of Snowdonia in North Wales (Ph.D. 1934), then won a Beit Fellowship at Imperial College London 1932-1934. In 1935 he was appointed Chief Geologist to Whitehall Exploration Ltd in Fiji but returned to Imperial College as Lecturer in Geology in 1936.

In 1940 Shackleton was appointed a geologist in the Mining and Geological Department of Kenya, as part of the wartime strategic planning programme. He surveyed widely throughout Kenya producing reports for the Geological Survey of Kenya on the areas of Malikisi, North Kavirondo, Nyeri, the Migori Gold Belt, and Nanyuki and Maralal. His studies extended into the geometry of the orogenic belts of East Africa and the volcanism that produced the Rift System. In 1942 the archaeologist Mary Leakey discovered prehistoric human artefacts at Olorgesailie, a lower Palaeolithic (Acheulean) site southwest of Nairobi. In the mid-1940s Mary and L.S.B. Leakey excavated the site and Shackleton collaborated with the investigations, preparing geological maps of the area around the Olorgesailie site and the area between Olorgesailie and Ngong.

Shackleton returned to Imperial College in 1945 and was offered a Professorship there. However, he thought the department too unmanageable and in 1948 returned to Liverpool as the Herdman Professor of Geology. In his time in the Herdman chair, he re-organised the Liverpool geology department and put it at the forefront of geological research in Britain. In 1962, in order to increase his opportunities for research in Africa, Shackleton became Professor of Geology in the University of Leeds and joined the staff of the Research Institute of African Geology (serving as Director from 1965 until retirement). For the year 1970-1971 Shackleton was Royal Society Leverhulme Visiting Professor of Geology at the Haile Selassie University, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. He formally retired in 1975 but was Research Fellow at the Open University from 1977 until his death and remained very active in field geology.

Shackleton's influence on his profession was profound. His achievements were recognized by the award of the Silver Medal of the Liverpool Geological Society (1957) and the Murchison Medal of the Geological Society of London (1970), and his election to the Fellowship of the Royal Society (1971). His Royal Society citation recorded that he was:

'Well-known for his contributions to the study of crystalline rocks, more particularly of rock deformation and large scale tectonics. A versatile pioneer in investigation of the Caledonides of Wales and western Ireland, of Rift Valley vulcanicity and Pre-Cambrian tectonics. His papers and discussions have influenced much recent work in these fields in which he has trained many of the younger British workers. Of particular importance have been his work on Tertiary volcanics in Kenya, his understanding of the Pre-Cambrian of eastern and central Affica.-and his acqounts of Dairadian structures and deposits'.

Shackleton produced some 160 scientific papers and through encouragement of younger colleagues exerted a deep influence on several generations of geologists. He had an extremely wide knowledge of his subject, from the origins of the Earth to the evolution of man. Although his earlier work had focused on the British Isles, he developed a particular interest in the geology of East Africa. Shackleton initiated structural studies across orogenic belts in Tarizania-Zambia-Malawi (in the late 1960s), major studies across the Limpopo Belt and adjacent Archaean greenstone belts of Zimbabwe-Botswana-South Africa (in the 1970s) and projects across the orogenic systems of Egypt, Sudan and Kenya (in the early 1980s). Just prior to his death he was working on a detai led compilation of the Pre-Cambrian geology of East Africa. Shackleton's interests were global, however, and continuing research interests included the Pre-Cambrian geology of Arabia and the tectonics of the central and western Himalayas. At the age of 75 he led a pioneering Royal Society geological traverse across Tibet, in collaboration with the Academica Sinica, Beijing.

Shackleton died on 3 May 2001. He married three times and left five children (two sons and three daughters), including the distinguished geoscientist Professor Sir Nicholas Shackleton (1937-2006).

Born, 1911; educated at Radley College and then at Magdalen College, Oxford; arranged the 1932 Oxford expedition to Sarawak, serving as its surveyor; first known ascent of Borneo's Mount Mulu; led the Oxford expedition to Ellesmere Island, 1934-1935; lectured in Europe and America on his travels; joined the BBC as a talks producer in Ulster; RAF's Coastal Command as an intelligence officer and anti-U-boat planner, 1940; Labour MP, 1946-1955; director, 1955-1964 and 1973-1982 and deputy chairman, 1975-82, of the John Lewis Partnership; life peer, 1958; Minister for the RAF, 1964; sworn of the Privy Council in 1966 and became Deputy Leader of the House of Lords in 1967; leader of the House of Lords, Paymaster-General (taking over security from Lord Wigg), and Minister in Charge of the Civil Service, 1968; Leader of the Opposition in the Lords, 1970-1974; a director of Rio Tinto Zinc (deputy chairman, 1975-1982); chairman of the Political Honours Scrutiny Committee; Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society (RGS) (Honorary Membership); Cuthbert Peek Award; RGS President 1971-1974; Special Gold Medal 1990; died, 1994.

William Gawan Sewell was born on 6 July 1898, in Whitby, Yorkshire. He was born into an old Quaker family. He was educated at Ackworth School, Whitby County School and took his M.Sc. in chemistry at Leeds University. In 1921 he was appointed Demonstrator and Assistant Lecturer in the Department of Colour Chemistry at Leeds University. In 1922 he married Hilda Guy, a fellow student at Leeds (Botany and Education). They were to have three daughters and one son (the eldest daughter died in Chengdu at the age of seven).

In 1924 he resigned his University post to go, with his wife, to the West China Union University, Chengdu, Sichuan, as part of the Friends Foreign Mission Association (later the Friends Service Council). After a years language study he joined the Department of Chemistry, eventually becoming the Head and Associate Dean of the College of Science. In 1927 he was evacuated from Chengdu. After some time in Shanghai, he spent two terms teaching at Lingnan University, Canton, before returning to Sichuan.

From 1942 to 1945, he and his family were interned by the Japanese at Stanley, Hong Kong. After recuperation in England he returned to Chengdu in 1947. In 1949, after the establishment of the People's Republic of China, he was one of the few foreign teachers invited to stay. He continued his teaching at the West China Union University, returning to England in 1952.

After leaving China, he worked for eleven years (1952-1963) as Assistant Registrar (London Representative) of the University of Ghana (formerly the University College of the Gold Coast). He retired in 1964, and spent his time involved chiefly with China and Quaker committees. He was for several years a Vice-Chairman of the Friends Service Council, a Chairman for one year. He paid three visits to New Zealand, which gave him the opportunity of lecturing on China. In 1974 he visited eastern China. He died on 13 January 1984.

His publications (with the Edinburgh House Press) include Land and Life of China (1933); Turbid Waters (1934); China Through a College Window (1937); Strange Harmony (An Account of Internment) (1946); I Stayed in China (1966); The People of Wheelbarrow Lane (1970); China and the West: Mankind Evolving (1970).

Charles Brodie Sewell was born in 1817. He studied at Glasgow University in 1833/34 before beginning his medical studies as an apprentice in 1834. He entered University College Medical School in 1837 and in 1840 obtained his M.B., L.S.A. and M.R.C.S. He practised in London and in 1888/89 was President of the Metropolitan Counties Branch of the British Medical Association. In his mid-seventies he retired to Canterbury and died there in 1900.

Born 1886; educated Notting Hill High School, London; won Entrance Scholarship to Royal Holloway College, 1906, where she gained a BSc Hons in Mathematics in 1909; Mistress, Wimbledon High School, London, 1909-1910; Mistress, Maida Vale School, London, 1910-[1914]; Private Mistress in Sedburgh, Yorkshire, [1914-1917]; Assistant Mistress, St Sampsons Elementary School, Guernsey, 1918; Assistant Mistress, Twickenham Girls' School, 1918-[1927]; died, 1929.

Settle, Speakman and Company were coal merchants, founded in 1911 in Liverpool. They moved to Crewe, then Manchester, then Stoke on Trent, with an office in the City of London. The company was taken over in 1973 by Legal and General Assurance Society.

Joan Gili was born into a publishing family in Barcelona in 1907 and emigrated to Britain in 1934. He helped found the Dolphin bookshop near Charing Cross Road, London and began his career as a publisher of Hispanic works in 1938. In the following year, Stephen Spender and Gili produced a translation of Nadal's selection of Lorca's poems. Gili wrote the influential "Introductory Catalan Grammar" in 1943. Several volumes of his translations of Catalan poems were published in the next few decades. Gili became a founding member of the Anglo-Catalan Society in 1954 and was later its president. He was also known as the "unofficial consul of the Catalans in Britain". Gili died in 1998.

Beatrice Serota (1919-2002) was born in London on 15 October 1919, the daughter of Alexander Katz and Milly Witkower. She was educated at the Clapton county secondary school and at the London School of Economics. In 1942 she married Stanley Serota. After wartime service in the Ministry of Fuel and Power, Serota was elected as a Labour member of Hampstead Borough Council in 1945, beginning a long involvement with local politics. In 1954 she was elected to the London County Council (LCC), serving as Chairman of the Children's Committee. When the LCC was abolished in 1965, Serota was elected to the Greater London Council (GLC) which replaced it. She became the Labour Chief Whip on the GLC, and served on the Inner London Education Authority, until 1967. Serota's work for the LCC and GLC led to her being awarded a peerage for services to children in 1967. This enabled her appointment as Minister of State for Health in the Department of Health and Social Security, 1969-1970. Prior to becoming a minister, Serota had served on a number of advisory bodies and commissions. She was a member of the Longford Committee on crime, 1964; the Royal Commission on the Penal System, 1964-1966; the Latey Committee on the Age of Majority, 1965-1967; and the Advisory Council on the Penal System, 1966-1968, and 1974-1979. Following the Labour government's defeat in 1970, Serota served on the Community Relations Commission, 1970-1976; and was Chair of the Commission for Local Administration, 1974-1982; the BBC Complaints Commission, 1975-1977; and was a Governor of the BBC, 1977-1982. Serota also had an active career in the House of Lords, being Principal Deputy Chairman of Committees and a member of the European Communities Select Committee, 1986-1992. she was Deputy Speaker in the Lords from 1985 until her death in 2002.

She was also involved with the National Council for One Parent Families and the Family Service Units until her death in 2002.

Serjeants' Inn was an extra-parochial place, constituted a civil parish in 1858. The civil parish was co-terminous with the inn of the same name in the City of London, south of Fleet Street. There was a separate and unrelated Serjeants Inn in Chancery Lane, which was not extra-parochial.

Serdang Central Plantations Ltd. was registered as a company on 12 January 1909, to acquire and manage estates and plantations for the production of rubber, coffee, cocoa and other crops. The company's registered offices were at Mincing Lane House, Eastcheap, London. The Directors in 1909 were William Frederick de Bois Maclaren, Herbert Wright, Frank Copeman and James Charles Tate. The first Annual General Meeting of the company was held on 16 March 1909. The first estates to be purchased were Soekaloewi and Boloewa, Malaysia. This was extended in 1929 with the acquisition of the Wassenaar Estate in the Tamiang District of Sumatra.

By 1918 the company was feeling the effects of wider problems in the rubber plantation industry caused by a lack of shipping, the restriction of imports imposed by the Government of the United States of America and the consequently low prices of rubber. By 1921, the company had joined the restriction scheme of the Rubber Growers' Association in an attempt to stabilise prices. By 1932 the company faced liquidation, and turned to its shareholders to support a voluntary liquidation of the company and reconstruction of a new company under the same name. The new company was incorporated on 8th September 1932.

Sequah was one of the most successful quack medicine businesses operating in Britain between 1887 and 1890. Its origins can be traced to the American medicine shows such as the Kickapoo Indian Medicine Firm. In September 1887 a William Hartley (1857-1924) started Sequah's medical career in Portsmouth selling Prairie Flower, Indian Oil, Indian dentrifice and other remedies, which supposedly cured rheumatism and disorders of the stomach and liver by an alleged combination of botanic and mineral substances.

These quack medicines were sold by travelling salesmen or quack doctors (Sequahs), and sales were surrounded with a great deal of public showmanship. Band players accompanied the drawing of teeth for example, and the whole event became a public occasion, drawing large crowds. Sequah published advertisements and testimonials in local newspapers and worked hard to obtain maximum publicity. Agreements were made with pharmacists and grocers to continue retail sales after the departure of Sequah. The Sequah Chronicle, a penny newspaper published weekly, contained advertisements, jokes and short stories.

In March 1889 the firm Sequah Ltd was created, with Hartley as Managing Director, and by 1890 there were 23 Sequahs operating in the UK. He recruited Peter Alexander Gordon (alias James Kasper) in 1890.

Gordon was the son of Dr J.F.S. Gordon, an Episcopalian Minister of St Andrew's, Glasgow Green, born on 9 November 1859. The records demonstrate the high expectations which Hartley expected from his Sequahs. After working for six months as a Sequah in England (May-November 1890) Kasper travelled abroad to the West Indies, America and Canada, and in 1892 to Spain. Other Sequahs were sent to South Africa, India, the Low Counties, Burmah and Japan.

The need to sell abroad was largely occasioned by the Customs and Inland Revenue Act of 1890, whereby sales of medicines could only take place in a "set of premises". The effect this restriction would have on travelling salesmen was evidently not initially appreciated by them, but it was soon clear that interpretation of the relevant clause would not encompass the mobile vehicles of Sequah Ltd. In spite of attempts to diversify sales, the firm ran at a loss in 1892, and at a low level of profitability 1893-1894.

In 1895 the firm was wound up, and although a new company, the Sequah Medicine Company Ltd, was formed in 1895 (dominated by John Morgan Richards, the doyen of the American proprietary medicine business in England), this too was dissolved in 1909. James Kasper evidently parted from Sequah in 1892 and probably returned to New York and to his mind-reading act. Hartley died in Soho in 1924, unnoticed and leaving only? 734, a fraction of the wealth he had owned in the heyday of Sequah.

Sepang Selangor Rubber Estates Limited was registered in 1923 to acquire Sepang estate in Selangor, Malaya. In 1931 it was acquired by London Asiatic Rubber and Produce Company (CLC/B/112-103).

Nassau William Senior was born in 1790. He was educated at Eton and Magdalen College, Oxford University, gaining an MA in 1815. He became a barrister at Lincoln's Inn, London, in 1819. He held the position of Professor of Political Economy at Oxford, 1825-1830 and 1847-1852, and was a member of the Poor Law Commission in 1833, for which he wrote the report (1834). Senior was a Master in Chancery from 1836 to 1855. A list of his publications may be found in the British Library catalogue.

Nassau William Senior (1790-1864) was educated at Eton and Magdalen College, Oxford University, gaining an MA in 1815. He became a barrister at Lincoln's Inn, London, in 1819. He held the position of Professor of Political Economy at Oxford, 1825-1830 and 1847-1852, and was a member of the Poor Law Commission in 1833, for which he wrote the report (1834). Senior was a Master in Chancery from 1836 to 1855. A list of his publications may be found in the British Library catalogue.

Born 1912; educated Manchester Grammar School and Balliol College, Oxford University; joined editorial staff, Manchester Guardian, 1937-1960; served World War Two, 1939-1945; free-lance writer, 1960-1988, on subjects including gardening, architecture, town planning and local government; Member, Royal Commission on Local Government in England, 1966-1969, for which he wrote a Memorandum of Dissent; member, Basildon Development Corporation, 1975-1979; died 1988. Publications: A guide to the Cambridge Plan (Planning Department, Cambridge County Council, 1956); (ed) The regional city: an Anglo-American discussion of metropolitan planning (Longmans, London, 1966); City of Manchester Plan (Jarrold and Sons, Norwich and London, 1945); Central redevelopment: the Eldon Square area (Newcastle-upon-Tyne City Council, 1964); Your architect (Hodder and Stoughton, London, 1964).

Sengat Rubber Estate Ltd

Sengat Rubber Estate Limited was registered in 1910 to acquire estates in the Kinta district of Perak, Malaya. Harrisons and Crosfield Limited replaced Shand, Haldane and Company as secretaries and agents of the company in 1954. In 1957 Sengat Rubber Estate Limited was acquired by Grainger, Born and Company, and Harrisons and Crosfield Limited resigned as secretaries and agents.

Senate House Library

Senate House Library's history goes back to the official foundation of the University of London in 1836 but it really began life in 1871 when a bookfund was started. The library holds material relevant chiefly to the arts and social sciences. The library (formerly the University of London Library) is administered by the central university as part the University of London Research Library Services. In 2005 it had over 32,000 registered users. It is the second largest library in London, outside that of the British Library, less than one mile to the north. The library holds over two million volumes, including 120,000 volumes printed before 1851. Along with subscriptions to over 5200 Journals, the library's resources include the Goldsmiths' Library of Economic Literature, the Harry Price Library of Magical Literature and the Palaeography room, the largest public collection of books of this kind in Europe. The library also holds over 170,000 theses by University of London graduate students and has over 1,100 manuscript collections.

Selincourt, Ernest De (1870-1943), literary scholar and university teacher. Educated at Huddersfield College and then in 1885 at Dulwich College, matriculated at University College, Oxford in 1890. 1893 to 1895 lectured at Bedford College, and gave tutorials at Oxford; Lecturer in English Literature at University College, 1896, and in 1899, University Lecturer in Modern English Literature; elected to the chair of English literature at Birmingham University, December 1908; 1919 became dean of the Faculty of Arts, and in 1931 Vice-Principal, retired from Birmingham University in 1935. Selincourt was also the brother of Agnes De Selincourt (1872-1917), Principal of Westfield College 1913-1917.

Siegfried Seligmann was born in Wandsbek (now part of Hamburg), 1870; studied medicine in Freiburg, Strasbourg, Berlin and Munich, qualifying in 1895; chose to specialize in ophthalmology and worked in Berlin for a few years before returning to Hamburg in 1898, where he continued to practise as an eye specialist; married Alice Warburg in 1904. Alongside his medical career, Seligmann became a leading public figure in Hamburg and carried out research into magic and superstition as a private scholar; his 1910 work Der Böse Blick (The Evil Eye) is still considered a classic. He worked as a military doctor during the First World War, resuming his Hamburg practice when hostilities ceased and continuing to work until his death in 1926.

Charles Seligman, 1873-1940, was educated at St Paul's School. He qualified as a doctor and became Director of the Clinical Laboratory at St Thomas's hospital, and also treated shellshock victims during World War One. He became interested in tropical diseases and it was for this reason that he went on his first expedition to Borneo and the Torres Straits. Whilst there, he developed an interest in anthropology and the rest of his life was devoted to this discipline. He also attempted to combine disciplines, using psychology to explain anthropological problems. He first taught at the London School of Economics in 1910, and was appointed to the Chair of Ethnology of the University of London in 1913, the first of its kind at the University. He retired in 1934, and was awarded the title of Emeritus Professor. Brenda Seligman, d 1960, accompanied her husband on anthropological expeditions and published material in her own right. Like her husband she acquired her knowledge of anthropology whilst working in the field. She was particularly interested in kinship and the lives of women and children.

Hilda Mary Seligman (fl. 1936-1947) founded the "Skippo" Fund, which supplied the first health vans to serve isolated villages in India and Pakistan. The Fund's 'Asoka-Akbar Mobile Health Vans' were given to the All India Women's Conference to administer. She was the author of three small books: When Peacocks Called (1940), Skippo of Nonesuch (1943), Asoka, Emperor of India (1947).

Selaba Rubber Estates Ltd

Selaba Rubber Estates Limited was registered in 1909 to acquire estates near Telok Anson, in Lower Perak, Malaya. In the same year it also took over Somerset Rubber Estate Limited. In 1928/9 it was acquired by Golden Hope Rubber Estate Limited (CLC/B/112-054).

Born 1900; qualified with an MD from Belgrade, Yugoslavia, 1926. During the 1920s and 1930s he worked at the University Hospital for Pulmonary Diseases and Belgrade State Hospital, as well as undertaking research in Paris clinics; in charge of a unit for Internal Diseases and Tuberculosis at the Municipal Hospital Belgrade, 1935-1941. He fled to London in 1941, working in various capacities for the Yugoslav government and liberation movements and acting as Yugoslav representative to UNRAA. He appears to have re-qualified as MB,ChB in Glasgow in 1944 and he undertook research work under Professor Dible at the Postgraduate Medical School, Hammersmith, 1946-1948. Subsequently he held appointments at the Hounslow, Harrow, Hampstead, Edgware, Ealing, Luton and Uxbridge Chest Clinics, where he tested his classification scheme of TB. In 1948 and again from 1953 he undertook general practice work and had a small private practice. The collection reflects his dedication to the classification scheme for pulmonary tuberculosis which he devised. This was a subject which had interested him from 1923 and which he appears to have first written about in 1940. He published a large number of papers in Serbian, French, German and English, and his important books were published byHeinemann: The Classification of Pulmonary Tuberculosis (1953) and Tuberculosis, Classification, Pathogenesis and Management (1955). In his scheme he emphasised that every case should be classified for either primary or secondary TB of any organ, and must represent a pathogenic entity: he further divided into two pathogenic types and four clinico-pathologico-pathogenic forms. Sekulich died in 1986.

Dr Milos Sekulich (1900-1986) was born in Valjevo, Serbia and trained as a physician at Belgrade University. He became a specialist in internal diseases and tuberculosis and from 1935 was head of the Belgrade Municipal Hospital. In 1941 he fled the German occupation of Yugoslavia to come to Britain, bringing messages and accounts of atrocities from General Mihailovich and the Serbian Peasant Party to the British Government. In exile in Britain he was medical adviser to the Yugoslav Ministry of Health in exile, a member of the Medical Council of the Yugoslav War Ministry in exile, executive committee member of the Yugoslav Red Cross and Yugoslav Representative to the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration, 1941-1945. After World War Two, he remained in Britain, an opponent to the new communist government of Yugoslavia. He continued to practice medicine. From 1945-1948 he did research on the classification of tuberculosis, later he worked as a GP in the National Health Service and in various chest clinics. He published many medical works. Sekulich was much involved in Serbian emigre affairs publishing several pamphlets and books through the emigre press. He was editor of the Serbian emigre publications "Peasant Yugoslavia" and from 1964 "Voice of the Serbian Community".

Born in Kirchberg, Saxony 1850, died in Zurich, Switzerland 1933; from 1867 active in the workers' movement in Saxony; to escape mobilization in 1870 he fled to Switzerland and participated in the Swiss labour movement ever since; editor of the Züricher Arbeiterstimme and other periodicals; elected as a member of the cantonal and municipal council of Zurich in 1896 and 1898 and of the Swiss national parliament in 1911.

Lilli Segal, a German Jew, was born in Berlin in 1913. Segal fled to France after the Nazi seizure of power, where she engaged in illegal courier work to Germany and was finally arrested and deported to Auschwitz.

She managed to escape and fled to Switzerland. In the 1980s and 1990s she was involved in research into the history of Nazi medicine.

Publications: Die Hohenpriester der Vernichtung: Anthropologen, mediziner und Psychiater als Wegbereiter von Selektion und Mord im Dritten (Reich, Dietz Berlin, 1991) and Vom Widerspruch zum Widerstand: Errinerungen einer Tochter aus gutem Hause.

Sir John Robert Seeley was born in London on 10 September 1834, He received his education from the City of London School and Christ's College, Cambridge, where he graduated in 1857. From 1857 to 1859 Seeley taught classics at Christ's. In 1859 he left Cambridge to become chief classical assistant at the City of London School and in 1863 he was appointed professor of Latin at University College London. In 1869 Seeley became professor of modern history at Cambridge; a position he held for the rest of his life. Seeley published works on the classics and history. Among his chief works are, Ecce Homo 1865, The First Book of Livy, 1871, The Life and Times of Stein, or Germany and Prussia in the Napoleonic Age, 1878 and Lectures on Political Science, 1895.

Frederic Seebohm was born in Bradford, Yorkshire, and educated in York. In 1855 he moved to Hitchin, Hertfordshire, where he lived for the rest of his life. He had begun to read for the bar at the Middle Temple whilst still living in Yorkshire and was called to the bar in 1856. In 1859 he became a partner in Sharples and Co bank, which his father-in-law had co-founded. He later became president of the Institute of Bankers. Besides being a committed Quaker and political liberal, Seebohm was strongly interested in history, particularly the medieval period and agricultural history; he wrote and published several books on historical and religious topics and his writings are still influential today.