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HUGHES HALL: THE REDOUBTABLE MISS WILMOT BUXTON
The Marsh Marigold Tramp Club Dr Jean Lambert, Honorary Archivist and Life Fellow, delves into the archives of Hughes Hall once again and comes up with a lively account of one of the college’s earliest societies. Miss E M Wilmot Buxton, alumna of this college and schoolmistress at Brighton High School for Girls, proposed the idea of the Marsh Marigold Tramp Club (MMTC) in the autumn of 1893. She suggested the club’s aim was to encourage ‘acquaintance with one’s native land’ – an aim that would surely chime with many of us with the recent travel restrictions. One or more tramps lasting a week or ten days and conducted on strictly economic principles were to be undertaken annually. Locations might include the Weald of Kent and Dartmoor. The use of the word ‘tramp’ rather than ‘walking’ or ‘hiking’ is unusual though unsurprising, since doing things differently is a Hughesian tradition. (Compare the use of ‘gild’ for the college’s alumnae association.) But exactly what was meant by ‘tramp’ is not explained. A heavy or forcible tread? A stamp, trudge or march? Or a long, tiresome walk? Conversely, the choice of ‘marsh marigold’ presents no such problem. The golden marsh marigold grew in abundance along the Cam and in the nearby water meadows surrounding the college’s first home in Newnham. By 1893, it had been adopted as the college flower and is emblematised in the earliest version of the college crest, which was probably designed by students. The marsh marigold was especially appropriate for the Tramp
College crest designed by students in the 19th century featuring the marsh marigold Club given Miss Hughes’s practice of accompanying each new student on a long walk through Grantchester Meadows for the purpose of getting to know her better.
of the redoubtable Miss Wilmot Buxton leading a party of students on a three-week trip to the High Alps during the Easter vacation of 1894.
Unfortunately, there appears to be no extant record of the MMTC tramps undertaken in the native landscape. There is, however, a vivid description
Seven cloaked females disembark on the steamer from Newhaven. Paris is the first stop on their itinerary. Under a blazing sun, they proceed at a rapid
A whirlwind tour
