Early black doctors in South Africa

Journal of African History

Volumn 46, Issue 3, 2005, Pages 427-454

  Digby, Anne ^a  

^a OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

Education; Medicine; Race; Resistance; South Africa

Indexed keywords

HEALTH CARE; MEDICAL GEOGRAPHY; RACE; TWENTIETH CENTURY;

AFRICA; SOUTH AFRICA; SOUTHERN AFRICA; SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA;

EID: 31044439017     PISSN: 00218537     EISSN: 14695138     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/S0021853705000836     Document Type: Article

References (189)

1. South African Medical Journal, 25 Nov. 1944. A. D. Lebona (MB, B.Ch., Wits, 1948) worked at the Bochabela Location in Bloemfontein, and the Queen Elizabeth II Hospital in Maseru, Lesotho, before becoming a general practitioner first in Bloemfontein, later in Lesotho, where he had to move for political reasons. Here he also held official positions, and in 1966 initiated a flying doctor service in the country (obituary, [SA] Sunday Times, 7 Dec. 2003).
2. J. Iliffe, East African Doctors: A History of the Modern Medical Profession (Cambridge, 1998), 3-4.
3. Iliffe, Doctors;
4. A. Patton, Physicians, Racism and Diaspora in West Africa (Gainesville FL, 1996).
5. K. A. Shapiro, 'Doctors or medical aids - the debate over the training of black medical personnel for the rural black population in South Africa in the 1920s and 1930s', Journal of Southern African Studies, 13 (1987), 234-55.
6. J. Starfield, 'A dance with empire: Modiri Molema's Glasgow years', Journal of Southern African Studies, 27 (2001), 479-503
7. S. D. Gish, Alfred B. Xuma: African, American, South African (Basingstoke, 2000);
8. M. Adikhari (ed)., Dr A. Abduraman: A Biographical Memoir by J. H. Raynard (Voices of Black South Africans Series, Friends of National Library of South Africa) (Cape Town, 2002).
9. G. Goonam, Coolie Doctor: An Autobiography (Durban, 1991);
10. M. Ramphele, Across Boundaries: The Journey of a South African Woman Leader (New York, 1995).
11. I. S. Monamodi, 'Medical doctors under segregation and apartheid: A sociological analysis of professionalization among doctors in South Africa, 1900-1980' (Ph.D. thesis, Indiana University, 1996).
12. The term black is here used for Africans, Indians and Coloureds. However, descriptions of black ethnicities are complex. Dr. Jackson, for example, described himself as Coloured in 1873, whereas by the 1890s (after there had been a large migration of Africans from Mozambique and the Eastern Cape to Cape Town), such a term would have excluded Africans or those of African descent. Similarly, the term Malay, referred at first to former slaves or their descendants, later denoted only Muslims (V. Bickford Smith, 'Black ethnicities, communities and political experience in late Victorian Cape Town', Journal of African History, 6 [1995], 452, 461).
13. Cited in H. Deacon, 'Cape Town and country doctors in the Cape Colony during the first half of the nineteenth century', Social History of Medicine, 10 (1997), n. 94.
14. For example in government papers, G12-1877, Blue Book on Native Affairs.
15. To the South African born should also be added the occasional immigrant medic such as the West Indian, A. C. Jackson, or the Indian doctor, Umedram Laibhai Desai, and black doctors in neighbouring territories, such as Basutoland, where Drs. Sebeta and Motebang practised.
16. Shapiro, 'Doctors or medical aids';
17. G. W. Gale, A Suggested Approach to the Health Needs of the Native Rural Areas in South Africa (Benoni, 1938), 12
18. 'Native medical practitioners', Leech, Nov. 1935
19. R. H. W. Shepherd, Lovedale, South Africa (Lovedale, 1942), 292
20. World Health Organization (WHO), Apartheid and Health (Geneva, 1983), 94-5
21. K. P. Mokhobo, 'Pioneers in black medical education' (unpublished paper, 2002).
22. E. Hellman (ed.), Handbook of Race Relations in South Africa (Oxford, 1949) 408. Most had done a preliminary year at Fort Hare, and as many as 87 medical graduates had earlier attended it between 1916 and 1959
23. This is probably not a complete listing because of the difficulties of tracing individuals who did not list their names in professional registers and directories.
24. In West Africa medical schools were set up at Dakar in Senegal in 1918, Ayos in Cameroon in 1928 and Yaba in Nigeria in 1930 (Patton, Physician, 24, 33), and in East Africa at Makerere in Uganda in 1923, and at Khartoum in the Sudan in 1924 (Iliffe, Doctors, 60-2).
25. Iliffe, Doctors, 111.
26. Government papers, UG 32-1912, Census of 1911. Part V, Occupations, 706-7.
27. C. Bundy, The Rise and Fall of the South African Peasantry (2nd edn., Cape Town, 1988).
28. Sunday Times, 7 Dec. 2003, obituary of A. D. Lebona (1920-2003).
29. Olive Beatrice Bikitsha (Fort Hare, 1947, MB, B.Ch., Wits, 1949), and both practised in E. London;
30. Dr. H. L. Mahabane (Fort Hare, 1943, MB, B. Ch., Wits, 1949), and both practised in Vlakfontein, Pretoria. Amongst 36 black doctors who later practised in the Transvaal, five were married and practised as professional couples (T. D. Mweli Skota, The African Who's Who [3rd edn., Johannesburg, 1967], 264).
31. Frequent marriages between medical professionals ensued. A sample survey of medical women of all races on the Medical Register in 1983 found nearly half were married to medical doctors (A. J. Brink et al., 'Women doctors in South Africa: A survey of their experience and opinions', South African Medical Journal [1980], 562).
32. Ramphele, Across Boundaries, 43.
33. Patton, Physicians, 97
34. Iliffe, Doctors, 19.
35. T. D. Mweli Skota, ed., The African Yearly Register (Johannesburg, 1931), 51
36. Makers of Modern Africa: Profiles in History (London, 1991), 495
37. M. Jacobson, Silas Molema and S. T. Plaatje Papers (Historical and Library Papers, Wits University Library) (Johannesburg, 1978), x;
38. Starfield, 'Dance with empire', 490.
39. Wits archive, Molema papers, Ad 1, letter to S. T. Molema, 28 Apr. 1910.
40. F. B. Matthews, Remembrances (Mayibuye History and Literature Series, no. 54) (Cape Town, 1995), 8.
41. P. D. Hey, The Rise of the Natal Indian Elite (Pietermaritzburg, 1961), 38.
42. R. D. Ralston, 'American episodes in the making of an African leader: A case study of Alfred B. Xuma (1893-1962)', International Journal of African Historical Studies, 6 (1973) 85.
43. Molema had an obstetric internship at St Mary's Hospital Manchester, was an assistant surgeon at the Genito-Urinary, Skin and Cancer Hospital in Dublin and a resident physician at Hume Street General Hospital in the same city (S. M. Molema, Life and Health. Being Health Lectures Delivered to Bechuanaland Bantu Societies [Lovedale, 1924];
44. Starfield, 'Dance with empire', 501).
45. Hey, Indian Elite, 38.
46. South African Medical Journal, 25 Nov. 1944
47. Starfield, 'Dance with empire', 479-80, 486, 494.
48. National Library of Scotland (hereafter NLS), MS 7549, correspondence of R. Xaba; NLS, MS 7815 fos. 75, 286-7, 289, 294
49. government papers, UG 25-1939 Report of Committee on Medical Training, 38.
50. NLS, MS 7815, fos. 78, 286-7, letters to Rev. F. Ashcroft, 24 July 1926.
51. Shapiro, 'Doctors or medical aids', 246.
52. South African Medical Journal, 25 Nov. 1944.
53. National Archives London (formerly: Public Record Office), CO 998/4-6, committee on the training of nurses for the colonies, sub-committee B on the training given in the colonies to indigenous nurses, 1944; A. Beck, Medicine, Tradition and Development in Kenya and Tanzania, 1920-1970 (Waltham, 1981), 17, 34-5, 49, 58.
54. See A. Digby, Diversity and Division in Medicine: Healthcare in South Africa from the 1800s (forthcoming), for a longer analysis of this medical aids scheme.
55. National Archives Cape Town, MC 30, Colonial Medical Committee to Colonial Secretary, 9 Mar. 1877.
56. South African Medical Journal, 1 (1927), 494-7.
57. S. Swart, 'Eugene Marais and C. Louis Leipoldt', Journal of African History, 30 (1997), 241, 248, 253-5
58. C. van Onselen, The Seed is Mine: The Life of Kas Maine, a South African Sharecropper, 1894-1985 (Oxford, 1997), 490
59. C. van Onselen, 'Race and class in the South African countryside', American Historical Review, 95 (1990), 116
60. H. Bradford, 'Herbs, knives and plastic', in T. Meade and M. Walker (eds.), Science, Medicine and Cultural Imperialism (London, 1991), 120-47
61. Digby, Diversity and Division in Medicine, ch. 8.
62. S. Marks, Divided Sisterhood: Race, Class and Gender in the South African Nursing Profession (Johannesburg, 1994), 59-60, 140.
63. For example, Editorial, South African Medical Journal, 9 May 1927.
64. 'Notes on a native medical service in rural areas', South African Medical Journal, 24 Jan. 1931.
65. Government papers, UG 25-1939, Medical Training, 37, 40.
66. The Gluckman Report had wished to have teams of doctors working with other health practitioners in some 400 innovative health centres that would integrate curative medicine with preventive work and health education. Although by 1948/9 29 of the new health centres had been set up, the apartheid regime soon undercut Gluckman's strategic reforms so that by 1950 some centres were already closing, and by 1952 government policy envisaged health centres as being concerned only with blacks.
67. National Archives Cape Town, HBC 157, file A45/3, and HBC 174, file A91A, training of medical students; H. Phillips, The University of Cape Town, 1918-48: The Formative Years (Cape Town, 1993), 114, 323-4
68. J. H. Louw, In the Shadow of Table Mountain: A History of Cape Town Medical School (Cape Town, 1969), 145
69. N. Macvicar, Africa Tomorrow? (Johannesburg, 1947), 72
70. WHO, Apartheid and Health, 96
71. National Archives Pretoria, 'Report of a Commission of Enquiry into the Separate Training Facilities for non-Europeans at Universities, 1953-4', 11, 62-5, and K97 0,03M, E5/40, minutes of meetings of this commission.
72. Mokhobo, 'Pioneers';
73. A. Brown and J. Barnes, 'The Medical School of the Witwatersrand - a brief history', Adler Museum Bulletin, 23 (1997) 9
74. B. K. Murray, Wits. The Open Years: A History of the University of Witwatersrand, 1939-59 (Johannesburg, 1997), 174.
75. South African Institute of Race Relations (SAIRR), Report (1949-50), 68
76. M. Horrell, The African Homelands of South Africa (Johannesburg, 1973), 163
77. B. K. Murray, 'Wits as an "open" university 1939-1959: Black admissions to the University of the Witwatersrand', Journal of Southern African Studies, 16 (1990), 676
78. Murray, Wits, 175
79. National Archives Pretoria, KA, K97, 0,03M, minutes of meeting at Wits, May 1954
80. A. Taylor, 'The urgent need of establishing a fourth medical school in Durban' Leech, Oct. 1947, 56-7
81. Monamodi, 'Medical doctors', 272.
82. E. H. Brookes, A History of the University of Natal (Pietermaritzburg, 1966), ch. 15
83. National Archives Pretoria E5/40, minutes on university facilities for non-Europeans, and K186, I, non-European medical schools, 1965: WHO, Apartheid and Health, 96
84. SAIRR, A Survey of Race Relations (1951-2), 5.
85. Monamodi, 'Medical doctors', 328, 331.
86. Quoted in ibid. 327.
87. R. R. Colborn, A. P. Kent and B. Leon, 'The changing medical student population at the University of Cape Town', South African Medical Journal, 85 (1995), 257
88. G. Gale, 'The Durban Medical School: A progress report', South African Medical Journal, 7 May 1955, 436-40.
89. P. V. Tobias, 'Apartheid and medical education: The training of black doctors in South Africa', Journal of the Medical Association of South Africa, 72 (1980), 395-410. The rate of ministerial permissions for black students to study at Wits or UCT was racially differentiated, with Africans having a much lower rate of access relative to application.
90. L. Kuper, An African Bourgeoisie: Race, Class and Politics in South Africa (New Haven, 1965), 79, 122-3.
91. For example, K. P. Mokhobo's father was an agricultural worker and his mother a domestic worker, while the parents of Anvir Adam and Essop Jassat were street traders. For bursaries see National Archives Pretoria, K97, E5/40, minutes of meetings at Fort Hare and Wits, April and May 1954; A. Kerr, Fort Hare, 1915-48: The Evolution of an African College (Pietermaritzburg, 1968), 189: SAIRR, Reports (1949-50), 68: (1951-2), 53-4,57.
92. Dr. Ralph Hendrickse interviewed by Helen Sweet, 25 Feb. 1999.
93. Testimony to UCT Medical School Internal Reconciliation Process (IRC) of black doctors who graduated in the early 1960s.
94. South African Medical Journal, 18 (1944), 373-5.
95. The system of coloured folders was still in evidence in the early 1980s according to Dr. Charles Slater of UCT Medical School.
96. UCT, IRC, testimony from Drs. S. H. I., A. M. and S. A.
97. UCT, IRC, letter of 4 June 1944 in small archive supplied by Dr. Lawrence to the IRC.
98. Dr. Ralph Hendrickse interviewed by Helen Sweet, 25 Feb. 1999. Also, testimony by Dr. Ralph Hendrickse and by Dr. S. H. I. to the University of Cape Town's Internal Reconciliation Process, 2001-2.
99. UCT, IRC, reply to questionnaire by Dr. S. H. I.
100. Government papers, UG 25-1939, Medical Training, 33.
101. R. E. Bernstein, 'The students' attitude to the Bantu problem', Leech, Apr. 1938, 28-9.
102. Dr. Anvir Adam (B.Sc. [UCT], MB, B.Ch., DTM and DPH [Wits]; MCFP [SA]), interviewed by Anne Digby, 12 Oct. 2002.
103. Campbell Library, Durban, MSS of John Nembula include a letter from Dr. M. V. Gumede (BA [Natal], MB, B.Ch. [Wits]). Dr. Gumede shared a practice with Wilson Conco at Umzumkulu, then worked as 'Bantu district surgeon' for Mapumulo, Zululand, and later practised at the Kwa Mashu Polyclinic.
104. Murray, 'Wits as an "open" university', 675. There are differing recollections from white medical students as to how rigidly these apartheid restrictions were put in place. Thanks to Drs. Jac Herberg and Saul Isroff for attempting to clarify this issue for me.
105. Professors Mervyn Susser and Zena Stein, interviewed by Anne Digby, 3 May 2003.
106. Interviews Anne Digby with Dr. Jassat, 25 Sept. 2002 and Dr. Mokhobo, 15 Nov. 2002.
107. Monamodi, 'Medical doctors', 289.
108. SAIRR, Report (1952-3), 71
109. Murray, Wits, 132.
110. Dr. Godfrey Getz, personal communication with Anne Digby, 25 July 2002. Peter Tsele graduated MB, B.Ch. at Wits in 1953, and then practised in Pretoria.
111. Murray, Wits, 129-35.
112. N. Mandela, Long Walk to Freedom: The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela (London, 1995), 276
113. Murray, 'Wits as an "open" university', 659.
114. Iliffe notes a similar date - 1949 - when East African black graduates began to go to Britain for further medical qualification (Iliffe, Doctors, 99-100).
115. Mokhobo, 'Pioneers'. Machupe Mphahlele (MB, B.Ch. [Wits, 1954] DPH [London, 1953], DGP [Dublin, 1959], MRCOG [England, 1963], FRCS [Glasgow, 1964]; FRCOG, 1978). Dr. Mphahlele worked in the University Teaching Hospital, Zambia and later in Lebowa.
116. Rhodes University, Cory MS 16,575, folder 2 of report of Joint Council Conference, 27 Nov. 1932; Gale, Health Needs, 12,
117. R. F. L. Hoernle, 'Anatomy of segregation', in R. F. L. Hoernle (ed.), Race and Reason (Johannesburg, 1945), 101.
118. Essop Jassat, MP (MB, B.Ch., Wits, 1960), interviewed by Anne Digby, 25 Sept. 2002 and Kubedi Patrick Mokhobo (MB, B. Ch., Wits, 1957) interviewed by Anne Digby, 15 Nov. 2002.
119. Iliffe, Doctors, 109.
120. R. R. Edgar (ed.), An African American in South Africa: The Travel Notes of Ralph J. Bunche (Athens OH and Johannesburg, 1992), 59
121. Sun, 1 Mar. 1940 (the first of 16 articles by J. H. Raynard reproduced in Adikhari [ed.], Abdurahman).
122. Wits archive, Molema papers, DA 62, employment offers, Ad 2 letters; Edgar (ed.), Bunche, 161
123. J. Comaroff and J. L. Comaroff, Of Revelation and Revolution (2 vols.) (Chicago, 1991-7), 11, 364-5.
124. P. Joyce, A Concise Dictionary of South African Biography (Cape Town, 1999), 185:
125. Skota (ed.), African Yearly Register, 207
126. Edgar (ed.), Bunche, 148-57:
127. Comaroff and Comaroff, Of Revelation and Revolution, 11, 363-4
128. I. Frack, Every Man Must Play a Part (Cape Town, 1970), 69.
129. South African Medical Journal, 25 Nov. 1944.
130. Iliffe, Doctors, 84-6.
131. Gish, Alfred B. Xuma, 58, 73, 167
132. Edgar (ed.), Bunche, 148-53.
133. Dr. Jasset, interviewed by Anne Digby, 25 Sept. 2002.
134. Personal communication from Dr. Anvir Adam, 2 Aug. 2003.
135. National Archives Pretoria, K186, vol. 1, Bureau of Statistics figures cited in returns from Non-European Medical Schools, 1965.
136. Macvicar, Africa Tomorrow?, 72
137. SAIRR, Report (1952-3), 71, (1953-4), 136.
138. SAIRR, The African Homelands of South Africa (1973), 165
139. J. Browde, P. Mokhobo and E. Jasset, University of Witwatersrand Faculty of Health Sciences, Internal Reconciliation Report (Nov. 1998), 14-15
140. WHO, Apartheid and Health, 225.
141. Monamodi, 'Medical doctors', 356-7
142. Kuper, African Bourgeoisie, 92, 96.
143. Goonam, Coolie Doctor, 60.
144. SAIRR, Report (1950-1), 57
145. SAIRR, Report (1952-3), 71
146. SAIRR, Report (957-8), 208
147. Browde, Mokhobo and Jassat, University of Witwatersrand Faculty of Health Sciences, Internal Reconciliation Report, 20
148. Mokhobo, 'Pioneers';
149. M. Jarrett Kerr, African Pulse. Scenes from an African Hospital Window (London, 1960), 57
150. Skota, African Who's Who, 267.
151. Rand Daily Mail, 28 Aug. 1951.
152. Dr. Harry Stein (MB and B.Ch. 1949, Wits; MRCP 1952 and FRCP, 1971, Edinburgh)interviewed by Anne Digby, 24 Feb. 2000
153. Hey Indian Elite, 44-6
154. Goonam, Coolie Doctor, 67
155. Mokhobo, 'Pioneers'.
156. M. Hersman, 'Kubedi Patrick Mokhobo', Arena, Mar. 2003, 31
157. Monamodi, 'Medical doctors', 342, 396
158. WHO, Apartheid and Health, 225.
159. Botswana National Archives, MED 16/4, medical services complaints.
160. Reconstituting the Union of South Africa: A More Rational Union Policy. Address to the Bantu Studies Club of Witwatersrand University, 30 May 1932 (Lovedale, 1932), 22.
161. Kuper, African Bourgeoisie, 234:
162. H. Kuper, Indian People in Natal (Pietermaritzburg, 1960), 67-8, 245.
163. Rhodes House Oxford, Microfilm Afr 551, presidential speech to Bloemfontein ANC Conference, Dec. 1948.
164. Mandela, Long Walk, 125: Rhodes House, Micr. Afr 551, Onward to Freedom (Lovedale, 1952), 12, 20.
165. Ramphele, Across Boundaries, 57.
166. T. Karis and G. M. Carter (eds.), From Protest to Challenge, IV: Political Profiles, 1882-1964 (Stanford, 1977), 94, 129. The African and Indian Congresses had demanded that the government repeal six specified apartheid laws, and during the ensuing campaign volunteers broke laws, after notifying the authorities of their intention, thus inviting arrest.
167. Adhikari (ed.), Abdurahman, 10
168. Goonam, Coolie Doctor, 60
169. F. Wilson and D. Perrot (eds.), Outlook on a Century. South Africa, 1870-1970 (Braamfontein, 1970), 427.
170. Mandela, Long Walk, 76, 112-13, 130-1
171. Makers of Modern Africa, 498-500.
172. Mandela, Long Walk, 131, 146, 157, 159
173. Makers of Modern Africa, 498-500.
174. Karis and Carter (eds.), Protest to Challenge, IV, 20
175. Mandela, Long Walk, 276.
176. Government papers, UG 61-1959, Tomlinson Commission, 56-8, 160-3, 203: SAIRR, Report (1961), 220.
177. D. D. T. Jabavu, The Black Problem (Lovedale, 1920), 165.
178. Browde, Mokhobo and Jassat, University of Witwatersrand Faculty of Health Sciences, Internal Reconciliation Report, 19.
179. Dr. Anvir Adam, personal communication with Anne Digby, Oct. 2002
180. The untitled piece is by Professor Chaitz, a plastic surgeon, who graduated in the Wits Medical Class of 1968 (Auricle, Sept. 2003). Thanks to Dr. Adam for drawing this to my attention.
181. Rhodes University, Cory MS 16,575, paper given by Xuma, Jan. 1961.
182. 'My experience as medical student'.
183. Karis and Carter (eds.), Protest to Challenge, IV, 20, 94, 97, 116-17, 164.
184. South African Medical Journal, 25 Nov. 1944.
185. For a discussion of this point in relation to the British medical profession see A. Digby, Making a Medical Living (Cambridge, 1994), ch. 7.
186. See Iliffe, Doctors, 3, for a discussion of symbiosis between the African state and profession.
187. Dr. Anvir Adam, personal communication with Anne Digby, Oct. 2002
188. Hersman, 'Mokhobo', 31. Mokhobo left for Swaziland, later for Lesotho, was involved in the flying doctor scheme sponsored by Harry Oppenheimer, became Minister of Health in Bophuthatswana in 1976 and began practising as a cardiologist in Mafikeng in 1985, before moving to MEDUNSA in 1990. He is now a consultant cardiologist at Sunninghill Hospital, Johannesburg. Dr. Patrick Mokhobo, personal communication with Anne Digby, Oct. 2002.
189. See S. Marks, The Ambiguities of Dependence in South Africa: Class, Nationalism and the State in Twentieth-Century Natal (Johannesburg, 1986), for a wider discussion of structural ambiguity.