Miss N I Ejindu appears in one of the most striking surviving photographs of a Nigerian educator in Britain during the colonial period. Taken in 1946 at Marlborough Senior Girls’ School in Isleworth, Middlesex, the photograph shows her teaching British pupils the words and actions of a traditional game during a Physical Training lesson.
The photograph formed part of a series on colonial students studying through the University of London Institute of Education. Ejindu was described at the time as coming from “Obsi, Ibo country, Eastern Nigeria” and was associated with St Monica’s School, a major girls’ boarding institution linked with the Onitsha mission area.
Her appearance in the British classroom offers a glimpse into a wider history of Nigerian teachers travelling abroad for further professional education. It also places an African woman at the centre of a classroom scene fourteen years before Nigeria achieved independence.
Miss N I Ejindu in an English Classroom
The photograph of Miss N I Ejindu was taken at Marlborough Senior Girls’ School in Isleworth in 1946.
During the lesson, Ejindu demonstrated the words and actions of a traditional game to the pupils. The girls gathered around her, listening, watching and taking part in the activity.
The scene is significant because of the roles occupied by the people in the photograph.
Britain exercised colonial authority over Nigeria at the time, and British missionary and government institutions had played major roles in establishing Western-style schools across the country. Yet in this English classroom, an educator from colonial Nigeria was standing before British pupils as the instructor.
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She was not simply observing the class. She was contributing directly to it.
The photograph consequently preserves a small but revealing moment in the long relationship between British and Nigerian education. Ideas, teaching methods and cultural practices did not move in only one direction. Africans who travelled to Britain carried their own knowledge and experiences into the institutions they visited.
From Eastern Nigeria to Britain
Miss N I Ejindu came from Eastern Nigeria, an area with a rapidly expanding network of mission schools during the first half of the twentieth century.
The original description connected her with Obosi, near Onitsha, in what is now Anambra State. Obosi was part of the wider Igbo-speaking region of south-eastern Nigeria.
At the time, British documents commonly used the spelling “Ibo” for Igbo.
Ejindu travelled to Britain in connection with further educational study. She was undertaking a general course in education, with particular attention to the teaching of senior girls.
Her journey therefore belonged to an important phase in the professional development of African educators during the late colonial period. Nigerian teachers increasingly occupied significant roles in schools that had initially been created or supervised by missionary organisations, colonial authorities and local communities.
By the 1940s, educated Africans were also taking an increasingly prominent role in shaping the future of education in Nigeria.
Ejindu’s presence in Britain formed part of that changing educational world.
St Monica’s and the Growth of Girls’ Education
Ejindu was associated with St Monica’s School, an important institution for girls within the Church Missionary Society’s educational network around Onitsha.
The development of schools for girls represented an important change in southern Nigerian education during the early twentieth century.
Mission organisations had initially concentrated considerable attention on educating boys, partly because male pupils were expected to become teachers, clerks, catechists and other workers within the colonial and missionary systems. Opportunities for girls expanded gradually as mission organisations established institutions devoted specifically to female education.
St Monica’s became one of the prominent girls’ schools in the wider Onitsha mission area.
In his 1930 account of the Niger Mission, F. Deaville Walker described St Monica’s School as having approximately 170 boarders. This made it a substantial educational institution at a time when secondary and advanced educational opportunities for Nigerian girls remained limited.
The school was located within the wider missionary network extending eastwards from Onitsha through Iyi Enu and surrounding communities.
Its existence reflected the growing recognition that the development of education in Nigeria required trained women as well as men.
Women teachers played particularly important roles in girls’ schools, where they could serve as classroom instructors, supervisors and models of professional life for younger female students.
Ejindu’s connection with St Monica’s therefore places her within an important chapter in the history of Nigerian women’s education.
Ifeyinwa Ejindu and the 1947 Derbyshire Visit
The following year, the name Ifeyinwa Ejindu appeared among Nigerian visitors connected with Derbyshire’s School Museum Service.
The School Museum Service had been established in 1936 and developed an innovative system through which museum objects and educational materials could be used directly in schools.
Teachers and education students visited Derbyshire to observe how such resources could enrich classroom learning.
Ejindu was among a group of Nigerian educators associated with visits to British educational institutions during this period.
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Her presence illustrates how professional training could extend beyond formal lectures. Visiting teachers encountered classrooms, museums, teaching collections and different approaches to organising lessons.
For educators returning to Nigeria, such experiences could become part of a much broader professional knowledge base.
The journey from Eastern Nigeria to London, Isleworth and other British educational centres therefore connected Ejindu with an international network of teachers studying the practice of education.
Nigerian Educators in Britain
Ejindu was not alone.
A number of Nigerian educators travelled to Britain during the late colonial period for further study. Some later became highly influential figures in Nigerian educational, religious and political life.
Among the Nigerians associated with the Derbyshire educational visits was Michael Adekunle Ajasin, who built a distinguished career in education and later entered politics. Ajasin became the first executive Governor of Ondo State following Nigeria’s return to civilian government in 1979.
Another was Emmanuel Oladipo Alayande, an Anglican priest and educator who became closely associated with Ibadan Grammar School and remained an important figure in Nigerian education for decades.
Thompson Tanimowo Solaru also developed a prominent career in education and the Methodist Church.
These names demonstrate how educational travel to Britain formed part of the professional development of a generation that would assume increasing responsibility within Nigeria as colonial rule approached its final decades.
Their experiences were connected to a larger transformation taking place across the country.
Nigerians were increasingly occupying senior educational positions, expanding schools, developing professional organisations and participating in debates about what education should accomplish in a society moving towards self-government.
A Classroom Within the British Empire
The photograph of Miss N I Ejindu was made while Britain still governed Nigeria.
In 1946, the political relationship between the two countries was changing rapidly. The Second World War had ended only the previous year, nationalist organisations were becoming increasingly influential, and constitutional reforms were gradually increasing Nigerian participation in government.
Education was deeply connected to those changes.
Schools produced many of the teachers, journalists, civil servants, lawyers, clergy and political leaders who became central figures in the movement towards independence.
For women, access to education also opened pathways into professional life that had previously been much narrower.
Against this background, Ejindu’s classroom appearance acquires significance beyond the immediate school lesson.
A Nigerian woman, already involved in education, had travelled to Britain for further professional development. During her time there, she entered an English school and contributed something from her own experience to the pupils’ education.
The relationship between Britain and Nigeria remained profoundly unequal in political terms, but the photograph captures a human encounter that was more complex than a simple picture of Britain teaching Africa.
For those few moments, the educator from Nigeria was leading the lesson.
Women Teachers and a Changing Nigeria
Women teachers became increasingly important figures in twentieth-century Nigeria.
As opportunities for female education expanded, women entered teaching in greater numbers and helped create institutions through which later generations of Nigerian girls gained access to formal schooling.
Teaching also became one of the professions through which educated women could achieve a degree of financial independence and public influence.
Schools for girls did more than teach literacy and academic subjects. They helped produce generations of women who became teachers, nurses, administrators, community leaders and professionals.
Ejindu belonged to this broader transformation.
Her story is especially valuable because historical narratives of colonial Nigeria have often concentrated on governors, nationalist politicians, missionaries and male intellectuals.
A classroom photograph can reveal another part of that history.
It draws attention to the Nigerian women who worked inside schools, trained younger generations and participated in the development of the country’s educational institutions.
Fourteen Years Before Independence
When Ejindu stood before the pupils in Isleworth in 1946, Nigeria’s independence was still fourteen years away.
The country would become independent on 1 October 1960.
Much would change during those intervening years. Nationalist politics would grow stronger, constitutional reforms would expand Nigerian participation in government, regional administrations would assume greater responsibility for education, and schools would expand rapidly in several parts of the country.
The teachers being trained during the 1940s and 1950s were therefore preparing for careers during one of the most transformative periods in Nigerian history.
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They would work across the final years of colonial rule and into the era of self-government and independence.
Miss Ejindu’s photograph belongs to that transitional generation.
It captures neither a famous political speech nor a major constitutional conference. Instead, it records something quieter: an educator at work.
That simplicity is part of its historical value.
Conclusion
Miss N I Ejindu was photographed in 1946 at Marlborough Senior Girls’ School in Isleworth while teaching British pupils the words and actions of a traditional game during a Physical Training lesson.
She was connected with St Monica’s School, a significant girls’ boarding institution within the wider Onitsha mission network, and travelled to Britain for further educational study through the University of London Institute of Education.
The following year, Ifeyinwa Ejindu appeared among Nigerian educators connected with educational visits in Derbyshire.
Her story belongs to the wider history of Nigerian teachers who crossed borders in pursuit of professional education during the final decades of colonial rule.
It is also part of the history of Nigerian women who contributed to the expansion of girls’ education.
Fourteen years before independence, a Nigerian woman stood before a class of British schoolgirls and led their lesson.
The photograph preserved that moment.
More than eighty years later, it remains a compelling image of education moving across the boundaries of empire.
Author’s Note
The story of Miss Ejindu reminds us that some of the most revealing moments in history are preserved not in political speeches or official ceremonies, but in ordinary acts of work. A teacher standing before a classroom may appear simple, yet this 1946 scene connects the histories of Nigerian women, colonial education, professional training and the movement of knowledge between societies. Ejindu represents a generation of African educators whose work helped prepare communities for profound social and political change, even when their individual names rarely occupied the centre of historical narratives.
References
Imperial War Museums. Colonial Students in Great Britain: Students at University of London Institute of Education, photograph D 29308, 1946.
Derbyshire Record Office. Smith, Mark. “1947: Some Illustrious Nigerians at the School Museum Service”, 21 March 2023.
Walker, F. Deaville. The Romance of the Black River: The Story of the C.M.S. Nigeria Mission. London: Church Missionary Society, 1930.
