Arch Bishop Trevor Huddleson

ARCHBISHOP TREVOR HUDDLESTON: A BIOGRAPHY

Trevor Huddleston was born on 15 June 1913 in Bedford, England. and after travelling in India, Burma and Sri Lanka as a youth, he returned to England to go to theological college. Huddleston became an Anglican deacon in 1936 and a priest in 1937. He had always lived a simple and in 1940 he joined the Community of the Resurrection wha community of monks committed to the vows of poverty, chastity and obedience, and service to others. Father Huddleston arrived in Sophiatown in 1943 to take Sohiatown. In 1949 was elected Provincial of the Community of the Resurrection of South Africa and was made superintendent of the St Peter’s School. In 1950 with Helen Joseph, Nelson Mandela and Ruth First became involved in the forces removals in Sophiatown. During his early years in Sofia Town, Huddleston began writing on the lives and the struggles of the African people in and 1956 he published these writings in a book named ‘Naught for your Comfort’. There were already schools and clinics established by the CR Community but he established a shelter for homeless children in the winter; he set up other schooling and feeding programmes. He founded the African Children’s Feeding Scheme (ACFS) which still exists today and is based in Mayfair, working with 60,000 children all over the Province. IN 1954 Huddelston gave Hugh Masekela his first trumpet passing it on fro Lois ‘Satchmo’ Armstrong. He also asked the leader of of the Johannesburg Native Municipal Brass Band to teach him to play the trumpet and that was the beginning of a very successful Jazz career.

During the resistance to the forced evictions and removal of some 65,000 people from Sophiatown to places like Meadowlands, Soweto and other places, based on skin colour, Huddleston became a major voice in opposition to apartheid and in standing up for the rights of the community. By the spring of 1955, as removals got underway, the pressure on Huddleston was immense;...