Royce, Annie – Young headteacher was pioneer suffragette

Annie Royce (1885-1954)

BORN in Sproxton, Annie Mary Royce became a respected teacher in Grantham, but not before she had distinguished herself as one of the first suffragettes.

At Sproxton school, as a six-year-old she was mention by the school inspector as a “distinguished pupil”.

She joined the suffragette movement in 1904, while at college in London.  There is no evidence she broke the law or was particularly militant.

She returned to Grantham, becoming a teaching student at Grantham Technical Institute and passed her teaching certificate at Lincoln.

Miss Royce became headteacher of Birdwell Girls’ School, Barnsley, in 1913, then head of Featherstone Girls’ School, Pontefract, in charge of about 400 scholars and considerable staff of teachers, four years later. She was still only 28.

She returned to Grantham in the late 1930s and taught at the old Wesleyan School, Wharf Road, where she had begun her career as a pupil-teacher.

Miss Royce became vice-president and a member of the committee of the Grantham Business and Professional Women’s Club