Bahá'í history in the UK

History of the Bahá'í faith in the UK

There were few contacts between the UK and the Bahá'í faith in the 19th century.

First Bahá'ís

The first English Bahá'ís are recorded around the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries.

The very first in England was probably Marion Miller who became a Bahá'í in 1894 in Chicago and came to England in 1895. Marion Miller taught the faith to her aunt, Miss M. Brown of Bushey in Hertfordshire, who converted in 1896 or 97.

Miss Miller later stopped being a Bahá'í and no-one knows what became of Miss Brown.

However although they may have been the first there are two far more significant figures than Marion Miller or Miss Brown.

The first person we know of who was formally a Bahá'í in England was Mrs Miriam Thornburgh-Cropper. She was an American and was known to be living in London in 1898. Through her Miss Ethel Rosenberg of Bath, the first English woman to become a Bahá'í in her native land, declared her faith in the summer of 1899.

Mrs Thornburgh-Cropper and Miss Rosenberg were the real foundation of the English Bahá'í community.

Mrs Thornburgh-Cropper was part of the very first pilgrimage of western Bahá'ís to see Abdu'l-Bahá in Akka. Miss Rosenberg was closely associated with Abdu'l-Bahá and Shoghi Effendi and was a very important figure in the early development of the English community.

Tentative beginnings

Over the next few years a number of other Britons converted and a Bahá'í group began in London in 1914.

The Bahá'í leader Abdu'l-Bahá visited Britain in 1911, and over the Christmas/New Year period in 1912/3. During this period the pace of conversion increased. A Bahá'í Spiritual Assembly for England was constituted in 1922 (as were local spiritual assemblies in London, Manchester and Bournemouth) and a National Spiritual Assembly for Great Britain in 1923. The hold of the faith in Britain was still tentative and it declined after the early 1920s.

Revival

The faith revived in the mid 1930s. A magazine was started, together with summer schools and a publishing trust. The National Spiritual Assembly was put on a firm legal footing. More converts were made, including the famous potter Bernard Leach.

The number of local spiritual assemblies grew and by 1963 there were 50, which grew to 102 by 1974 and to 200 in 1992.