Remember a Charity Week is a national effort to encourage everyone to think about how they want to be remembered and explore the extraordinary impact gifts in wills can have on future generations. St Edmund’s College has been the beneficiary of gifts in wills of all sizes and kinds and is committed to preserving the enduring legacy of our benefactors and magnifying their impact into the future.
One of the most visible examples of such generosity came in 2013 when Canon Timothy Russ left a bequest that reminds us every day of the historic importance of our community. A series of portraits from Sawston Hall, the home of the recusant Huddleston family to whom he was related, now take pride of place in the heart of the College.
Originally on loan to the College for display and preservation, the portraits depict members of the extended Huddleston family through the ages, from 1566 to the 1760s, and significant figures associated with the family, as well as monarchs Charles II and James II.
It was for some time believed that one of the portraits, often referred to as ‘A Lady in Black,’ was a portrait of Queen Mary I who had a strong connection to the Huddleston family and visited their ancestral home, Sawston Hall, in 1551 and 1553, but professional investigations have not supported this identification. Canon Timothy Russ had hoped the sale of A Lady in Black might facilitate the purchase of Sawston Hall and the creation of a Catholic heritage centre, but its value (significantly under that of a verifiable royal portrait by Holbein) was not high enough to enable the plans, and when he died in 2013 the full complement of portraits was left to St Edmund’s.
Canon Timothy Russ’s bequest of portraits to St Edmund’s College offers more than just aesthetic enrichment or monetary value. These paintings provide a material connection to the long and complex history of Catholicism in England, and in doing so weave St Edmund’s into the wider tapestry of local and national Catholic history, linking the College not only to the story of individual sitters, but also to the endurance of a faith tradition through persecution and marginalisation, and into emancipation.
Some of the Portraits in the Russ Bequest
St Edmund’s College traces its foundation to 1896 when the 15th Duke of Norfolk and the Baron Anatole von Hügel established an institution to provide board and lodging for Roman Catholic students at the University of Cambridge. This institution was only possible after the Universities Tests Act 1871 and Pope Leo XIII lifting a proscription on Catholics becoming members of the universities of Oxford and Cambridge in 1895. The end of this exclusion led to the formation of a small community of Catholic students under the supervision of Fr Edmond Nolan, a former Vice-President of St Edmund’s College at Ware, Hertfordshire.
It is from this foundation that our College has grown into a diverse and welcoming community of nearly 1,000 members. Our circle of legacy donors commemorates these foundations of our community and is named after Fr Edmond Nolan.
A legacy bequest can be a powerful way of extending one’s values, passions, and hopes into the future. Canon Timothy’s bequest secures for St Edmund’s a visible reminder of its place in history and ensures that future generations of students and scholars would be able to see themselves as part of a much longer story.
As we reflect during Remember a Charity Week, we invite you to consider how your legacy could become part of St Edmund’s, shaping the College for the future. If you would like more information about leaving a gift in your will or wish to speak about your plans, the Development Office would be happy to help. Please contact William Edwards, Development Officer, to arrange a conversation in confidence.
With thanks to the Public Catalogue Foundation, a charity registered in England and Wales (1096185), where high-quality versions of the portraits can be viewed, and Professor Paul Luzio.
