Name Helen House | ||
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“On 31 December 1956 I moved into my little cottage with the tall trees, delighted to have a home of my own…” (Joseph, 1986). The cottage was 35 Fanny Avenue, and moving into it in December 1956 was an act of faith and optimism as Helen had been arrested just days before that, charged with treason, and would be on trial for four harrowing years. It is tempting to speculate that Helen Joseph chose to live in Norwood as two of her struggle comrades (Bram Fischer in Oaklands, and Violet Weinberg in The Gardens) lived in close proximity to the suburb. Whatever the reason for her choice of home, she would conduct her struggle against injustice from this address until her death in 1992. Banned four times, jailed four times, her life became a long saga of police persecution, much of it spent under house arrest.
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Early life
Born in 1905 in Sussex, England, Helen Beatrice May Fennell grew up in London. She graduated with a degree in English from the University of London in 1927, and then departed for India where she taught for three years at Mahbubia School, a school for girls in Hyderabad. In about 1930 she left India for South Africa. She settled in Durban where she met and married dentist Billie Joseph.
Political Awareness
Her service as an information and welfare officer in the Women's Auxiliary Air Force during the Second World War, and her subsequent decision to become a social worker, exposed her to some of the realities of South African life. But Joseph owed her political education to Solly Sachs, serving under him at the Garment Workers Union. In 1953 Joseph was a founder member of the Congress of Democrats, the African National Congress’s white ally, and in 1954 of the Federation of South African Women. In 1955, she was one of the leaders who read out the clauses of the Freedom Charter at the Congress of the People. She was one of the main organisers of the Women's March of 9 August 1956, one of the most memorable moments of her illustrious political career.
The Treason Trial
Joseph’s opposition to the State had not gone unnoticed, and in December 1956 she was one of 156 people arrested and charged with high treason. The trial lasted for four years, from 1956 to 1961. Delivering the verdict on March 29, 1961, Justice Rumpff stated:"On all the evidence presented to this court and on our findings of fact, it is impossible for this court to come to the conclusion that the African National Congress has acquired or adopted a policy to overthrow the state by violence, that is, in the sense that the masses had to be prepared or conditioned to commit direct acts of violence against the state."
House Arrest
In 1962, she became the first South African woman to be placed under house arrest, and was restricted to her home at 35 Fanny Avenue, Norwood, with a security policeman moving in next door. 'I was the first white woman to become subject to the pass laws…At least, my house won't be burgled while I'm at home and the police are watching', Joseph joked in an interview. Bullets pierced her windows and an explosive device was placed in her letterbox.
In his submission to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, secret service operative Paul Erasmus stated “…that from about 1978 till late in the 1980's he and his colleagues on many occasions damaged the property of Mrs Joseph by throwing stones through the windows of her house… made telephone threats, fired shots at the house but did not intend to injure any person, ordered and caused unwanted supplies to be delivered at her house, poured paint remover over her motor car as well as a motor car of Ann Hughes when the latter visited her.” at the Truth and Reconciliation Commission it was also revealed that the apartheid state’s fear of her was puzzling: “How a weary old girl, an ou tannie like me can be a threat to state security only they can say.”
Despite her incarceration at home, Joseph regularly looked after the children of comrades, including the daughters of Nelson and Winnie Mandela, and the children of Molly and Bram Fischer. From the late 1970s Christmas Day was “Open Day” at Helen Joseph’s house. Those involved in the ant-apartheid struggle had an open invitation to visit the home. All comrades brought food, and at 12 noon everyone raised their glasses to those on Robben Island (and apparently the Robben Islanders were aware of the ritual). On December 25, 1992, Joseph was in hospital and the venue moved to 11 Plantation Road, The Gardens. Robben Island’s prisoners had been released, and those present raised their glasses to Helen, who would die shortly thereafter.