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WAREHAM UNITED REFORMED CHURCH

Constance Coltman

The First Ordained
Female Minister in Britain

Born Constance Mary Todd in May 1889 in Putney, Constance
grew up in a Presbyterian family. She attended St Felix School,
Southall as a boarder and then read History at Somerville
College, Oxford. She felt called to the Ministry, but was told it was
impossible in the Presbyterian Church.

The Congregational Church had considered the question of the
ordination of women. Women as Deacons and Elders had been
discussed in both denominations. However, William Boothby
Selbie, the then Principal of Mansfield College Oxford, was
persuaded that Constance's call was genuine. In 1913 she was
th
accepted and on September 17 1917, she was ordained.
Constance became minister of a Free Church in Leicester - the first
woman minister in the English Congregational Church. She
married the Reverend Claud Coltman and some of their ministries
were joint.

Constance was a lifelong pacifist, a supporter of Women's Suffrage
and reproduction rights. She was a founder member of the
th
Christian CND movement. She died in Bexhill-on-Sea on 26
March 1969.

In 2017, the centenary of her ordination, the magazine 'Reform'
produced an article about her. I believe the URC Bookshop has
copies of ' Constance, Pioneer, Pastor and Preacher' edited by
Janet Wooton.

Marion Grattidge

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