William Fraser Mitchell

(1900-1988)
Professor of Education, Selly Oak Colleges, Birmingham

Born in Dundee in 1900, William Fraser Mitchell graduated from the University of Edinburgh with the degree of MA (1922) before going to Exeter College, Oxford to pursue research into English pulpit oratory in the C17, for which he was awarded the degree of BLitt. He returned to Edinburgh to take a PGCE at Moray House, and became personal assistant to Professor Sir Godfrey Thomson at the University of Edinburgh before moving south to lecture at Armstrong College, Newcastle and the University of Reading before being appointed to the Chair of Education at Selly Oak Colleges in Birmingham from 1944 until 1951. He became very interested in the polymath James Burnett, Lord Monboddo, and generously supplied information to others pursuing the same research. He was a minor poet, collector of Christmas and post cards, a prolific letter writer, and a Friend of the University Library. He gifted many of his collections to Edinburgh University Library during his lifetime, and at his death bequeathed his research papers and a large sum of money for further purchases of books and MSS.