From Activist to Leader of the CPP, 1945–1951

Abstract

Nkrumah claimed he traveled to London “to study law and, at the same time, to complete my thesis for a doctorate in philosophy. As soon as I arrived in London, therefore, I enrolled at Grays Inn and arranged to attend lectures at the London School of Economics.”¹ He departed for London in late May 1945, where he was met by George Padmore and Joe Appiah. Padmore was, according to Sherwood, “the London-based guru of colonial revolutionaries”² and Joe Appiah was a Ghanaian law student and active member of the London-based West African Students Union (WASU). All three became political colleagues.³ Padmore was indeed a political magnet in black activist circles in London. As the vortex of imperial rule, the capital drew many African students who gradually became politicized by the organizational activities and views of Padmore and the desire to see their respective countries free from colonial rule. Padmore was “always neatly dressed with crease-lines in his usually dark trousers and spotless white shirt under jacket and ties,” writes Abrahams.⁴ He had an “iron will” and resolute political focus.⁵ According to Sherwood, it was C. L. R. James who introduced Nkrumah to Padmore by way of a letter. Immediately after his arrival in London, his colleagues found him accommodation at the WASU hostel. He stayed there for a short while before moving into a house with his former colleague Ako Adjei at 25 Laurier Road, Tufnell Park, in north London. He later moved to a room at 60 Burghley Road in north London. The address was in proximity to individuals who were to become some of his close political colleagues. Among them were Joe Appiah, who lived in Primrose Hill Gardens in Hampstead and shared the house with Bankole Akpata, F. Kankam-Boadu, and Afolabi Odebiyi.