Newly available: Alliance for Cannabis Therapeutics (ACT) papers

Papers held in the Wellcome Library relating to the work of the UK branch of Alliance for Cannabis Therapeutics (ACT) have now been catalogued and are available for research. They can be ordered online through the Wellcome Library’s catalogue (ref SA/ACT). The main bulk of the papers contain the day-to-day administrative files of the group, including correspondence, press cuttings and material relating to delegations to the Houses of Parliament.

The UK branch of ACT was set up in 1992 by Elizabeth Clare Brice [1]. The group strove to campaign for the legalisation of cannabis in the UK to alleviate the symptoms associated with Multiple Sclerosis.

Brice, a medical journalist, was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis in 1983. In 1992, after reading an American medical report, she started using cannabis to help her condition. In that year, with two other patients, she set up ACT, an informal association of patients, doctors and politicians, with the support of the American organisation of the same name.

ACT initiated the debate about medical use of cannabis in the UK, keeping the discussion alive, through interviews and articles for the press. ACT exerted pressure politically and took two delegations to the Department of Health and Home Office. On the second delegation in 1997, ACT asked ministers if the British pharmaceutical entrepreneur Geoffrey Guy could be given a licence to cultivate cannabis for research. In 1998 Guy founded the company G.W. Pharmaceuticals to produce and market medically useful extracts from the cannabis plant.

In 1997 ACT was involved in the British Medical Association's report 'The Therapeutic Uses of Cannabis’. Brice was interviewed by a House of Lords Select Committee in 1998 on the subject and also later appeared as an expert witness in a trial about the illegal use of medical cannabis. [2]

Brice donated her papers to the Wellcome Library in 2010. Sadly, she died in August 2011. She is survived by her husband Duncan Dallas, founder of Café Scientifique, and her two sons.

The ACT papers are available to registered Wellcome Library readers after the completion of an Archives and Manuscripts readers’ undertaking. Some files have been restricted and closed under the Data Protection Act.

The papers interlink with two other recently catalogued collections of archival material on the medicinal use of illegal drugs: the papers of psychiatrist Ronald Sandison and of MP Brian Iddon.

[1] Elizabeth Brice campaigned under the pseudonym Clare Hodges, to protect her family

[2] Elizabeth Brice participated in a Wellcome Witness seminar on 'The Medicalisation of Cannabis' in Spring 2009: a downloadable pdf and material relating to the seminar is also available in the Wellcome Library's archive and manuscript collections (catalogued as GC/253/A/40).

Image: Cannabis Sativa (Credit: Rowan McOnegal / Wellcome Images, N0021170)

Author: Sharon Messenger

A Jersey connection: Arthur Mourant and Jacqueline du Pré

The Wellcome Library is not known particularly for its holdings of musical celebrities but the archives often reveal some unexpected items. The fate that struck the talented cellist, Jacqueline du Pré does fall within the Wellcome Library’s remit however, given that it was multiple sclerosis that robbed her early of a longer brilliant musical career. Readers would not expect to find material from her within the personal papers of the serologist Arthur Mourant, that have just been digitised as part of a wider project dedicated to "Modern Genetics and its Foundations".

Yet, here we find correspondence of a very personal nature that reveals the close relationship that Mourant had with her Jersey-born family. In one letter dated 9 September 1942 from Jacqueline's father, Derek du Pré, Mourant is invited to be god-father to her older sister, Hilary Anne (File ref: PP/AEM/A.262).

Mourant’s papers include several other letters from Derek, many press cuttings from the 1960s relating to Jacqueline’s brilliant career and private life as well as all Jacqueline’s concert programmes and tickets Mourant attended.

In his autobiography Mourant includes childhood reminiscences of Jacqueline’s sister, Hilary and his relationship with the Du Pré family. She remembers him as a warm and generous man who played with the Du Pré children and “took delight in listening to their weekly concerts”. Mourant was known as the 'Pied Piper' in the children's games, as well as ‘Lalla’ and ‘Uncle Arthur’ (Blood and Stones: an autobiography by A.E. Mourant, La Haule, Jersey: La Haule Books, 1995, p.96). A bachelor until late in life, Mourant enjoyed feeling a part of their family. Also within the papers is a poem that is dedicated to the musically gifted Jacqueline, here re-named ‘Dame Josephine’:

It is touching to find Mourant retained an undated drawing given to him by Jacqueline when she was very young.

The drawing sits in the archive alongside a letter dated March 2nd 1961 from Jacqueline to Mourant: "Dear Uncle Arthur, what a wonderful bouquet! It gave me such pleasure when I came home and arranged the lovely variety of Spring flowers (at 3 a.m!)… with lots of love from Jackie". This letter was sent the day after her debut concert at Wigmore Hall at the tender age of 16 - his brochure and ticket are retained within the same files (PP/AEM/A.267):

Just over 10 years later after extensive concert performances, Jacqueline was forced to retire from the platform apparently from ‘nervous exhaustion’ that was later correctly diagnosed as multiple sclerosis. She died at the age of 42 on 19 October 1987. Following du Pré’s diagnosis, Mourant wrote a letter in Feb 1972 to R.J. Berry of the Royal Free Hospital, London requesting information about the disease according to a responding letter dated 23 Feb 1972 containing multiple-sclerosis statistics (File ref: PP/AEM/K.194).

Picture references:

Photo of Jacqueline du Pré by Lotte Meitner-Graf taken from a Royal Festival Hall concert programme 21 November 1965, File ref PP/AEM/A.268
Drawing and letter given to Mourant by Jaqueline du Pré, n.d. File ref. PP/AEM/A.267
Mourant’s poem dedicated to Jacqueline, n.d. File ref PP/AEM/A.272
Cover of Wigmore Hall concert programme, File ref PP/AEM/A.268

Authors: Rada Vlatkovic and Julia Nurse