William Fergusson was born around 1795 in the Colony of Jamaica to a Scottish father and a Jamaican mother of African descent, and became the first known student of African descent to attend the University of Edinburgh.
Fergusson qualified as a licentiate of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh in 1813 and was commissioned as a Hospital Assistant in the British Army, being posted to the Colony of Sierra Leone, where he was appointed Second Surgeon.
As a colonial surgeon, Fergusson treated Africans rescued from slave ships by the Royal Navy through the Liberated African Department, rising through the ranks to Assistant Surgeon in the Royal African Corps and later Staff Surgeon, First Class.
Fergusson's administrative career advanced alongside his medical work, and in 1841 he was appointed acting Governor of Sierra Leone, becoming, in the words of historian Christopher Fyfe, 'the first, and last, governor of a British African colony of African descent'.
Fergusson served multiple terms overseeing the colony before dying at sea in 1846 while travelling back to Scotland; his appointment as governor remained, for well over a century afterward, an almost singular achievement within the colonial administration of the British Empire.
- First known student of African descent to attend the University of Edinburgh
- First and only Black governor of a British African colony, Sierra Leone, 1841
- Treated thousands of Africans liberated from slave ships through the Royal Navy's anti-slavery patrols
- Rose to Staff Surgeon, First Class, in the British Army
- Medical service can be a pathway into political leadership. Fergusson's decades as a colonial surgeon built the reputation and experience that led to his governorship.
- A singular achievement can remain unmatched for generations. No other Black governor led a British African colony for well over a century after Fergusson's term.