page_title: Hedley Churchward
section_title: Conversion
hierarchical_section_title: Hedley Churchward / Conversion
caption_attribution_description: English: "On the road to Mecca"
context_page_description: Al-Hajj Hedley Cole Churchward, was an English set designer and painter, notable for converting to Islam and in 1910 being the first known British Muslim to make the Hajj.
context_section_description: On a sketching trip to Spain Churchward first made his acquaintance with Islam. He was awed by the Alhambra in Granada and the stunning architecture of the Córdoba Mosque, developed a liking for the landscape of Al-Andalus, and determined to travel to Morocco. He became steeped in Arab culture, gradually exchanging his western clothing for local garb and announcing to his family that he had adopted Islam.
  In Cairo, his growing reputation in the Arab world, resulted in a commission to decorate one of the city's mosques. He built a home for himself close to the Pyramids, and became a student at the Al-Azhar. He proved an able scholar, and soon preached sermons at a small mosque, winning an appointment as lecturer in Sira at the Qadi's Academy. In the years that followed he shuttled between England and Morocco, also managing to visit Australia and South Africa to investigate work opportunities. In South Africa his art and easy elegance gained him the patronage of Cecil Rhodes and the favour of the Randlords. Churchward's intercession with President Paul Kruger resulted in the construction of the first mosque on the Witwatersrand.
caption: On the road to Mecca
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