Thomas Babington Macaulay was the founder and the first principal of CMS Grammar School, Lagos which is the oldest secondary school in Nigeria. He is also credited, alongside his father-in-law, Samuel Ajayi Crowther, and Thomas King, with translation of the Bible into the Yoruba language. Babinton was born 26 January 1826 to Yoruba Parents who were part of the slave cargo of an intercepted ship from Lagos. His parents were returned to Sierra Leone where he was born.
T.B Macaulay was like very many children of recaptives, brought up by the Church Missionary Society. He was educated at Fourah Bay Institution and then joined a training program that took him briefly to Britain under a Missionary College. His marriage to Samuel Ajayi Crowther’s daughter produced among others, Herbert Macaulay who was to become Nigeria’s foremost nationalist and whose face adorns the One-naira coin. Babington Macaulay died in 17 January 1876 in Lagos during a smallpox epidemic.
