• WILLIAM Beckford (Lord Mayor of London in 1762 and 1769) was celebrated for his spirited defence of John Wilkes and his challenge to the autocratic tendencies of George III and his ministers, a fact that seems almost entirely forgotten today.

Cecil Rhodes, for all his human faults and failings, bequeathed the money he had amassed to provide funds for young people to pursue an academic education at one of the world’s most prestigious universities.

More than that, the scholarships provided by this fund were, according to Rhodes’s own explicit instructions, to be awarded on merit rather than ethnic origin, a notion that was extraordinarily revolutionary for the times in which he lived.

I hope in years to come that those who are now so keen to erase the memory of these public benefactors will prosper in their careers and use the wealth that they have amassed to provide the same sort of assistance on the same terms.

MAGNUS NIELSEN
Finchley Road, NW3