Helen Joseph conducted a relentless 40-year fight against oppression 6,000 miles away from the green hills of her Sussex home. She was banned, placed under house arrest, shot at, threatened and charged with high treason. On one occasion a bomb was tied to her front gate.

She helped write the Freedom Charter and for some time, at Mr Mandela's request from his Robben Island prison, looked after his daughters.
She never forgot life in the Vanzell Road family home, yet it appears as though Easebourne has all but forgotten her. Helen Fennell was baptised in St Mary's Church in 1905 and died in South Africa on Christmas Day in 1992.

Mr Rang recently completed his dissertation examining class, gender and racial issues facing South African women in protest during the struggle in the 1950s.

While reading Ms Joseph's autobiography, Side by Side, he was amazed to discover she was born 12 miles away from his home. He said: "I want her to be recognised for who she was and what she achieved, in her own town."

August 9 is Women's Day in South Africa – a bank holiday which commemorates the day in 1956 when Helen Joseph and others united 20,000 women in a march on the Union Buildings in Pretoria.

Protesting against the wide-scale oppression of African women and the unjust laws in place at the time, the women stood in silent protest for 30 minutes, arms held high in the congress salute.

Last Saturday, raising his voice above overhead announcements from a pony club meeting and impervious to the curious stares from passers by, Mr Rang addressed a small group of people gathered in the drizzle on St Mary's Church green.

He spoke about Helen Joseph, read Nelson Mandela's eulogy to her, and then the preamble of the Freedom Charter.

He said: "We can only wonder what she would have thought if she had been told that her beloved Freedom Charter would be read in her memory in her halcyon Midhurst.

"Helen Joseph, courageous fighter for justice and equality in South Africa. Helen Fennell, daughter of Easebourne. We thank you and are honoured to stand here in your memory."

Then, as the rain began falling in earnest, he asked for 30 seconds' silence, bowed his head and raised his arm in her memory as she had done 52 years earlier.

Every year, at noon on Christmas day, Ms Joseph made a point of remembering all exiles, political prisoners and those who had died in the struggle. It seems fitting she, too, is remembered, in the place where she was born.

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