Ragnhild Hatton

She served on the London Honours Board of Examiners in History, 1964–68, and was an external examiner in history for the University of Nottingham, 1965–69, the University of Edinburgh, 1965–70, Queens University, Belfast, 1972–73, and the University of Warwick, 1975–77. She served as a member of Council of the Royal Historical Society, 1979–1983.

While still a graduate student, she became a part-time teacher. She was appointed Assistant Lecturer at the London School of Economics in 1949 and rose to become Lecturer in 1950, and Reader in 1958. In 1968, she was named Professor of International History. She was appointed Professor Emeritus in 1981. She served as Dean of the Faculty of Economics and Political Science, 1974–1978, and Chairman of the History Department, London School of Economics, 1978–1981.

Moving to London on her marriage, she matriculated as a part-time student at University College, London, where she continued to work on the doctoral thesis that she had begun in Norway. Working with G. J. Renier and Mark A. Thomson, she completed her PhD degree in 1947 with her thesis on "Diplomatic relations between Great Britain and the Dutch Republic, 1714–1721."

The daughter of Gustav Ingolf Hanssen and Marie Rikheim Hanssen, Ragnhild Hanssen was educated in a private school for girls in Bergen, Norway and then in the Bergen Cathedral School. She entered the University of Oslo, where she received her candidata magisterii (Cand. Mag.) degree in 1936. On 24 June 1936, she married Harry Hatton (died 1989), an English businessman, who had served in the Royal Navy as well as in merchant ships and later became a mathematics teacher. The couple had two sons.

Ragnhild Marie Hatton (born 10 January 1913 in Bergen, Norway – died 16 May 1995 in London) was professor of International History at the London School of Economics. As the author of her obituary declared, she was "for a generation Britain's leading historian of 17th- and 18th century Europe...."