Barbara Akinyemi was born 26 May 1914, the daughter of Harold George Powter and his wife, Ethel, née Barnard. She was brought up in Maidstone, Kent. She trained as a nurse at Lewisham Hospital, London, specializing in midwifery and health visiting. During the Second World War, she worked as a nurse in Norwich and Aberdeen. After the war she applied to join the Colonial Nursing Service, and was posted to Nigeria as a health visitor in March 1947. She worked initially in Lagos and was taught Yoruba, the local language, by Olu Akinyemi. During her contract she also worked in Kano and Makurdi. At the end of her contract she returned to England where she met her language teacher again, who was working in London for the Crown Agents. They married in Maidstone, 24 Oct. 1953. They returned to Lagos in 1958 and lived in the hospital compound, where her husband was head of the hospital administration. Barbara continued her medical work in private clinics and also did voluntary work at the Cheshire Home. She was a founder member of the West African Book Club, which was established in 1982, and an early member of Nigerwives, an organisation for foreign wives of Nigerian men.