Violet Tweedale

My last post was this photo of a little gravestone in the grounds on Milton Hall, just across the road from our house. I've been aware of its existence for many years but today I took a photo and stuck it up here.

For the benefit of search engines I'll post the text here. It reads:

HERE LIES CHUMMIE
FOR ONE YEAR THE BELOVED
FRIEND OF CLARENS AND
VIOLET TWEEDALE
DEEPLY MOURNED AND LOVED
BY ALL WHO KNEW HER

Afterwards Beth did some research about it and discovered that my assumption about it was wrong. I'd assumed, probably because it all seemed a little twee, that Clarens and Violet Tweedale were the children of the household. Turns out I was wrong: they were the adults.

If you search for Violet Tweedale you get lots of hits. Violet Tweedale, née Chambers (1862 – 19th December 1936), was a Scottish author, poet, and spiritualist. There's an article about her on Wikipedia which fills in a lot of the details.

She was born in Edinburgh, moved to London in 1889 and married Clarens in 1891 (so aged 29, which on the face of it seems quite old for that period). Other references suggest that she died in Torquay.

I can't find any reference to her ever living in Milton Hall mind you but Milton Hall Heritage Statement suggests that between 1891 and 1936, which must be the period we're talking about, it was owned by "the Pryors of Cambridge who leased it whilst letting to farmers most of the parks" (although the Milton Photo Archive reveals that the Pryors themselves were in residence in 1922).

Anyway, an interesting character and one of her books, Ghosts I Have Seen is available to download from Project Gutenberg.¹

As for Clarens he seems to be something of a cipher and there's very little on him to be found.