Tag Archives: The Dashwoods

Brenda Garlick: The Mount, The Dashwoods, 1950s

The Mount, the Dashwoods, Aunt Ena

The Mount, Yarmouth, pulled down late 1960s to make way for new road.

The Mount, Yarmouth, pulled down late 1960s to make way for new road.

It does mean a lot to me that it’s not there, I spent so much time up there. I remember such happy days there.

I have such happy memories. My aunt was so good to me. I could go to the house anywhen I liked and play in the gardens, and play horses with my friends in the old stables.

As I got older – my aunt was such a good seamstress –  I would buy lengths of material and my aunt would show me how to sew and make clothes. She did more like that with me than my mother did.

I did meet Mr. Cuthbert, who was a lovely gentleman. He would wander down to the kitchen when my aunt was there, and talk to me. And I met Miss Constance and Miss Caroline.

The Mount, front

The Mount,;photo Brenda Garlick

I always felt they wanted to be much more involved. There was a regime which had been imposed on them when they were children, and they didn’t dare go beyond the boundaries. They kept it up, all their lives. Miss Constance always sat in the Lady Chapel, not with the main congregation. The difference was they had been brought up in the religious background with their father who was a reverend and uncles who were reverends.

They were always referred to as ‘Mr’ Cuthbert and ‘Miss Constance and ‘Miss’ Caroline. I think it was a mark of respect for your betters that we don’t use today.

They were such generous benefactors. If anyone was suffering, wanted money, or was in trouble, they were great benefactors. They gave money to the church, the school. They had so many charities, they were so good to the people of Yarmouth.

My aunt did very well out of them, what they had left they left a lot to her. She loved them; we all did, my mum and my dad.

Ruth Mills: Early Days

My aunt Ena was housekeeper at The Mount and lived in, in the servants’ quarters. She was the only live-in servant left and was responsible for the housekeeping, and did all the cooking. My mum used to go in to help, so I was often there when I was small. Mrs Lansdowne and Mrs. Dye used to come in too, to help. It was a huge house – 32 main rooms as well as servants’ quarters and all the outbuildings.

The Mount photographed by Ruth Mills c1960

The Mount, home of the Dashwood family, photographed by Ruth Mills in 1960s. Ruth's mother and Aunt Ena worked at The Mount, with Ena ( Doe), last live-in servant. Miss Constance was last surviving member of the family, all of whom died childless. The House was pulled down in 1966 to make way for the new road.

The Mount, home of the Dashwood family, photographed by Ruth Mills in 1960s.
Ruth’s mother and Aunt Ena worked at The Mount, with Ena ( Doe), last live-in servant.
Miss Constance was last surviving member of the family, all of whom died childless. The House was pulled down in 1966 to make way for the new road.

Miss Constance, who was the last surviving Dashwood, was very short, quite tiny but rather dumpy.
She came down to the kitchen to see Aunt Ena at exactly the same time every day, to give her the menu for the day. If I happened to be there, I had to hide in the scullery and not be seen. Whether my mum and my aunt had decided that children shouldn’t be seen, or whether Miss Constance had made that rule, I don’t know.  I was certainly discouraged from going into the main part of the house.

The main rooms in the house seemed to be just as they were when the Dashwood family first lived there – very Victorian. The furniture had to be polished every day – one of the jobs I did to ‘help’ Mum.

There was a massive cupboard in the kitchen full of sacks of dried food like lentils and haricot beans. On one wall there were rows of bells to show which room you were being called to. The back stairs for the servants were steep and had a rope instead of a handrail, and there were long dark corridors with stone floors leading to the main house.

I used to go down into the cellars, lots of dark rooms with high windows with grills over them, where there always seemed to be lots of toads. There was an enormous boiler down there too, which I don’t remember ever working.

The smell of the stables is still easy to imagine, musty, with strange smells coming from the canvas hood of an old invalid carriage. The horses had all gone and there were no cars there – the stables wouldn’t have been big enough.

Mr. King, the gardener, grew all the vegetables for the house and there was a wonderful apple store with racks of apples that smelled really good.

I spent a lot of time wandering about outside on my own, quite happy. Once I was sent to pick daffodils – there were thousands growing there. Outside the back entrance there was a big old laburnum tree. If I climbed up and sat in the branches, I could see over the wall everyone coming and going in Back Lane, and they couldn’t see me. It’s left me quite content even now to be on my own.  Ruth Mills nee Kelleway b 1945