Tag Archives: The Mount

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.

Pat Burt :Early Days living in ‘Kevack’

When we lived in Kevack in the High Street, we had an outdoor loo.  You went across a small yard, and there were 2 loos side by side. One belonged to our next door neighbour, Mr King, the head gardener at The Mount, and he had to walk through the bottom of our yard to get to his loo. They could be sat in theirs, right next to us,  –  but they were flush, those loos.

My mother was cook to the Hamiltons in the Wight/White House for some years until she was taken very ill.  When I was very small, I used to have to go with my mother when she went to work while she was cooking in the kitchen. I always remember the smell of the lovely rubbery green staircase they had.  Instead of carpet the stairs were covered in this lovely pale green rubber and it smelt beautiful.

I was knocked down by a car, when I was 7 and there were very few cars about. I was running home from school for lunch. It was a very rough day and I could see the sea  blowing up at the end of Pier Shore Lane  down between the Yacht Club and The Towers. I was coming along South Street and I ran straight across the High Street. Of course the High Street was a main road then, and there was a car coming, driven by one of the Miss Creagh Osbornes and it hit me. Luckily it didn’t hurt me much, just my ankle. It was my own fault , I was so excited, I wanted to see the rough sea.  I didn’t go back to school that day, and later Miss Creagh Osborne knocked on the door and brought me a black and white china dog as a present. Pat Burt nee Adams b 1929

Jean Maitland: 1930s, The Mount, Dashwoods

The Mount seen fom the marsh

The Mount seen fom the marsh

We used to go scrumping apples at The Mount. We used to go through the bottom of the Rec.  and fill our knickers with the apples, them knickers that had pockets in. The boys used to dare us.
When anybody had a baby they used to take them down one rose, Cuthbert, Caroline, and Miss Constance, the Dashwood family.
Miss Constance was the last one left of the Dashwoods.  She left me a book when she died. Jean Maitland nee Levey b 1928

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

Serena Dias de Deus nee Hunt: characters at church

Miss Scadding  played the church organ. She was quite eccentric; had her hair cut like a man, which was not usual in those days, and wore a mortar board.  She regaled us with stories about her cats. Her family had a music shop at Totland. I believe her father used to teach organ at Osborne House, maybe to Queen Victoria’s children, I seemed to have heard that at some time.

There were plenty of “characters” who attended the church, such as the Dashwood family from The Mount ; Theresa , Caroline, Cuthbert  and Constance.
The Dashwood family had always had their private pew in the church balcony, but the balcony had been put out of bounds because it needed repairs and the roof leaked. However, Theresa took no notice of this and alone took her rightful place on the balcony. If it rained, she just put her umbrella up.

Cuthbert wore plus fours and rode an old fashioned bicycle. To mount it, he used to run along with the bike and suddenly leap onto a sort of pedal at the back and jump into the saddle. We children loved to witness this!

Caroline came to my house one day when I was small and took me to The Mount to look at the wisteria which was growing on a wall and was very beautiful. She brought some freshly cooked asparagus for my cat, which she said cats enjoyed. I could not believe it, but he did.
Constance had rosy cheeks and was very sweet and friendly. Serena Dias de Deus nee Hunt b1939