A POSTSCRIPT

to A Pickworth Diary

THE MYSTERY of Dorothy Houghton that has bothered me since first reading the diary in 1998 was finally solved five years later. On 26th January 2003, I received an email from Mrs Susan Simmons living in Warkworth, New Zealand, which said: 

I have just stumbled across your web site after putting a search in for William Christopher Houghton, my great grandfather, and I am dumbfounded. Dorothy who wrote the Pickworth Diary that you reproduce, was my great aunt. I immediately looked through old photographs belonging to my mother, Marjory, who died three years ago, and included among them was one of my grandfather, Francis Cyril Houghton in his World War One uniform. I have just now read his account of war written in Dorothy's diary and seen the Roll of Honour with the name of him and his two brothers, Reg and Basil, included and I have tears in my eyes. I have sent a link to your page to my cousin Tony Sherwin who lives at Chessington, Surrey. His mother is Elizabeth, Francis Cyril's youngest daughter who also lives in Surrey, and they were stunned to know about this discovery. They will also be delighted and moved to read Dorothy's diary. My mother married my father, Dudley Wright, at Surbiton in Surrey in 1946 and I was born there the following year. We emigrated to New Zealand in 1948, both my parents having served in the army and had found it difficult to settle after discharge. We have been living here ever since.
I am very pleased that the diary has fallen into the hand of someone who obviously treasures it. I suppose it was thrown out with a load of other books from the family.

Biographical details of those mentioned in the diary are as follows:

DOROTHY HOUGHTON (born 9th July 1889) did not marry. She had been deaf following an illness at the age of 15 and this is no doubt the illness referred to in her diary. She is remembered as being tall and dark and in spite of her disability, was a very jolly person. The family eventually moved to Paington, Devon, where her father died on 20th January 1923, and she then felt rather lonely and so moved to Newcastle where her brother Basil was living and working. She died at Newcastle in October 1971. 
HER BROTHER, Basil Gordon Houghton (born 15th June 1887) died at Newcastle on 20th June 1969 and his wife Gwendoline (nee Wear) died there in 1960. They had two daughters.
HER BROTHER Reginald Christopher Houghton (born 26th April 1893) died in 1966.
HER BROTHER Hal, William Henry John Houghton (born 29th May 1875) died in Canada circa 1968.


Dorothy is photographed here about 1941 when she was 52.

 

HER BROTHER Francis Cyril Houghton (born 22nd February 1881) became the manager of a bank at Barton-on-Humber. He married Moira Kathleen Spencer (born 8th September 1886) on 7th September 1909 and they had six children, Moira (Molly), Marjory, Barbara, Geoffrey, Kenneth and Elizabeth. He died at Barton on 19th November 1938 and his wife died at New Malden, Surrey, in 1978.
HER SISTER Edie, full name Helen Edith Margaret Houghton (born 7th March 1885), became an Anglican nun and died at the House of Retreat in London in 1952.

 

HER FATHER, the Rev William Christopher Houghton (born 1847) died at Paignton in Devon on 20th January 1923.
HER MOTHER, Mrs Julia Houghton (born 16th March 1852), was the daughter of the Rev William Barham, Vicar of Fridaybridge, Suffolk. She was taken ill at Paignton and Dorothy returned to nurse her but she died in 1932 and Dorothy went back to Newcastle.

A further email arrived from Andrew Clayton in Birmingham, England, on 13th July 2003 which provided more information about Dorothy. It said:

I have just been made aware of the Dorothy Houghton's diary by Susan Simmons. Dorothy, or Auntie Dosh as we called her, was my great aunt. I knew her when we lived in Newcastle circa 1953-56. I was about eight years old and Dorothy would have been in her mid or late sixties. We used to go to her house for tea occasionally on a Saturday or Sunday. I, of course, was required to be on my best behaviour so it wasn't always a totally enjoyable experience. As you probably know, she never married and lived alone in a terraced house in Ashleigh Grove, West Jesmond. She was quite deaf which may be the affliction referred to in her visit to the hospital in London. I thoroughly enjoyed reading the extracts of the diary and hope to be able to read it in its entirety sometime soon. I have also learned more about my grandfather Basil and the other members of the family. Edie (Edith), the nurse, became a nun in the early 1930s. Was that decision influenced by her war experiences, I wonder? That, of course, is the fascination of all this social history.

The diary has now been handed to the family where it belongs and so it has returned home after more than eighty years.

Photos: Courtesy Susan Simmons and Tony Sherwin

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