Aunt Flossie indirectly provided the only evidence that the Wrays were remotely interested in their family history. When I began contacting my cousins, several produced (with an air of reverence) the distribution document of her estate which detailed her siblings or their children who were alive in 1978. Even my father, who was not known for nostalgia, had kept his copy.
Although we knew her as ‘Flossie’, her parents named her ‘Florry’. She was born
on 15 August 1889 at Back Lane, Preston and was eventually baptized on 12 July 1891.
She started school very early -
Her school record is only noteworthy because she was knocked down and injured in the playground by Herbert Robinson (the son of Preston’s tailor) in 1899 and was later absent for ten days in the summer of 1902 with ‘a gathering in her head’.
Perhaps it was inevitable in view of her Christian name that Flossie should become a nurse. Her acceptance by the nursing profession shows some resourcefulness. Flossie served in the Queen Alexandra’s Imperial Nursing Service Reserve during World War One. When the armistice was signed, she then was either transferred or “lent” to the Queen Alexandra’s Military Nursing Service for India (QAMNSI).
The nursing service was ‘incredibly concerned with social class and status’. They gave preference to daughters of professional people such as teachers, chaplains and Army officers. The following are typical comments in the minutes of the Nursing Board:
‘Not in the least acceptable; her father is a shoemaker.’
‘Not a lady by birth nor by education.’
‘Hardly up to standard, personally and socially.’
Quite how Flossie ‘got through this social net’ and later married above her station
(as we shall see) is a mystery. However, sometime in 1919, this thirty-
A niece remembers being spellbound by Flossie’s stories of her Indian experiences – of panthers who carried off small animals from the camp at night.
On 14 April 1921, Florence (sic) Wray (25!) married Harold Sugden (31) at St Thomas’ Church, Dera Ismail Khan in the diocese of Lahore, Pakistan. The occupation of the couple’s fathers was not required on the marriage certificate – it would have been interesting to read her description of Alfred Wray’s occupation.
Harold Sugden’s ancestry was quite different to Flossie’s modest origins.
His grandfather, William Sugden (born 1816 in Bath) was a surgeon and apothecary. Harold’s father, Edward Sugden, was born in 1850 at Backwell in Somerset. At the age of 21, he studied to be an architect. He then switched careers and trained as an Anglican clergyman at Chichester Theological College.
He was a curate at St Mary Magdelene, Dundee (1878-
Using his architectural expertise, he also designed several church buildings in Scotland such as St John the Baptist Episcopal Church, 116 Albert Street, Dundee (1885) and the Church of St Margaret, Lochee, Dundee.
Edward married Elizabeth Mary Sparks in 1887 at Chepstow, Monmouthshire and they had a son, Harold (born 8 June 1891 at Coupar Angus, Forfar), and a daughter. In 1901, Harold was at Heaton Lodge boarding school at Kirkheaton, Yorkshire.
According to the Indian Army records at the British Library, H. Sugden was appointed
to the Indian Army on 4 September 1918. In January 1919, he was a Lieutenant in the
infantry and became a temporary Captain in 1920 until October 1922 -
It is generally believed by Flossie’s family that the marriage foundered because of pressure from Harold’s relatives. That she kept her engagement ring and passed it on to a favourite niece perhaps indicates her feelings about her marriage.
When she returned to her parents’ home at Preston, she became a matron at ‘Foxholes’ maternity home in Hitchin (right) which is a measure of her ability and strong (not to say stern) character. She was known as ‘Matron Sugden’ and was nursing there in 1951 when her mother died. She would drive there (somewhat erratically) which again was comparatively unusual for a woman at that time. Later, Flossie worked in a home for the elderly at Stevenage.
As soon as she heard that the cottage at Chequers Lane could be bought, she visited the owner, Mr. Vickers, and purchased it.
Her sister, Maggie, remembers that Flossie was very generous to her children.
Flossie’s next door neighbours were the Newells (at 6 Chequers Cottages). Chris Newell’s instant memory of Flossie was that she saved his sister Barbara’s life when a boiled sweet lodged in her throat. She was turning blue, when Flossie ‘popped it out’.
Flossie died intestate in the summer of 1966 at Fairfield Mental Hospital, Stotfold, Beds. Her immediately disposable estate was valued at £4,500. Her sister Nan continued to live at the family home until her death in 1978. Then, 5 Chequers Cottages was sold for £18,000.
As a young boy, I was a little afraid of Auntie Flossie. She seemed fierce, strict and demanding. She glared at me and bristled with trembling lips during the most trivial of chats.
Towards the end of her life, Flossie became a little unbalanced. She locked her sister, Nan, out of the house and a villager remembers being terrified at school because Flossie arrived there declaring that there was a terrible epidemic and demanding that all the children had to be inoculated.
I am so pleased to have a photograph of her next to me at a family wedding in 1951
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Sources: Preston school log book -
Flossie in 1951
