Frood, Mrs Mary, the Misses Hester and Constance
Frood, Mrs Mary, the Misses Hester and Constance, Broadway House, Topsham
Frood, Mary Catherine Isabella (1856-1931) née Campbell. Born in Canada, the only daughter of James Hunter Campbell, a magistrate, and Mary Forest Keast, she described herself as Scottish.[1]
She married Dr James Frood (1852- 1913), a physician, surgeon and public vaccinator in 1878 in Waipukurau, New Zealand.[2] He was born in Ireland: his grandfather Major James N. Frood had been in the Life Guards.[3] Their early married life was in New Zealand where four daughters (Mary Sophia, Constance, Hester, Joan) were born between 1880 and 1885.[4] Mary gave birth to son James at sea between New Zealand and Scotland in 1887,[5] and by 1891 the family, with two servants, was living at Broadway House, Topsham, a substantial property with “lofty rooms and large gardens” and a colonnade.[6] She set up a School of Domestic Training for Gentlewomen with one of her daughters at Broadway House from 1904.[7] The school had a very large flower and vegetable garden, tennis, croquet and hockey grounds, a dressmaking room, a large kitchen with sculleries and larders and a room for theatricals and dancing.[8]
She became visible in the Topsham and Exeter suffrage movement from 1910, becoming one of the small number of local women who joined both the WSPU and NUWSS, and was first honorary secretary of the Topsham branch of the NUWSS.[9] In 1910 she was one of 15 women named in the local paper as meeting Mrs Pankhurst at an “at home” at the Royal Clarence Hotel, Exeter, organised by the WSPU.[10]
Between 1910 and 1913 she convened at least one public meeting in the Museum (then part of Broadway House), presided or spoke at other public meetings, organised petitions, attended fundraising events, wrote lively and sometimes funny letters to newspapers, painted graffiti in white oil paint on pavements and her own wall near the railway station, and stuck suffrage cartoons on her gate.[11] She organised a census boycott at the family home in 1911[12] and took part in the Suffrage pilgrimage of 1913.[13] In 1913 at a packed meeting she was on the platform with one of her daughters and Mrs Bush, Miss Chessnut, and Mrs T Holman at a meeting in support of women’s suffrage.[14]
She argued for a link between taxation and the vote, describing herself as “one of the unenfranchised middle class women who have paid Income-tax for years”.[15] She also linked her argument to the colonial notion that the British should never be slaves.[16] In her letters she identifies her husband as a “strong conservative” but does not give her own affiliation, though she organised meetings in support of the Unionist MP Lionel Walrond.[17]
A pillar of the local community, her “untiring energy” was recognised in the setting up of a non-political and non-sectarian women’s club in Topsham in 1914.[18] That year she lent a field, Broadway Lawn, for Topsham Women’s Club fete and gave cooking lessons to Topsham Girl Guides.[19] In 1921 she lent her piano to the Topsham Debating Society and in 1921 was on the Committee of the Topsham Red Triangle Club.[20]
In WW1 she was on Exeter St Thomas Food Committee.[21]
After her husband died in 1913 leaving effects of £2391 7s 5d she benefited from a Trust Fund set up to pay her an income during her life, and then for their four daughters equally.[22] She travelled to Buenos Aires first class on the Asturias in 1911, and again to Argentina in 1924. Her son James, who served with the Devons during the war and received the MC, had worked in Argentina before WW1.[23]
Mrs Frood was in the first tranche of women to obtain the parliamentary vote in 1918 when she was living at 26 The Strand, Topsham.[24] She died in 1931 at the Helena Club, 82 Lancaster Gate, Paddington, where eldest daughter Mary Sophia was a long term resident,[25] and her ashes were placed on the family grave in Topsham Cemetery (Div. 1542). She left effects worth £2922 4s 3d with probate granted to her daughters Mary Sophia and Constance Islay.[26]
Frood, Miss Hester
Hester Frood, (1882-1971) was born in New Zealand, but moved to Topsham by age nine.[27]
Her mother Mrs Mary C.I. Frood (see above) was an important figure in the Topsham suffrage movement. Hester and sister Constance (see below) carried the Topsham banner on the Suffrage Pilgrimage march in 1913.[28]
Art was Hester’s focus, exhibiting etchings, paintings and drawings all through her life. At Exeter High School for Girls she exhibiting drawings in 1898,[29] and showed her work at the “at home” to celebrate the opening of a school for the domestic training of gentlewoman in Broadway House run by her mother and a sister.[30] She studied as an artist with N.H.J. Baird of Holcombe and for six months in Paris and etching with D.Y. Cameron.[31] In 1904 she exhibited an oil portrait at the Royal Academy, and went on to exhibit at Manchester City Art Gallery, the Grosvenor Galleries, the “South Kensington Museum”, the Ashmolean, and in USA and Scotland. In 1946 she exhibited at the Devonshire Association exhibition at Newton Abbot.[32]
When in 1925 she showed etchings and drypoints at the Grosvenor galleries, critics praised her “fine sense of romantic composition “ and for her watercolours “delicacy of touch”. The Yorkshire Post described “two dainty sketches”.[33] Her work is today in galleries around the world.[34]
During WW1, unlike her two surviving sisters, she did not enter the services, but donated a framed etching for a Red Cross sale for the war effort, and obtained a permit to paint on Exmouth beach.[35]
In 1921 she took part in the movement for revival of dramatic expression through plays and folk dancing when she appeared as Queen Gwenguiu in a play by the Topsham Amateurs.[36]
She married poet and former bookshop owner Mr Frank Gwynne-Evans: they lived at 26 The Strand from 1927 where she had a studio overlooking what is now Topsham Museum, and the river.[37] She died in Essex and is buried as Hester Evans in Topsham cemetery.[38]
Hester spent WW2 in Topsham. Under her married name, Mrs Gwynne-Evans, she was described as the ‘able Chairwoman’ of the Topsham Women’s Institute Fruit Preservation Scheme which between May and October 1941 had produced and disposed of 659 pounds of jam. By December 1942 a further 881 pounds of jam had been produced. In 1943 she donated an etching to raise proceeds for the Devon Federation of Women’s Institutes. In 1944 she gave a short address to the Women’s Institute on ‘Humorous situations’. [38.1]
Frood, Miss Constance
Constance Islay Frood (1885-1955) was born in Bulls, Rangitiki, New Zealand, but before she was six the family moved to Broadway House, Topsham, Devon where her father was the local doctor.[39] She attended St Margaret’s School, Exeter, “for daughters of Gentlemen”, where in 1905 she exhibited needlework, won the Form VI prize and an award for making Honiton lace. She received a commendation from the Royal Drawing Society for original illustration.[40]
Her mother, Mary C.I. Frood (see above) was an important figure in the Topsham suffrage cause, and Constance carried the Topsham Banner on the NUWSS suffrage pilgrimage in 1913 with her elder sister Hester (see above).[41]
Constance sought to follow in her father’s footsteps and become a doctor. In 1907 she enrolled in the University of Birmingham Medical School but did not get through to the second year. In the University’s first decade, 181 young women entered the Medical School, though only 18 (10%) made it into the third year and 9 (5%) finally qualified. This compared to 605 male entrants with 212 getting into 3rd year (35%) and 74 qualifying (12.2%).[1]
Instead of medicine Constance then trained at the nearby Anstey College of Physical Training, Birmingham, learning to teach gymnastics, games and dancing for children from infancy to age 20.[42] In 1909 she passed a hygiene exam.[43]
In 1916 her sister Joan died leaving her and sister Mary Sophia effects worth £317 5s 2d.[44] In 1913 her father made a Trust Fund under which she was beneficiary following her mother’s death, which occurred in 1931.[45]
By 14 December 1917, when she applied to join the WAAC in Europe, she gave her permanent address as Rest Harrow (Ashburner Cottage, 3 Station Road, Topsham) and a moral reference was provided by the brewery director, S. Ratcliffe Esq of Riversmeet House, Topsham, who had known her for 19 years. Her application shows she was 5’ 6½”. Initially her application was turned down as she was doing essential teaching work in Glasgow, but she became Administrative Assistant for drill in the WAAC, after the intervention of her well-placed elder sister Mary Sophia, who was WAAC Area Controller at Abbeyfield from 1917-1919 and who wrote that her sister was “thrilled by being in the WAAC and has enjoyed her training so much”. Her war record shows she was in Rouen, le Havre, and Le Treport. In 1918. Constance’s pension was enhanced by a promotion to the rank of Deputy Administrator for the three months before her discharge in 1920.[46]
Constance had a successful career teaching physical education for Glasgow Corporation, eventually as deputy superintendent of physical education, and becoming President of the West of Scotland Gymnasts’ Club (Women) and the Scottish League for Physical Education (Women), founder member and honorary treasurer of the Glasgow Keep-Fit movement, and she helped the Glasgow Soroptomists Club in projects for disabled ex-servicemen.[47] During WW2 she was an ambulance driver in Civil Defence.
She reached the age when she became eligible to vote in a Parliamentary election in 1925.[48]
From 1925-30 she lived at 19 Queen Mary Avenue, Glasgow with the Kelly family (including James Kelly of Belsize Park Gardens, London NW3) and Esther Legge. Sometime between 1930-32, and probably after coming into her Trust Fund in 1931, she moved to 26 Alder Road, Glasgow, where she lived to her death aged 69 in 1955.[49] She shared her home with Esther Legge for 25 years: Esther and brother James Campbell Frood were present when she died.[50]
Entry created by Penny Bayer, July 2018. Updated September 2021. Up[dated April 2023.
[1] Census, 1881, Topsham; Hawke’s Bay Herald, Vol XXI, Issue 5177, 12 Sept 1878. In the Asturias’ passenger log from Buenos Aires to Southampton her nationality as Scottish (Ancestry: Incoming passenger lists: 30 Dec 1911).
[2] Hawke’s Bay Herald, Vol XXI, Issue 5177, 12 Sept 1878.
[3] 1891 Census, Topsham; Hawke’s Bay Herald, Vol XXI, Issue 5177, 12 Sept 1878.
[4] 1891 Census, Topsham.
[5] 1891 Census, Topsham.
[6] 1891 Census, Topsham and DEG, 24 Jan 1905
[7] DEG, 31 Dec 1904; DEG, 20 & 24 Jan 1905.
[8] DEG, 20 Jan 1905.
[9] Mrs Holman organised the inaugural meeting at Sea View, Topsham, when Mrs Frood became honorary secretary, WT, 25 Nov 1910.
[10] WT, 29 Oct 1910. For more information on her suffrage activities see Penny Bayer,
“Participation in female community by women of the Frood family of Topsham: gentility, suffrage, the Great War and afterwards”, The Devon Historian, 2018.
[11] Present at Exeter NUWSS meeting, DEG, 17 July 1909. 1910; collecting names for NUWSS petition, The Common Cause, 30 Dec 1909, 6 Jan 1910, 13 Jan 1910; at anti- suffrage meeting at Killerton, DEG, 27 Jul 1910; interrogator at Exeter anti-suffrage meeting, WT, July 28th 1910; organised and presided at meeting in support of Conciliation Bill at the Museum, Broadway House, WT, 21 Jun 1910; at NUWSS Christmas tree fundraiser at Barnfield Theatre, with other Topsham women – Misses Lake, Frood, Lane and Mrs Tom Holman and Bush, WT 29 Nov 1913. See also Votes for Women, 3 Mar, 1911
[12] 1911 Census, Topsham.
[13] Penny Bayer, Mike Patrick, Topsham’s Suffragists 1911-1913 (Topsham Museum Society, 2013) pp. 3-5.
[14] WT , 28 Nov 1913.
[15] DEG, 17 Jun 1910
[16] Votes for Women, 3 Mar 1911.
[17] DEG, 16 Jun 1910
[18] WT, 8 May 1914.
[19] WT, 10 July 1914, DEG, 18 July 1914.
[20] WT, 21 Oct 1919, DEG, 3 Feb 1921.
[21] WT, 22 Sept 1917.
[22] Probate: 15 August 1913.
[23] WT, 26 Nov 1917.
[24] Topsham Electoral Rolls.
[25] Probate Register, 1931, p.410.
[26] ibid.
[27] 1891 Census, Topsham.
[28] Penny Bayer, Mike Patrick, Topsham’s Suffragists 1911-1913 (Topsham Museum Society 2013) pp.3-9; and Penny Bayer, “Participation in female community by women of the Frood family of Topsham: gentility, suffrage, the Great War and afterwards”, The Devon Historian, 2018
[29] DEG, 17 Dec 1898.
[30] DEG, 26 Sep 1905.
[31] http://www.campbell-fine-art.com/artists.php?id=349, and obituary in WMN, 13 May 1971.
[32] e.g. The Sphere, 7 Feb 1925; Manchester Evening News, 15 Jun 1914; obituary in WMN 13 May 1971.
[33] The Sphere, 7 Feb 1925.
[34] e.g. Spencer Museum of Art, Kansas; Art Gallery New South Wales; the Art Institute Chicago.
[35] WT, 18 Nov 1915 and permit in Topsham Museum.
[36] DEG, 28 Jan 1921.
[37] Topsham Electoral Rolls.
[38] https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/116685771/hester-evans
[38.1] Devon Heritage Centre 1618G/WB/TP Women’s Institute Minutes books, Topsham, vols. 2, 3.
[39] 1891 Census, Topsham.
[40] DEG, 16 March 1905.
[41] Penny Bayer, Mike Patrick, Topsham’s Suffragists 1911-1913 (Topsham Museum Society, 2013) pp. 3-9. See also Penny Bayer, “Participation in female community by women of the Frood family of Topsham: gentility, suffrage, the Great War and afterwards”, The Devon Historian, 2018.
[42] PRO: WO/398/81 Constance’s war record.
[43] Birmingham Gazette, 10 July 1909.
[44] Ancestry National Probate Calendar. Administration London 16 Feb 1916.
[45] Probate Exeter 15 August 1913.
[46] PRO: WO/398/81.
[47] Glasgow Herald, 23 Sept 1955.
[48] Glasgow Electoral registers.
[49] Glasgow Electoral registers.
[50] https//scotlandspeople.gov.uk, death record 644/19 991, Cathcart (Glasgow). Ancestry: National Probate Calendar, p.418.
[1] Information in this paragraph kindly supplied by Peter Vessey from his database of traceable early students and staff at the University of Birmingham (1880 – 1918) based on University records (original student record cards, lists of the previous year’s students published in the annual Calendars, and the Register of Degrees, Diplomas & Certificates, 1900 – 1934).