Montague, Mrs Amy, Penton House, Old Tiverton Road, Crediton
Amy Julia Mary Montague[1] née Lind (1864-1956) was born in 1864 in London (Marylebone), the daughter of James and Florence Lind. By 1871 the family were living in Withycombe Raleigh and her father described himself as a retired army officer. He had been born in India and retired with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. In 1881 the family were living at Edgehill, South Down Lane, Bideford. Amy, aged 16, was the eldest resident daughter, and still described as a ‘scholar’. Five years later Amy married Leopold Montague in Exeter. He had also briefly served as an army officer, in the Derby Regiment, and served in the Volunteer and Territorial Forces.
Amy and Leopold, settled in Penton House, Leopold’s father’s home, living on their private means, and had four children: Zoe (b.1888), Paul (b.1890), Felix (b.1894) and Ruth, q.v., (b.1897). Leopold was also a theosophist and an amateur dramatist, both writing and the family were much in demand to present plays and comic pieces at entertainments in the Crediton area. Paul was a friend of Rupert Brooke’s, and Brooke’s poem, Dining Room Tea, was completed after a visit in 1911 to Penton for tea when Paul, Rupert and other Old Bedalians were entertained by Amy Montague.[2]
Montague was a woman of wide interests including nature (British Mycological Society member), folklore (Folklore Society member) and drama. She initiated the establishment of the first troop of Boy Scouts in Crediton, and continued to support them financially.[3] Her granddaughter recalled that she did ’an hour of trigonometry’ before getting up and always took a collecting tin on walks.[4]
It is not clear when Montague first became active in the suffrage movement, although she referred to having been a supporter since 1892.[5] In December 1907 she organised and chaired the first WSPU public meeting in Exeter, at which Christabel Pankhurst spoke.[6] Almost immediately after that meeting she became involved in active in WSPU campaigning at the by-election in Newton Abbot opposing the election of the Liberal candidate. This involved her in presiding and speaking at meetings, often with hostile audiences at Bovey Tracey,[7] Teignmouth,[8] Newton Abbot,[9] and Dawlish.[10]
She continued speaking and introducing speakers at WSPU meetings around the county in the spring of 1908.[11] That summer she led an Exeter contingent to the national ‘Votes for Women’ demonstration in Hyde Park in June 1908 where she spoke from the same platform as Christabel Pankhurst.[12] When the Anti-Suffrage League formed a branch in Exeter at the end of 1909 she wrote letters to local papers arguing against their policies.[13] She also wrote protesting against the forcible feeding of women prisoners in Winson Green prison.[14] Her home at Penton became a haven for WSPU organisers: Vera Wentworth, Rose Dugdale and Annie Kenney are all noted there at an ‘At Home’ for WSPU members to meet Dr Elizabeth Garrett Anderson.[15]
In 1910 Montague went out to speak at WSPU meetings in Honiton, Axminster and Topsham.[16] She also hosted a WSPU meeting at the Royal Clarence Hotel when Mrs Pankhurst visited Exeter in October 1910 and moved the resolution in support of the Women’s Suffrage Bill at the subsequent public meeting where Mrs Pankhurst spoke.[17] In the campaign for the second General Election of 1910 she led the WSPU delegation to lobby the sitting MP for Exeter, Mr Duke (who would not commit himself to support women’s suffrage) and asked a question at a meeting held by his Liberal opponent (who was in favour).[18] At the 1911 census neither Amy Montague nor her daughter Ruth are recorded, at Crediton or elsewhere, indicating their protest against ‘being counted’ by a government for whom they did not count.
As WSPU militancy increased Montague seems to have moved closer to the NUWSS and is recorded at Exeter events and on the NUWSS pilgrimage.[19] Nonetheless when Mrs Pankhurst was held in prison in Exeter she was involved in organising support for her.[20]
During the First World War both Montague’s sons were killed in action, Felix in March 1915 and Paul in October 1917. After Felix’s death Amy devoted her time to work in the Red Cross hospitals in Exeter and Crediton. She trained as a masseuse with an additional qualification in medical electricity, qualifying in December 1915.[21] She maintained her name of the Register of the Chartered Society of Massage and Medical Gymnastics through to the 1930s. She is also said by her grand-daughter to have installed gymnasium bars in a room at Penton to provide rehabilitation for the patients.
After the war she urged women to vote not for a party but for the ‘betterment of the world. Our Lord’, she said, ‘has given us great promise that we can help His Kingdom to come here. In short we must make it part of the life beyond, where so many of our brave boys await us who gave their lives to lessen the misery of the world.’[22] She continued to live on in Penton until 1956, long outliving her husband. During the Second World War, despite being in her late seventies, she was active in the Civil Defence movement as an Air Raid Warden.
Montague died on 4 February 1953 in the Kenwyn Nursing Home at Crediton and is buried in Crediton Cemetery. Her estate was valued at £16727.
Entry created by Julia Neville, with acknowledgements to Mary Estcourt (grand-daughter) and Paul Cleave for their contributions, August 2018
[1] Census and family information from www.ancestry.co.uk
[2] Nigel Jones, Rupert Brooke: Life, Death and Myth (2014).
[3] E&E, 25 Jun 1910, p.6.
[4] Personal communication from Mary Estcourt to Paul Cleave.
[5] DEG, 23 Dec 1907, p.6.
[6] WT, 20 Nov 1907, p.2
[7] DEG, 21 Dec 1907, p.6.
[8] DEG, 23 Dec 1907, p.6.
[9] WMN, 28 Dec 1907, p.8.
[10] WT, 4 Jan 1908, p.3; 14 Jan, p.8.
[11] Exeter, WT, 8 May 1908, p.9 and 11 Jun 1908, p.2; Torquay, WT, 30 May 1908, p.4; Topsham, WT, 21 Jun 1910, p.
[12] WT, 23 Jun 1908, p.6.
[13] DEG, 2 Nov 1908, p.5; WT, 3 Nov 1908, p.6.
[14] WT, 1 Oct 1909, p.9.
[15] WT, 13 Oct 1909, p.3.
[16] Honiton, DEG, 24 Jan 1910, p.5; Axminster, 28 Jan 1910, p.7; Topsham, WT, 21 Jun 1910, p.2
[17] WT, 29 Oct 1910, p.2; DEG, 29 Oct 1910, p.6.
[18] WT, 21 Nov 1910, p.4; 29 Nov 1910, p.4.
[19] WT, 22 May 1914, p.3; 7 Jul 1913, p.4; 22 Nov 1913, p.2.
[20] WT, 9 Dec 1913, p.8; DEG, 13 Dec 1913, p.3.
[21] Red Cross First World War Volunteer card; entry into register of physiotherapists.
[22] Crediton Area History and Museum Society Archive, Cadbury Ruridecanal Magazine, January 1919, Report of Montague’s address to women voters at Shobrooke,. This reference contributed by Paul Cleave.