Petherick, Miss Edith

Petherick, Miss Edith, 5 St Leonard’s Road, Exeter

Edith Maria Petherick[1] (1863-1941) was born on 29 December 1863 at 2 Higher Mount Radford Road, Exeter. She was the daughter of John William and Elizabeth Maria Petherick. J.W. Petherick was a solicitor and a city magistrate. The family had moved from Mount Radford to 5 St Leonard’s Road by the time of the 1881 census. The St Leonard’s Road house contained ten rooms and the 1911 census shows that they employed a cook and a house-parlourmaid.

Edith was the youngest of five children, with two sisters, Alice and Mary, and two brothers, William and Edward. Both William and Edward became solicitors with their father. William moved away to practise in Exmouth and Edward remained with his father in the firm of Messrs Petherick and Son, Bedford Circus and continued to live in the family home in St Leonard’s Road. Mary married Albert Mummery, an alpinist who was killed in a climbing accident in 1895. Alice and Edith remained at home. Elizabeth died in 1906 and John in 1917, at the age of 95.

Edith was described as an artist/sculptor in the census in 1901 and as an artist in the census in 1911 and she is known to have exhibited at Eland’s in Exeter in 1901,[2] at the Devon County Arts and Crafts Association in Torquay in 1912, where she won a bronze medal and a certificate,[3] and at the Westcountry Artists’ exhibition in Torquay in 1915.

John Petherick and one of the Petherick daughters are listed as present at the inaugural At Home meeting to launch the Exeter branch of the NUWSS in 1909.[4] Miss Petherick is also referred to as assisting in the Suffrage Shop at the end of 1909. By 1910 Miss Edith Petherick was a member of the branch committee and she was re-elected to that position in 1913.[5] Her continuing membership of the committee is referred to at various events in 1912[6] and 1913, including acting as a member of the Reception Committee for the Provincial Council meeting in Exeter in May 1913 and running the book stall at the Christmas Fair.[7]

There are no further reports of her activity after the end of 1913. She and other members of the family are noted as subscribing to various wartime charitable causes.

Edith died on 20 November 1941, still at 5 St Leonard’s Road. Her effects were valued at over £2000.

 

 

Entry created by Julia Neville, October 2018


[1] Family and census information at www.ancestry.co.uk

[2] WT, 28 Sep 1901.

[3] DEG, 18 Apr 1912.

[4] DEG, 16 Feb 1909.

[5] WT, 8 Nov 1910, mentioned as committee member at the event where Lord Lytton spoke; 19 Feb 1913.

[6] DEG, 25 Jun, 1 & 28 Nov 1912.

[7] WT, 24 Mar 1913; DEG, 27 May & 29 Nov 1913.

 

Return to Index