Out of the Long Ago

by Maud Milgate

Cousin Florence

During the summer of the following year I had a letter from Mrs. Coleman saying that a Mrs. Chase from Australia was staying at the Saracens Hotel Diss and that she had lived in her youth at Diss Court. She also enclosed a local newspaper which also recorded the fact, adding that Mrs. Chase (formerly Florence Baldwin) was on a world trip and was in England to see her birth place before going on to Canada to see her brother John Baldwin who had emigrated many years before. Mrs. Coleman added "Is this anyone you are looking for". Well, was it? I did not know. I had heard my grandmother speak of Diss Court many times. She said her niece Harriet Baldwin lived there. Now Harriet must have married the dandy Robert Baldwin I had seen in one of the oval photographs at Attleborough. I had also heard my mother speak of the holidays she had spent at Diss Court as a young woman, but I had never heard of a Florence Baldwin. I took a chance and wrote to the lady, told her what I knew and what I was looking for. She replied that she was Harriet and Robert Baldwin’s daughter, that she had married young Reggie Chase of Chase Mills Diss and that with her 6 children had emigrated to Australia in 1923. She further said that as her mother and mine had been first cousins, she and I must be second cousins and that she would like to meet me and would await my coming. I therefore set out in mid-October to go to Diss to meet her. My search was taking on reality. Arrived in Diss I was told Mrs. Florence Chase was in bed with flu, so I rested and waited for her to recover. Four days later we met by appointment in the lounge of the Park Hotel. She was very small and in her middle seventies but very active. She had a well educated pleasing voice and I liked her immediately She was not feeling very strong and I did not see much of her to begin with but I did meet an Owen Baldwin one evening. He was a cousin of Robert’s ((Florence’s father) and a rather disreputable member of the family I imagine. Mrs. Coleman had met him one day while I was there and said she would take me to see him. She called for me with the car one evening after dinner and we went to a very old dark cottage in a mysterious yard in a side street in Diss. Owen was an old man, a widower, but very lively. On the walls were religious pictures but next to them a saucy naked lady was pinned up. He talked sensibly enough and told me quite a bit about the past. He said he had met Florence in the street that morning. "She must find things in Diss very altered" he said. "You know" turning to me "when she was young she never went out in Diss, around the shops unless attended by a groom or young Katie Reeve. Everyone knew her". I enjoyed talking to him, he was like a character out of a book with his big Norfolk nose and cheerful outlook on life. I asked him about the Breckland country; that sandy waste that lies around Thetford and which has a fascination for me and I always remember what he said about it. He spoke of going through Breckland one sunny summer’s morning, with the hum of the bees and the birds singing and his old car sailing along the lanes "like a bird" and with joy in his heart. He described this as "happiness". When we left he kissed us good -bye and said I was a "lovely lady". I should not have liked to have made the visit alone!! The next evening Florence dined with me at the Park Hotel and we had a good talk about our family relationship. I talked of looking in Diss churchyard for relatives and she said I was looking in the wrong place. The graves were at Palgrave It seems Diss Court lies on the outskirts of Diss and by taking a field path across some meadows known as "The Lows" it was easier to get to Poigrave Church than Diss. Also her grandmother had lived in Palgrave and Florence had been born there and married there, so the sole interest was around Palgrave Church. The following day I went with Florence to Scole about 2 miles away to visit Katie Reeve who kept "The Greyhound" public house there with her niece Winnie. Katie was related to Florence on the Baldwin side and had lived much of her young life at Diss Court. She was 87 and not very well, a fact that had made Florence come to England first, before going on to Canada to see her brother John. In fact she never did go to Canada because John Baldwin died before her stay in England was over. I had expected Katie to be an old lady sitting up in bed wrapped in a shawl and I had hoped she would live long enough for me to ask her a few questions. Instead I met a very small, very alert little creature with the most endearing smile. As Florence had always got a taxi around "Patterson" was always waiting for us, and we took Katie to an old house turned into a cafe. It was run by foreigners and they looked at us very suspiciously when we asked for tea, but after some hesitation they served it. There was no-one else there and we did not enjoy the tea very much but Florence and Katie had known the house in their youth and got a thrill out of reconstructing its furnishings to what it had been when it was a private house. and they had rolled up the carpets and danced there. After some talk with Katie I took their photograph which unfortunately did not come out.

That evening I went to dinner at the Saracens Hotel with cousin Florence and afterwards we had a long talk in her room. The hotel was an old coaching Inn, and very dark and spooky upstairs and it had creepy narrow passages and steps up and down. Cousin Florence’s room had a sloping floor and looked out on to the churchyard It was an ideal setting for a mystery novel.

Talking about the family history Florence said as a child she had visited a very old lady named Pilgrim at Kenninghall. She thought she was a relative but did not know what. The old lady had a daughter Hilda who was married to a Fred Disney and we decided that the next day we would visit Kenning Hall and Banham and see if we could find any clues. Sunday was cold and windy but "Patterson" soon got us there. Kenninghall churchyard proved very interesting and I saw a very old tomb partly sunk into the ground to Margy and Thomas Bilham, I think these may have been our great great grandparents but ivy obliterated all dates. We looked round the church and on coming out met the Vicar. I said I would like to search the registers there the next holiday had. He replied I could with pleasure because by then he would be inducted to the living. He was new to these parts having come from Sheerness in Kent. We went on to Banham which had a lovely village green with tall trees surrounding and a very old church, and churchyard. On that very windy Sunday afternoon we searched among gravestones, peering at names and dates. Suddenly Florence looked at me and said with a laugh "You have got a nerve, doing all this." She came back to the Park Hotel and had tea with me and we sat in the Bar all evening talking. Only a solitary Japanese came in. I cannot think why we sat in the bar.

I persuaded Florence to come up on the Broads with me for a couple of days. She was not too good after her flu but decided to risk it. As our decision was a spur of the moment one I rang up a Mrs. Jekkel for aaccommodation because the Revitts were not on the phone. However the first person we bumped into in Wroxham was Mr. Revitt. I introduced Florence, they shook hands. there was a pause then she said to him "You are a digger." I stared, what was she talking about, but he laughed and said "Yes, I am" and they seemed pleased to see each other. A "digger" apparently was an Australian. But we were due to go on a Broads trip so I hurried her on after promising to take coffee with the Revitts next day. Florence loved the Broads, she had never been on them before, and was so pleased she had come with me. She and Mr. and Mrs. Rivett had a good talk about Australia, on the following morning and by the time I had seen her on her train for Diss she had promised to spend a weekend with me at Ramsgate later on. This she did early in December. She came through one of the worst fogs we have ever had to reach me and the weather throughout the weekend was abominably cold. Elsie my friend came and showed her a cine-film of Blanche so that Florence should know what she was like and next day we went to Canterbury to our cousins Ralph and Rene Castle in order to take Florence to see more cousins Ronald and Ren Pilcher. We took Florence into Canterbury Cathedral which enthralled her and after lunch in a cafe we went out to Harbledown to Ronald’s charming house. Over tea Ralph turned to me and said "What is our exact relationship to each other?"