Feb 05 2010
A Love Story
In 1893 a young girl, only 16 years old, fell in love with an unsuitable man.
Her name was Frances, and she lived in the industrial heartlands of south-west Wales, in the area around Pembroke Dock.
I don’t know who the man was – I have heard it suggested that he was a travelling photographer, one of many who went from village to village in rural areas taking portraits of country people; they would return several weeks later with the photos – sometimes the only ones the folk would ever own.
However they met, the young girl was besotted with the man, and he seemed to be equally taken with her. The pair became close very quickly, to the dismay of her family, but they continued to meet and correspond.
A plan was hatched. The two of them were to elope! They swore that they would be together no matter what the consequences, and decided to run away as far as they could go, get married, and live together forever. For a young girl with no experience of the world, this must have been a very romantic notion, and Frances agreed to the plan eagerly. The man booked two tickets on a trans-Atlantic ship – they were going to sneak away one morning, make their way to the docks and head across the sea to America and a new life.
Somehow, Frances’s parents found out about the plan. Instead of confronting their daughter, they simply crept up to her bedroom on the morning of the elopement, and locked the door. She cried and screamed and pleaded to be let out, but they were resolute; she would remain there until the danger was passed.
The ship sailed, and as far as I know, the man was on it. I don’t know his name, and I don’t know what happened to him; he simply disappeared out of the story.
Frances was heartbroken. She swore from that day onward that she would never love another man as long as she lived: she would never marry, never have children. The years went by, and whilst she was a bonny lass and many young lads came calling, she was interested in none of them.
When she was in her early twenties, Frances was offered a job in Scotland, working for a Welsh couple who owned a house just outside Nairn called Lochloy. She accepted the job and became the cook. Her handsome face, her baking skills and her unmarried state made Frances a very interesting topic of conversation for the local suitors; they all made their overtures, but she had sworn never to love, never to marry.
Living nearby was a bachelor farmer called Kenneth. By all accounts, he was very quiet, gentle, and had a real affinity for animals – his small farm was filled with dogs, cats and horses. He and Frances met occasionally, and he set about wooing her. The courtship proceeded at glacial pace; any sudden declarations would have sent her running for the hills. They exchanged the odd word here and there, a gift of eggs was left on a doorstep, a cake made its way to a table. Frances was 39 years old when she finally said yes.
Frances and Kenneth were married and lived at a farm called Springbank. They went on to have two sons, Kenneth and Thomas, and Thomas was my grandfather.
It was one of my greatest ambitions to have children, and it is one of my greatest regrets that I cannot. I feel very sad that I will never be able to pass on the story of Frances and Kenneth to my own children and grandchildren, but I have now passed to story on to you. If at anytime you feel like telling this tale, and passing it on to anyone you know, I would be very grateful!
The photo at the top, in case you hadn’t guessed, is my great-grandmother; Frances Gay McKenzie.
12 responses so far
A story of devotion, love and perseverance. I’ll be delighted to pass it on. Thank you SD.
That is an absolutely lovely story, SD, and I’ll tell anybody that will listen. My own kids ,sadly,show no interest in my family tree or the small snippets of information I’ve gleaned about my relatives. As a child, I loved to hear the stories mum and dad told me, and to look a the photos they had, and I’ve never tired of digging up further information ! Eventually, I hope they might come to be interested too and then I’ve got loads of stuff to show them.
The last bit of your post has had given me the biggest lump in my throat and a tear in my eye.
I hope your pain is a little lessened by sharing this simple, but wonderful, love story.
There are so many lovely stories in family histories, if we have time to listen. My children are only now becoming interested in ‘family’ … it seems reaching the 40’s is a trigger.
Wow! What a story. With the Nairn connection, maybe you could talk Tilda Swinton into assisting with some sort of film version!
I think you’re right, Plaid, it’s often an age thing that sets off the Family Tree-itis.
Beautiful (her)story SD, but I can’t help thinking that your great-grandmother had a perhaps lucky escape. Especially in the days when popping back to the Old Country should anything go wrong, wasn’t an option.
I see there’s a caravan park at Lochloy nowadays…
That’s true KC! My mother in law Chrissie, who was the loveliest mum in law in the world, was engaged to a Canadian before my dad in law, Hughie. She wrote to her Canadian all the way through the war, but while he was waiting to be de- mobbed, he was in a motor cycle accident and was killed at once. She was heart broken, but I suppose there must have been hundreds of people in the same boat, and she pulled herself together and within 18 months met and married Hughie. He’d been married but had lost his wife to a slow and horrible death by consumption. They agreed they would both put the past behind them, though Chrissie kept her engagement ring and the Canadian letters hidden away in a box.
I often wonder whether she would have been happy with her Canadian, and such a different life in Toronto- she and Hughie had their ups and downs but I think they were pretty happy.
And if she’d settled in Canada, I would never have met and married Big Man, and then where would we all be?
A wonderful story of loss and eventual happiness … As I suspect young Dragon yours will be too …
I will be glad to pass on your story, SD. Husband and I have no children either, only dogs - collie dogs. We have been to Nairn and have a photograph of the beach at Nairn in our living room, blown up to poster-size and framed. It was one of my very favourite places in Scotland when we were there on our honeymoon almost 24 years ago.
This is my first visit to your blog. I shall return!
Bex from Massachusetts in the US of A.
Aye, I feel sure all families have such wistful tales to tell, though perhpas not as superbly turned as the one with which SD has delighted us. I can chip in with two:
1. Aunty Pearl (really great aunt) was the daughter of a small-time squire in mid-Wales - a petty autocrat. She fell in love with the gamekeeper but was forbidden to marry “below her station”. This was around the time of the Great War, if after it then it was the time of the Lost Generation. She never did marry and died aat about the age of 80.
2. During WW2 Aunty Veronica got to know a Canadian - I don’t know what branch of the armed forces he was in but he didn’t get sent to Europe as he was working nearby her home, which she shared with Grannie. Well the Canadian bloke and AV got the hots and he was permitted to stay over the nights, which shows that Grannie (who lost her husband in the GW) had her heart in the right place. All expected said pair to get married once the war ended, but not so! Canadian revealed instead the existence of a wife in Canada and vamoosed, as they say over there. AV became increasingly crabby over the years and the poor woman ended up at loggerheads with all her nearest but no longer dearest. She never married either.
I too will pass on SD’s story if the right opportunity knocks.
Isn’t it amazing how many emotions a small piece of family history can uncover? Plaid, Barney, LL and others - you are absolutely right, everyone’s family must have similar stories! I was a strange younger dragon - I started getting interested in my family’s history when I was about 15 - to the extent of contacting distance family members and bringing about new meetings. The first World War must have had hundreds of thousands of heartbreaking stories. As a storyteller and historian I say TELL THE TALES. To quote a lovely gravestone…’To live in hearts we leave behind is not to die’.
I join the crew of family historians in the making. I, too, have no hope of children (only cats) to pass my story on to but I hope my neices may read my notes in later years.
In the process my mum and I discovered her mother was adopted at birth and the only clue we have about her birth parents is that her mother is recorded as ‘Helen Barbour, daughter of a retired joiner’. However, I intend to trace her adoptive parents’ family tree too. As she was their only child there’s unlikely to be anyone else who will do it. They were in their forties when they adopted and my mother has their marriage certificate, so that is a good start.
So many ‘loose end’ tales that need a place to be told. Perhaps that’s the making for a future book, Dragon.
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