Melksham Times Past

A column about days gone by in Melksham by local historian Lisa Ellis

A Fuller story from Neston Park

The Edwardians loved a good gossip, especially when it came to divorce because it was usually predicated by scandal. And the newspapers of the time didn’t disappoint.

Roland Forestier-Walker and Olive Bassett had married in 1904 and lived at the Manor House in Cliffe Pypard. Both coming from well-respected families, Olive was also financially secure, receiving £3,000 a year. (An inheritance from her father who had died in 1903; roughly £350,000 a year in today’s money).

Lieut-Colonel R S Forestier-Walker of the Monmouthshire Royal Engineers had been deployed to France in 1914. While still serving overseas during World War I, he received a letter from his wife, Olive, announcing her infidelity and offering an uncontested divorce and a settlement of £500 per year. Although she would not say who her lover was, it was discovered that Olive and her maid’s brother, Frederick Jones, had been cohabiting at Fisher-hill, North Chapel, Sussex from October 1915 until May 1916.

Olive died in 1926 at the age of 44 in a nursing home, not having remarried, leaving an estate of just more than £2,000. (I have not yet learned a cause of death, but during the divorce reporting, it was mentioned she had a drinking problem).

Norah Phipps, daughter of an MP, was married to Sir John Michael Fleetwood Fuller, 1st Baronet, the 13th Governor of Victoria, Australia, and then owner of Neston Park. The family were known as owners of Fullers Brewery in London, producers of Fuller’s London Pride cask ale. Although his name is memorialised on the Atworth Clock, he did not die as a consequence of the war, Fuller died of heart failure following an operation in 1915.

Widow Nora and then-divorced Roland Forestier-Walker married in 1921; their wedding was announced in all the newspapers. They settled at Cottles in Atworth (now Stonar School) and by all accounts were a happy and loving couple, quite committed to the community, taking great interest in local government, both representing Atworth on the council.

In 1935, Norah had been suffering from asthma and the couple took a cruise off the coast of North Africa to improve her health. She died on board at the age of 56. Her husband died three years later.

Pictured left to right –  Olive Bassett, Forestier-Walker (1882-1926); Roland Stuart Forestier-Walker (1871-1938); Norah Jacintha Phipps, Fuller Forestier-Walker (1875-1935); John Michael Fleetwood Fuller (1864-1915)