CFHS code : PL112
Parish : St Paul
Inscription : In Loving Memory of ELLEN PARRY HEADDEY eldest daughter of THOMAS HEADDEY b 9 Sept 1846 d 7 July 1906 also CLARA MARIA HEADDEY second daughter b 11 Jun 1850 d 27 Dec 1925
Monument : Headstone/Kerb stones
Above information from Cambridge Family History Society Survey
Monument
This headstone, in the parish area of St Paul, is against the west south wall, five rows from the notice board at the entrance to the cemetery.
Inscription
In Loving Memory of ELLEN PARRY HEADDEY
eldest daughter of THOMAS HEADDEY.
born 9th Sept 1846. Died 7th July 1906.
“
……. beloved remembrance.)
Also CLARA MARIA HEADDEY second daughter.
Born 11th June 1850. Died 27th Dec 1925.
“Rest in Peace”
Relationship: Sisters. Their parents are one grave to the north
Both girls were born in St Asaph, Flintshire, Wales to Thomas Headley Headdey & Sarah Preston (née Parry). Thomas was born in Cambridge and worked for the Inland Revenue, so the family moved often. The sisters grew up in King’s Lynn (1851), Worksop (1861) and Oxford (1871). In the 1881 census they are running a boarding school, with their younger sister Laura, in Ormond Terrace, Regent Street, Cheltenham, where Clara seems to be the headteacher. By 1891 they are both principle teachers, still in Cheltenham, but Laura is living with her parents in Headingham and married a year later. The sisters ran a school called ‘Ladies’ Collegiate Boarding and Day School’ and advertised that they ‘receive boarders and daily pupils and prepare for the Oxford Local, Royal Academy of Music, Trinity College, London College of Preceptor’s Examinations, etc…Eminent Professors and Governesses attend for Accomplishments, Book-keeping, Higher Branches of Arithmetic etc. Besides the usual English subjects, the Curriculum includes – Divinity, Latin, Political Economy etc. Home comforts and a good table is provided. A University Exhibition of £15 per annum, tenable for three years was awarded to a pupil last September…Terms from 25 guineas per annum’ (Oxford Times May 1888). They were still running the Collegiate School in June 1896 and an advert of that year advertised ‘healthy locality, excellent sanitation, highest references. Great attention given to delicate or backward pupils’. By August 1899 Ellen and Clara had moved to 20 Hills Road where they ran a school and lived with their recently widowed father and Uncle William.
Ellen Parry Headdey (1846-1906)
Ellen died ‘peacefully’ in her sleep at 20 Hills road after a ‘long and painful illness (sarcoma)’ and was buried on 11 July 1906.
Clara Maria Headdey (1849-1925)
Clara was born in St. Asaph, but was baptised in South Lynn on 16 September 1851. She lived at 183 Chesterton Road from at least 1911 to 1922. When Clara died at the age of 76, she was at the mental hospital in Fulbourn. After her death 20 Hills Road was sold as part of her estate and was advertised as ‘suitable for conversion into business premises’.
NB- the date of birth is incorrect. She was born in the 2nd Quarter of 1849, and was already 19 months old when the census of 1851 was taken. It is not known why the date is incorrect on the grave monument.
Sources:
Parish burial records
Ancestry
Newspaper archives
by Mary Naylor with additional information by Claire Martinsen
[If you have any further information about this family please contact us at Friendsofmillroadcemetery@gmail.com]