A Blue Plaque for Jean Blathwayt

A familiar face 

This photo on a Facebook page attracted 3k views in one day.  It shows Jean Blathwayt being presented with a quilt on her retirement in 1983 from the Budleigh Salterton Brownie Pack.

And a famous family 

Blathwayts had been associated since the 17th century with Dyrham Park, near Bath.  Jean’s great-uncle, Colonel Linley Wynter Blathwayt, was a noted supporter of suffragettes.

Her father, the Revd Francis Linley Blathwayt, was a parson-naturalist, Rector of Melbury Osmund in Dorset from 1916 to1929, and it was there that Jean and her elder sister Barbara were born.  

An inspiration

An unpublished manuscript written by Jean Blathwayt in the 1940s records the influence of Lady Lilian Digby, above, a neighbour living close to Melbury Osmund. Awarded MBE in 1918  for her VAD work during WW1, Lady Lilian, of nearby Lewcombe Manor, was a keen Girl Guide and District Commissioner of the area. ‘The Brownies would trail across the fields to her lovely home to be tested for various badges,’ recalled Jean. ‘Brownie Revels were held in this good lady’s garden.’  

Budleigh connections

Jean was a boarder at Copplestone House School on Bedlands Lane, Budleigh. Her aunt, the artist, writer and GP’s wife Joyce Dennys, was living in the town at that time.

St Peter’s Church, Dyrham and Hinton

In 1929 the Revd Blathwayt moved with his wife Marjorie and their children to take up the living at Dyrham Rectory. Jean became a boarder at St Mary’s School, Calne, in Wiltshire, before going on to Wellgarth Nursery Training College in London. The School’s magazine reported that during the Munich Crisis of September  1938, when it was feared that war was imminent, her parents housed three of the staff, twelve children and thirteen students at Dyrham Rectory.   

Budleigh

In 1953, on the death of her father, Jean settled at ‘Sunbank’ on East Terrace in Budleigh. During WW2 she had worked as a nursery teacher and Red Cross nurse, having  started a Nursery Home for young children at the Rectory with her sister Barbara.

From about 1956 Jean pursued a career as a children's story writer. 

Jean Blathwayt with a young friend

Some of her books

Although she never married it was her experience of working with young people and her help with local Girl Guides which inspired her to become an author of children’s books.

A total of 15 were published between 1957 and 1977. Some use a Budleigh setting.

Budleigh’s ‘Brown Owl’

In the early 1960s she was involved with the Parish Council and a Music and Movement group and by 1967 was Division Commissioner for the Girl Guides in the Exmouth area. Generations of young people remember Jean Blathwayt’s support and friendship. ‘I have amazing memories of her’, recalls one former  Budleigh Guide Leader. ‘She was incredibly tuned in to children of all ages.’ 

'A great lady, no children, but wanted and encouraged the best out of every one!' was how another youth leader, Graham Bastone, remembered her.

'She was instrumental in the creation of the original St. Peter's Church Youth Group, attending as the responsible adult and supporting a number of us in many ways,' recalled Julie Cotton. 

'I spent a lot of time with her and her sister and they both played a large part in my early years. I'm sure I still have photos of her green mini clubman - double back doors and wooden finish - which she drove me in on my first camp ever!  

'It was also Jean who inspired me to work on my Queen's Guide Award, testing me on one of my badges, and subsequently encouraging me to take up the leadership of the Budleigh Salterton Guide Unit later on.' 

  

Jean Blathwayt's later years were affected by ill-health, leading to her death in 1999. Jean and her sister are buried in the same grave at St Peter’s Burial Ground in Budleigh.

 

Brownie Leader and children's author Jean Blathwayt is still remembered by people who feel indebted to her. I believed that her achievements deserved recognition with a blue plaque at her former home in Budleigh, especially in her centenary year.