Introduction
Ann Susan Purchase spent most of her adult life in domestic service or caring for members of her extended family. She also looked after the young Ralph Reader, who later became one of Britain’s best-known theatrical producers.
Childhood in Hardington
Ann was born on 26 January 1877 at Hardington Mandeville, the fifth of nine children born to William Walter Purchase and his wife, Elizabeth (née Bartlett).[1] Her father was a labourer who rented a cottage in Pen Lane from the Portman estate.[2]
When Ann was seven, her mother died of chronic asthma and heart disease.[3] Two years later, her father married Sarah Jane England (née Old) at Crewkerne. Sarah Jane was a widow who lived in Hermitage Street, Crewkerne.
Life in Crewkerne
Sarah Jane may have encouraged Ann to seek work in Crewkerne. By the age of fourteen, Ann was employed as a servant by Thomas Chard, a bootmaker residing in Sheep Market Street.
By 1901, Ann was working as a shirt machinist and living with William Reader, a general provider, in Goulds Barton. William recorded Ann as a relative in the census, but no specific family relationship has been identified. After William’s wife died in 1906, Ann became his housekeeper, caring for him and his young son, William Henry Ralph (who later became the entertainer, Ralph Reader), until William’s death in 1912.
According to a later recollection by Bert Rendell, Ann offered to care for Ralph because “no one else wanted him”. During breaks between jobs, she returned to Hardington with Ralph, who attended the village school. Bert recalled that Ralph last attended the school in April 1914 when he was ten years old.[4] Ralph is listed in the index to the school admissions register.
Return to Hardington
After her father’s death in 1915, Ann may have returned home permanently to care for her stepmother, Sarah Jane Purchase. In the Portman estate sale of October 1920, their cottage was purchased by Mrs Heneage.[5] However, Sarah Jane held a life tenancy and continued to live there.[6]
The 1921 census recorded Ann living with her stepmother, her youngest sister Emily and Emily’s husband, William David Pucknell. Both William and Ann worked at Pen Hill Farm, Pendomer, William as a farm labourer and Ann as a daily help.
Later life
Ann’s time at Hardington may have ended with the death of her stepmother in late 1931 or early 1932 at the age of about 95.[7] By 1939, she was living at West View, Crock Lane, Bridport, where she worked as a domestic servant for Harry Philip Castree, a retired draper, and his wife, Mary.
Ann spent the end of her life as a resident of Dorcas House, an almshouse in Preston Road, Yeovil. She died on 15 November 1957 at the age of eighty, leaving an estate valued at £311 4s 5d. Probate was granted to her niece, Evelyn Daisy Bessie Hussey of Yeovil.[8]
Conclusion
Ann’s life illustrates the limitations faced by many unmarried working women, as she spent most of her adult years in domestic service or caring for others. Although she left little documentary evidence of her life, her role in caring for the young Ralph Reader connected her to one of the twentieth century’s most notable figures in amateur theatre.
References
[1] Civil registration birth index; 1939 Register; family reconstitution.
[2] Hardington rate book for 28 November 1891.
[3] Death certificate of Elizabeth Purchase.
[4] Bert Rendell’s recollections in the Hardington parish magazine of March 1984.
[5] Hardington rate book for 31 December 1923.
[6] Eddy Colin Turner’s copy of the Portman Estate sale catalogue of October 1920.
[7] Civil registration death index (age recorded as 94 but probably older).
[8] National probate calendar.
