Janet Gentles Foster

(This is the one who set sail for South America, with her violin, in 1920, to follow her heart.)

Jenny, on the right, with her younger sister Grace

Mini family fact file

Jenny – bound for South America

Jenny R.I.P.

Jenny’s early years

Mini family fact file

Date of birth: Janet Gentles Foster, born 23 October 1887 Stirling

Date of death: 26 October 1957 Spalding, Lincolnshire

Siblings: Rachel Foster 1886-1916; Grace Foster 1889-1937; James Foster 1890-1891; and Robert Foster 1894-1895

Parents: Robert Foster (24 April 1858 Stirling – ) and Rachel Gowans (c1858 Forfar, Meigle, Perthshire – 28
September 1918 Stirling), married 26 August 1885 Stirling

Husband: John MacPherson, married 4 August 1920 Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Children: Rachel Helen Williamson McPherson and Elizabeth Frances Foster McPherson, born 1 July 1921, Rio de Janeiro

We think this photo show Jenny, seated bottom right of this photo, wearing glasses. The two other girls could be Rachel and Grace, her sisters.

Jenny – bound for South America

The family story handed down is that, after the First World War, Jenny decided to leave Scotland, bound for Rio de Janeiro, following her heart to marry John McPherson. This was despite the wishes of her father Robert Foster – who even went so far as to say he’d write her out if his will if she did so. Undeterred she left. John had returned to South America in the summer of 1919; Jenny sailed out in July 1920, and they married the next month.

All turned out well for Jenny, the next summer their twin girls Rita and Betty (Rachel and Elizabeth) were born, and for the next few decades she lived abroad with John, before they retired to Scotland after the Second World War.

The family story adds that, over the years Jenny used to continue to play Scottish airs on her violin, perhaps, surely, thinking of her homeland?

Jenny R.I.P.

When we find Janet (aka Jenny) Foster in the death records in the late 1950s she is recorded as ‘of … Stirling’. Her address given as “3 Windsor-place Stirling”, yet she died in Spalding, Lincolnshire.

This puzzled me, and felt so poignant too, as though it went beyond the simple recording of a home address, to say more about her – that she, and her heart – were ‘of Stirling’. The recording of both her maiden surname Foster, and married one McPherson, in the Scottish tradition, added to this sense.

So why, three days after her 70th birthday, had Jenny died at Spalding in 1957? Her husband John McPherson had died a few years before, and she was staying at the home of her daughter Betty (Elizabeth McPherson, married to John Simpson. So, two questions: why was Betty living in Lincolnshire, and why was Jenny staying with her? I asked Daddy (WSDB); he was just 10 years old at the time and could remember the time:

“Yes I do know. John Simpson had left the army after returning from Burma. I think he left in 1948. He then was given a job by a man called Major Peacock who had been a POW in Burma and so he had a special soft spot for people who had fought there. Major Peacock was Chair of a well know family owned local brewery.

“The brewery needed an architect to restore and look after their pubs and although John had not finished qualifying Major Peacock gave the job to Captain John Simpson who was married to Betty.

“One of the their main breweries was in Spalding Lincs and I remember sitting on their draught horses when I was a child. They lived at 23 Holland Road, Spalding, a short walk from the Spalding Parish  Church Day School, which I attended with my sisters and my cousins for a term before going off to prep school.

“My Grandmother Jenny (Janet MacPherson had been feeling very unwell for some months and so she came to stay with Betty who looked after her, where she was diagnosed with lung cancer (she never smoked). So she stayed at Betty’s house, until she died [only] six weeks later! She must have been very ill.

“Grannie used to live in a lovely large house call the Birren in St Fillans near Loughearnhead in Perthshire, until her husband [John McPherson] became very ill so they moved to a smaller Victorian Villa (semidetached I think)  but nice in Stirling so he could be treated. He died of lung cancer too. I think he (John MacPherson) died in church (Holy Rude, Stirling, the Castle church where Archibald Miller had been the minister, and chaplain to the castle).”

Jenny’s early years

I know the saying is to “begin at the beginning”, but I think it’s more interesting to look at the beginning after the end.

Janet Gentles Foster was born at 6am on 23 October 1887 at 24 Broad Street. Her father was Robert Foster, master plasterer; her mother Rachel Foster M.S. [maiden surname] Gowans.

Janet/Jenny was their second child, a daughter, Rachel, being born the previous year. A third daughter Grace would be born in 1889. Two sons would follow in 1890 and 1894, James and Robert respectively, but so sadly both would die the year after their births.

Jenny – a violinist

“Pss Jenny MacPherson was a brilliant violinist, she also wrote music. She went to Stirling High School*, a very old school, at one stage called King’s School Stirling. It was a medieval school founded educating priests etc”: Daddy/WSDB added, to an email.

I remember when I was aged about 8 or so, being in the drawing room at Fairy Knowe, and being given her violin to hold. I had just started learning it at school (and was absolutely terrible!).

* This is interesting that Jenny went to Stirling High School; as did her future husband, John. They would have been in the same school year. Presumably it wasn’t co-ed, but maybe they were childhood sweethearts (does anyone know?).