Was this Dorset’s last witch trial? At the County Petty Sessions held at Sherborne on 25 September 1884 a woman was tried for stabbing her elderly next-door neighbour with a darning needle. This seemingly minor case created considerable interest because the attack was the result of the woman believing her neighbour had ‘witched’ her daughter … Read more
Vera Gwendolen Pragnell was born on 23 September 1896 at 10, West Chislehurst Park in Eltham, London, the daughter of Sir George Pragnell (1863-1916) and Leonora Caroline Louise Jenkins (1872-1950). Vera’s father was a self-made man, born in Sherborne, Dorset, his father William George Pragnell (1837-1898) was head gardener to the Wingfield Digby family at … Read more
On 14 October 1895, the annual Pack Monday Fair was held in Sherborne, Dorset, and the Rowland family were in town with their travelling show which they pitched in the Fair Field in Digby Road (now the Pageant Gardens). Thomas Rowland (1856-1926), a travelling showman, and his wife Betsy (née Smith) (1854-1923) had nine children, … Read more
Georgina Binnie-Clark was born at the Digby Hotel in Sherborne on 24 April 1871, one of seven children born to Arthur Walter Binnie Clark (1834-1913), manager of the Digby Hotel and former valet to George Wingfield Digby (1797-1883), and Maria Louise Clark (née Letheby) (1837-1908). Georgina’s parents were married by licence at Taunton in Somerset … Read more