Noel and Molly Downing bought The Cottage, Upton in Oct 1945 for their retirement. It had six or seven bedrooms and for the next twenty nine years the house welcomed a number of guests – old friends and family that came to stay or just visit for the day. Noel died in Oct 1965 and Molly in Sep 1974.
Coronation 1953, The Cottage, Upton
The visitors book has survived and gives us a full list of those staying. They include Noel’s University friends from Brasenose College, Oxford, Molly’s nursing friends and latterly the growing families of the couple’s three daughters. Together with Molly’s well-organised address books and note books this has helped piece together who was who in the events of the First World War that seems to have forged so much of their lives and circles of long term acquaintances.
Noel & Molly Downing, daughters Pam & Hazel, Stephen, grandchildren Christopher, David, Jonathan, Juliet & Anna, The Cottage, Upton, c. 1962
At some point extra land and property was agglomerated with the purchase first of the Garden Cottage opposite and finally the disused Methodist chapel on a small plot of land to the North.
Visitors Book
- Phyllis Marten Evans
- Marguerite Grazebrook
- Mary Simpson
- Balfour Anthony Trotter
- Kathleen Ashe
- Thomas Henley Flynn
- Trounsell Gilbert
- Elizabeth Hardy
- Lyon Hatton
- John Fritz Kivas Dobbs
- Kathleen Pinsent