Left: A loose page from Hestia's mother Kathleen's album is tucked inside Hestia's own album. She was born at Wylam in 1911. The woman holding her appears to be a nanny in her white uniform. Below: Ivar holds up his first child in 1912.

Hestia's father Ivar.

Hestia Dagmar Grey (Het) Born 16 July 1911, Died 23 March 1986.

Married Elliot Evers on 29 April 1933 at St George's Church Jesmond, Newcastle upon Tyne.

Marna left, and Pete right, twins born in 1921 were Het's cousins, the daughters of Eric Grey. They lived at Meldon Burn House in Milfield, it was the first house on the left coming from the south. They had a tennis court and a pony called Molly.

By 1914 the family had moved to Middle Ord the house belonging to Ivar’s mother Christian Grey. Angela was born there in 1914. During the war the family moved to Newcastle where Ivar was in the No. 151 Protection Company of the Royal Defence Force which up to June 1917 was guarding Swan Hunters dry docks at Wallsend, St Peters Engineering and shipbuilding works, the Elswick Works, the North Eastern Marine Company’s works and the Carville Power Station. Ivar was later mentioned in dispatches in 1919. Their second son Robert was born on 19 August at 33 West Avenue, Gosforth. It was only at the end of the war that the family moved back to Middle Ord. They stayed there till the early death of Ivar’s older brother Jock in 1924 when they moved to Milfield Hill.

Het's first small album has only seven pages filled with photographs. The others appear to have been transferred to her second larger album.

"Hestia Grey Newcastle Church High School or 23 Grosvenor Place Jesmond."

The first images show 23 Grosvenor Place. The family moved to Jesmond in Newcastle in about 1921 so that the children could go to school. The house was eventually converted into 5 flats, with Kathleen Grey keeping one.

Un captioned photo probably taken at Middle Ord.

Het's younger sister Angela Grey with Jewell the donkey at Middle Ord.

Uncaptioned but may be Mr. Paxon and his son.

The second larger album starts in 1923.

Het's cousins Hope and Faith Dixon-Johnson were twins born in 1912, with their pekinese dogs. Their mother was Freddy Grey. Their father Charlie had been killed in Flanders in 1917. They had lived in Croft, Durham, but moved to Middle Ord possibly after Jock Grey of Milfield died. Het's Uncle Jock died in 1924 when her father Ivar inherited Milfield Hill.

1925 Camp at Featherstone, Haltwhistle. Het was a member of the girl guides. The pictures show the camp and her teacher Miss ford who was the gym teacher at the Church High School for girls.

Left: Mrs Williams and Nora Williams at Alnmouth. Mrs Williams was a great friend of Kathleen Grey Het's mother. They lived in Windsor Terrace in Newcastle and sometimes stayed at Milfield.

Left: Het's friends from the Church High School. They included Dorinda and Cynthia Patterson who lived in Wooler. Dorinda later married Norman Grey whose son John farmed Galewood. Rita Carr-Ellison later married a Duke. Eulalie Rodenhurst came from a family of vegetarians. Her father was involved in early radio broadcasting. The Greys recorded a christmas play which they listened to on a crystal set.

"1925 Perthshire.. Quarry Cottage.. Crieff" Het and her siblings would go and stay with their Aunt Majorie, their mother's sister.

Marjorie Blake had lost her first husband in the war and remarried a man called Welch who was known to the family as Uncle Taffy. Kathleen and Majorie's mother was Selena Burns whose mother was Selina Colquhoun. Quarry Cottage in Crieff, Perthshire, was a house in the garden of the larger house belonging to Archie Campbell Colquhoun.

1926 left: Mr Emmett and Mrs Rodenhurst at the cairn on Yeavering Bell. They both lived in Newcastle and would stay at Milfield to eat a "sunday supper" at the week ends.

Above: At Quarry Cottage in Crieff having a picnic on the slag heap. Ivar Grey on the left, Uncle Taffy standing on the right. Below: Flowerburn on Black Isle was where Christian Grey, Ivar's mother lived.

1926 The Rand family at Ford Hill on the banks of the Till. The Grey children used to play rounders with their sons. The children were allowed to go into the fruit cage and eat as many raspberries and gooseberries as they liked.

Left: Milfield Hill . Above: Ford Church.

Left: Grey sisters on the hay bogie with William Drummond of High Farm.

Above:The horse was called Mary Smith and was used to go on pic nics. This may be the new road up the hill. Grace Balfour was another friend. The family lived in Newcastle. Mr Balfour died suddenly at Milfield Hill.

Above: Marna with pony at Meldon Burn. 1927 a pic nic at the Roman Wall, floods at Etal, the gates of Ford Castle, a photograph of Woolworths at Chester. Uncle Pat, Kathleen Grey's younger brother was married at Chester.

1927 In tents at Chesters Roman Camp. 1928 Easter holidays at Farnham, near Tilford. Aunt Majorie and Uncle Taffy had a farm called Fairoaks at Farnham after he had retired from the marines.

Uncle Taffy, Angela Grey and Aunt Marjorie holding the spaniel with Taffy's sister Ethel.

Left: 1928 a visit to Cresswell and Riding Mill. Miss Hillman and Dr White were teachers at the school.

Right: 1928 Long Houghton girl guides camp.

1928 Austruther with the Colquhouns, May island. Above and below: Iain and Sammy Campbell-Colquhoun. Iain was a sweet, gentle natured man. He was stationed at Alnwick Castle in WW2 with his regiment and shot himself there; his brother Lawrence later also committed suicide.

Left: Archie CC on the left with his and two of the Grey children on the beach at Elie in Fife.

1928 Summer Holidays at Milfield Hill. Playing tennis at Meldon Burn with Jim Grey, bathing in the Till and at Berwick. Above: Standing left Jack Grey, Het's older brother wearing a green striped bathing suit, their cousin Jim Grey at back on right. In the centre Angela Grey with her brother Robert. The others are the Holland family. Harry, Esme and Ronnie Holland became doctors. Their father was a doctor who specialised in blindness in India and was knighted.

Very small cut out images placed on half a page. They include a picture of Ivar Grey (right).

Het's brother Jack joined the HMS Conway. It was moored on the Mersey river near Liverpool. They lived in this old wooden boat and slept in hammocks. The parents would go over for sports days. Jack had been considered too wild to stay at the Newcastle Grammar School. He liked the Conway. The Conway's rival boat was the Worcester, moored on the Thames. Jack and his friend Basil went into the merchant navy but Jack didn't like it and switched to the RAF in 1936 when he was 24.

1929 Summer holidays. Swimming in the Till. The McClintock family at Milfield Hill in 1930. Country dancing at Blagdon. Ruins of Newminster Abbey at Morpeth.

Het's Uncle Pat at Prospect House, possibly in Lincolnshire; he moved about a lot. Patrick Blake was Het's mother Kathleen's younger brother, born in 1904. He was a very sociable person and started a dry cleaning business. The Greys had to use the firm for dry cleaning and later to buy Better Biscuits because he worked for them. He was married to Phyllis Ellison in Chester in 1927. Het’s album shows a photograph of Woolworth’s in Chester in 1927 so the Greys seem to have attended the occasion.

Milfield Hill and tea in the garden

HMS Conway in 1930. Above right the Conway Cutter Crew 1930 with Jack Grey third from the left.

1929 A school trip to Switzerland.

HMS Conway 1930. Jack with his mother Kathleen.

With the Evers family at Rock Mount. Joyce Evers was friends with Het. Peggy and Joyce lived in Worcestershire. They were sent to school in Newcastle because their parents knew the headmistress.

Above: Jack, Hestia and Angela Grey and Mairi (the "M" is pronounced as a "V") Campbell-Colquhoun. Below: Hay Bogie with the Grey children, and Ronnie Miller who became a speech writer for Mrs Thatcher, (his mother was a glamorous actress), and Tony Atkinson.

The family car in College Valley.

In the Easter holidays the children camped in the Common Plantation. Ivar Grey had a large bell tent from the army. They slept on war time stretchers. Het's caption on the back of the picture above says: "Me cooking lunch chipped potatoes to go with some braised beef. Kibbie is sitting beside the empty plate having eaten all of Robert's carefully sliced lunch. We discovered it later and were wrathfully indignant."

Left: photographs of the Evers family with old Mr Evers. Het called him Tod. She married Elliot Evers in 1933. Below: Het with Kibbie the border terrier.

The cooking was done by Betty and Nancy. Kathleen Grey never learned to drive and arranged for fish to put on the Wooler bus to the saddlers Andrew Robinson, then one of the children would go and pick it up. Kathleen went on a cookery course in Edinburgh. Whether she ever learned to cook is not recorded.

Ivar Grey had five brothers Jock, Eric, Boyd and Gervase and two sisters Freddy and Mary. The oldest brother Jock had no children and lived at Milfield Hill after the death of his father in 1915 until his own death in 1924. The Grey children recalled visiting him there. He had a moustache with waxed ends. He owned 2 dogs a bull dog called Smuggler and a black Labrador called Jet. When Jock died he left another house called Meldon Burn in his will to any of his siblings who would want it. Eric Grey who had married Dorothy (Dodo) in 1916 lived at Meldon Burn with his wife and three children, Jim the oldest born in 1916 (who the Greys called Spud) and twins Margaret, (known as Pete) and Mary called Marna. Eric had fought in WW1 and been hospitalised possibly with shell shock. He died in 1933 and his family then moved to Gosforth in Newcastle. Freddy had married Charles Dixon Johnson in 1907.

Marjorie's first husband Robert Mills was killed in action in 1917 only three months after their marriage. She remarried in 1921, Uncle Taffy, a Lieut Colonel in the Royal marines. A strong disciplinarian he is remembered for washing up the dishes between courses. They lived after the war at a farm called Fairoaks in Farnham.

Archie Campbell Colquhoun had married Anna Ross, his mother’s lady’s maid. They had five children: Christian who was called Kitty or Kirsty, Mhora, Mairi, Iain and his younger brother Lawrence (known as Sammy). Archie had his breakfast walking round the table in his kilt because “your enemy may come” he ate out of a wooden bowl with a horn spoon. Robert Grey’s album contains a photograph of Garscadden House in Drumchapel dated 1934. (The house was destroyed by fire in 1959) where Archie also lived. Archie’s father the Rev. John Erskine Campbell Colquhoun owned both Garscadden and Killermont House. His ancestor Lawrence Colquhoun bought Killermont in 1747. It is now the clubhouse for Glasgow Golf course.

The Greys neighbours near Milfield who appear in the photographs were the Rand Family at Ford Hill, with whom the Grey children played rounders. Willie Drummond who lived at High farm. Alan Bousfield nephew of Dr Badcock at Doctors Lodge near Ford Hill, who stayed with his uncle in the summer.

Kathleen Grey had many friends in Newcastle who appear with their children in Het’s album, and who came to stay at Milfield. Nora and Mrs Williams who lived at lived at 7 Winsdor Terrace in Newcastle. Mr Emmett and Mrs Rodenhurst, the Balfours and their daughter Grace, The Hollands, Ronnie, Harry and Esme, the McLintocks, a large Irish family, who had a terrier called Biddy, Ronnie Miller who became a speech writer for Mrs Thatcher who stayed with the Atkinsons. Tony Atkinson was killed in WW2 by friendly fire; he was the son of Uncle Sid and Aunt Lil. (Friends not relatives) Nancy and Billy Worsdell lived in Newcastle and had something to do with the railways. It was Nancy who said one day that they ought to pay at stay at Milfield Hill and this was how the idea of having paying guests began. There were often odd people in the house, mostly they were nice and came because they loved wallking in the hills. They were put in the west bedroom, and tower room and given a cooked breakfast and dinner.

Het's school friends form the Church High School included Peggy and Joyce Evers, who lived at Rock Mount in Worcestershire but went to school in Newcastle whose bother Elliot Het would later marry. Eulalie Rodenhurst whose parents had something to do with broadcasting and Kathleen Waugh.

 

Above left: The Grey family had two Rob Roy canoes. Robert Grey is pictured fishing in the Till. The children would play sardines and murder indoors.