catherine blanche mallandaine + jack wright-davies
Katie was born at Greenhill House in Fordington, Dorset on 18 July 1873, the daughter of Henry Hawkes Mallandaine and Lucy New. Katie spent her early childhood in Dorchester and later in Salisbury. She moved to Wolverhampton with her family and appears with them in the 1891 Census at Waterloo Road.
Like her sister Lucy, she trained as a nurse and travelled with her to South Africa in 1905 in search of answers regarding their brother’s death. They found great need in South Africa and both sisters remained and worked as nurses and missionaries. While in Africa, Katie met John Wright-Davies who was serving as an Anglican priest in Rhodesia and on 20 September 1908, the two were married at the Protestant Cathedral in Salisbury, Rhodesia by the Bishop of Mashonaland.
Jack Wright-Davies was an Anglican minister in Salisbury — his brother George was also an Anglican minister and served as the first rector of St James Westminster in London, Ontraio. Jack and Katie returned to England and he took up a position as Vicar at Eastham Parish Church in Wirral, Chester in 1917.
Not long after they settled in Wirral, their daughter Sylvia Mallandaine was born but sadly, she died before her third birthday and Jack and Katie had no more children.
They remained in Eastham parish for the rest of their lives. In a letter to her sister in law, Nellie, dated 23 May 1941, Katie described their war time experience when a delayed action German bomb fell near their house:
At 2am the Police came and waked us up and said we must get out. We decided to risk it and stayed in our beds. At 10:30 the next night the Bomb exploded, oh! What a bang. We were just struggling to leave the drawing room and go to bed. We fell as flat as pancakes on the floor while grass clots, stones, and soil fell in a deafening roar on our roof. No one hurt, half the garage roof was blown off (car not hurt, just dirty) back kitchen door blown off hinges and one or two windows blown out. But the whole house was smothered in dust and soot down the chimneys. ...Nothing mattered, as no one was hurt. George sent us some tea (1 lb.) but I did not really need it. Our ration does us quite well. The garden has looked lovely this spring, such crowds of daffodils, and hyacinths and now they are over. Pheasant-eyed harcions are out and smell so sweet. But instead of sweet-peas and summer flowers, we have broad beans, french beans, and runner beans, and of course lots of cabbages and root vegetables. The only thing I am tired of is eggs. They fill so many gaps... I forgot to mention that when the bomb exploded it made a crater 40 feet wide. It was a small hole in the grass before it went off but it must have gone into the earth a long way with great force.
Katie suffered from ill health for many years and lived her later years as an invalid. She died at Eastham Vicarage on 30 March 1953 and her obituary appeared in the London Times on 1 April 1953. In 1959, Jack Wright-Davies dedicated a sanctuary lamp in his church in Eastham Parish to the memory of Catherine, his wife of 45 years. Jack died in Wirral on 14 February 1964.