7 Queen Edith’s Way, Hillcrest

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History of 7 Queen Edith's Way

1935

Mrs Hunter

1939

Mary A Hunter, b 1872, private means

John F H Bulman, b 1911, medical practitioner

Maida B Bulman, b 1910,

Agnes Buggey, b 1887, house keeper

We are fortunate to know a very great deal about John Forster Harrison Bulman (19911-1985), Maida Beatrice Mary Hunter (1910-1994), her mother Mary Adelaide Hunter and their housekeeper Miss Agnes ‘Adda’ Buggey. The correspondence between John and Maida has survived and was published as ‘Portrait of a Wartime Marriage,’ in 2024 by their daughter, Claire Wathes. The summary that follows is produced with her permission.

John’s father, Harrison Bulman, was a mining engineer. His mother was the daughter of Arthur Jones, an Anglican clergyman who became a Canon of Durham Cathedral. He went to Trinity College and took a double first in the Natural Science Tripos. He then studied Physiology for two years and did a further three years at St Thomas’ Hospital to qualify as a doctor in 1937. John’s father died while he was at university. However, a generous uncles, Colonel Philip Bulman, helped John, and his siblings, until they became established.

Maida was born to Charles Hunter and Maida Roberts. Charles had qualified as a doctor at the University of Glasgow. He served as a Medical officer to the Indian Railway and subsequently in Africa. He married Maida senior and they married in 1907. Charles spent most of his time in Africa and Maida senior was able to join him on a couple of trips. Maida junior was born in 1910. Charles died in early 1914 after an illness. He had been married only seven years and his death at the age of 54 was six months short of his entitlement to a pension from the Colonial Office.

Maida junior gained a scholarship to Cheltenham Ladies College, and then a second scholarship to read French and Italian at Newnham College. Her mother bought 7 Queen Edith’s Way to be able to live near her daughter. Their housekeeper, Miss Agnes Buggey, had joined the Hunter family back in 1911 when Maida junior was just five months old. She stayed with the family. almost continuously until she retired a year before her death at the age of 80.

John and Maida first met in March 1932 when they were both undergraduates. They were introduced to each other by Robert Bayne-Powell, a mutual friend. John left Cambridge in 1934 to study medicine in London; Maida obtained a job teaching French and Italian at High Wycombe School. In 1937 John wrote to her and their relationship resumed. they married in St Benet’s Church on 27th July 1938. Maida had saved enough money (about £250) to buy a new grey Austin 7 car which she named Griselda; she used this to visit John. In July1939 Maida resigned her teaching job; they holidayed in Northumberland but war was clearly inevitable. When war was declared John applied to the RAF as a doctor but was then accepted into the RAMC.

The rest of the book uses extracts from the their wartime correspondence as well as explanations of what was going on in the general public and wartime domain, to paint a vivid picture of the many pressures, anxieties, moments of excitement and frustration, that affected their marriage right until the close of war in 1946.

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