Sawston Village History Society

Mary Challis (born 1925), by Mary Dicken and Dr Tim Wreghitt

The speakers in September were Mary Dicken and Dr Tim Wreghitt. Their subject was Mary Challis 1925-2006.

Mary was born in August 1925, so this is her centenary year. The Challis family had been established in Sawston since the mid-eighteenth century and had come to play a key role in village affairs, largely through some very profitable marriages to heiresses who brough them money and land. Thomas Challis (1754-1816) married Ann Haylock and fathered nine children while later generations were equally fecund; Jonathan Challis, his son, married Sally Everard from Pampisford and became a landowner and shopkeeper. He was a trustee for Huntingdon’s Charity as were his son and grandson.

Their retail empire expanded to include groceries, draperies and even funeral services along with a flourishing auctioneers business developed in the next generation by AJ Challis (1832-1903), Mary’s grandfather. They were also pillars of the Congregational Church and played a considerable role in its foundation and later administration. AJ had been Vestry Clerk and became the first clerk to the Parish Council set up in 1895 and was succeeded in this position by his son.

Mary’s father was Alfred Challis (1875-1944), after whom she was named Alfreda Mary, although always called Mary. Her mother, Annie or Dot Moulton (1885-1970), also came from a family with retail experience and who were prominent in the Congregational Church. She had been a nurse in the Red Cross Hospital in Whittlesford in WWI. Alfred and Annie were married in 1924, when he was 49 and Annie was 39 so Mary was their only child. She was educated at home until she was seven and then at the Perse School for Girls where she did well academically, was a member of the First Hockey XI and Head Girl in 1944. She went on to take a degree in Horticultural Studies at Studley College, Worcestershire.

She returned home to live with her mother and to look after the family small holding at what is now 68 High Street. Mary had many interests; she kept hens, ducks and geese in a decidedly free-range environment and had bee hives, she was a keen photographer and developed her own prints much of the time. She supported the Congregational Church, later SFC, and made an extensive collection of documents and photographs pertaining to the history of Sawston. She helped to mount exhibitions to showcase her items and appeal for more. She maintained strong family connections and went on expeditions with friends especially within East Anglia.

Her mother died in 1970 and in her later years, she was less able to care for her estate. When she died in 2006, she left her house and garden and three adjoining properties to the AM Challis Trust Ltd to establish a haven for flora and fauna and a museum and archive relating to the history of the village. The trustees have been greatly helped by a splendid band of volunteers and now the house and garden are fully restored and regularly open to the public, and to private groups, with exhibitions being mounted on local themes. On what would have been her hundredth birthday the current trustees met in the Parish Cemetery to put flowers from her garden on her grave and commemorate her with a tribute from Rosemary Phillips, chairman of the Trust, and a short service led by the Rev’d Ian Henderson.

Mary Dicken