Leonora 'Nora' Huxtable and Sarah Rind midwife

In Memory Of Our Beloved Aunt

LEONORA HUXTABLE 1899-1980

Her Father

THOMAS HUXTABLE 1865-1928

Her Mother

SARAH RHIND 1865-1941

And her Nephew

EDWARD HUXTABLE 9 to 12-4-1934

Always In Our Thoughts

Leonora Huxtable, known as Nora, was the daughter of Sarah Huxtable nee Rhind. Nora was a spinster lady, and she lived with her mother, Sarah, at Chestnut Cottage. As a young woman she worked as a nanny at Stuckgowan House . She then stayed at home and worked with her mother where they did Bed and Breakfast. Guests, often cyclists, were accommodated in a `bungalow` at the Craigard end of Chestnut Cottage. This was a wooden building, in reality a large hut. It had a corrugated tin roof, a double bed, a chest of drawers and a dressing table on which was a stone washing "Scottish Cycling Union" sign. After her mother, Sarah, died Nora worked at The Torpedo Range as a clerical officer in the Observation Office located above the Torpedo Tube firing point. Then finally she worked in the Arrochar Post Office with Sam MacCrorie the Postmaster.

Leonora also features briefly in the film Arrochar Screen Test where she can be seen at the Sam MacCrorie's shop and a little later walking home.

Sarah Huxtable (nee Rhind), Nora's mother, was the Arrochar midwife for many years. She was also known as Nurse Huxtable and she was responsible for the safe birth of many Arrochar villagers. She would sometimes travel to outlying cottages and stay there for some days awaiting the arrival of a baby. Walking up` Stronafyne Glen` to a shepherd's cottage, located near where Loch Sloy Dam is today, would be a good example of one of her journeys.

As a mark of respect at her death, her coffin was carried on the shoulders of the village men, in relay fashion, from 11, Kirkfield Place, the home of Tom Huxtable where she died, the `Long Way` to the cemetery. This route passed High Kirkfield down Wylie's Brae, along the Shore Road and then up the Church Brae and on to the Cemetery. This was followed, of course, by what appeared to be all The Range Men. In those days women did not attend the interment at a cemetery.