A Birthday Tribute

A Birthday Tribute


From time to time, guests who have been browsing our Visitors’ Book ask us “Who are The Millers?” –  a name that repeats itself many times in the book.   The answer is that that they are guests who became our good friends over the years, and in the month that would have been her 93rd birthday, we would like to say a little about Jean Miller. 

Born into a railway family in Cheshire in 1925, she lived mostly in the town but her heart was always in the country and she had a great way with animals; she could both ride and drive horses, and dogs would obey her on sight.  When of an age to serve in WW2, she gave up her clerical job to volunteer for the Women’s Land Army, and despite being only 5’1” and of slight build, did great service helping to feed the nation in those desperate times, working mainly with cattle and surviving an attack by a bull.

When peace broke out, she had to return to the town, but holidays were always in the country, with her husband and later her daughter.  It was a joint passion for fishing that led them to Shropshire and to the original caravan at Thomas House in 1994.  Her love for the area and for all within it grew even stronger over the years, visiting in all seasons and weathers.  Last into the caravan, first into Acorn Lodge when we built it, she spent countless happy hours helping on the smallholding with the cattle and chickens, walking the hills, fishing the rivers and making the most of every minute spent in the area.  As age took its toll, she could walk less and less, but never lost her enthusiasm for the Border Country, and lived for her visits to the area.  Even when virtually wheelchair-bound, she took delight in coming to see her old haunts from the seat of a car, and in gazing at the views from the windows of Acorn Lodge.  

Her death in August of this year deprived her of her long-anticipated holiday in the Lodge this autumn, and took from us a dear friend of many years.  A picture of her beloved Shropshire Hills hung in her room until the day she died.