Mary Margaret (Pearce) Wood

British, 1746 - 1808

BiographyMary Margaretta Pearce was born in 1746, the great-granddaughter of Sir Gordon Cumming of Altyre, near Forres, Scotland. As a young woman, she journeyed to India, and on the sea voyage met Ralph Winstanley Wood, an officer in the 8th Hussars, whom she later married. In addition to one son, they had three daughters, two of whom are shown in this portrait. The elder of the two, standing closest to her mother, married a Mr. Webber, a high official in the East India Company Civil Service. The younger girl, Elizabeth, married Mr. Taylor of the firm Bocham, Taylor, & Company. A third daughter, Mary (who is not represented), married Crawford Davison who had previously purchased the Woods' house, Pierrepont Lodge, when a financial crisis required them to sell it. After a long period of poor health, Mary Margaretta Wood died on October 23, 1808, and was buried in the church yard at Frensham. The inscription on her tomb attests to a cheerful disposition and a poor constitution: "Though long the victim of disease and pain,/ Ne'er heard when friends were near her, to complain;/ Whether ordain'd to distant climes to roam,/ Or back returning to her native home;/ With that best cordial in her heart, Content,/ She went her way, rejoicing 'as she went';/ With him that she lov'd pass'd cheerfully through life,/ An anxious mother and a faithful wife."

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