16/02/2026
The Story of Emily
St Dominick WI has been very busy in February.
We started our 80th Birthday celebrations with a wonderful evening on Saturday 7th February! We gathered together in the Parish Hall for a delicious meal. We will continue our celebrations in March when we have officially been a WI for 80 fun filled years!
At our monthly meeting on Wednesday 11th February our speaker was Martin Lovell, General Manager of The Story of Emily situated in the 14 acre estate in St Ive near Liskeard. Members were fascinated to hear about the background to the renovation of the Rectory and the building of The War Rooms that together tell the story of Emily Hobhouse. Emily lived at the Rectory with her parents (Reginald and Caroline) and siblings in the 19th-century. The Rectory was restored to the Victorian world of the Hobhouse family set in 1875. We learnt what it was like to be a woman in the 1900s where women had no vote and were kept very private and how, after she nursed both her parents before they died, Emily decided she wanted more purpose in her life and to escape the shackles of St Ive. Emily learnt about justice and humanitarian causes and when Emily was 40 the Anglo-Boer war started. Emily heard about the plight of women and children basically imprisoned in concentration camps in the Transvaal in South Africa. Emily felt moved to see the horrendous conditions for herself and travelled for 5 days by train, on her own, with only bread and apricot jam to sustain her. She found the misery and suffering was far worse than she realised and felt compelled to travel back to London to campaign for better conditions for the women and children. She raised funds to purchase food and equipment to boil drinking water which made a huge difference to change the mortality rate. After the war she continued to fund-raise and helped the farmers and their families that survived to recover from the war and reverse the scorched earth programme by re-establishing their homesteads. Sadly, Emily died in her 60s and her ashes were put into an obelisk in Bloemfontein where hundreds of people attended her funeral. Emily is a National Treasure in South Africa for the remarkable humanitarian work and the number of lives she saved. In November 2026 Emily's funeral will be recreated at St Ive to mark 100 years since her funeral in Bloemfontein. An incredible 25,000 visitors have been through the attraction last year! The restaurant celebrates it's South African heritage with recipes from the late 19th century with fresh Cornish ingredients. The restaurant window is the longest piece of glass in England, it has 65 layers of glass and holds up the beautiful glass roof, itself, a sight to be seen!
The vote of thanks was written by Marion and presented by Kay.
Following this inspiring talk, a few members then visited The Story of Emily on Friday 13th February, to experience the amazing attraction that we are so lucky to have on our doorstep. We had a very enjoyable day, a wonderful lunch in the restaurant and a few giggles trying on the Victorian dressing up costumes in the Rectory!
Article written by Anne-Louise Mellor
In March, our WI meeting will be held, as usual, in the Parish Hall on the 11th March from 7.30. Our talk will be about The Tamara Trail. Guests are welcome to join us, £5 entry. If you would like more information about our friendly WI please contact Gill Brown on [email protected]
