How we paid tribute to one of greatest writers

Significant people who lived in Torbay during the 20th century - not always famous - as researched by Ian L Handford, President of Torbay Civic Society: Agatha Christie - part two

Agatha's timeless detective stories came during the mid 20th century joined eventually by six romantic novels under a pseudonym Mary Westmacott in the year she went to Baghdad on the Orient Express.
It was in Baghdad she met the bachelor Max Mallowan, a leading archaeologist who was immediately smitten ending in marriage that year.
In 1931, while living in London, Agatha would take Max to her Torquay home. Then on return to Egypt he continued his dig at Ur until achieving sponsorship through the British Museum in 1933 to undertake a new dig in Syria.
Husband and wife now happily worked for years, Agatha as photographer while undertaking washing, labelling and mending of many artifacts found on this site.
With her novels published under the pseudonym Westmacott this gave Agatha greater freedom to write about personal matters including her beloved mother, her first love Archibald and what she saw as a difficult relationship with Rosalind.
On their return to her Ashfield home in Barton Road Agatha was horrified to see new developments taking place around the property which now had lost its sea views.
It was why the Mallowans purchased “Greenway House” - a Georgian Mansion near Galmpton at Kingswear on the River Dart.
Set in 33 acres the house was isolated from all noise and it was here that dozens of plays, films, short stories and crime novels forever flowed from Agatha's pen. With the announcement of the Second World War in 1939 Max joined the Home Guard at Brixham while Greenway was eventually turned into a nursery for children being evacuated from London.
With the final Westmacott novel - The Burden - complete Agatha had produced 81 books over four decades but now wished to complete her autobiography, finalised when age 75.
Nevertheless, she still continued to write until her death in 1976 while Max was knighted for services to archaeology and she having received a CBE then was made a Dame of the British Empire (DBE) in 1971.
The DBE is the female equivalent to the male Knighthood - although very much rarer.
Agatha died on January 12, 1976, at 85 and being far older than Max he remarried but then died in August 1978 before being buried alongside his beloved Agatha.
It would be 25 years before I visited Rosalind and her second husband Anthony Hicks at Greenway House having sent my draft article (about her mother) about to be reproduced in ‘Bygones’ in 2001.
Then in October, 2004, Rosalind died and we all learned she had always kept strict control over the integrity of her mother’s work stating - all her stories had been written between the years 1920 and 1973 a time which ‘she saw as appropriate and that there was no reason to try and update them.’
It now took scientists until 2005 before announcing to the world they had cracked the ‘secret of Agatha's all-time success as the world greatest novelist’ by undertaking in-depth studies using mesmeric type mathematical formula making her books seem what they described as unput downable’.
The studies carried out by linguists at Warwick and London Universities even suggested that ‘her words carried out powerful neurol triggers’ which even Agatha was perhaps unaware of.
It was now 30 years after her death that a neighbour still living in Barton Road contacted me to suggest a Blue Plaque could be sponsored at the site of where Ashfield had stood to commemorate the life of Agatha Mary Clarissa Miller.
So it was, that in 2007 a granite stone was mounted at ground level for the Blue Plaque unveiled by Mathew Pritchard (Agatha's grandson accompanied by his wife Caroline) in conjunction with Cllr John Dunn - Chairman of Torbay Council.
Later this was sadly vandalised and a larger four-foot stone was erected by Torbay Council to carry our new Blue Plaque making a far more substantial memorial which can still be viewed.
IAN'S COMMENT: It took 30 years before our Society honoured the world's greatest storywriter by unveiling that first commemorative Blue Plaque provided by an anonymous neighbour.
A copy of our pamphlet -Ashfield and Agatha Christie may be obtained by sending 2x First Class stamps and a SAE to Office 4 at No.1 Palace Avenue Paignton TQ3 3HA.