Ian Handford: Archers star who lived and died in Torquay

The fictional Doris Archer from BBC Radio’s The Archers was now fully entwined with Gwen Berryman’s life, even after she attempted to retire.

The studios refused to accept her full resignation, as the writers still needed Doris alive, leading Gwen to take only partial retirement.

This arrangement required her to continue travelling to the Birmingham studio until she eventually relocated to Torquay. Even then, she returned weekly by rail, staying for two days to record another five episodes of the show. Later, as what she believed to be arthritis worsened, she admitted to getting a bit sick of Doris, saying, “I think I like her better when she is a bit nasty and not quite so twee.”

Meanwhile, she continued to reply to her hundreds of fans when penning on her own paper headed “from Doris Archer at Brookfield Farm, Ambridge, near Borchester.”

After falling at a railway station, Gwen self-diagnosed her pain but could never pinpoint when it truly started. She described it as “like having broken glass in the knee” or, as she called it, “pains and twinges.”

The next stage of “twinges” would emerge in 1962 while on a visit to relatives in South Africa. While touring a game reserve with family, a ranger ordered an immediate retreat after spotting a rhino. The retreat quickly turned into a frantic run as the huge, shortsighted animal, startled by an American tourist’s shouting, began to charge. For the first time, Gwen felt the “twinges” she had thought were arthritic could be something more serious. The holiday group survived the rhino charge, but with Gwen's ankle having given way, it took an X-ray to confirm her suspicions. The consultant admitted she had psoriatic arthritis, a far more serious form of this disease, involving skin complications in the knee and ankle. Determined not to disappoint her millions of listeners, Gwen quickly arranged for her fellow actors to record The Archers from her hospital bedside.

Once discharged from hospital Gwen found she now had to use a walker trolley. Climbing the BBC stairs weekly now became a real challenge. The central Birmingham studios had no lifts or any plans to fit a lift, so the constant stress, pain, and discomfort of ascending and descending two floors each week soon took its toll. The doctor told her that continuing this practice would ultimately see her using a wheelchair, and for Gwen, that was a step too far. After numerous resignation attempts, it was lady luck that saved the day. All the central BBC studios were relocated to the Pebble Mill Television Centre just outside the city.

Gwen appeared on the television programme This is Your Life on February 25, 1976, before she published her book Doris Archer's Farm Cookery Book. In 1980 she was awarded an MBE. She continued working in semi-retirement while living in Torquay, where she completed her autobiography, The Life and Death of Doris Archer, published by Eyre Methuen in 1981.

She chose to settle in Devon, where both her brother and nephew lived, selecting Seaway Court in Seaway Lane, Torquay, as it was very near the railway.

When Arthritis Week came, she offered advice to fellow sufferers, saying, “I would advise people to live where they can see things happening from their windows—keep cheerful—don’t sink back and just say I can’t go out—be cheerful and thank God for the things you can do.”

Throughout her life, Gwen had enjoyed handicrafts and needlework, and now she still took on additional challenges, learning Italian and joining the Torbay Soroptimists.

But the fictional Doris had to finally die and did so peacefully at Glebe Cottage, Ambridge, in October 1980, having been on the radio for 29 years.

Miss Berryman, meanwhile, a broadcaster and actress for 40 years, died peacefully in Torbay Hospital on the evening of December 20, 1983. Today there is no memorial to her in Torbay, yet the BBC sponsored a Civic Society blue plaque to honour her in Wolverhampton, unveiled at the family home in Goldthorn Hill, Penn, Wolverhampton.