Rose Beatrice Smythe was born at Froxfield, Hampshire in 1886.  Her birth was registered at the Petersfield District in the December quarter of that year.  She appears on the 1891 census living with her family at Gardeners Cottage, Froxfield.  The household comprised: William Smythe (head, married, aged 62, working as a head gardener), his wife Agnes Smythe (aged 32), and their seven children: Evelyn A Smythe (aged ten), Florence L Smythe (aged nine), Annie M Smythe (aged seven), Lillian A Smythe (aged five), Rose (aged four), Frederick C Smythe (aged two) and Violet M Smythe (aged one).  Also living at the family home was a domestic servant, Luisa Kate Morton (aged 15).  With seven young children in the house she must have had her work well and truly cut out. 

 

William had been born in Ufford, Suffolk; his wife in Norfolk.  All the children however, had been born in Froxfield.

 

By the time the 1901 census was taken the family had moved to Hove, Sussex.  The children's mother had died in 1895 at the young age of 36 (her death recorded at Petersfield District in the December quarter of that year).  William is recorded on the census as a 72 year old retired gardener.  Evelyn, Lillian, Frederick and Violet are also noted on the return but the other children - including Rose - are not.  There were also two further additions: Daphne M Smythe (aged eight) and Percy W Smythe (aged six).  Like their brothers and sisters, they had been born at Froxfield.

 

It seems probable, from the dates on the 1901 census return, that Percy had been born the same year that his mother died.  Perhaps she had died during childbirth or complications resulting from it.  This though, is simple conjecture.  It would seem however, that after her death, the family moved to Sussex.

 

I am unsure when Rose Smythe's association with Sussex 54 VAD began.  Her signature - B Smythe - appears in Nurse Oliver's album on the same page as the date 1913 and she is also recorded as Nurse Smythe in a newspaper cutting the following year.

 

In 1916 she married Charles Jenner in Brighton.  Their marriage was registered in Brighton district in the September quarter of that year.  Two years later a son, Bernard C Jenner, was born.

 

Rose Jenner died of consumption (TB) in 1927.  Her death was registered in the Ticehurst (Sussex) district in the September quarter of that year.