Elsie Spiers Rule (1879-1962)

                                   

           This painting was donated by ‘Miss Rule’ from Perthshire on 19 December 1951.¹ According to Scotland’s People there were four ‘Miss Rules’ who died in Perthshire after 1951. Two of these were in the wrong timeframe and only one of the others was a ‘Miss’. This left the likely donor as being Miss Elsie Spiers Rule. ² 

Elsie Spiers Rule was born at 7 Montgomerie Crescent, Kelvinside, Partick on 25 April 1879. Her birth was reported by Catherine Black, a nurse. Elsie’s parents were Robert Rule (a soft goods manufacturer) and Louisa Shand who had married on 9 June 1868 in Partick. ³ Elsie was their youngest child in a family of four girls (Louisa E. born 1871, Helen Margaret, born 1872, Mary Shand, born 1876 and Elsie) and a boy, Robert born 31 May 1873. ⁴ 

The family was at 7 Montgomerie Crescent in 1881 with Elsie S. Rule aged 1. Elsie’s father Robert who was born in Rothesay in 1837, was a ‘manufacturer of cotton and woollen dress goods employing twenty men and ten women’. ⁵ He was the second son of Robert Rule, a Paisley yarn merchant. Elsie’s mother, Louisa, was a sister of Baron Shand of Woodhouse, Dumfriesshire who sat as a Lord of Appeal in the House of Lords. She died on 28 September 1888 aged 53. ^{6, 7} 

All three of Elsie’s sisters married. On 19 January 1898, Louisa married J (I?) Graham, an East India Merchant at 7 Montgomerie Crescent. Two years later, on 18 April 1900, Helen, married J. D. Nimmo, also an East India Merchant at the same adress. Mary married Robert Spiers Fullarton, a General Practitioner at The Grant Arms, Grantown on Spey on 11 July 1908. Elsie was a witness at this wedding. ⁸

In 1891, Elsie and her sister Mary both scholars, were in Dollar visiting a Miss Jane Macalister in Academy Street, Eglinton Place. ⁹ Also present were Margaret Cameron, pupil governess and Elizabeth Birch, lady housekeeper. This latter person remained with the family until her death in 1939. ¹⁰

 Eight years later, Elsie passed the Arts and Sciences Preliminary Examination at Glasgow University. ¹¹ Her brother Robert had earlier graduated with an MA from the same University. 

Elsie does not appear on the 1901 Census, however, her father Robert Rule aged 63, widowed, and retired was residing at Pokesdown, Hampshire. ¹² The family home remained at 7 Montgomerie Crescent, Govan. ¹³ On 5 October 1905 a Miss E. S. Rule left England for Calcutta aboard the Oceana although it is not clear that this is the same Miss Rule. ¹⁴ In 1911, Elsie was still at 7 Montgomerie Crescent with her father and four servants, living next door to Mary Kirkpatrick (qv) who was also a donor of paintings to Glasgow. ¹⁵ On 6 December 1913, Elsie sailed from Glasgow to New York aboard the California. She had no occupation listed. ¹⁶

By 1915, Robert Rule had become the proprietor/occupier of Benachie House and Grounds in Crieff, as well as retaining his house at 7 Montgomerie Crescent, Govan. ¹⁷ Benachie was to become Elsie’s future home. The family seems to have taken up a prominent place in Crieff society. In 1921 Elsie attended the Crieff Highland Gathering among the ‘fashionable attendance’ in the grandstand. She was accompanied by Mrs Robert Rule and Miss Birch. ¹⁸ In the census of that year Elsie is listed at Benachie with her father and his grandson, also Robert, along with four servants. ¹⁹ Later, Elsie’s father acquired more property in Crieff with a house and offices in Ferntower Road. ²⁰ Robert Rule died at Benachie on 19 October 1929 aged ninety-two. His death was reported by his son Robert. ^{21, 22,23}  

The following year, Elsie donated a view indicator to be placed on the Knock of Crieff, a small, wooded hill to the north of the town, in memory of her father. ²⁴ The inscription reads:

                               IN MEMORY OF ROBERT RULE

                                          BENACHIE CRIEFF

                                   “I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills from whence cometh my help”

Thereafter, Elsie Rule became ‘one of Crieff’s most respected residents, a lady who gave unstintingly of her wealth – through channels publicly and anonymously’. ²⁶ In the same year as her father’s death she contributed £200 to the miners’ relief fund. ²⁷ In 1934 she again travelled to America arriving in Boston on 1 September aboard the St. Louis. ²⁸In 1940 she was still the proprietor of the house at 3 Cleveden Crescent, as well as Benachie House and grounds, The Haven, Ferntower Road West and a house on Ferntower Road, all Crieff. During the war years it was reported that she donated a ham to Crieff Cottage Hospital ²⁹ and provided funds so that the men of the 3rd Battalion Home Guard could be provided with a ‘Balmoral’ in place of the F.S. Cap. ³⁰ She attended various fund-raising events and at the Crieff Ladies’ Lifeboat Guild sale, held to raise funds for the RNLI, she won one dozen (13) eggs in a raffle. ³¹ She was especially generous to ex-servicemen who were down on their luck by providing money and  purchasing of various items of clothing. She also supported events at Morrison’s Academy, presenting the Senior Shot Putt Cup in 1958. ³² 

 In 1952, the year after her donation of the painting to Glasgow, she gifted her house ‘one of the finest mansions in Strathearn’ to Crieff Old Peoples’ Welfare Committee as a ‘home for old folks’. ³³ 

Elsie Spiers Rule died aged 83 on 27 October 1962 at Benachie, Crieff. Her death was reported by her personal servant William F. Eades who was living at Benachie Cottage, Ferntower Place, Crieff. ³⁴ A memorial service was held at Woodside Crematorium Chapel in Paisley on 30 October. ³⁵ 

In the grounds of the crematorium stands a stone marking the Rule Family Memorial. An inscription contains the following information:

‘Erected in the Abbey burying ground by Robert Rule (Elsie’s grandfather), merchant in Paisley, in memory of Margaret Spiers his wife, who died 24th Sept 1842 aged 35 years, and was buried in the angle formed by the north transept and nave of the church, where was also buried Robert Rule (Elsie’s father) who died 7^th Feb’y 1854, aged 53 years. This stone was removed by their son Robert, in consequence of the ground being required for the late repairs upon the Abbey Church and is placed here to mark the spot where lie the mortal remains of his beloved sisters’ (Helen, and Jessie Currie Rule).

Various tributes were paid to Elsie including at the AGM of the local Horticultural Society. An obituary in the local paper noted that she had ‘disbursed thousands of pounds to deserving causes and to people in Crieff and further afield over the past 30 years’. She was a Christian Scientist and attended the Crieff South Church. ³⁶ In her will, she left £73,397. Her house at 3 Cleveden Crescent was left to her caretaker Ian David Eades and his wife Jean ‘with the hope that it would not be turned into flats’. Her chauffeur was given the house that he occupied at the time of her death. ³⁷ 

The painting was initially owned by ‘Mrs Edwards’. (This was Ruth Edwards who with her husband, were Fantin-Latour’s British agents. He often visited the Edwards at Sunbury-on-Thames during the 1860s. ^38,39 The painting was exhibited at the Royal Glasgow Institute of Fine Arts, Glasgow in 1892, cat. no. 369, as Baigneuses. It was priced at £31. This may have been where it was purchased by Robert Rule and passed to his daughter.

References

1. Glasgow Museums Resource Centre, List of Donations to Glasgow.
2. Scotland’s People, Death Certificates.
3. Scotland’s People, Birth Certificate.
4. Ibid
5. Scotland’s People, Census, 1881.
6. Scotland’s People, Death Certificate
7. Glasgow Herald, 29 September 1888 
8. Scotland’s People, Marriage Certificates.
9. Scotland’s People, Census, 1891.
10. Scotland’s People, Death Certificate.
11. Glasgow Herald, 20April 1899, p3.
12. ancestry.co.uk, 1901 Census, England.
13. Scotland’s People, Valuation Roll 1905
14. ancestry.co.uk, UK and Ireland, Outward Passenger Lists, 1890-1960.
15. Scotland’s People, Census, 1911
16. ancestry.co.uk, UK and Ireland, Outward Passenger Lists, 1890-1960.
17. Scotland’s People, Valuation Roll 1915.
18. Strathearn Herald, 24 August 1921, p5.
19. Scotland’s People, Census, 1921.
20. Scotland’s People, Valuation Roll 1925.
21. Scotland’s People, Death Certificate
22. Glasgow Herald, 21 October 1929.
23. Strathearn Herald, 26 October 1929, Obit.
24. Strathearn Herald, 14 April 1962.
25. https://waymarking.com/waymarks/wmWH37_Knock_of_Crieff_Indicator_Crieff_Perth_Kinross
26. Strathearn Herald, 3 November 1962, p2.
27. Perthshire Advertiser, 19 January 1929, p 5.
28. National Archives and Records Administration (NARA); Washington, D.C.; Book Indexes to Boston Passenger Lists, 1899-1940)
29. Strathearn Herald, 13 January 1940, p3.
30. Strathearn Herald, 2 April 1941, p2.
31. Strathearn Herald, 1 April 1944, p1.
32. Strathearn Herald, 5 July 1958.
33. Dundee Courier, 11 October 1952.
34. Scotland’s People, Death Certificate.
35. Glasgow Herald, 29 October 1962.
36. Strathearn Herald, 3 November 1962, p2.
37. Strathearn Herald, 2 February 1963, p3.
38. https://www.vads.ac.uk/digital/collection/NIRP/id/34931/
39. National Inventory of Continental European Paintings, Culture and Sport, Glasgow, Kelvingrove Museum.
40. Billcliffe, Roger, A Dictionary of Exhibitors of the Royal Glasgow Institute of the Fine Arts, 1861-1989, The Woodend Press, 1990-1992.