Susan Donaldson's Blog (1)

The character of my great-grandmother, Maria Rawcliffe had always appealed to me. Her name was an evocative mixture of down-to-earth Lancashire grit with echoes of a more flamboyant Latin nature. She looked a formidable lady from the one photograph (left) I had initially of her. To give additional colour there was a, no doubt, apocryphal story that “granny’s dark looks” came from Spanish descent, after an Armada ship…