The Hon. Fflorens Roch (12 Feb 1879 -18 March 1969) was an author and chief commissioner for Girl Guides in Wales.[3] In 1916 she donated the Llanover Manuscripts (seventy-seven volumes of notes, transcripts and compositions by Iolo Morganwg) to the National Library of Wales.[4] She was a recipient of the Silver Fish Award, the Girl Guide Association's highest adult honour, in 1922.[5]
She married Walter Roch (1880–1965), the MP for Pembrokeshire on 20 April 1911.[9] At that year's annual general meeting of the Liberal Social Council in Newport,[10] she was presented with a bookcase containing a "valuable collection of Welsh literature" as a wedding gift.
She "lived very little with her husband and had nothing in common with him."[11] She developed a "close and long-lasting relationship"[12] with Scottish author and art theorist, Clementina Anstruther-Thomson (1857–1921). The two were "rarely apart".[13]
Catholic faith
Roch, like her parents, was a committed Catholic.[14] In 1948, she donated the main house of Llanover Court to the Catholic Church, and moved into a small home on the estate.[15] She also paid for the building of a Catholic church, Our Lady of Peace, in Newbridge, Caerphilly,[16] published several pamphlets and books through the Catholic Truth Society including about the Catholic faith in Girl Guiding.[17]
Girl Guides
During World War I, Roch and Anstruther-Thomson organised Girl Guides in London, and gave joint classes in drill and public speaking at the first Girl Guide Training School.[18] She also held other roles within Girl Guiding over the years:
1937: gave £500 to Abercarn Council to be spent "solely on labour costs of various improvements which would be left over owning to money not being available."[27]
1939: converted a deposit made by her father to the National Library of Wales of the Llanover Manuscripts into a gift. This meant the manuscripts, seventy-seven volumes of notes, transcripts and compositions in the hand of Iolo Morganwg, were now property of the Welsh nation. Because of the significance and generosity of this gift, the library made Roch a governor for life[28]
1939-40: paid for the building of the Roman Catholic Church, "Our Lady of Peace", in Newbridge, Caerphilly, to a design by architect Philip Hepworth[29]
World War II: provided accommodation for an evacuated convent school[30]
1948: gave her family home, Llanarth Court, including the church of St Mary and St Michael – one of the oldest Catholic churches in Wales[31] – to the Roman Catholic Church. It was run as a Blackfriars school by the Dominican Order until 1990[32]
Roch also paid for the building of Llanarth Village Hall and gave land for the Llanarth Cricket Club.[33]
Wonder Night: A Nativity Play (1932) Pub. Catholic Truth Society
Because of Thy Holy Cross: A Lenten play (1934)
And With the Children: A Child's Passion play (1935) Pub. Catholic Truth Society
The Gates of Heaven and How They Were Opened to Mankind (1936) Pub. Catholic Truth Society
St Francis of Assisi: Lives for Children (1938) Pub. Pellegrini & Co
The Third Order of St Francis (1939)
St Anthony of Padua (1940) Pub. Burns Oates & Washbourne
The Venerable Sister Mary Assunta, Franciscan Missionary of Mary: 1878-1905 (1945) Pub. Catholic Truth Society
The Catholic Way of Worship (1951) Pub. Catholic Truth Society
The Isle of Caldey: A Short Guide, illustrated by Edith M Gill (1952) Pub. R H Johns Limited
She contributed articles to Wales: A National Magazine in 1912[36] and chapters to Naomi Whelpton and Kitty Streatfield's 1926 book Rangers Pub. Pearson. She was a book reviewer for Life of the Spirit magazine from 1947 to 1953.[37][38]
^Jeal, Tim (2001). Baden-Powell: Founder of the Boy Scouts. Yale, USA: Yale University Press. p. 479. ISBN030018672X.
^Alexander, Kristine (2017). Guiding Modern Girls: Girlhood, Empire, and Internationalism in the 1920s. Vancouver, Canada: UBC Press. p. 76. ISBN978-0774835909.
^Jeal, Tim (2001). Baden-Powell: Founder of the Boy Scouts. Yale, USA: Yale University Press. p. 479. ISBN030018672X.