Audrey went to Downe House in 1934, her sister Sylvia followed her there. She led an idyllic childhood in Scotland and at school in Berkshire she was fully involved in all aspects of school life. She played lacrosse for the 1st team, was a key member of the cricket 1st XI, excelled at music and maths and proudly gained the much sought after Music colours. She was Head Senior in her final year leaving Downe a term later than intended due to a serious medical situation which forced her to miss what should have been her final term. Undeterred and recovered she returned to complete her education and reinforce a strong relationship with the school and Miss Willis that lasted beyond school not just with her but also with her parents. 

On leaving Downe at the end of 1938 she went to study Music at The Royal Academy of Music in London. Her time at The Academy was interrupted as war broke out and her parents insisted she return to Scotland. During the war she worked for The Union Bank of Scotland in a branch in the Bridge of Allan replacing the men called up for duty. She was fully involved in the war effort within the local community be it on fire warden duty as the bombers came in at night, organizing the Red Cross effort or coordinating the Girl Guiding groups in the area 

Post war, with many of her peers deceased, she returned to the Academy. She graduated in the Summer of 1950, over 7 years after she had expected with her world and future life very altered. 

Music continued to be her life. She played in orchestras (clarinet), was an accompanist on piano at numerous concerts in London, often at the lunch time and evening concerts in St Martins-in-the Field and taught music privately. Outside of music she completed a secretarial course, being a decade older than most of the others, a geriatric as she called herself , but undeterred, she carried on determined to overcome the impacts of War on her life. She took up a secretarial position in London and it was at work she met her husband William (always known as Bill). She was married in March 1957, the start of a devoted union that lasted until Bill’s early death in 2010. They moved to Sussex in 1962 and she remained there for the rest of her life. 

Audrey had three children, Malcolm, Sheila and Rosemary, six grand children and missed out by months from becoming a great grand mother. 

Downe was to play a part through her long life. Aside from being a pupil herself in the 1930’s, she was a parent of two more pupils, Sheila Harrison (DH 1982) and Rosemary Biggs (Harrison DH 1984) but more recently as the loving grandparent to Emily Biggs (DH 2019) and Georgia Biggs (Upper Sixth). Her close association with the school was as strong at her death as in her teenage years. She had visited the school several times in the last 7 years and marveled that in spite of the many changes, old buildings removed, new ones appearing, faces changing over the years, that the spirit of Downe and Olive Willis (who her parents were friends with) had remained intact. She always remembered from her own time the cosy atmosphere created by Olive Willis who used to say goodnight to the girls bringing her dogs along with her. She frequently recalled how as pupils the aim was to ensure they could all stand on their own two feet, a trait she was glad the school seemed to maintain across her century of life. She retained a strong interest in the school right up to the abrupt end of her life. It was as important to her in 2021 as it seemed to be from her final school report as Head Senior written by Olive Willis “Audrey shows in all that she does that she has the best interests of the school at heart, and she has inspired a feeling of great confidence in her judgment and quiet imperturbability”. 

Audrey died in November 2021 aged 100, still living independently alone in her own home until the last 5 days of her life. A truly remarkable person, pupil, parent and grandparent. A direct link with a current pupil back to the founder of Downe House, an encyclopedia of precise stories of Downe, of the War, an array of recollections accurate in detail to her last days, spanning a century of extraordinary events and remarkable change not to mention 19 Prime Ministers, attending the coronation of King George, living as a young adult through World War II, her fathers involvement with advising Churchill which she witnessed first hand, a life sandwiched between Spanish Flu and the covid Pandemic (neither of which she succumbed to) with Downe weaving its way through her own 100 years of life. 

She was unique, talented, resilient, proud and seemingly indestructible, no medication in sight even in her final years. She never stood still, she was instrumental in running the business her husband set up in Sussex, she had a lifelong passion of the outdoors be it skiing in Scotland or Switzerland before War tore life apart, her young life devoted to helping others, a passion for gardening, a loving mother and grandmother and through all this she never left her music behind playing in the evenings at her grand piano as her children were trying to sleep! only giving up when her hands could not cope with the keys.  She had an energy and enthusiasm that defied her age, sharp witted to the final hours, she made an impression on everyone that met her, her life was simply quite extraordinary and she leaves a huge hole in the lives of her friends and family. The end of an era but a treasure trove of a century of stories. 

Written by Audrey’s family