Enjoy watching a video showing a collection of old photos of the Aberdeen suburb of Bieldside, found to the west of the city.
The railway station at Bieldside was opened in 1897. The middle of the 19th century Cults Mill is near Bieldside. There was a ferry across the River Dee at Bieldside.
Old Photographs of Bieldside Aberdeenshire – Tourscotland on YouTube
Ruth Roche, Baroness Fermoy
Ruth Sylvia Roche, Baroness Fermoy, was born in Bieldside on 2 October 1908.
Friend and confidante of Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother, Baroness Fermoy was the daughter of Colonel William Smith Gill and his wife Ruth, and the maternal grandmother of Diana, Princess of Wales.
Showing early promise as a pianist, Baroness Fermoy studied under Alfred Cortot at the Paris Conservatoire in the 1920s.
Her musical career was cut short when she married the wealthy and much older Maurice Roche, 4th Baron Fermoy, in 1931. They went on to have three children together.
Maurice Roche died on 8 July 1955.
The following year, the Queen Mother, a widow who preferred the appointment of widows to her household, appointed Lady Fermoy an Extra Woman of the Bedchamber.
After four years, Lady Fermoy was promoted to Woman of the Bedchamber. She held the post for 33 years.
Meanwhile Lady Fermoy’s younger daughter, Frances, married John Spencer, Viscount Althorp (1924–1992), and became Frances Spencer, Viscountess Althorp. The Spencers had five children; the fourth was Diana, whose Royal marriage in 1981 made her the Princess of Wales.
It was reported that Lady Fermoy was not on speaking terms with Diana in her later years.
Lady Fermoy died at her home at 36 Eaton Square, London,on 6 July 1993. She was 84 years old.
