Ursula Heathcote - House-Mother and Activist

Portrait and interview - 1993 

The same sun is newly born

                              in new lands

in a ring of endless dawns   (Rabindranath Tagore)

Only connect ...     (E M Forster)

Ursula's birthplace in 1920 was Kolar Gold Fields in Mysore State, South India.  Her twin brother Harry, who was due to arrive after her, was overlooked by the Doctor 'White' who nearly killed him and their mother.  The doctor kept on claiming 'he' was only her afterbirth, even though her mother insisted 'he' was her fifth child.  As a result, Ursula had the good fortune to also have an Indian mother, her beloved ayah who breast fed her.  They were fortunate to also have a wonderfully lovable, colourful and adventurous childhood in an idyllic setting, especially during the summer in the Nilgiri Hills.

After fourteen years in Australia with her family, Ursula returned to India for her marriage and was in Simla in the Himalayas in 1947 when India shed the British Raj.  Later, she and her husband returned to Australia where after many moves, due to changes of employment, they finally landed themselves in Woomera Rocket Range in South Australia, way out in the bush, then a secretive place.  One day she read in the library, reports about the results of dropping the atom bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.  She was so horrified by this that she could not allow herself or her family to be involved in the testing.  They moved to Melbourne where her husband was able to get a transfer.  From that time, Ursula became a pacifist.

In 1954, they came to England.  The main reason was for her mother in-law's terminal illness.  She also had a strong wish to meet A S Neill and visit his co-educational progressive school.  She went with her children to visit Summerhill in 1956 and while there, by sheer chance, met an Australian she already knew, Miss Lyttle, the founder-head of the only co-ed progressive day school in Melbourne where her first born had been to kindergarten ten years earlier.  With great praise, she told her about Dartington and also mentioned that the founder-trustees - Dorothy and Leonard Elmhirst who had, as their spiritual friend and guide, Rabindranath Tagore the renowned Bengali poet.   For her, this was an essential connection which motivated her to come to Totnes the following year with her nomadic children with the intention of establishing roots at Dartington.

In 1970, after all the children had left the school, she went to work for thirteen years at the Senior School - Foxhole, as a house-mother.  During the final year, she became involved with Greenham Common, which was a camp established to protest against the British Government allowing nuclear weapons being placed at RAF Greenham Common in Berkshire.  At dawn on New Year's Day 1983, Ursula took action with forty-three other women and attempted to climb the perimeter fence.  For this, she served a fortnight in prison with thirty-seven of the women.  Her account of the prison experience was published in Resurgence that year.

From 1986-93, Ursula was a voluntary worker for Women's Aid at the Women's Refuge in Torbay.

She is glad to now be settled in Totnes.  Of course, there are times when she is in India and Australia bound, more often in thought than transported!  She hopes soon to regain energy and use it to campaign for pensioners' rights.  Also, with friends to grow old disgracefully!

The picture in my portrait by Vanessa is a print by Karl Weschke which I love.  It hangs above my staircase and expresses the triumphant primordial woman.

Update: Ursula died in 1996.  (Karl Weschke died in 2005)