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Material from the Associated Press is Copyright © 2024, Associated Press and may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. Harriet’s parents were local wheelwright (and at one time victualler), Edmund Chaplin and his wife Elizabeth nèe Barnard. Total strangers along her route – which Wilkins figured out as she went along – were eager to offer food and shelter to the woman the press dubbed the “Widow Wilkins.
Now widowed and aged 57, the 1901 census captures postmaster and grocer, William Wilkins, at the ‘Post Office’ in Church Street, Great Ellingham. Her adventure was documented in the book “The Last of the Saddle Tramps”, a photographic and descriptive memoir of her 7,000 mile journey.The 1942 Great Ellingham Invasion Committee Record lists Mr and Mrs Everett with three children and ‘Mr Spencer’ at Church Farm in Great Ellingham. The gift Elizabeth Letts has is that she makes you feel you are the one taking this trip: selecting your route from a gas station map, enduring awful weather and accidents, hearing the creak of the saddle and the roar of the trucks that pass you by. Soon after, she had become ill herself and left the hospital with doctors telling her she had only two years to live. I first started playing music in primary school, where I had violin lessons (not something I’m proud of! She defies all odds, crossing mountains in snow - when told it’s impossible - rides through torrential rain - because she has no where to sleep - but never gives up.
With all the sudden chaos in her own life, she decided to make the most of what time she had left and to make the journey across the country as a way to honor that unfulfilled bucket list item.Five year old Alice Eliza is with her maternal aunt and uncle, Henry and Eliza Cattermole at 11 Casella Road, Deptford. This poignant, inspiring story is not just about a woman choosing to live instead of die, but also about an America that no longer exists. To top that off, she became ill and upon being admitted to the hospital was told she was terminally sick and had no more than two years left to live.