Carruthers, Pamela Isabel Jameson

Carruthers [née Torrie], Pamela Isabel Jameson (1916–2009), showjumping course designer, was born on 11 August 1916 at 19 Atholl Crescent, Edinburgh, the only child of Thomas George Jameson Torrie (1880–1916), a lieutenant-colonel in the Life Guards, and his wife, Esmé Muriel, née Crabbe (1895–1984). Her parents had married in Killin, Perthshire, on 6 September 1915, and her father was killed in action on the western front in November 1916. In 1920 her mother married Basil Eddis, a merchant in India, where Pamela spent part of her childhood. After the breakdown of this marriage Pamela and her mother moved back to Britain, where her mother was married for a third time, to Ralph Hope Vere. In her late teens Pamela and her family lived in Dumfriesshire. She was educated at Westonbirt School, near Tetbury, and at the Ozanne finishing school, Paris. She embarked on her riding career at an early age and while in France she attended a course at Saumur, the French cavalry school, as part of her education. On returning to Scotland she opened her own riding school in Dumfriesshire and commenced her career as a showjumper and a hunter exhibitor. On 8 November 1939 she married, in All Saints (Episcopal) Church, Lockerbie, Hew Douglas Carruthers (b. 1914), RAF officer, son of Lieutenant-Colonel Francis John Carruthers, army officer. Eventually the couple bought a farm in Malmesbury, Wiltshire. They had two sons: Christopher Hew, born in Hoddom, Dumfriesshire, in 1940, and John Anthony, born in Chippenham, Wiltshire, in 1941