Falmer School and Rhoda Dubbin

My maternal great grandmother, Rhoda Dubbin was schoolmistress of Falmer National School in the early 1900s. She was born in Cheshire but moved to the Brighton area when her father James Moss took up a position as coachman at Stanmer House in the 1850s. Her daughter, Rhoda Bertha Dubbin (my grandmother) also spent time assisting at the school. Her husband, Samuel Moss was a local ironmonger and her son, James Dubbin, later fought at Gallipoli with the Hertfordshire Yeomanry.

Rhoda retired c1910

The family are listed as living in Falmer national schoolhouse in the 1901 census. Photos included here show Rhoda standing with school children in front of Falmer School around 1900 – possibly when she retired in 1910 and another shows her with her daughter at the door of their accommodation there. A silver plate commemorating her retirement is also a treasured family possession. The younger Rhoda (my grandmother) married Richard Bowes and they settled in Hertfordshire in the early 1920s, but that is another story! My childhood family home in St. Albans was called ‘Falmer’ as a tribute to our connection with this lovely village.