Ruth Sylvia Roche, Baroness Fermoy, was born in Bieldside on 2 October 1908. She was a friend and confidante of Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother and the maternal grandmother of Diana, Princess of Wales. She was the daughter of Colonel William Smith Gill and his wife Ruth. She showed early promise as a pianist and studied under Alfred Cortot at the Paris Conservatoire in the 1920s. Her musical career was cut short when she met, and later married in 1931, the wealthy and much older Maurice Roche, 4th Baron Fermoy. They had three children, including her younger daughter, Frances who would become the mother of Diana. In 1956, the Queen Mother appointed Lady Fermoy an Extra Woman of the Bedchamber. The Queen Mother, being a widow herself, showed a preference for appointing widows to her household, and four years later Lady Fermoy was promoted to Woman of the Bedchamber, a post she held for the next 33 years. Lady Fermoy died at her home at 36 Eaton Square, London, on 6 July 1993, aged 84. It was reported that she was not on speaking terms with Diana when she died. Of interest to folks with ancestry, genealogy or Scottish Family Roots in Scotland who may wish to visit one day.
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