Padstow maid, writer, tale collector 1850 - 1923
Enys Tregarthen is the pen name of Nellie (Ellen) Sloggett, author and folklorist.
She was born in Padstow, where she lived most of her life.
Nellie’s father died when she was just seven. As a teenager she suffered a spinal illness and was paralysed for the rest of her life. Then Nellie, with her mother, lived with an aunt, the wife of a well-to-do master mariner. By 1881 the families had moved to Marine Villa, overlooking Padstow quay. Nellie kept diaries about flowers, the seasons, and birds and other creatures, all seen from her window. She may have told stories to her younger cousins. Her first book was published in 1885 under the pen-name Nellie Cornwall.
Latterly she devoted much attention to folklore and legend, recording many stories about Cornish Piskey folk. She published three such books under the pen-name of Enys Tregarthen. Together they contain 27 folk tales. They are:
The Piskey Purse: Legends and Tales of North Cornwall (London, Wells Gardner, Darton & Co., Ltd. 1905)
North Cornwall Fairies and Legends (London, Wells Gardner, Darton & Co., Ltd., 1906)
The House of the Sleeping Winds and Other Stories (London, 1911)
Nellie probably remained at Marine Villa until about 1905 when it was sold. She then briefly lived with her cousin in Little Petherick. From a date after 1911 until her death in 1923 Nellie had a room at in Dennis Road, Padstow, the home of her unmarried cousin, Alice Rawle.
In 1938 an American writer Elizabeth Yates met “Miss R” (probably Alice Rawle) who told her of Nellie’s work, showed her Nellie’s room, and her trunk of unpublished material. Yates edited this material for publication as Piskey Folk: A Book of Cornish Legends (1940), The Doll Who Came Alive (1940) and The White Ring (1949)
There is no known image of Nellie Sloggett, so we have used a picture of the Mazed puppet of Enys Tregarthen, modelled on photos of Padstow women of her era and the reliable information that Sloggett girls are beautiful.
- Simon Young 'Her Room Was her World' : Nellie Sloggett and North Cornish Folklore.' Journal of Ethnology and Folkloristics volume 11 no 2 2017
- Simon Young 'Enys Tregarthen of Padstow, A Neglected Cornish Folklorist and Fairyist' 2023 Pwca Books
- John Buckingham, Padstow museum https://www.padstowmuseum.co.uk/enystregarthen.html
