Down memory lane with Mother Cadogan


Guyana Chronicle
May 9, 2004

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Mother Cadogan or `Big Esther’ as she was called in Baron when she was active in the village, lost her sight in both eyes in 1989, but her memory is incredible and her laughter is contagious.

Just pose a question and she’s on top of it with an answer, sometimes with a little prompting from one of her daughters.

`Mother Cadogan’ or `Big Esther’ whose name is really Esther Cadogan, was born on April 12, 1912 to Lousia Jones, called Ma, and Ebenezer Jones nicknamed `Ole Head’.

She has lived all her life at 162-163 Surat Drive, Triumph, formerly known as Middle Walk.

The fourth of six children - four boys and two girls – Mother Cadogan attended the Tabernacle Moravian School in Triumph under schoolmasters, Richmond and Adams.

She remembers starting school at age six and finishing when she reached Standard Six.

&That time, your mother used to tek you out from school in Standard Six and send you to learn sewing - crochet, embroidery, straw-work and other things.

As a girl, (after) I left school, I used to wake up early morning and go in the backdam to cut plantain and pull provisions. We used to use them for home use and share some wid the neighbours, Blacks and Indians,” she said while relaxing in a `Berbice Chair’.

Her father was an engineer and her mother used to keep the house and mind the children. Mother Cadogan recalls her mother “used to bake plenty, plenty bread, foh the pastor and dem other people.”

&Man, you shoulda see Christmas time, was sheer confusion wid she and the nuff nuff baking,” she remembers with a smile.

Mother Cadogan fondly remembers as a small girl going to village tea parties put on by her sister, Elvira, who was a seamstress.

Later, as a teenager, she would attend dances in the village in the company of her sister and brothers. She remembers doing the square dance and the waltz.

&The women used to dress up in fancy long dress and the men in their scissors tail suit,” she added.

Mother Cadogan and daughters Hyacinth (left) and Virginia

In July 1933, she married Arthur Cadogan who worked as a blacksmith at Lusignan and Enmore Estates, and on October, 1, 1933, she gave birth to their first child, Cecil, a retired Police Inspector.

Her other children were, Victor (deceased); Hyacinth, a seamstress/hairdresser; Virginia, retired headmistress, Triumph Nursery School, and Cicely, formerly of the Guyana School of Agriculture who now resides in the USA.

Mother Cadogan is blessed with 21 grand-children, 32 great grands and five great, great grand-children.

She was well-known as `Big Esther’ by the people at both `BV’ and Mon Repos markets, as she made it a habit to go to market on a daily basis.

She was also popular among the small children who would wait patiently for when Big Esther was returning from the market, as her basket always contained cake, bananas or some goodies for them, a daughter recalls of her mother’s activities.

&That time things did cheap, cheap, you could get one dollar fish and it can cook three times comfortably. You used to get plenty, plenty bananas foh four cents, nah now,” Mother Cadogan sighed.

She credits her ripe old age to eating good, fresh provisions the village was well known for producing. She told the Chronicle that she thoroughly enjoys a meal of ground provisions, as well as pork, fish, beef, but not chicken.

She remembers that she was once given a goat named `Brown Girl’. Since then, the family is never without a herd of goats.

Today, though she is cared for by her daughter Virginia, with whom she lives, and with assistance from Hyacinth who lives next door, if she is granted one wish she would like for her sight to be restored.

And with one of the many contagious laughs she emitted during the interview, Mother Cadogan disclosed how she enjoys her occasional tups (drink) of high wine and milk when she is allowed the treat by her daughter.