Katherine St Aubyn Penrose (1881-1972), Divisional Director Ireland's WRENS

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Hi,

Katherine St Aubyn Penrose was born in Cork but her family would appear to have been based in Waterford, for her father ran some of the Duke of Devonshire’s estates there. Penrose was appointed Principal, Queenstown (Cobh), and later promoted to Divisional Director in charge of the Irish Division of the WRNS.

One important part of her role was the substitution of women for men in various Irish naval ports. In that regard there are a few notable cases in which Penrose had mixed success in terms of outcomes, e.g. Kingstown (Dún Laoghaire). See example: Admiral Barton is not only delighted that women can do the job of men but that they’re so cheap in comparison. This naturally draws Penrose into the balancing act of welcoming the fact that women are getting to replace men but also seeking to give Barton a rap on the knuckles for excessive focus on how inexpensive women are to employ for these roles. In that regard Penrose applies for Olive Moultrie MacLeod (later MBE) to be re-graded as a Deputy Principal rather than an Assistant Principal in the course of replacing Lt Nevitt. In that regard Penrose “must place on record my horror at the suggestion that she should do both this man’s work and her own because it would be such an economy for the Admiral to get her services so cheaply”.

Extract from TNA ADM 318.539.

On the RN policy in Ireland of not employing Catholics in ‘sensitive’ roles, e.g. coding, confidential books etc, (although this isn’t in the naval regulations per se) there was one minor kerfuffle in December 1918. An unfortunate English-born Catholic, Delores Padbury, lost out on a trip to Bizerta due to overseas reorganisation and so was destined for Buncrana instead as a last-minute replacement there. To compound her misery Padbury was immediately sent packing by Penrose when Padbury’s religion came to Penrose’s notice. Instead of questioning Penrose’s decision to do a Lord Brookeborough, the WRNS meekly sent a “very sorry Ms Penrose for troubling you” reply. The unfortunate Padbury missed the mailboat that night from Kingstown.

Extract from TNA ADM 318/386.

Penrose would also appear to have had her favourites from among the APs. In that regard there are letters to the effect of ‘do visit’ or ‘do please write to me’, with Penrose providing her address as ‘Lismore Castle’, i.e. as if she was the lady of the manor and had evicted the Duchess of Devonshire. Overall though she'd appear to have done well enough: Buncrana was a mess, but many of the English APs regarded it as a hardship post and so it was constantly the subject of reshuffles and personnel rotation; Larne was an enormous operation, with a small detachment at Belfast to compound the logistical nightmares; Kingstown (Dún Laoghaire) and Queenstown (Cobh) would appear to have ran reasonably well, as the RN admirals and commodores issue a steady enough stream of praise - notwithstanding the occasional objection re the conduct of a particular officer here or there.

However, I’m well-aware that a trawl of the various ADM 318 files of her POs and APs would only give a limited insight as to Penrose's personality, management style etc. I’m sure that someone has already written an article on her but I couldn’t find anything in the usual places. Has anyone additional information as to what's been published in this regard?