Beatrice Chase

[2][3] Both Olive and her younger sister Hilda were educated at the Convent of the Holy Child in Cavendish Square, and both were baptised Catholics and became Dominican Tertiaries.

They rented out the farm and its outbuildings, but retained a cottage in which they lived, and built an adjacent Roman Catholic chapel which was licensed as a public oratory by Dr. Charles Graham, the Bishop of Plymouth, and for which the sacrament was reserved in 1910 until it was universally withdrawn by the Vatican in 1920.

Her passion for Dartmoor is evident in her writing and she was often referred to as 'My Lady of the Moor' following the publication of John Oxenham's novel in which she was the heroine.

[1] Chase was initially welcoming to devotees of her work to her home at Venton, where she was happy to show them round and sell them signed copies of her books, but in later life she tired of them and erected notices on her property ordering "trippers" not to call.

[9] As she grew older she vigorously campaigned to protect the moor from modern developments – particularly its use by the British Army – selling many of her possessions to fund this.

[3] Since the second half of the 20th century, Chase's writing style has been seen as outdated and her novels have been described as containing "cardboard characters [that] move stiffly through stereotypical scenes ... uttering trite phrases of deplorable sentimentality".

[13] In her last book The Dartmoor Window Forty years On (1948) she claimed to have started the tradition of Uncle Tom Cobley appearing in a smock-frock at the annual Widecombe Fair,[14][c] and today she is credited as the person who instigated the practice of leaving fresh flowers on Jay's Grave.