Leesa Sandys-Lumsdaine died in Jedburgh, Scotland, on 20th December 1985. Her connection to Wickhamford is that her mother, Joyce Sandys-Lumsdaine, and two of her siblings, bought Wickhamford Manor form George Lees-Milne in 1947. Joyce, her brother Patrick George Leeson and sister Cynthia Murial Batty paid £10,400 for the Manor and six and a half acres of land (see Leeson Family at Wickhamford Manor). The siblings sold the Manor in 1955 and there is a listing in the 1951 Electoral Roll that shows that Joyce was living there at that time, but not her husband. He had returned to Bombay, as a merchant, in October 1946. Their daughter, Leesa, then in her teens, probably lived with her mother at the Manor for part of the period the family owned the property.
Obituaries about Leesa Sandys-Lumsdaine appeared in the Scottish newspaper, The Southern Reporter in January 1986 and in The Scotsman in December 1985. She had been born in England on 25th January 1936 and soon after went out to India where her early education was in Darjeeling. Later, on returning to England, she went to Lawnside School in Great Malvern and then to Cheltenham School of Art. She was an outstanding painter, especially of horses and painted nearly all of the most famous racehorses of her era. She was also keen on lurchers and started shows which became popular over the whole country. She had moved from Gloucestershire to the Scottish borders in 1974. Leesa Sandys-Lumsdaine never married.
Family Background
There is some confusion over spelling with entries of her name in the records. Her birth was Registered in Upton-upon-Severn in the March Quarter of 1936 as “Lisa Sandys-Limsdaine”, with her mother’s maiden name as Leeson. This surname spelling was an error. There is also a record from India of Edith Leesa Sandys-Lumsdaine being baptised in Calcutta in 1936. Joyce and “Lisa” Sandys-Lumsdaine had sailed aboard the SS Viceroy of India on 14th March 1936, bound for Bombay. Their home address at that time was given as Brandan, King Edwards Road, Malvern. Joyce was then 25 years old. It is possible that “Lisa” became “Leesa” in honour of her mother’s maiden name of Leeson?
In the following paragraphs, the generations before Leesa Sandys-Lumsdaine are indicated numerically, starting with her father.
Sandys-Lumsdaine surname and Sandys lineage
- Joyce Dorothy Leeson had married Colin Cren Sandys-Lumsdaine, in Calcutta, in December 1934. She died in Newbury in 2000, having had no other children. Colin was born in Calcutta in 1908 and he died in Fife in 1967.
- His parents were Lt-Col Francis Myles Sandys-Lumsdaine (1865-1938) and Edith Louisa nee Magor.
- Francis was born in Scotland, one of nine children of the Rev’d Francis Gordon Sandys-Lumsdaine and his wife Mary Lillias, née Lumsdaine. The couple took on the hyphenated version of their name after their marriage, in St Paul’s Cray, Kent, in 1816.
- Rev’d Francis Gordon Sandys was born in Kent in 1828, the son of a clergyman, Rev’d William Edwin Sandys (1781-1871) and he was one of 14 children.
- Going further back in time, William Edwin was a son of Edwin Humphrey Sandys (1750-1831) ...
- ... and grandson of Richard Sandys (1724-1763), the family all living in Kent.
- Richard Sandys was a son of Henry Sandys (1697-1726) ...
- ... and grandson of Jordan Sandys. Jordan Sandys had been a captain in the Royal Navy and he was buried in Downe, Kent, on 9th January 1734.
- Jordan was a son of Henry Sandys (1642-bef. 1698) ...
- ... and grandson of Richard Sandys of Ombersley Court (bef. 1616-1669).
- Richard was the son of Edwin Sandys (1561-1629).
- Edwin Sandys was the second son of Edwin Sandys, Archbishop of York (1519-1588). It was Edwin’s elder brother, Sir Samuel Sandys, who lived in Wickhamford Manor and was buried in Wickhamford Church in 1623.
Leesa Sandys-Lumsdaine paintings
If Leesa Sandys-Lumsdaine’s name is searched for online, numerous links can be seen to her equine paintings. Two are illustrated below; she was clearly a very talented artist.
Tom Locke – November 2025
Acknowledgements
The lineage of the Sandys-Lumsdaine family was found on the Thompson Family Tree on ancestry. Further details of the Sandys family were taken from A History of the “Sandys” Family by Comley Vivian and revised by Col. Thomas Miles Sandys, 1907 edition.