Gillian Griffith Heywood

Gillian Griffith Heywood, 98, of Otto, NC, died in Charleston, S.C. on September 15, 2025, following Richard Heywood, her beloved husband of 65 years, who passed away on August 10, 2025. Their children are Stephen and Judi Lynn Smith, Geoffrey and Janne Smith (who live in Australia), Phoebe and Gavin Wilson, and David and Beth Heywood. Gill's sister, Veronica Greenwood, lives in Cambridge, England. Gill has four grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren.

Gill was born Gillian Frances Griffith in Bures, Suffolk, England in 1926, one of six children.

Her father, David Griffith, was a doctor in the British Army in World War I, and later was the dentist in Sudbury, Suffolk. Her mother, Grace Gulston Griffith, was also a doctor, having surmounted the many difficulties of going to Medical School before 1914 and qualifying in a male-dominated profession.

Gill lived at Newton Green, Suffolk, with 3 older and 2 younger siblings. She started school at the Newton Green Village School. When she was 7, her mother, Dr. Grace, opened a medical practice in London. Gill and her older sister, Rosemary, stayed with her and both attended North London Collegiate School. In 1938, she moved back to Suffolk and spent 8th grade at Sudbury High School. This was right around the time that World War II started.

In September of 1940, Gill and her 2 younger sisters Bridget (Biddy) and Veronica (Ronny) were evacuated to the U.S. because of the Blitz. They were transported across the Atlantic on an old ocean liner, Empress of Australia, along with a group of British children under the age of 14, all headed for asylum in the US. They lived with sponsors: Gill and Ronny with Mr. and Mrs.Walter Howlett, and Biddy with Mr. and Mrs. Bradshaw Crandell in Westchester County, New York.

Their trip was the last voyage to carry English evacuees across the Atlantic because of all the lost shipping due to German U-Boats. The three sisters stayed in New York until 1944, when Biddy and Ronny returned to England. Gill finished high school in 1944, attended Bouré School and Tufts University in Boston, graduating with a B.S. Degree in 1948. She became a U.S Citizen in 1951.

Gill married Stephen Smith in 1950. He went to the University of North Carolina and Wake Forest Law School. He served in the Korean War as a naval officer 1951-54. Stephen James was born in Wilmington, NC in 1953, Geoffrey Howard also in Wilmington in 1956.

Steve and Gill traveled to St. Thomas, Virgin Islands, on their boat Ballyhoo in 1957, where Steve started a business that took tourists out on sport fishing trips. Gill and the boys at first lived aboard an old sailing boat, and then in a Danish-built house on St. Thomas, from which Gill ran a daycare nursery. Phoebe Anne was born in 1958.

After her divorce in 1960, Gill married Richard Heywood. Their son, David Heywood, was born in Miami, FL in 1962. After moving to South Miami, where the family grew up, Gill was an Elementary School teacher, which she continued to do until retiring in 1982, when they moved to Otto. They chose to retire to a beautiful old farmstead on Middle Creek, and began the task of rebuilding an 1880's oak log cabin. This took about ten years to complete.

Gill was involved with the rebuilding of their new home, and also volunteered for the Mainspring Conservation Trust. In addition, she tended a football field-sized garden, and, as a 38-year member of the Nonah Weavers, she was an avid weaver and knitter, creating works of art, along with her good friends Peter, Mole, Konrad, The Elephant's Child, Piglet and Mrs.Tiggywinkle. She also loved Classical music, wildflowers, hiking, writing letters by hand, and had a lifelong fascination with puzzles and games.

In lieu of flowers, the family suggests donations may be made to Mainspring Conservation Trust (online at www.mainspringconserves.org or P.O. Box 1148, Franklin, NC 28744).

Arrangements by J. Henry Stuhr, Inc., Mount Pleasant Chapel. A memorial message may be sent to the family on our website at www.jhenrystuhr.com.