Elsie Myrtle Abbot
Licence Creative Commons 3.0, from the National Portrait Gallery Collection
Elsie Myrtle Abbot, DBE 1907-1983
Lived in: 4 Constable Close
Profession: Civil Servant
About her life:
- Born Elsie Myrtle Tostevin on 3 September 1907 in Wandsworth, Surrey, London
- Completed her education at St. Hugh’s College, Oxford and graduated with a double first (first class honours in both parts)
- Entered the Civil Service at the Post Office in 1930 and later transferred to Her Majesty’s Treasury, where she became the Deputy Secretary, specialising in management matters, the ‘first’ woman to do so
- Married Edward Aston “Ted” Arnott (1904-1992) in 1938 and they had two children, Edward Wyatt Arnott. The marriage ended in 1945
- In 1947 married Dermot Charles Hyatt “Derry” Abbot, also a senior officer in the Civil Service
- In 1957 appointed a Dame Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire
- From 1958 to 1967 she was Third Secretary of the Treasury
