Mary Kelland Armstrong (Bruford)

Mary Kelland Armstrong was born at Monkton Heathfield near Taunton in Somerset, the younger daughter of William Henry (“Bill”) Bruford, a merchant navy captain, and Dorothy Hilda (“Judy”), who had worked as a teacher. Over the course of the first nine years of her life, the family moved to Kent, Newcastle, and Falmouth, before finally settling in Rochester in 1968. Here she completed her secondary education at Bromley High School. During these years, Mary demonstrated the qualities of motivation, leadership, and high achievement that would later be manifest throughout her professional career, by becoming a Queen’s guide.

After doing her A levels she …