Percy Cecil Pepper

Census Address: The Cottage, Burghley Park
Place of Birth: The Cottage, Burghley Park
Date of Birth: 1898
Enlistment Address: -
Regiment: -
Service Numbers: -
Place of Death: Stamford
Date Died: March 1970
Burghley House and Buildings

Robert Pepper

Robert Pepper

Percy Cecil Pepper was born in 1898 and lived with his family in the gamekeeper’s cottage in Burghley Park. Like his elder brother Robert, he was at school in 1911 and there is no record of him serving in WWI. He lived in Burghley Park in The Cottage all his life, following his father and grandfather to become gamekeeper on the estate. He was still on the estate in the 1950s as Lady Victoria Leatham recalls him in her book:

” Cecil Pepper Keeper at Burghley all his life, succeeding his father before him, he was tiny and lean, had large blue eyes and a very high-pitched voice. He hunted on a most noble beast, about seventeen hands high with a wild eye and flaring nostrils. Mr Pepper bounced around on top, brandishing his hunting crop.”

He married twice, first to Gertrude C. Deer in 1924. After her death he acquired a reputation as a ‘ladies’ man’ until he married Lydia Hall in 1964. His death was registered in Stamford in March 1970.

This photograph, from Lady Victoria Leatham’s book “Burghley, the life of a great house” (Herbert Press Ltd 1992) is of Robert Pepper, father of Robert Henry and Percy Cecil, an impressive figure of a gamekeeper.