Josephine Kermode (Cushag)

Josephine Kermode
"Cushag" at the age of around 22
Born	Margaret Letitia Josephine Kermode (1852-09-18)18 September 1852 Ramsey, Isle of Man
Died	15 February 1937(1937-02-15) (aged 84) Bournemouth, England
Nationality	Manx

Josephine Kermode (1852–1937) was a Manx poet and playwright better known by the pen name "Cushag".

Margaret Letitia Josephine Kermode was born on 18 September 1852, at 73 Parliament Street, Ramsey. She was one of seven children who lived beyond childhood to Rev William Kermode (1815–1890), and his second wife, Jane née Bishop (1818–1858), of Shelton Hall, Staffordshire. As well as being Chaplain of St. Paul's Church, Ramsey, Josephine Kermode's father was President of the Isle of Man Natural History and Antiquarian Society and he was to initiate a Parish Book for Ballaugh, in which he wrote a useful account of the antiquarian remains in the parish. He inspired devotion in his children and "a love of learning, a love of country and a love of service."

Cushag, as she came to be known, and her sisters were educated at home by a governess, while her brothers went to public school. She and the family moved around the north of the island as her father changed jobs, moving from St. Paul's in Ramsey to become, first, Vicar at Kirk Maughold (1871–77) and then Rector of Ballaugh (1877–1890).

After her father's death in 1890, the family moved back to Ramsey, to Hillside on Vernon Road. Here Cushag took up a voluntary role as a District Nurse, until her health was adversely affected and she was obliged to stop. Eventually the family moved to the former home of Cushag's grandparents' in Claughbane, on the outskirts of Ramsey.

Cushag never married, and she acted as housekeeper for her brother P.M.C. Kermode from 1908, the year after his seminal work on the Manx Crosses was published.

P.M.C., as he was known, was an amateur archaeologist and historian at this time, whilst working full-time as Clerk to the Justices at Ramsey. Cushag was described as sharing with her brother "the same gentle kindliness and old-fashioned courtesy; proud, yet modest; sensitive and yet lovable." She respected P.M.C with the "reverence for a genius."

They lived in a secluded house in Glen Auldyn, with the river running through its garden and a meadow next to it for the grazing of their horse, Brownie.