Fred Paxford

Who was Fred Paxford?

Frederick William Calcut Paxford was C. S. Lewis's gardener and handyman at The Kilns from 1930 until Lewis's death in 1963. He is said to have been the inspiration for Puddleglum the Marsh-Wiggle in The Silver Chair in the Chronicles of Narnia: "an inwardly optimistic, outwardly pessimistic, dear, frustrating, shrewd countryman of immense integrity."

Paxford, an Oxfordshire countryman, was born the same year as Lewis and had been gassed as a soldier during World War I. He had been working at The Kilns when Lewis bought the property in 1930 and hired him as a gardener and factotum. Paxford spent several years clearing the grounds and establishing an orchard and vegetable garden. He acted as a chauffeur to Lewis, who could not drive, and did the shopping for the household with a great sense of economy. He sang hymns in a loud voice, much to the annoyance of the neighbours, "but it was the incessant gloominess of his predictions, especially about the weather, that caught people's attention and led to his employment as the model for Puddleglum the Marsh-Wiggle in The Silver Chair."

Douglas Gresham, Lewis's stepson, wrote of Paxford: