Mary Wyatt - Queen Consort of Seaweeds 'She Sells Seashells on the Sea Shore, the Sea Shells She Sells are Sea Shells I´m Sure.' There are other variations of this tongue twister / rhyme but this is the one I remember learning on the beaches at Torquay as a young child. What I did not know was that the rhyme almost certainly applies to a woman who walked the same shorelines some 130 years before me. After her marriage to William Wyatt, Mary (1789–1871)[1] became a resident of Torquay and by 1830 she was one of the two Torquay dealers in shells and minerals with her premises in Terrace Road[2[. In the same year Mrs Wyatt was mentioned by Blewitt ( Panorama of Torquay , First Edition)[3] as having a good collection of madrepores and shells “near the market”. When the Second Edition appeared in 1832 J Heggerty at the Old Quay and Mary Wyatt at 7, Torwood Row, are again listed as dealers in minerals and shells.[4] However, it is for her work on seaweeds that her name crop...
