Drogo Baggins and Primula Brandybuck

Two families

Drogo Baggins was born in T.A. 2908 (S.R. 1308), the son of Fosco Baggins and Ruby Bolger, and a second cousin of Bilbo, since both descended from Balbo Baggins, the founder of the family. His brother Dudo and sister Dora made up the rest of Fosco's children; Dora, the writer of much good advice, was remembered by Bilbo with a waste-paper basket. Drogo was, by the Gaffer's account, a decent, respectable hobbit with a healthy appetite, and nothing was ever said against him except that he married across the river.

Primula Brandybuck was born in T.A. 2920 (S.R. 1320), the youngest daughter of Gorbadoc Brandybuck, Master of Buckland, and Mirabella Took, one of the three daughters of the Old Took. She was therefore Bilbo's first cousin, and she carried the Stoorish blood of the Brandybucks and the Fallohide blood of the Tooks together. Their only child, Frodo, was born on 22 September 2968, and the family lived at Brandy Hall among Primula's relations, where Drogo was often to be found at the old Master's table.

The accident

In T.A. 2980 Drogo and Primula went out on the Brandywine by moonlight, as Bucklanders did, and both were drowned. Hobbiton opinion, as expressed by the Gaffer at the Ivy Bush, held various theories: that Drogo's weight had sunk the boat, that Primula had pushed him and he had pulled her in, or simply that boats were unnatural and this was what came of them. The bodies were recovered; the cause was never settled. Frodo, aged twelve, was left an orphan at Brandy Hall in the care of his uncle Rorimac, and grew up there among a crowd of Brandybuck cousins, including the infant Merry, until Bilbo adopted him nine years later. Frodo's own memories of his parents are not recorded, but the double inheritance they left him, the Shire's steadiness and Buckland's strangeness, was often remarked upon.

Drowned together on the Brandywine in T.A. 2980.