Folk have long memories in Up Holland, a Lancashire mining village recorded in the Domesday Book, but few could put a name yesterday to the features of its most illustrious daughter.

When villagers were shown a photograph of Baroness Ashton of Upholland, the European Union’s first foreign minister, nobody could place her.

“Never met her,” said someone outside Rathbone’s, the bakery. “Not a clue,” said another. “I didn’t even know we had a baroness until today”.

Those with the longest memories wondered whether Cathy Ashton was anything to do with the Ashtons who once ran the petrol station at the bottom of the hill. Even old neighbours could not place her. Pat Walker, 78, said: “I have never heard of her and I have been living here since the 1950s.”

Lady Ashton was born on March 20, 1956, and lived with her family in a house on the Ormskirk Road, set back from the road behind tall trees. It was known as the “fort” to children because it had a military frontier air and was grander than its neighbours.

Consequently the Ashton family were thought of as posh. Those who knew them say that is far from the truth. The baroness attended St Thomas the Martyr primary school and went on to the grammar school. Unlike her contemporaries, she eschewed the sixth form to study sociology, business and law at Wigan and District Mining and Technical College.

Her A levels were her passport to Bedford College, part of London University, where she studied economics, and to her passage away from the village. Lady Ashton returns occasionally but there is little to come back to. The family house has been converted into a surgery and her parents and sister are buried at the cemetery beside St Thomas the Martyr Church.

There was “no real contest” when she had to choose her title, she wrote at the time in the parish magazine, when she was Minister for Human Rights and Justice. “I often reflect on Up Holland when I am working in the House of Lords. Roots matter. Knowing where you come from and where you belong helps us all to stay grounded.”

When the church celebrated its 700th anniversary, Lady Ashton opened the pageant, and took delight in pointing out the family home to her teenage daughter as the procession passed by. The Venerable Peter Bradley, the rector, said: “I would describe her as unpretentious. Certainly with her elevation to the Lords, she has kept her feet on the ground and I hope that does not change.

“Part of her does like to be in the background but she did do a little for us in the pageant, up-front stuff. She opened it and spoke a few words. She was content with that. She did not lord it over us.”

At the primary school Josey Hynes, a teaching assistant, recalls the baroness taking tea with her parents. “They thought she was marvellous,” she said. “They were made up”.

Her colleague Elaine Ashcroft, now a teacher at the school, was one of the baroness’s classmates at the grammar school.

She said: “At the time I would not have said she was any different to anyone else. I would have been amazed by what she has done since. The thing about her is that she still looks exactly the same”.