"Published by the composer". Hopeful Victorian Ballads.

 

I have a 'damaged' right hand. A legacy of my ancient stroke. Happily, I can still type -- though I'm down to two fingers -- but I make lots of typos and various other 'erreurs de frappe'. Trying to undo accidental instructions to my computer is occasionally nightmarish. But occasionally, just occasionally, a mis-hit leads me somewhere interesting and useful. Like today.

As you know, I scan e-bay, quasi-daily, for fascinating historical fragments. Same keywords every day. Which is a bit dumb, because keywords on e-bay can be erroneous, misspelled or just plain fakes. I always check out the photos, programmes, music ...

Well, yesterday I mis-hit whatever my target was, and I came upon some super shops carrying C19th sheet music. All sorts. Lots of Waltzes, Quadrilles, Polkas and other dance arrangements, which ar'n't really my scene, but a decidedly interesting heap of songs of the Entertaiment and Music Hall varieties. Many, bearing credits which meant nothing to me. So, I put aside my D'Oyly Cartesians for the nonce, and have begun to investigate.

This one caught my eye, and it had quite a tale behind it.

It dates, I discover, from 1854, and it was sung in a Scottish Entertainment given by 'the Misses Bennett and Angus Fairbairn', an act which had a decade of career around the British provinces, before eloping to America ...

Well, the Misses Bennett (who were apparently not Bennett at all) were the originals. But Mr Fairbairn became the 'front man' as time went on. Who was he?

James Angus FAIRBAIRN (b Kirknewton 31 May 1823; d Dorchester, Mass 1887) son of Thomas and Elizabeth, married Margaret née Waters, was a railway signalman in Perth. But a signalman with artistic yearnings. In 1850, his muse went public ..

And the following year he burst into public songs, assisting the 'Misses Bennett' in their Entertainment.

The Misses Bennett, billed as such (Miss E and Miss M H), had been seen in 1850 at the Glasgow City Hall concerts, sharing a bill with the Alban Crofts. Elizabeth was apparently Elizabeth ROBERTS. Miss? Mrs? Mary was allegedly her sister. But the whole lot of them told fibs, over the years, so that it is impossible to sort them out. However, I may have spotted them -- Elizabeth 35, Mary 30 -- as Bennett, born England, vocalist -- in the 1851 census for Anstruther Easter in Fife. Oh. With the 'Robertson' family ... 

Elizabeth played piano, both girls sang, and originally not just Scottish songs. I see them duetting 'Deh conte'. Anyway, once Mr Fairbairn became attached to the act they seem, for all that they were not Scots, to have become almost wholly Hibernian. Suitably attired in overtly 'Highland' costume.

This is 1854, and it is seen that Angus has pushed himself to the front.

He had, after the birth of his fourth child, also begun an affair with the younger Miss Bennett. Whether they ever became legally married I have no idea, but Margaret 'late of Melrose Abbey and Bowhill' died at Dunnington, Yorks on 13 January 1905 as Mrs Fairbairn.

Of course, in the fruition of time, Mary, too, bore children to her paramour. Usefully, she bore two daughters, who in the goodness of time were able to replace the 'sisters Bennett' in the Family Fairbairn act. But the Family Fairbairn operated now not in Britain, but in America. They seem to have emigrated in 1869, and I see them performing in Chicago in 1871. Angus, Mrs Roberts and Miss Katie Roberts. Who? Later, more predictably, it is Angus, Mary, Bessie (b 1857) and Polly (b 1858).

The act, alas, seems to have had a limited showing and a very limited success on the left hand side of the Atlantic, and a little para about Angus's death, in 1887 of intestinal cancer, tells us was a disgruntled man.

I am always fascinated by songs which are 'published by the composer'. Or 'for the composer'. It's like a vanity publication. One assumes that a regular publisher, or a recognised singer, didn't want it. Which is fair enough. I have self-published in my time. My reason was that my publishers wanted cuts, and I didn't. Not a reason likely to affect a song.

I've investigated the writer of several such pieces in the past, but today ...

First, I came on this.

A three-shilling song, with a nice cover, published by a well-known firm of piano dealers .. but Mr Bevan has paid for the publication. I wonder why. To get his name connected with that of the bashful Earl (who must surely be Shaftesbury, or maybe Stradbroke)?

Well, there are a few Sam Bevans around in the 'sixties. A farmer, a Reverend, servants ... but I'm plumping for Sam who was 'secretary to the English and foreign Library' at 15 Bond Street. I see that the Library had to purge its lists of 'impure literature of the 'Anonyma' type' in 1864. Sam seems to have shifted to the Douro Silver Lead Mining Co.  Was it this Sam?

I don't see the song getting a professional outing, but it does turn up in amateur provincial concerts.

Now, to pay for one song to be published is OK. But what do we say of a man who does it over and over and over. This next one led me off on a really amusing chase ...

John d'Este, eh? Published by the composer. d'Este? It is, of course, a pseudonym, even though he decided to deed poll latterly. Dr John d'Este MA (Cantab). One of the gentleman's lesser peculiarities and peccadillos in a doggedly determined 'career' in music ...

John EASTES was born in Canterbury, Kent, 3 December 1823, the son of pawnbroker George Eastes and his wife, Elizabeth, and in his teens became a chorister at the local Cathedral. I maybe doing George a disservice, for there was one of the same name 'deputy organist of All Saints' Church Maidstone in the 40s ... anyway, I see 'Master Eastes' singing soprano in 1834, alongside Master Longhurst, and as late as 1837-8 ('an anthem from The Creation').

In 1843, he married Harriott Newport, billed himself as 'of the London concerts' and in 1845 had a son (John Newport Eastes, 26 August 1845) and was appointed a Lay Vicar at Trinity and King's College Cambridge. He would later say 'principal tenor'. He taught singing in Cambridge and turned out some music ('The Royal Naval Polka', 'The Arabian Polka') with picturesque titles. 'The Soldier's Bride' (1847) was self-published, so I imagine the Polkas were too.

He was now advertising 'pupil of Crivelli' and 'member of the University Choir' and was up to four children, and being 'of Sidney Sussex College', his servant girl committed suicide and he started giving a lecture 'Musical Sketches of Italy' at home and away .. 'artist, composer, poet and orator'.  And the string of publications continue ('Only for thee, this heart will throb for thee', 'The Harp of Jacob', 'The Song of the British Navy') as 'An Excursion to Alexandria replaced his Italian lecture.

And in 1859 he graduated BA. 1864, it was MA. The doctorate seems to have come from his fertile imagination.

And aureoled with his newfound 'glory' he walked out on Hariott, and moved to London with his new companion, Caroline Crow. Or Caroline d'Este. For as he pompously announced in the press (and Cambridge took it for a hoax), his lofty Dutch ancestry gave him the right ...

In his new guise, he published a Practical Hints on Singing, churned out the music sheets ('easy but commonplace'), billed himself voluminously as 'MA Cantab, Lay Vicar of King's, Trinity and St John's College Cambridge, formerl of Canterbury Cathedral, Principal of the London College of Vocal Music' -- the College of WHAT?  and in between times laid seven more children with some extraordinarily fancy names, on Miss Crow. By which time he was 'Doc Litt MA' ... 

He died in 1891 ... leaving a bundle of descendants, and a larger bundle of sheet music of which I have found the following (in no particular order) ... nearly all 'published by the composer' ...

I don't know whether to feel sorry for Mr Eastes, or to laugh at his pretensions. Perhaps both.

To which may be added Beautiful Night (1872), a set of musical valentines (1 shilling for five), 'Give Honour to the Brave' (Oswald Allen 1881), 'When Tom Comes Home' (G H Ryan 1881), 'Britons Rally Round Your Flag' (C W Rooke 1886) ..

PS I have yet to find a report of any of these being sung in public. But I shall keep looking.

And I am sure I shall shortly be adding another gent or two this list! Ah! Here's one from America. New Bedford, Mass, to be precise. And this one claims that it did get sung! By the group pictured on its cover. The harmony group who called themselves The Village Four. Even when they added a soprano to the team. Floruit 1913-1918.

That was around the time when the writer, Thomas Herman Griffith (b Prospect, Ohio 26 October 1889; d Cincinnati 13 April 1967), son on Ohio carpenter,  floruitted too. Yes, he was, for the nonce a professional baseball player. Elmer B Griffith (b Prospect 12 March 1884; d Prospect 23 October 1923) was his elder brother.

I have no idea whether the brothers wrote anything else, but by 1920 Thomas was a clerk in a broker's office, by 1930 he was a dealer (radio)... but the pair seem to have got their piece of music sung. And at least one person bought it ...

Here's another. From Iowa. Not self-published (thought probably self-paid for) by its writer. Professor Edward CLAPHAM MD, was indeed a Professor and doubtless a Doctor of Medicine. He was Professor of Chemistry, Toxicology, Materia Medica and Microscopy at Iowa State University in the 1860s. And a musical hobbyist.

Clapham was born in Springfield Place, Leeds 25 October 1836, the son of a chemist and druggist, John Keighly Chapman, and his wife Charlotte née Peacock. He was educated in Pontefract, became (1859) an associate of the Phatmaceutical Society, and went to work as a chemist in Huddersfield. Or, at least, I think so. But a learned tome about all those -ologies was published in Edinburgh in 1850. An MD at 14 or wrong man?  

Our Edward emigrated to America in 1862, and was listed in 1867 as 'professor of anatomy'. He married, had a son .. but died 11 October 1879 in Astoria, Long Island. His wife, Kate (née Lewis), died the following July and the child was brought up by an uncle.

The sister to whom he dedicated the piece was Rosa née Clapham (1840-1892), who married David Bruce Peebles of Edinburgh. Engineer, inventor, gas engineer and (unless there were two of them) sometime piano and singing teacher! In they 1890s they lived at Tay House, Bonnington ...

I see the son, 'Charlie' Clapham (b 10 September 1875) has a large entry on Findagrave ...

Here's a beauty.  1850.

I am not insinuating that the splendid Signor Lanza was anything but a first-class professional. But Miss Purcell and Healey Esq were not at all of the same stature.

Miss Purcell was a striving young soprano, who put in an appearance on the minor concert platforms between 1846 and 1853. I see her in the 1841 census living in Friar's Road with her Scots mother. They assure us that they were both 'of independent means'. I don't see them again thereafter. She can't have been awful, because she did appears down the lists with such as Miss Graddon, Louisa Bassano, Sophia Messent, or Rebecca Isaacs, on occasion. However, she was definitely 'minor'. What her connection with the allegedly lofty George Healey Esq was, I cannot imagine. He was clearly into fairies. And well-off enought to indulge his passions for poetry and drawing (he has done the cover himself...). I imagine he paid Lanza to set his words ... if he really was an Esq.

This one doesn't say 'published by the composer' but it, effectively was. Mr William Dressler (b Nottingham, 31 August 1926; d Brooklyn 1 July 1914) was the publications manager of the firm of Hill. 

Mr Dresser was a modest musician, pianist, accompanist, music teacher, organist et al for some two decades, from the 1850s to the 1870s largely in Brooklyn. I see him just occasionally accompanying a singer at Irving Hall or Steinway Hall. His main achievement as a composer seems to have been the 1873 Fairy Voices, a singing book for schools. 

Addendum

Another from Connecticut. Salem to be precise.

Whittleseys flourish in Connecicut. This one, Or(r)amel (b Salem 7 November 1801; d Salem 9 September 1876) was the son of a preacher, and himself a music teacher -- founder and principal of the Music Vale Seminary -- who ventured into local politics. 

Mr Whittlesey had four daughters, and the eldest of these was Eliza (b Salem 8 October 1826; d Salem 9 September 1897) to whom he dedicated this piece of music, which he published ... when?  Eliza married Lieutenant John T McGinnis, (Company E, 18th CV) had two children, and saw her husband 'fall at Piedmont'.  Eliza ran the Seminary in succession to her father, followed by two of her sisters, but after Orramel's death the girls closed the school down .

Wotta lotta Cartesians! ... but I'm still defrocking them!

 

Cartesians are getting tough to decipher, but I am still pulling the odd one out of the hat, in spite of a foule of failures. The Geraldine St Maur basket for Lost Cartesians is bulging somewhat. But I press on ... win or lose, or simply add some factual details where they have been lacking ...

 

So, here we go ... World of G&S scholarship, my latest contribution!

 

And to those who say 'it really doesn't matter, matter, matter, matter' ... why not get it RIGHT ... and, anyway, I'm having fun!

 

 

Frank MANNING (b Islington 1861; d Southwark, London 24 March 1899)

Working out the what and the when of 'Frank Manning' has been laborious. He came from a theatrical family and his name, like that of his father, seems to have been assumed. His father 'John [Joseph] Manning' (1826-1874) was an actor at the Grecian Theatre. His mother was Mary Ann née Ransome. And he had one elder brother named Ambrose. Yes, the Ambrose Manning (1858-1940) who was to become a fine and durable character actor on the British stage. 

They can all be seen together in the 1861 census. Papa, mamma, Ambrose 2 and Frank 1 month. In 1871, Ambrose and Francis. 1881 it's Ambrose and William! I see 'Thomas Ambrose Manning' born Holborn 1858 in the registers. But there is no Frank or Francis Manning registered in early 1861. Just a couple of plain Johns. At his death, he was said to be married with two little boys ... 

And just one brother. Ambrose.

But at the funeral are the actor W J Manning (b Mile End March 1861; d Clapham, June 1928 aged 67), of the Gaiety and Daly's &c, and his wife. Who is supposed to be Louise Blanche née Gomersal. And her parents. So where does he fit in? If he does. Because his real name was William [James] BILLHAM. And his son's name was ... William Ambrose G[omersal] Billham (b Worcester 1888). Until he changed it to Manning! 'Ambrose' again! William and Louise Billham can be seen down Sussex way in the 1891 census.

And at the funeral, too, are the Misses Cissie and Kate Manning ... oyyyy!

And in the 1881 census, there is our Ambrose (22) sharing digs with William (20). But it's Frank who is supposed to be 20!

Yes, this is what I go through to bring you three lines of definitive results.

The definitive result is that 'Frank' got pneumonia during the run of The Lucky Star, which led to a heart attack, and his death at the age of 38. As Francis John Manning. Yeah. I guess he was officially Frank Billham.

 

Mrs Graham[e]-COLES ought to have been more straightforward. If the name was for real. Her fair career of over a decade is crystal clear. And it all starts off in the Portsmouth/Southsea area in 1888, when she is Mrs already. Mostly. With the 'e' abd the 's'. Mostly. And one clue: 'pupil of Randegger'. Of course, there were hundreds, nay thousands of those. Genuine and barely, but mostly simply students at  the schools he attended.

Well, it is a guess, but I plump for Miss Florence Coles from Bideford, 'student at the LRAM aged 19' in the 1881 census. Daughter of William, schoolmaster, from Upottery. This Florence seems to have married a William Harman in 1883 ... so the Grahame may just be decoration.

Anyhow, the lady concerned - whoever she may have been - rose through a couple of years of local concerts, and some mostly lesser London concerts (Crystal Palace, Meistersingers Club, People's Palace, Bayswater), to be co-cast as Ulrica in Ivanhoe for Carte, and going on to tour as the Widow Merton in Vicar of Bray. She was later seen with the English Opera Singers (qv), W H Burgon's group, at Queen's Hall, on plentiful Pier Pavilions and at the People's Palace (Stabat Mater), before disappearing from sight after 1900.

So, Florence Coles (b Bideford 1861) by William out of Mary Elizabeth apparently née Pym? Mrs William Harman (22 March 1883). Eleven children? Died April 1937 ..?  Maybe. So, what's with the Grahame? Maybe not, I fear.

PS she gives an address of 34 Formosa St, Maida Hill, around the turn of the century ... an Elizabeth Catherine Wyer Keeley died there 29 August 1902 ... born 1823. I think not. Sigh. It seems to have been an apartment building.

 

My delvings hav'n't all been failures.

 

Lillian [Eliza] COOMBER (b Portsea 17 December 1874; d Peacehaven 6 April 1952) had the grace to keep her birth name. All the way to her death.

Daughter of Thomas G Coomber, 'fleet engineer of the Royal Navy' and his wife, Eliza. Studied at the RAM from where she went quickly to the Queen's Hall, then to singing Micaela at Covent Garden (1897). I see her at the Crystal Palace proms, at Hull, at Sheffield in Elgar's King Olaf before she was hired for George Musgrove's Australia-based opera company. She sang Marguerite, Micaela, Maritana, Senta, Arline, Filina, Venus in Tannhäuser et al To Australia, but the local press cheered loudest for the local Mme Slapoffski. Back in England, she sang with the Moody Manners troupe and with the Carl Rosa (1903-4, Il Trovatore, Don Giovanni, Nozze di Figaro) after which it was said that would visit South Africa. Her little term with the D'Oyly Carte seems to have been her last prominent engagement. She retired to the Lewes area, where she lived out her days.

Rosa COOKE (b Lambeth 19 March 1844; d Bronx 21 October 1916) daughter of musician John Parker Cooke and his wife Jane Caroline née Usher, spent most of her life and her career in America after the family emigrated in her young days. I see her in 1868, 'a charming little actress', singing 'Lo, here the gentle lark' as Oberon in A Midsummer Night's Dream with Castle and Campbell. She had a long and wide career as a singer and actress, which I'm sure has been detailed somewhere, and which apparently included a try at opera in Italy, and she was still up and at it forty years on. For a surprising number of years of her later life she was an inmate of the Bronx Hospital for Incurables, but when she died it was of angina pectoris.

But what to say of the substantial Flora Macdonald and Norah Maguire (aka Norah Phyllis) of Bayswater? Stage names? Invisible.

Well, not quite!

Flora MacDonald

 

But I have, probably, largely nailed another Cartesian leading lady: the original Josephine in America, Miss Eva S[usan?] MILLS [née HOWELL]. When Eva was born, in Washington DC, around 1852, she was apparently not surnamed 'Mills' but 'Howell'. The seeming daughter of Darius Carpenter Howell (b Baltimore 23 Janary 1820; d Baltimore 9 July 1887). She became Mills when her mother, who, was née Susan Edmonton Kenyon Guest married or 'married' the well-known Washington sculptor, Clark Mills in 1861. In his will, Mills (d 12 January 1883) referred to her as his 'adopted daughter'. I have tried to trace Eva's birth, but without success. Susan's re-marriage may or may not have been legal. Howell lived till 1886 with a different wife. And there are other anomalies ...

By 1873, Eva was singing soprano at Washington's St Aloysius Church and later at other local churches and concerts, with the nearest thing to a theatrical engagement being the performance of Act 2 of Martha at a church concert. HMS Pinafore was her first theatrical job, and the most substantial of her career, although she sang Serpolette et al on its back. By 1883, she had returned to church choiring and teaching in Washington, and my last sighting of her is in 1908, back at St Aloysius.

 

Stepfather Mills

 

Celia [Mary?] McFADDEN contralto, of Philadelphia, appears only briefly on my screen. She sang in concert in her home town in 1878 and in 1880 made a brief foray on to the stage as Buttercup and Ruth. That's all I know.

 

Charles MACK and his wife Sarah MACK seem to have been veritably Charles McKAY of Rochdale and his wife Sarah née THOMAS (m Burnley 1883). Is that he in 1913 at Whitby, in 1921 at Leeds, in 1927 at Hull ... ? Probably not.

 

James MATTHEWS (b Westminster c 1861; d unknown) was the son of John William Matthews (plasterer) and his wife Mary née Mills. Although you wouldn't believe it to read the family historians who have attached all sorts other folk to their tree. In the 1881 census, he can been seen with his parents 'vocalist unemployed'. I can follow up sisters Fanny and Charlotte but ... not him. In 1891 he seems to have become a painter .... if it is he. There are a lot of James Matthewses ..

 

 Robert [William] McQUEEN (b Alnwick 6 October 1887; d Exeter 30 April 1960), son of a cabinet-maker, had a sliced-up career with the Carte Company. In between times, I see him in pantomime, variety and musicals round the country, my last sighting being in the cast of The Student Prince (1950). He married, as his second wife, a widow named Peggy Wainwright, with three children, who survived him.

 

Agnes [Gertrude] MITCHELL (b USA c 1859) was not easy, and I hav'n't quite 'got' her yet. We are told she was American. In 1881 she admits, in the English census, to being 21 years old and having a middle initial of 'G'.  That helps. She later claimed to have sung/acted at Booth's Theatre. I hav'n't got my Norton to hand...   Then came Christmas 1880 as principal girl in Robinson Crusoe in Dublin (1880) and her stint with the Carte companies. From there, she went on to appear as Fiametta in La Mascotte and in Olivette at the Strand Theatre (1881), before heading to Australia with A T Dunning's comic opera company (The King's Dragoons, Boccaccio etc). She was the first to play the title role in Olivette, down under. 

She had travelled to Australia on the John Elder on which Dr Richard Benson Warren FRCSI was surgeon, and, at some stage in 1882, they were married. The couple were still in Australia in 1889 ... but I guess that they (or, at least, he) returned to Britain, for the respected Dr Warren 'acting surgeon to the Mounted Infantry Regiment' died, aged 35, in London 31 July 1891. He left his £188 8s 11d to be executed by his father. No mention of Agnes. I've lost her.

PS: I have my Norton and yes! Agnes is one of General Stanley's daughters with the Boston Ideals at Booths in 1880! Isabel alongside Mary Beebe and Clara Merivale... 

PPS Vague possibility. Sarah Amanda Mitchell (Mrs Cottrell) vocalist, daughter of George B Mitchell, musician, born Charleston, SC, sister Mrs Agnes G Warren of Boston ... 

 

William [Craig Denniston] MORGAN (b Glasgow 20 October 1852; d Esher 2 January 1944). A performer from a young age, he developed into a re-stager and director. His personal life seems to have included at least three wives, and a dozen children.

Tom [Thomas] MOSS (b Halifax, Nova Scotia 8 September 1843; d Wales 4 February 1894), son of Henry Moss, a musician 'of Scarborough' in the 1871 census of Belgravia, with his Birmingham-born wife, Sarah Ann née Kimberley 'of Rotherham'. He is still professing music in 1891, in Moss Side, and three sons and a daughter have been added to the family. They subsequently removed to Wales, where Tom died in 1894 and Sarah the following year. Is he the Tom Moss 'tenor and comic character vocalist' at the Croydon Music Hall in 1866, at Battersea in 1871?  

 

William Lister MORRAH (b King's Lynn 16 November 1871; d Barnet February 1953), son of Colonel James Arthur Morrah, latterly Mayor of Winchester. He and his 'acceptable tenor voice' worked for a decade in the musical theatre, following his Cartesian years with appearances in The Little Michus and the juvenile leads in The Sweet Girl (Dick Kenyon) and Sergeant Brue (Michael Brue) on the road, before retiring to become 'a traveller in motorists' sundries' and 'a superintendant at Selfridge's'.  He married Marguerite Longhurst (b France 21 July 1871; d St Albans 1950) who does not appear to have been a performer.

 

Ida ?Tylor MüLLE (b Massachussetts 28 April 1868; d Manhattan August 1934) was the most successful of the singing daughters of German immigrant musician Ernst Mülle (b 25 September 1826), from Märckranstädt, Saxony, and his wife Mathilde Auguste (d 1903). Her career has been well documented elsewhere, her personal life included an abortive marriage to a certain James Benjamin Tuthill (1885). Sister Babette Antoinette married the well-heeled James V Simpson, and Mathilde, Ida and middle sister, Emma (d 1916) lived many years with the Simpsons in Mount Vernon. Eldest sister, Marie, who led her own company as [Mrs] Marie Bell died 1902.

Ida Mülle

 

I'll probably add to this bunch over the remaining weeks of my time in the sun ... but this is enough for one meal!

PS Well, George responded with a few other names needing investigation, so ....

Marie [Elsie] WILSON (b Hulme, Manchester 10 December 1888) is, I think, a pre-marital child of Francis Sunley Wilson, solicitor's clerk, and singer Eleonore ('Lori') Recoschewitz from Bergedorf, Hamburg. When she joined the Carte organisation in 1906, a great point was made of her age and birthdate. Only 17. Alas, the records of the British nation don't agree. It seems that Lori may have already had the odd pre-marital child. Anyway, parents and Marie can be seen in Manchester in 1891, and Hammersmith in 1901 and 1911 by which time Marie is 'vocalist'. 

After all the brouhaha made at her first Cartesian appearances, she actually didn't stay long with the company. In 1907 she went touring with The Blue Moon, then as Miss Hook of Holland .. in 1910-11 she played Lady Elizabeth Thanet in Our Miss Gibbs on the road, and I suppose that is she singing, in between times at the Manchester Tivoli ... then I lose her. Mother died 11 February 1923, and father 28 December 1930, and Marie is not mentioned ..  Another lost soprano.

Mama Wilson

A[lbert] Laurence (var Lawrence] LEGGE (b Dorchester, Devon 7 December 1880; d Hallam Street Marylebone 27 October 1927) is rather more transparent. Son of Joseph Legge (telegraphist) and his wife, Jane, married 1907 to Evelyn Constance Maria Ede. After his time with Carte, and London appearances in The Mountaineers and The Islander, he ventured to South Africa. On his return he took to the Halls and revue, and I see him in the theatre only in The Only Girl (1916). During the war he became a temporary Captain and Major in the RAF.

A L Legge

Ruby GRAY (b Kentish Town 10 September 1888; d Henley, Oxon 26 February 1978), daughter of pub broker William Gray and his wife Eliza, began her career at the Savoy as a teenager. In between Savoy engagements, she toured for Courtneidge in My Mimosa Maid, and after leaving the Savoy permanently, was seen with the Beecham Opera Comique Company as Orlofsky in Die Fledermaus, and Nicklausse in Tales of Hoffmann. in 1911 she toured as Nadia in The Chocolate Soldier. How long she continued performing, I know not, but in the 1939 census she is a marriage registrar. She died, unmarried, at the age of 90. Several other performers worked as 'Ruby Gray' subsequently.

Ethel GEORGE [JIRIKOVIC, Ethel Rose] (b Marylebone 24 September 1889; d St Albans 1966)

Daughter of Vencil/Wenzel George Jirikovic (d 1940), laundryman and tailot, and his wife Alice née Raymond (d 1931). Ethel and her sister Mabel Alice (b 20 October 1896; d St Albans 1970) went into the theatre as Ethel George and Mabelle George. Mabelle remained single and in the theatre for many years, Ethel married musician Kingsford William Shortland, and gave him a son, Raymond, and daughters Joan Alice and Patricia (12 August 1921) before they separated. In the 1939 census, the sisters are sharing a home: Mabelle is 'theatrical'; Ethel is a 'cloak room attendant'.

Later. Two days later. Yesterday was a frank failure. But I was awakened by torrential rain at 6am, so I vengefully came straight to 'work'. Where to start? Why not with letter 'A'?  Mr M Abbey. The only one I can find is a Morriss Abbey and he was a ship's captain. Jane Addy? Must be a pseudonym. Or a foreigner.

Stuart [Duncan] ALEXANDER (b Aberdeen 1872; d Blackpool 23 October 1911).  Educated at public school, Cambridge, medical intentions ...  but ended up singing in pierrots, on piers and in concert parties ('The Romantic Knights', Reuben More's Pierrots). He played in The Price of Pilsen on tour, sang at the Aeolian Hall with David Bispham, but was stymied by a heart problem when scheduled to appear in Iolanthe at the Savoy. Which didn't stop his being billed thereafter as 'the Savoy tenor'. He toured with Albert Chevalier, and Ernest Lord's Light Opera Singers, and in 1907 founded his own concert party, 'The So and Sos'. His heart trouble caught up with him during an engagement at Fleetwood, and he died at the age of 39.

He married, in his south coast pier days, singer Maude Dorothy Davis (b Ryde, Isle of Wight) who appeared alongside him in many of his engagements.

WHAT A FLUKE!  I stumbled upon a death notice for Mr MORRIS ABBEY (d Atlanta, Ga 24 November 1901). A regular chorister in musicals, he was an understudy in a touring company of A Runaway Girl and apparently died of stage fright when suddenly asked to go on .... 'aged 35'.

Kate [Katharine Thomasine] ALLWOOD (b Walcot Square,  Lambeth x 7 January 1848; d unknown) was the daughter of violinist Thomas H Allwood and his wife Margaret Ann née Laidlaw. She was singing at her father's concerts in Scotland from her earliest teens, joined soon by her younger sister, Ellen Louisa (later Mrs Richard Henry Eaton) and the pair of them appeared in music halls, pantomime and concerts, after their father's death (1865), in the early 1870s. Kate did not allow her marriage to an Alfred Sanders (1871) or the birth of their son (18 August 1873) to keep her from performing ('fascinating appearance and finished vocalisation') and after her stint with Carte she was seen as Ganem at Sanger's (1878) and as Alice in Dick Whittington (1880), before -- after the 1881 census -- she and son simply vanish. Even the family historians have given up trying to trace them. 

Marie [ie Mary Eliza] ARNOLD (b Peterborough 8 January 1863) was the daughter of a coal man, and, thus, she spent a portion of her young years in Cardiff with mother Mary and her siblings. I first see her singing in 1887 in Liverpool ('Scenes that are brightest'), before she joined vanBiene and Lingard's company as Inez to Louise Henschel's Pepita, and as Murielle in The Old Guard. At some stage she is said to have attended the RAM and taken a gold medal. I see her, with her 'exceptionally sweet soprano voice', singing oratorio music in York, before she joined Redfern's endlessly touring Dorothy company. It was said that she sang the title role nearly 300 times, but she seems to have taken some time out to sing Gondoliers with the Carte tour. At Christmas 1890, she appeared as The Maid of the Mill in the Nottingham panto of Puss in Boots. In 1891 (censussed in Kensington with a sister, Alice), she gave a London concert (4 June) at Steinway Hall, and then took to the road as no2 to Giulia Warwick in Madame Cartouche.

I never quite understand why performers who have had success elsewhere (vide Miss Allwood) join the Carte companies in altogether lesser roles. Yes, Marie played Gianetta (latterly Fiametta, and presumably understudying), and Leila (Iolanthe, ditto) ... but ...

She played Fairy Fly in the Glasgow pantomime, sang in Scottish concerts and with W F Frame's concert party; I see her singing Messiah selections in Middlesborough and ballads on the Pier at Skegness, at the Public Hall Manningham ('Let Me Dream Again', 'Come dance the Romaika', 'Carita') ...

Latterly she played the title role in the touring musical The Lady Philosopher (1899-1900), appeared as Mrs Armstrong in A Merry Madcap, Nora in Fun on the Bristol, Dolores in a Florodora tour (1904) ... and then she vanishes. Age 40. Whither? Someone tell me ....

It gets tougher all the time .. but a few fragments have floated to the surface ...

Annette BIDGOOD (b Bedminster 24 July 1898; d Weston super Mare 1982) daughter of a joiner, Herbert Bidgood, and his wife Ann née Andrews. Appeared on the music halls in the war years. Mrs Grantley John Samuel Short.

Harry BARRON (b London 1871) may have been otherwise named. He turns up in 1888 giving an Entertainment at New Cross Hall ('an elocutionist of ability'), already a member of the Carte establishment. In 1891 he is in a Penzance hotel, with a bunch of other Carte choristers. In 1892, he went on tour with Leonora Braham, playing the title-role in Ching Chow Hi and Pierre Palliott in The Duke's Diversion, and I see him subsequently as Larivaudière in La Fille de Madame Angot, in various comedy tours, and as Will Atkins in Robinson Crusoe at Reigate. In 1893 he was Alphonse in a no3 tour of The French Maid. In the late '90s, he tried his hand at directing and writing. A comic opera His Satanic Majesty written with Fred Marlow jr was produced 13 November 1899 at Marlow sr's theatre in Southend. J W Hooper was the lead comedian.  Other than that ...

Wesley BRENHAM (yes, the 'W' was for Wesley!), tenor, has been irritatingly difficult to disrobe. I can only suppose that his name was a pseudonym, for I can't find him anywhere except on theatre ads. One of which says Mr W Brenham-Barrett. His credits were mostly for minstrel shows. In 1873 it was W G Braide's Minstrels, then W P Collins' Christy Minstrels ('Little Sunshine', 'The Dying Boy'), in 1874 Livermore's more substantial Court Minstrels. Later that year he joined the Gompertz diorama 'London to St Petersburgh', purveyed 'Half Hour Sketches from the Operas', and joined Sam Lloyd and Ellen Brougham and the Sestini Wilsons in their Entertainment. James Tute's Minstrels, Fred Smith's Phantoscopic Company (he got to sing Faust and Trovatore selections), pantomime at Barrow and, in 1879, he reached the London stage in the May Bulmer A Cruise to China and Vokins' Vengeance. Then began his time with Gilbert and Sullivan .. after which ..?

Wigmore BROOKES (b Marylebone 11 February 1870; d Aylesbury 24 February 1951) was the son of art dealer Reuben Brooks and his wife Eliza Jane. He began life being something medical in the armed forces before joining Carte. However, his main occupation was as a photographer, a trade he plied into his elderly years. He married Harriet Amelia Coates and had five children. 

Wigmore Brooks

I don't know how I snuck out of the Bs and into letter 'E' but there I found Ernest EGLINGTON. He was cagy until George told me his proper name could have beenn EGLINTON. And there he was.

Ernest EGLINTON (b London 1859), one of eight children of William James Eglinton (clerk) and his wife Mary née Cope. In 1891 he belonged to something called Edward Bishop's Opera Co, then by 1893 moved to the D'Oyly Carte where he remained until 1898. He took a turn thereafter in George Ridgewell's The Skirt Dancer, and by 1901 he is working as a music-hall pianist in Manchester. 40, unmarried and ..?

Eglinton

Bit untidy, this lot. But it's a start ....

Lilian EVELYN [JACKSON] (b Wigan 22 May 1887; d Appledore, Devon 18 May 1971). Married fellow Cartesian Ralph Hilton Layland, son, unmarried him and latterly became Mrs Herbert van Os.

A[ntonio] J[oseph LOPRESTI (b Montpelier Row, Knightsbridge 6 June 1844; d Nunhead 15 March 1888), son of cook Joseph Lopresti (the family of 'Lopresti's Duke of Gloucester Sauce') and his wife Edith née Coleman. Brought up, with his siblings, by Edith's replacement husband, post-office messenger Edward Clarke. A watchmaker ('general watch jobber to the trade') as a teenager, her ventured into music and theatre, conducting little concerts in the suburbs, and I see him in 1875 in Les Géorgiennes at the Phil. In 1886, he was down the bill with Mary Anderson in Dublin.

Twice married, he was survived by six of his eight children, on of whom, Harold Essex Lopresti (1886-1967) ventured into music.

Christian [Gray] LORIMER (b Edinburgh c1883; d Portobello 13 April 1977) sang the role of Ruth in Edinburgh as early as 1905 (with Cora Lingard as Mabel). Her far-roving appearances in the Savoy repertoire are listed in the Archive. She served in the army in the Great War, and I see her travelling from South Africa in the early stages of the second war. 

Christian Lorimer

Complementary details for

Oscar [Charles Blyford] LANGWADE (b King's Lynn 27 December 1894; d Eastbourne 25 March 1966) son of Horace Merrikin Langwade (railway clerk) and his wife Sarah Lizzie née Webber. A colourful life (see Archive), but he died, unwed, with very little to his name.

Josset LEGH [LEGH, Agnes (Pennington)] (b Melbourne 27 November 1887; d Winchester 1978).

This lady seems to have attracted some colourful stories. They may or may not be true.  I see only that she was born in Australia to John Alan Pennington Legh RN and his wife Agnes Mabel née Brotherton. Within a few years Agnes and her two siblings were back in Britain, living with Agnes's family in Dorking. She assumed the name of 'Josset' for her her brief stage career, and kept it, when she married, in 1911, Ernest H Huskinson, son of a draper, from Middlesborough and Leeds, described as 'actor'. Mr Huskinson subsequently dubbed himself Darrell-Huskinson. Maybe his stage name was Darrell. I don't see him acting as Huskinson. His mother's name was Broomhead ... 

They had two daughters, one of whom died aged 11 ...  the other was born in 1918. But wasn't Ernest supposed to be dead? It seems not. He was certainly in the Royal Navy in the war ('temporary lieutenant RNVR'), which he survived with the rank of Major, and took to playing tennis ... hmmm ...

The tale about Mrs H living on a 40 acres island seems a bit orf too. I live on a 35 acres farm: no room for a grocery, or a pub, and the water, sewage and post are vile ...

Well, wherever they went -- together or separately -- they ultimately both remarried. Agnes's new husband was 28 years her junior, and named ... Mr Michael Snowball.

ADDENDUM: O ye of little faith!  Katie Barnes has just sent me this gem ...

Great stuff!

A Cartesian couple who seem to have stayed together were Fred LENTON [ALCOCK, Frederick William] (b Barton Regis 12 July 1879; d Sheppey 13 September 1953) and Miriam [Augusta] CALLAWAY (b Manchester 9 July 1896; d Maidstone 1994). Married in 1921, they are censussed together in 1939, along with their 1922 (22 January) son, John:  Fred is still listed as 'opera singer', Miriam is running a catering firm. They had 30 years of marriage before Fred's death, aged 74.

Miriam Callaway

NITA CLUTTERBUCK [CLUTTERBUCK Annie] (b London ?16 February 1870).

Poor Nita. The family historians have made a frightful mess of her, crediting her with 3 marriages and 11 children. As if her story weren't messy enough already. So, yoohoo, family: here are the facts.

I managed to get on to the real Annie via the 1891 census. Vocalist. Soprano. Living with aunt Mary Ann Gosden in Windsor. Mary Ann was the widow of a labourer, Isaac Gosden, and her maiden name was Baxter. One step to find a small Annie C, born in London to a gasfitter-cum-bell hanger, Henry Clutterbuck, with a wife named Emma Baxter ...

Annie studied with a Mr John Thorman RAM and began appearing in concerts in 1889. I see her at Devonshire House on a bill with Rosina Brandram and Sybil Grey ... singing for J H Bonawitz, trying 'Bel Raggio' at the Portman Rooms, at John Thomas's 1891 concert, at Steinway Hall ('her voice is light but pleasing and altogether agreeable'), at Walworth ('Return with the May 20 April 1891), singing Tosti's 'My Heart's Delight' at Kilburn,  but mostly in very minor affairs with showpieces such as 'Caro nome'. And then came her moment with D'Oyly Carte. But after 1893 she is invisible. Except in the 1901 census, where she is living in Clapham (along with some Baxter cousins) with widowed Emma, aged 31, and no longer saying 'vocalist'. It seems the music had gone out of her life.

It was certainly about to. In 1902 Nita went to church to marry Captain Cecil Wilfrid Frank Wallis 'of the Royal New Zealand artillery'. In short time, it was revealed that the Captain, who had already pillaged Emma's piggy bank, was no captain at all, and under the names of 'Cecil Sutcliffe' and 'Bruce Wilson' had at least one other wife ...the press of two hemispheres had a field day, the big-or-trigamist went to jail for a good spell, and Annie and Emma were left to count the cost.

Annie may have lived out her days in Hove. If she still called herself Clutterbuck. And counted as 'widow'. And was born 6 January. The family historians plump for died 1936. 

Contrary evidence. Henry the gasfitter and Emma of 122 Hempstead Rd reckon on another child 12 June 1874. Frederick William. He was christened in 1875 along with their daughter, Annie. Born 16 February 1870 ...

 

Malcolm COCKERELL (b Dulwich 6 February 1882; d unknown), baritone, was one of the children of John Cockerell (secretary) and his wife Jessie née Green, a pianist and music teacher. He was trained as a chemical engineer, but took to the stage -- visibly, around Norwood, from 1905, then at the Crystal Palace -- until the Great War when he joined the army and went to France. At the end of the war, he married Simonne Julienne Leblanc in Lille, and after a return to Britain, seems to have settled somewhere in France (Somme). 

 

Alice [Matilda] COLEMAN (b Loughborough 18 September 1878; d unknown). Daughter of William Frederick Coleman and his wife Mary Jane née JOHNSON. Educated at the RAM and swiftly into the Carte Companies as described in the Archive. On to the Prince of Wales (understudy to Edna May) and the Apollo, and married William Smith, general exporter. They moved back to Leicestershire, where Alice taught singing and performed -- latterly as a contralto -- in concert ('Madame Alice Coleman'). A son and a daughter were born.

The widowed Alice can be seen in the 1939 census in Amersham, but then disappears. Maybe she followed her son to Canada. Dig deeper.

 

Alice Coleman

Marie CONRON [CONRON, Mary] (b New York 1859; d East 18th Street 5 June 1885). One of four daughters of plumber George Conron (d 9 October 1870) and his wife Ellen Mary ... three of whom became vocalists. Marie was the one to succeed.

I see her in concert at Chickering Hall in 1880, after which she had her G&S interlude, and was cast alongside Ed Marble and Lizzie Harrold in a 'musical comedy satire' titled Idle Hours (Portland 16 September 1880, Violet Remington). Elder sister Ella was also in the cast.

Younger sister, Florence, joined her in a performance of W S Hancock's 'Te Deum'. 

In 1881 she visited Australia with Wilhelmj, and gave the Queen of the Night's vengeance aria et al in support of him, remaining in the colony till mid-1882.

She played with the Duff organisation in two versions of Le Coeur et la main and played Josephine in HMS Pinafore when it was hurriedly staged to replace the production of Lecocq's work at the Standard Theatre. 

She died at the age of 26, and the press reported

Marie Conron

Not entirely factual. Father had been dead 15 years. The sisters were Ella, Lulu and Florence. WHICH two years is she supposed to have been in Europe? I hav'n't got my Norton with me, but I suppose she did play all those works at some stage. And 'the bread winner'? I see Florence, for one, crossing the Atlantic ... 

Detail on [Clara] Dorothy COURT (b Fazakerly, Lancs 10 March 1883)

F[rank] W[illiam] CANE (b Peckham Rye 1 February 1864; d Bracklesham Bay 6 April 1940) son of John ('artist') and Kate Cane. Husband to Kathleen Whitaker. He seems to have been an intermittent actor: in the 1911 census he described himself as 'professor of education'.

Herbert [Edgar] CRAYMER (b London 20 March 1888; d Redruth 25 November 1983). Son of egg merchant Herbert Craymer and fhis wife Maria, he worked as the eggman's clerk till his Cartesian adventure. He left the theatre to join up, and when he returned from the war he took up eggs again. He married Dorothea Kitty Perkins in 1921, and fathered two sons ...

John P[atrick] CURRAN (b St Luke's London 1 June 1859; d Ventnor, NJ 21 November 1930). Son of Florance Curran, a brass foundry worker, and his wife the former Mrs Bridget O'Brien.

Rose CULLEN (b c 1852; d 26 Belgrave Rd, London 7 December 1888) allegedly the daughter of John Cullen a sculptor. For a short while the wife of artist Albert Charles Tuck, who divorced her for infidelities with a well-off Charles Dashwood. Albert demanded £2000 in compensation, but I don't think he got it.

[Elizabeth] Lindsay CURRIE (b Edinburgh 9 June 1871) Daughter of James Currie and Jane Lyall née Key, she trained in Germany. I see her giving a concert in Hanover in 1894. The following year she took part in Daniel Meyer's concert at Queen's Hall, and again with her pianist sister, Margaret ARAM, in Glasgow. She sang with Evangeline Florence at a Kendal Festival, and in various minor concerts around London and Scotland and I spot her last in 1898 singing Solomon, alongside Kirkby Lunn, in 'a somewhat light but pleasing voice', before then boarding the Dungevan Castle for the Cape of Good Hope. There, she became Mrs Harold Edwin King .. In 1914 they are in Belsize Avenue, Hampstead ..

Wait a moment. Harold Edwin King was surely the name of Ada Crossley's husband... Ah well, I see her in 1933 with Sir James Currie and Lady Hilda Beatrice Currie and John Westall King Bart and Lady .. all living in Princes Garden SW7 .. It seems to be she who died at Henley 12 February 1966.

[Robert (Stanley) Lancelot] dit Lovat CROSLEY (b Sutton 20 March 1887; d Salisbury 21 March 1959), son of a varnish company manager, was originally, himself, a salesman in varnish, until he decided to be a tenor. He worked as a tenor for over a decade, during which time he went to the altar three times, and the font twice. His second wife (1925) was [Edith] Rose HIGNELL another former Cartesian with whom he appeared at Hammersmith and the Lyric Theatre in the 1920s. He seemingly traded her in for no3, shorthand-typist Margaret Mary née Egerton in 1947. Rose continued in the profession into the 1930s, but Crosley became a market gardener in Hampshire ('Sunningdale Nurseries, Salisbury') for the last part of his life.

Crosley

Rose Hignell

Reginald CROMPTON (b Almondsbury, Gloucs 14 July 1870; d New North Rd, Exeter 10 September 1945) son of Francis Crompton and his wife Elizabeth née Dudfield. Married Mary Isabel Reaney.

Ithamar ('Ita') Gobel COPE née VIGORS (b Southampton 27 December 1896; d Hendon 8 March 1981) 'beauty specialist, vocalist, actress' in 1939 (Tendring Hall) where she chops three years off her age. 

Percy J COOPER affirmed before American officialdom that he was Percy John Jabez Cooper, born in Chatham, Kent on 27 November 1847. In 1880, he affirmed that he was 35. In 1900 he proffered 45. And that he had been in America since 1872. At his death, from apoplexy, 26 December 1909 in Chelsea, Mass, someone (he was a confirmed old bachelor) recorded that his father was named John. And that he was 68 years and 29 days old. So ...  He's buried in Woodlawn Cemetery ..

Well, if all that is true, fine. But the English records don't show it. Fortunately, his singing career in the USA is a little more clear. He seems to have linked up with mezzo Flora E Barry, with whom he played in The Soldier's Legacy (1880, soprano: Geraldine Ulmar, Boccaccio et al with the Mahn Co, the Hess Acme and the Egleston Opera Co over several seasons. After his Carte Pooh Bah, he played the same role in Vermont (Katisha: Alice Carle) and later took part in semi-pro productions of Patience (Grosvenor) and The Pirates of Penzance (Frederick) while running down his performing career in favour of teaching.

[Annie] Marjorie CLARIDGE (b Tulse Hill 5 September 1897; d Drumbeg, 23 February 1978) Daughter of John Gilbert Claridge, a linen warehouseman, and his Irish wife Anne Christina née Henry. Attended the Guildhall School of Music ('Depuis le jour', silver medal), and was heard in suburban and provincial concerts from 1917 (Jewel Song, 'The Enchanted Forest' etc) and regularly in Belfast (Marguerite in concert Faust etc). She joined the Carte company briefly, and months after leaving, married John Maynard Sinclair (b Belfast 4 August 1896; d Belfast 31 January 1853), another linen merchant and moved to Ireland. Thirty years later, Sinclair, who had risen to high position in local affairs, was drowned in the sinking of the Princess Victoria ferry.

Hyman ('Harry') CLAFF (b Russia 1879; d Ashcombe Gardens, Edgeware 11 May 1943) was the son of a Russian synagogue minster, Moses Claff and his wife, Miriam née Newman. Brought up un Whitechapel, his career, which began in touring companies of The Circus Girl (Drivelli) and The Shop Girl (John Brown) in 1900, was to be mostly in the music halls and pantomime. His trademark garb and act was 'the White Knight'. He married Fanny Guttwock and had four children.

OK.. Enough of the Cs. Dip into the Ds ...

Inez d'AGUILAR may or may not have been one of the Jewish-Indian Army family of d'Aguilar. There was a later 'Inez' in that family. If so, she was probably born in India. Otherwise, it's a pseudonym. I can prove nothing.

She had a decade of career in the British theatre, beginning in Dolly Dolaro's The Black Prince (1874), then at the Opera Comique (Maud Crumley in Burnand's Proof Positive), then at the Royalty in The Duke's Daughter. In 1878 she toured with Jolly Nash, Maria Jones and G A Foote in an Entertainment party, then played at the Folly in Gilbert's The Wedding March (Sophy Crackthorpe), and in Grundy's Snowball. She appeared as fairy in pantomime at Dublin (1879) and when the theatre burned, returned to London as Topsy Grey in The Mother in law (1881). Between 1883-6 she appeared as a guest in amateur productions, around Reading, and I think I spot her doing panto in Cardiff in 1889, after which she vanishes. 

[David] Scott DALGLEISH (b Edinburgh 11 November 1861; d Bishop's Stortford 1 September 1941), son of a Scots cork merchant, spent a brief time in the professional musical theatre in the late 1890s, before marrying soprano [Annie Maud] Mary Brooke and beoming an advertising agent. The couple sang in local concerts in Wimbledon et al, up till the 1910s, and had a son, David, before Mary's death. 

James DANVERS [SMITH, James Bowles] (b Edinburgh 23 May 1855; d Southampton 1915) was the son of the actor Edwin Danvers (Edwin Bowles Smith), famed for his portrayal of Dame Hately in Black-Eyed Susan, and his wife Janet Young née McGregor.  Coming from a thoroughly theatrical family, it was hardly surprising to see James ('basso and pianist') performing as early as 1873 with Milly Howard's concert and operetta company. In a busy career as singer, comedian, company manager, director, pianoplayer he visited America with the breakable Colville-Henderson Company, directed and played Gobo in the long-touring Cloches de Corneville troupe, played villains in pantomime, was Christopher Crab in Billee Taylor, Biscotin in Madame Favart, Don Jose in Les Manteaux noirs, as Blous in Willie Edouin's Babes, King Henry in Little Lohengrin before joining Carte in 1885. Christmas 1886 was spent in Bluebeard at Liverpool. Thereafter, he took part in a number of musical plays from The Royal Watchman and Count Tremolio in the 1880s, to The Dandy Doctor and The Varsity Belle in the 1900s, took roles such as Pedrillo in Pepita and appeared in concert and in music halls with his burlesque piano (with soprano) act.

If his professional life was full and colourful, his personal life was also active. He married one Hannah Rae (1878) by whom he had five children (to 1885) and ?then one Annie Dobbs who allegedly produced eight or nine more. Four died as infants. In 1901 Hannah can be seen in Brixton with half a dozen of the brood ... Edith and Nellie are actresses. (in fact, dancers). Annie Danvers 'widow' is in Ardwick with four more including 'Cecil one month'. Something very odd here!

Hannah died in Preston in 1918. Annie 1920. Annie's offspring included one son who the parish registers tell us was christened 'William McArdle Danvers'. Was he really, or was it 'William Mikado Danvers' and an uncomprehending registrar? He became a successful music-hall performer as 'Billy Danvers'

James Danvers

Ada DAVIES (b Birmingham c1879; d Farnham Common 16 August 1936). Mythology credits the lady with being American (who would dare dispute Wikiplegia?!), but she was, to all evidence, born in Birmingham, daughter of a Mr J J Davies. She became a pupil of Franco Leoni (much connected with tenor Ben Davies) and seems to have made a debut in the Boosey concerts in 1896. In 1897, Leoni cast her in E C Hedmondt's production of his Rip van Winkle (Alice) and she appeared in the same season as the Dew Fairy etc in Hänsel and Gretel. She was seen liberally in concert, promoted her own at Steinway Hall, made an appearance at the Boosey Ballad Concerts. It was said that she sang at the Paris Opéra-Comique in 1899, but I have failed to find that record. In 1900 she took her turn in The Rose of Persia to enthusiastic notices, and in 1903-4 she was a member of the Moody-Manners Opera Company (Nedda, Micaela, Maritana, Arline, Venus, Filina, Eily). She later sang for several seasons at Covent Garden (Siebel in Faust, Germania etc). Thereafter she took part in other Leoni works-- now Madame Ada Davies -- The Gate of Life, Golgotha with Clara Butt ..  She was 'Madame' as she had married Mr Herbert Platten (agent, commercial traveller in metal rollers) 'son of the Rev Platten of Birmingham, in 1908, and the following year gave birth to a daughter, Annette Elizabeth (Bayswater, 7 October 1909). She was active, in her married life, in promoting and singing in local concerts and entertainments, and also sang on radio. Ada, of Gipsy Cottage, West Egypt, died in 1936. Herbert ('Major P of the Cheshire Regiment') survived her. Annette married Lt-Col Corfield ....

PS A Mrs J J Davies gave birth to a daughter 1 July 1880 at Arthur, Ontario, and the event was recorded in the Sheffield press ... and a Miss Ada Davies can be seen singing in the Newport are in the early 90s ... and there is another in Forest Gate ... so all is not straightforward ..

Isabelle DILLON [DILLON, Louise Isabel] (b Willesden 1 May 1880; d Staines 3 May 1969) was the daughter of gas engineer William Thomas Dillon and his wife Elizabeth. In a major career as a star soubrette and comedienne in musicals and revue, stretching over thirty years, she had a brief interlude in her earliest twenties with the Carte management. Her first stage part seems to have been in panto at Paisley (1897) her first musical comedy role as jeune première Millicent in Skipped by the Light of the Moon, and her most important as the original Soo-Soo in the mega-hit A Chinese Honeymoon (1899). Among the musicals in which she played leading roles were George Edwardes's Toreador, The Medal and the Maid, in Ada Reeve's role of Lady Holyrood in Florodora, as Julie Bon-Bon in The Gay Parisienne, The White Chrysanthemum, as Honour in Tom Jones, in Princess Caprice as well as a series of revues, latterly with George Clarke.

She married actor Sydney Donald Edward Hall (the Donald Hall of the Gaiety and Daly's companies?), but was divorced by him for infidelity, and subsequently 'remarried' one named Homewood. 

Marion EADIE-REID (b Poplar 23 February 1892; d Newport 1989) was actually, it seems, christened with the hyphen. Although it was a kind of aleatory one. She was the daughter of the rising young Dundee artist and decorator James Eadie (no hyphen) Reid 'of the City of London Guild of Handicrafts, and his wife Marion/Marian/Mary Ann née Maxwell. Reid pursued his career on the Continent and in picturesque paintable places, but based himself in England, latterly in Cheltenham. How much professional performing Marion did, I know not, but in 1921 she married Arthur E Lawrence 'of the Sarawak Civil Service' and produced two daughters by him. In the 1939 census they are living in Salisbury, and mother Mary (d 1948) is there too.

Edith [Lillian Myfvanwy] EVANS (b Bristol 30 January 1879; d Marylebone 26 November 1938) can't really be counted as a Cartesian. She appeared for one week as Phyllis in Iolanthe when the company visited her home town. She had already played the role with the Bristol Operatic Society (Richard Andean as Lord Chancellor) in 1903. But, although she played with the amateur soceties, in those years, Edith was no amateur. She had been on the professional concert platform in the Bristol/Clifton area since 1898 -- Hanham, Portishead, Kingswood, Swiford, Sneyd Partk ... then Bath, Exeter, Weston-super Mare a vast series of concert engagements including performances of The May Queen, Messiah,, Ancient Mariner, Elijah, The Martyr of Antioch, a concert Faust (Martha, with Lucile Hill as Marguerite) and Preciosa (Preciosa) ... In 1907, she appeared at the Crystal Palace in the 'concert version' of Merrie England. But she was headed now for the opera stage and Covent Garden ... Freia, Gutrune .. ' a true dramatic soprano' ..

Her personal life had not been as successful. She married one Arthur Thomas Gullifer in 1906, separated and then divorced him (1914) and re-married, one Henry J Coates, 'musical critic and composer' (1915) ... yes, I'm afraid she went from being Edith Evans to being Edith Coates. Gullifer died in 1916. Edith died in 1918 'of gastritis and pneumonia, following influenza'.

A few dates, places and bits to fill up little lingering lacunae:

Beatrice [Caroline Maud] ELBURN (b Windsor 13 July 1903; d Cuckfield 24 May 1975)  Mrs John Frederick Beaufoy Brown (1935), three children, one of whom may be still around ...

Marjorie [Lillian] Eyre PARKER (b Derby 10 June 1897; d Worthing 3 December 1987) is another who played games with a hyphen. She was born plain Parker. With no Lillian. Mother was Lillian Eyre. Mother got included between birth registration and baptism. Father, Alfred Edward, was a railway clerk. 

Marjorie Eyre

Sybil Marjorie EVERS (b Rugby 19 June 1904; d Hoddesdon 24 June 1963). Mrs (1) Noel Douglas John Brack; (2) Harold Maurice Abrahams.  Yes, the Harold Abrahams.

[Richard Hugh] MANSEL DYER (b Glyncorrwg, Neath 22 November 1910; d Bridgwater 26 November 1964)  The dreaded hyphen strikes again. At his death, his widow née Aileen Vesta HYNES remarried (1965) one James H Collins, as Mrs Mansel-hyphen-Dyer. She died in 1973.  (I suspect her of being actually Pauline V[esta] Hynes from Truro, but it's just a guess, there are plenty of Eileens).

Donald FERGUSSON (b Green Street, Kent 10 February 1885; d Wandsworth 1962) son of Scots surgeon and physician William Balfour Fergusson and his wife Charlotte née Mello. Brought up in Wales, educated in Liverpool. Began as a baritone singer, and appeared with the Carte at the beginning of his theatre career.

He seems to have travelled a bit. I see him sailing to Capetown in 1909. In 1911 he made fun of the census (age: can't remember; children: none I hope; nationality: Scottish), in 1913 he still bills himself as 'musician', in the war he was 'of the Royal Ordnance Corps', and he worked thereafter as an actor in supporting roles in theatre, radio and films. In 1939 ('actor, jounalist') I see him travelling to America with a company. 

He married Daisy Frances Kathleen née Davison, who survived him.

Phyllis [Mary] FERGUSON (b Southsea 15 September 1892; d Bideford 1970).  Daughter of chemist/druggist John Eustace Ferguson. Born in Hampshire, but brought up in Leamington, where her high soprano voice was put in evidence pre-teenage. From her late teens she was heard in Gloucestshire and Warwickshire concerts, and age 20 she went on tour as Sombra in The Arcadians, and played Princess in pantomime. She appeared on a number of occasions with the Carte companies between 1914-1917, but after her marriage to journalist-photographer Arthur Cossington (d 17 October 1940) she seems to have quit public performance. The marriage did not last, and Phyllis returned to sing in concert parties and pantomime for half a dozen years before retiring to Barnstaple. She died in Devon in 1970.

Helene FRANCOIS [FRANCIS, Ruby Helena] (b Bootle 1899; d London 1 December 1961). Daughter of James Henry Francis (motor car secretary) and his wife Elizabeth Annie Louisa née Taylor. Married James Standing Penfold Kewell (1895-1959) of the postal service. Her extensive career with the Carte management is listed in the Archive.

Helene Francois

Arthur FOWLES (dit Arthur William) (b Astley Worcs 1858 bapt 6 June; d London 14 September 1924). Son of coachman William Fowles and his wife Esther née Gwillam. Bass singer and professional vocalist, then teacher. Twice married, at least 6 children. Died of an aneurism in a London tramcar aged 65.

[Edwin] Alexander FRANKS (b Hammersmith 19 March 1904; d 38 Talfourd Rd, Peckham 7 January 1993) son of Edward James Franks (grocer's manager) and his ?wife Florence. Another of the many who came to the D'Oyly Carte companies at the beginning of a career, having only been heard 'the new bass' in the odd local concert. He would go on to some thirty further years of 'Old Man River's, panto Demons and a plethora of musical theatre engagements in London and in the provinces. In 1952, I see him in The Desert Song at Scarborough. He lived till nearly ninety years of age, but my last sighting of him in performance is in the late 50s.

Frank FLAVELL[E] (aka Morton FLAVELLE) (b Fulham 28 January 1895; d Southend 1967) had a discreet career as a tenor, sometime on radio, but more often in variety and as a chorister. The 'Morton' seems to have been a family name. 

The rest of the 'F's till tomorrow .. 

The morrow. Enough F. Try a G.

Sheila GALE [BOLTON, Janet Robertson] (b Galashiels 3 September 1893; d Sydney 26 September 1965). Active in Scotland from 1912 (Edinburgh panto), spotted singing Messiah in Aberdeen 1918, joined Carte briefly in 1919 and in 1920 went oon tour in The Maid of the Montains, then for a goodly tour as Olga in The Dollar Princess. In 1922 she went to Australia where she sang in A Little Dutch Girl, The Maid of the Mountains, The Boy, Katinka, The Merry Widow, The Peerp Show, The Arcadians. She married woolbuyer John Stanley Fitzgerald (d 1934), settled with her sister in Suva and aunt in Lautoka in Fiji, from where she visited Sydney regularly.

Daphne GLENNE [CORNELIUS, Dorothy] (b Westcombe Park, Blackheath 22 December 1886; d  Bexhill 23 August 1972). Daughter of Joshua Cornelius of the Board of Agriculture and his wife Ada. Another who did her earliest work with the Carte chorus. Subsequently played in roles in The Merry Widow (1908), The Dollar Princess (US and UK), The Quaker Girl (UK and US), The Dancing Mistress, Tonight's the Night and Carminetta on the British road, before moving into cinema (On Leave, Her Lonely Soldier, The Life of a London Actress etc).

Leonard James GOWINGS (b Mile End 15 July 1885; d Oxford 9 September 1969) was another who cannot really count as a Cartesian. He was a clerk at the London Corporation and took a parallel interest in music.

Edmée de DREUX [KUNZ, Edmée Agnes Julie de Dreux] (b Edinburgh 13 November 1873; d Reading, Pa 1960) actually had a right to her rather un-British name. Her father was Jules Antoine Louis Kunz, a teacher of French and German at the Edinburgh Institute, her mother was Wilhelmina née de Dreux. The Kunzes had a number of children who went into music, Edmée was sent to Paris for a course of study with Marchesi. I see her taking part in a pupils' concert along with a host of anglophone ladies of whom only one among the gaggle (Aileen Burke) I have ever heard. Oh her return she appeared in concert in Manchester singing ('Mon coeur s'ouvre'), at the French Benefit at the Alhambra, giving the 'Alléluia' of Le Cid at Queen's Hall ... followed by, next up, 'Jock o'Hazeldean' and a new song by Edward German. She sang the contralto part in the quartets in Elijah with the Royal Choral Society, and then joined the Carte.

In 1900, she joined the Turner Opera Company, singing the Gipsy Queen, Stella in Satanella, Lola in Cavalleris rusticana, Mercedes in Carmen, the Countess in La Fille su régiemnt, Mrs Cregan in Lily of Killarney, Lazarillo et al, though the press did find that her well-culyivates, lightish mezzo voice was rather ineffectual in Azucena.

She moved back to comic opera in the title-role of My Lady Molly, and as Lange in La Fille de Madame Angot, but after 1907 seems to have cried enough. I see her back in Edinburgh in the early 1930s, visiting America in 1931, in 1940 she is liviing on Broadway, single but with a gentleman butler, and in 1941 a lady in Bath left her a legacy, in 1950 she's a receptinist in an antique shop, and in 1952 she is claiming something from Social Security .. so I guess she ended her days in New York. But I hav'n't yet discovered where and for how long. Ten minutes later .. the splendid findagrave!  Reading, Pennsylvania ... 1960!  

Ernest [Reginald] LEEMAN (b Lowell, Mass 14 October 1875; d unknown). By Clarence M Leeman (painter) ex Edith. Studied at first with Charles Adams, made his first visible appearance as a tenor in Los Angeles (Venice Beach). 1906 to England where he 'studied with Charles Santley', married Scot Emily Helen MacGregor, and joined the Carte company. In 1911 he played the part of the singing 'Man' who introduced the Her Majesty's Theatre production of Kismet, and repeated the performance in America. Returning to Britain, he played over the next decade and more in musicals and comedy. My last sighting of him is in 1925, in Dear Little Billie. I should not be surprised if he also took part in some filmplays.

His son, Francis Hubert Hector LEEMAN (b Chelsea, 24 February 1909; d Windsor 1951) also became a performer under his mother's name of MacGregor.

I had better roll up this Cartesian roll call. But I'll just have to start another sooo ... let's tidy up a few more bits and pieces of 'identity' from Letter 'G'.

Evelyn [Mabel] GRIFFITHS (b Putney 19 August 1890; d Budleigh Salterton 20 March 1965). Daughter of musician William Richard Griffiths and his wife Mary Emily.  We get two for the price of one, here, because Evelyn married another Cartesian, Henry Herbert SMITH ('Henry Herbert') (b Hendon 13 June 1880;  d Conal Court, Wandsworth 16 September 1960).

Walter GLYNNE [WALTERS, Thomas Gwyn} (b Llanelly 4 January 1890; d Glamorgan 29 July 1970) was a son of David Walters 'gentleman farmer' and a member of a musical family. He married (27 July 1921) Sarah Helena Evans, and bred.

Bessie GRAVES 'theatrical profession' (1901 census) clearly wasn't for long. She may have been the Bessie Elizabeth Jane Graves born in Wandsworth 20 April 1876. If she were, she is a landlady in Birmingham by 1939.

I've spent most of my breakfast time investigating Lillian GREER. And I still don't know who she was. There are hints that she was Scottish, Irish, German ... Almost all of her engagements between 1882 and 1887, when she vanishes, are alongside William Howells SEYMOUR the Cartesian and comic opera comedian (b at sea 1837; d Dayton Ohio 6 January 1899), so I wondered ... but Seymour had been married to Ida Bell Woosbury since 1874 ...

Lillian arrives on the scene in 1882, playing at Uhrig's Cave with Charles Ford's Company, in which Seymour, Alice May, Louise Eissing, Phil Branson, Marie Bockel et al were also engaged. She joined McKee Rankin to play a couple of bits in Stormbeaten, but returned to the singing stage playing The Modern Dude and covering Janet Edmonson in Solomon's Virginia, and in Iolanthe. Seymour was chief comedian. Their next shop was a 'New York Ideal Opera Company' playing La Fille de Madame Angot and Giroflé-Girofla with Augusta Roche and Edward Connell, then a 'New York Comic Opera Co'. Lillian also appeared as Pitti Sing in a Coney Island Mikado. In 1887 the two joined something called the Starr Opera Company, playing in Brooklyn and, recast, in Philadelphia. Lillian played Ella in Patience while Dora Wiley took the title-role. George Appleby, Connell, Blanche Chapman, Agnes Hallock ... Fritellini in La Mascotte, Paquita in Girofle-Girofla, Hebe in HMS Pinafore, The Smith Family ...

Dora Wiley

And that's it. Seymour (who is not the Savoy Seymour) carries on, but no Lillian. I refuse to believe that she is the Miss Lillian Greer Macdonald who, at this point, married one Duncan Cameron of Brooklyn.

G(w)ladys [Jennie] GOWRIE (b Shepherd's Bush 3 December 1896; d Fulham 1962). Daughter of Frederick Henry Gowrie, wine merchant's clerk, and his Welsh wife, Margaret. When her singing career was done, she worked as a receptionist.

Marion GREY (b Regent's Park ?1875; d Newark, NJ 25 May 1949). She may have been born in Regent's Park, as she stated. She may even have been born in 1875, although few 13 year-old girls get to play Helena, Bianca et al in a major dramatic troupe. But if these 'facts' are true ... where is 'Marion Grey' in the birth registers of the nation? In the whole year of 1875, of 187, and 1873, not a single Mary, Mary Ann, or Marion Grey was registered in all of London. The 1881 census is empty, too. But by 1888 'Marion Grey' is on her theatrical way.

Of course, there were possibly multiple 'Marion Grey's. I'm sure our one wasn't with Charles Sleigh's company in 1878! But she could just be the one with Buckstone in 1888 and Benson in 1889 and playing Hippolyta in the West End! But she isn't. In 1890 this lady took the title-role in J K Jerome's Barbara, in 1891 she was Marguerite in A Village Priest, then Mrs Kildare in Mrs Dexter. Bruce and Darnley's company. Mrs Midhurst in The Solicitor and Rosa Leigh in A Love Game. These are not our teenage Marion! Can't be.  The Solicitor is still touring when the Archive tells us our Marion had joined the Carte.

Finally, in December 1893 I find our Marion as Lady Ella in Huddersfield. And Marion I jusr keeps going! The Empress Popaea in The Sign of the Cross, no less! So who is the Marion with Charles Coborn's High-Class Variety co in 1897? And visiting America in 1898? Marion I moves on to Princess Flavia in The Prisoner of Zenda ... Marion II is Phyllis Tuppitt in a Dorothy tour with Courtice Pounds ... Marion I is Mrs Parbury in The Tyranny of Tears and Katherine de Vaucelles in If I Were King and then, just to complexify things a bit more, Marion II skips into the non-musical theatre as Princess Venetia Corona in Under Two Flags, and as Lady Sylvian in A Country Mouse. We know it is she, because also in the cast is the man she has married (1901): Walter Fenner S Ringham (1877-1963). As Marion Grey. 

However, straight after she is back singing in a bit part in Véronique. Then, with her man, in French plays with Forbes Robertson, and in The Speckled Band (1911) ... 

Mr and Mrs Ringham emigrated to America (not Australia) thereafter, where they took part in theatre and film for many years. What became of Marion I, I fear I know not. Hang on, which one is with Julius Knight in Australia in 1907? Oh, dear, she 'wasn't liked'.

There are many photos of Marion II around, but I can't find one just now. So here's Marion I as a not-13- year-old Hippolyta.

Here's an obit for Marion II which seems to have got its Marions muddled.  Or have I?

Cecil GRAYSTONE (b Holywell, Flintshire 8 June 1891; d Holborn 1960) 'Actor', son of actor George Benjamin Graystone and his wife Louisa née Goose. Married Euphemia Mary Gladys née Prosser 1915.  So it must have been father who chorussed for the Carte!  G B Graystone (b Surbiton 13 March 1868; d St Kilda, Melbourne 3 August 1922).

Sydney Edward LETTS (b Tottenham 6 May 1868; d Essex 22 September 1940). Son of the Rev John Davis LETTS and his wife, Almeria Rose nee Towne. Married singer Janet Amelia Watts.

Arnold HALSTEAD (b Sowerby Bridge 19 July 1889; d Blackpool 1966). Son of James Halstead (engineer) and his wife, Alice. Married Mabel Jones (actress/vocalist) (b 23 May 1896; d Blackpool 1990). Made early appearances around the Halifax and Todmorden areas, tenor at Parl Congregational Church and St Asaphs Cathedral, soloist with Halifax Madrigal Society and Liverpool Choral Society, before joining the Carte in 1914. Corporal in the Civil Defence Corps during the latter part of the war.  He had his most prominent engagement opposite Desiree Ellinger in the touring Gipsy Princess in 1924 before running out his singing life back in Halifax and Blackpool while working as an insurance agent.

John HILDRETH (b Tow Law, Weardale, Durham 1879) Father John Hildreth (cartman), mother Ann nee Dunn. In the 1891 census, he is a grocer's warehouseman, in 1911 a commercial traveller in gas fittings. For an undefined period in between, he worked in the theatre. Twice married. Apparently alive at the death of his second wife 27 December 1929.

Millicent HOLBROOK (b Prestwich 4 December 1876; d Hale, Cheshire 26 March 1956) daughter of Edward John Holbrook ('fruit dealer') and his wife Millicent nee Payne, both products of the public house system. Unmarried.

George HUMPHREY ('unusually tall and slim') escapes me. He may have been born such, or as Geo Humph Something else ..  I first spot him, I think, playing something called Pauline up to date, a burlesque of The Lady of Lyons, at Surbiton in 1892. Then, for five years, a series of supporting parts in musicals (Mam'zelle Nitouche, Jaunty Jane Shore, The Lady Slavey, Baron Golosh, The Taboo, The Telephone Girl, Newmarket, The Yashmak, The Grand Duchess at the Savoy, The Royal Star, La Poupée) as well as roles with Olga Nethersole (A Fool's Paradise, Denise, Carmen, The Wife of Scarli, La Dame aux Caméllias, Frou-Frou) or Lewis Waller (The Sorrows of Satan). And then, after 1899 ... he seems to vanish. Why and where?  Overseas? Unless he's a clerk from Scotland, he doesn't seem to be around. Is that him touring in small parts in opera around 1908? It certainly seems to be he in Potash and Perlemutter in 1914. And is he the 'George Humphery' in Mr Manhattan in 1916 .. well, he was Humphery on and off from Jaunty Jane times. Yes, I know, alternate spellings screams 'pseudonym' ...  

Arthur KEMPTON (b Shepton Mallet 10 February 1878; d Surrey 1963). Son of Frederick H Kempton and his wife Emily, née Welch. Kempton lived a double life. By profession, he was a baker and confectioner. By preference, he was a baritone. Born in Shepton Mallet, brought up at least partly in Great Thetford, he settled in Felixstowe where he operated his bakery in Manning Road, for many years, whilst advertising and performing ('the Anglian baritone') mostly in concert ('The Sailor's Grave'), but occasionally on the amateur stage (Iolanthe, The Gondoliers). In 1912-14 he took a turn in the professional theatre, playing Private Willis in Iolanthe with the D'Oyly Carte, but returned to buns and a wartime stint in the Navy. He settled in Barnes, where he once again sang with the local Operatic Society (Mountararat, Sergeant Meryll) and Beckenham, but it seems that the year he spent with the Carte was his only mainstream theatre engagement. In the 1939 census, he listed himself as 'food expert'.

Kempton married Ethel Wawman, and fathered three childen: [Ethel] Mary (Mrs Hopkins, 14 October 1904) who sang on occasion alongside him Alice May (Mrs Broad, 3 October 1906) and Arthur Harry (b 19 April 1910).

Annie Minnie Elizabeth ('Nancy') KALE (b Willesden 4 February 1903; d Hammersmith 1996)

Daughter of John Henry Kale, variety performer and his wife Annie Sophia nee McBlaine. Married one John Walker (9 March 1936).

Nora Marian KEAST (b Redruth 8 January 1905; d ? Pembury, Kent 22 January 1958) daughter of Samuel Vercoe Keast and his wife Mabel née Pidwell. Married (1) Harry Fletcher Barnes 12 February 1927 ... who seems to have been already married. (2) Arthur W Rhodes ...

Ethel MORRISON [MAGINNITY, Ethel Mary ka Ettie] (b Wellington, NZ 20 January 1881; d Darling Point, Sydney Australia 11 May 1951) came from a well-known Wellington family. Her father, John Maginnity, was the landlord succesively of several major pubs including the Royal, Thorndon Quay, latterly an active City Councillor, and at the same time a lively member of such groups as the 'Amateur Christy Minstrels', purveying baritone ballads and comic songs and flute solos. Her mother was Eliza née Hennessy. She began public singing in her teens and was cast as the Fairy Queen in Iolanthe in both Wellington and Auckland in 1901. In 1903 she was hired for Williamson's touring company, but instead left for England and studied briefly at the RAM before announcing her marriage and retirement. She didn't fulfil either announcement, but apparently took a job at the Pavilion Music Hall, before joining the Carte companies. She married a 'financial agent', John Frances Abel Staines, in 1906, lost her supportive mother to 'accidental poisoning', bore a daughter (6 February 1913) ... her professional career is detailed in the G&S Archive. A decade after her first aborted engagement for J C Williamson, she joined his company taking G&S to South Africa and to Australia, where she remained some eight years. In 1921 her husband died and soon after she removed to America. There, she appeared as Mrs Ballard in Mayflowers (1925), Lady Mary Steeple in Madcap (1927-8), Lady Devon in Bitter-Sweet (1934) et al, but finally she returned to Australia where she died at Darling Point in 1951.

Nellie MORTIMER [WETHERALL, Ellen] (b United Kingdom c 1840; d Lake Grove, NY, 21 May 1904) was probably born in England. But maybe Scotland. Anyway she was it seems a 17 year old bride. He was an actor, so I imagine she had already put a toe in theatrical tides. The husband called himself 'G F De Vere', so it wasn't too hard to find him. George Frederick SMITH was my first punt, and I was right. The couple were married in Sunderland 13 April 1857.

They worked in the British provinces until 1863, young Nellie specialising in burlesque Cupids and Mercurys and the ilk, when they emigrated to America. There they fulfilled long and useful careers in all kinds of theatre -- Nellie was seven years with Augustin Daly -- with a return to Britain with E F Sothern -- and produced half a dozen children ... No scandals, no faits divers, just a steady working career apiece.

Nellie died agd 64, but George, some six or seven years her elder, lived on long enough to become 'venerable'. He died at Lake Ronkonkoma 24 December 1910, of Bright's disease. The couple are buried there, with their four eldest children ...  still insisting that they were not Smith, but Devere.

 

Another one who played about with names was the baritone who called himself, through a long and liked career on stage (Pawnee Bill in Annie Get Your Gun, Donegal in Florodora), halls, many a Pier, and radio, from about 1931, Brogden MILLARD. After a morning's scavenging, it appears to me that his real name was Jack Arthur ?LAWSON. His father was an actor-comedian, sometime of the Gaiety touring burlesque companies, by name George MILLER. Or MILLARD. Whose real name, so we are told, was George LAWSON. His mother was a soubrette who actually worked under her birth name of Ada Winifred BROGDEN (b Westoe 7 August 1887; d 13 February 1976). Her father was a choirmaster in the Durham area. The couple worked as 'comedy entertainers', and Ada later toured in Irene.  So, each half of 'Brogden's' name has some relation to fact. 

Now, George and Ada had a bundle of children, or so it seems. In the 1911 census they say have produced three, of whom two -- George and Jack --are with them in their Melton Mowbray digs: George (b Glasgow) and Jack Arthur (b Manchester). The family historians give George an extra wife (Kathleen McDonald) and a whole list of extra brothers and sisters, most of whom seem to have died young. One more clue: when Ada died, in 1976, she was credited with two living sons: Brogden Millard and Stanley Millard. So we know 'Brogden' isn't one of those who died before 1976. But who the heck is Stanley? Is he George? Or vice versa. I shall work on this one! Right now, I'm only clear about mother Ada ...

Myfanwy [Gwenllian] NEWELL (b 48 Trinity Square, Brixton bapt 20 October 1908; d West Croydon 19 January 1972). Daughter of Evan Cornelius Newell, clerk in the timber business, and his wife Emily Georgina née Eve. Married William Henry Boland, and seemingly left the stage.

Samuel MOONEY (b Clonmel 4 February 1906; d Dublin 7 December 1977). By Samuel Mooney ex Bridget Margaret Leonard. Etcetera.

[Charles] William MORGAN (b Abercarn 18 August 1889), son of an elder Charles William and his wife Florence Jessie. Rest of details and biog in the G&S Archive.

George [Arnold Charl(e)ton] MUDIE (b Norwich 14 May 1883; d Peterborough 11 April 1944) we have encountered in the scabrous take of his first wife, Cartesian Poppy Wilkinson. He was the son of [John] George Mudie and 'Adelaide Newton', both splendid musical theatre performers. He seems to have played 'old men' from an early age. After having got rid of the faithless Poppy (one child Max George Mudie 10 August 1903) he married actress Cissie Sephton [Celia Alice Sephton Taylor]. 

Matt[hew] NEWTON (b Wickham, Durham 18 June 1886; d Kensington 1947). Son of Thomas Newton and his wife Jane Metcalfe Buckton, he began singing in public around 1911 when I see him as tenor soloist with the Northumbrian Choir. He advertised as a 'tenore robusto' and gave Gateshead and South Shields and the Empire, West Hartlepool his stout 'Che gelida manina' before his stint with the Carte. That stint may not have been lengthy, but it was the prelude to some thirty years of singing and acting in provincial 'revue', concert party, variety (where he delivered the Miserere into the 1930s) and on radio. His wife, Margaret Jane née Kydd died in 1932, after which he played in a number of London musical pieces before returning to the variety stage and remarried (1935) Doris Irene Coles (b 12 July 1900; d Putney 9 December 1951). I don't see him much after 1941 ... 

O gosh. Here's a whole ship load of Cartesians going to America in 1934 ... there's Sam Mooney, and a few better-known folk ...

There's Joseph Thomas OAKLEY (who called himself 'Osborne Oakley') from Wales (b Argoed, North Blackwood 1899; d London 18 March 1954) son of coalminer Joseph and his wife Sarah.

And there's Josephine [Ann] CURTIS (b Subiaco, Western Australia 18 January 1909; d Manchester 26 January 1985). Educated at St Bridget's Convent, Perth from where she won a scholarship to the RCM (1930). Apparently spotted there by Henry Lytton and taken into the Cartesian ranks. She subsequently sang in the 1938 Beecham season at Covent Garden. In 1943 she married David Joseph Jones.

Oh, here's another shiplist. This is way out of my era! David, George, Jeff you sort these folk out. I need to get back to the 19th century!