Social Victorians/People/Ellen Terry

Also Known As

• Family name: Terry

Demographics

• Nationality: English

Family

• Benjamin Terry (1817–1896)
• Sarah Ballard Terry (1819–1892)
  1. 11 children, not certain of birth order
  2. Kate Terry (died in infancy)
  3. Ellen Terry (died in infancy)
  4. Benjamin Terry (1839–)
  5. Kate Terry (21 April 1844 – 6 January 1924)
  6. Ellen (Alice Ellen) Terry (27 February 1847 – 21 July 1928)
  7. George Terry (1852 – 22 March 1928)
  8. Marion Bessie Terry (13 October 1853 – 21 August 1930)
  9. Florence Maud Terry (16 August 1856 – 15 March 1896)
  10. Charles Terry (1858–1933)
  11. Tom Terry ()
  12. Fred Terry (9 November 1863 – 17 April 1933)

• • Ellen (Alice Ellen) Terry (27 February 1847 – 21 July 1928)
  • George Frederic Watts (23 February 1817 – 1 July 1904)
  • Edward William Godwin (26 May 1833 – 6 October 1886), unmarried relationship
    1. Edith Craig (1869–1947)
    2. Edward Gordon Craig (1872–1966)

Acquaintances, Friends and Enemies

Acquaintances

• Robert Browning
• Alfred, Lord Tennyson
• William Ewart Gladstone
• Benjamin Disraeli, Lord Beaconsfield
• Julia Margaret Cameron
• Oscar Wilde

Friends

• Henry Irving
• Charles Wyndham
• George Bernard Shaw
• Stephen Coleridge

Timeline

1864 February 20, when Ellen Terry was nearly 17, she and George Frederic Watts married, but ten months later they were separated.

1866, Ellen Terry resumed acting.

1868, Ellen Terry and Edward William Godwin began a relationship.

1874, Ellen Terry resumed acting after her relationship with Edward William Godwin.

1877, Ellen Terry and George Frederic Watts divorced.

1878, Ellen Terry joined Henry Irving's acting company at the Lyceum Theatre as leading lady.

1903, Ellen Terry began to manage the Imperial Theatre.

1905, Henry Irving died, and Ellen Terry left the stage for a while.

1906 June 12, Ellen Terry's "golden jubilee was commemorated by a star-studded gala performance at the Drury Lane Theatre, for Terry's benefit, at which Enrico Caruso sang, W. S. Gilbert directed a performance of Trial by Jury, Eleonora Duse, Mrs. Patrick Campbell, Lillie Langtry, Herbert Beerbohm Tree, Nellie Melba, and more than 20 members of Terry's family performed an act of Much Ado about Nothing with her, among other performances. The benefit raised £6,000 for Terry." ("Ellen Terry") One drawing in the program is by John Singer Sargent.

1907 March 22, Ellen Terry and American actor James Carew married. They separated two years later, but they never divorced.

1916, Ellen Terry's first film was released, Her Greatest Performance.

Questions and Notes

1. Ellen Terry and Edward Godwin's children were given the last name Craig so they had a surname.

Bibliography

1. "Ellen Terry." Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ellen_Terry (accessed August 2020).
2. "Terry Family." Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terry_family (accessed August 2020).