Lost in the past

The Sculpture Park at Churt #WordlessWednesday

A two mile woodland trail scattered with original modern sculpture. If you visit now you will see a completely different set of sculptures

To visit the Sculpture Park

The African explorer, the séance and the post-card Beauty – Isabel Jay’s unfortunate marriage #EdwardianActress #MondayBlogs

When I was a young child of about 7 or 8, my parents took me to performances of the light operas by Gilbert and Sullivan which I absolutely loved, so when I discovered that one of the popular beauties of Edwardian post cards, Isabel Jay, had become part of the D’Oyly Carte company after singing for Arthur Sullivan, I wanted to know more about her life.

In 1901 a journalist interviewed Isabel and her mother at their residence in Westminster Palace Gardens. She appeared to be sweet and naïve, proud of her achievements while at the royal Academy of Music when she had been awarded bronze and silver medals for elocution and a gold medal for operatic singing. She was still practising the piano each day but really enjoying the parts she had been given in The Mikado, Iolanthe and the Pirates of Penzance.

A reviewer for The Era wrote of her: "Miss Isabel Jay's bright, alert acting and fascinating personality would have condoned many deficiencies. But in addition to winning all hearts by her freshness and earnestness, Miss Jay gave us a delightfully easy and accomplished rendering of her share of the score, and the way in which she used a very valuable voice told of sound training and keen intelligence."

Isabel Jay left the company in 1902 to marry the explorer Henry Sheppard Hart Cavendish

Henry Sheppard Hart Cavendish, born in Kensington in 1876, was famous for his explorations and hunting achievements. After leaving Eton, he travelled widely in Africa, firstly shooting big game up the Zambesi. Later he visited the west side of Lake Rudolph in East Central Africa making notes for the Geographical Society of London. On this journey he was accompanied by 80 armed Somalians and 150 camels. When he reached Lake Stephanie a wounded elephant charged him and sat on him for 30 minutes. Its head was presented to the British museum. Cavendish also returned to London with 38 kinds of game. When in England he loved music, classical and popular and this is how he came to meet Isabel Jay.

Cavendish also attracted the attention of journalists. Photographs of his London home in 1900 showed the collection of antelope, elephant, giraffe, buffalo and lion heads which he had shot personally. Prior to his marriage Cavendish became entangled in a friendship with a man called Major Strutt after believing his dead mother told him at seances to make the Major his financial advisor. Early in the marriage Cavendish was bankrupt and their relationship was in trouble. The details of their subsequent divorce are painful to read because of his ill-treatment of Isabel but amazingly he remarried four more times.

Isabel returned to the stage in 1903 and after Cavendish reneged on this promise to give up alcohol the couple were divorced in 1906.

Isabel Jay

Frank Curzon

In the meantime, Isabel appeared in productions of the actor manager Frank Curzon and the couple eventually married in 1910. Isabel retired from the stage at the age of 31 before the birth of her second daughter. She died in 1927, aged 47, in Monte Carlo. Her husband Frank died later that year, after watching the horse he had trained win the Derby.

The RSM Isabel Jay Medal for Singing
You can read more about Cavendish and Major Strutt at Stage Beauty

My Guest Post on Beetley Pete's blogsite #ChildMigrants

I was thrilled this week when Bentley Pete published my guest post about child migration

https://beetleypete.com/2020/01/09/guest-post-liz-lloyd/

It is an introduction to other posts on that subject on this site.

One of the Allen line ships on which children travelled to Canada

To read more about Walter Shires who was sent away in 1885 go to A New Life in Canada

To find out about another family of girls who accompanied the Chuter sisters in 1887 go to
British Home Children

To see more photographs connected to Ada Sink and her sisters go to
She Would like to know her Birthday

The story of three brothers migrated in 1903 Three Boys Migrated to Canada

The life of a Barnardo Boy

A family split apart by the Poor Law in 1911

Photos of my travels

Over the last year I haven't had as much time to write about social history so I have enjoyed posting photographs from my travels instead. Here is a reminder of the places I have featured.

I returned to France with pictures of the historic port of La Rochelle on the Atlantic coast.