EDWARDS, Emma Rebecca
Emma Rebecca Edwards was born at Ipswich on 14 August 1851 and baptised at St Margaret's church, Ipswich on 30 November 1853, daughter of George Cordy Edwards (1819-1900), surgeon of Woodbridge and Ipswich, and his first wife Elizabeth Lorina née Branford (1820-28 September 1873), eldest daughter of Benjamin Branford, who married at Flordon, Norfolk on 29 August 1843. In 1871, 19-year-old Emma was living at 13 Carr Street, Ipswich with her parents, 51-year-old George and 50-year-old Elizabeth with four siblings, son Cordy 17, Rose 16, Katherine Susan 14 and Benjamin 13. Emma studied at the Ipswich School of Science and Art passing her freehand drawing examinations in 1876. In 1881, the family were still living at 13 Carr Street, from where Emma exhibited at the Ipswich Fine Art Club in 1881, a watercolour ‘A Corner of Chinas'. Her father George married secondly at Ipswich in 1882, Dora Zillah née Bacon (1853-1903) and by 1891, Emma was ‘living on own means’, at Summerhill, Culver Road, Shanklin, Isle of Wight with a younger sister Anna, who was baptised at the same time as Emma, keeping a cook and a housemaid and they were still there in 1911. In 1939, Emma Rebecca Edwards was living on own means, at 33 Paragon, Bath, Somerset where she died on 20 February 1940, aged 88, she was unmarried.