HOLDEN, Ethel Lofft
Ethel Lofft Holden was born at Ipswich in 1860 and baptised at St Mary le Tower Church, Ipswich on 15 October 1860, fourth daughter of Revd Hubert Ashton Holden (12 May 1822-1 December 1896), headmaster of Queen Elizabeth school at Ipswich 1858-1883, and his wife Letitia Lofft (5 July 1829-25 October 1920), daughter of Robert Emlyn Lofft (1783-1847) of Troston Hall, Suffolk, who married at Pakenham, Suffolk on 18 July 1854. Ethel was a figure and landscape painter who, in 1881, exhibited at Ipswich Fine Art Club from School House, Henley Road, Ipswich ‘Study at Low Tide’ and in 1882 she exhibited at the Bury St Edmunds Fine Art Society three pictures 'Reeds', 'Water Lilies' and 'Bullrushes' and the following year, a picture of her uncle and another 'Bavarian Girl' which was highly commended, she exhibited again in 1887 'Portrait of Mr Lofft'. Ethel also exhibited at the Society of Women Artists in 1885, from 20 Redcliffe Square, London, to where her father had retired in 1883, 'Dame of the Primrose League'. In 1891, a 30-year-old, living at 20 Redcliffe Square, Kensington with her parents, 68-year-old Hubert and 61-year-old Letitia, and her four sibling sisters Clara Lofft 32, Mildred Alexandra Lofft 27, Nora Lofft 23 and Hilda Beatrice Lofft 21, all born at Ipswich. Ethel married at St Mary Abbots, Kensington, London on 21 January 1893, Charles Stewart Douglas Wade (22 November 1864-29 April 1939) and in 1901, Ethel was living at The Grove, Common Hill, Saffron Walden, Essex with her 36-year-old husband, a solicitor, and their two sons, Emlyn Capel Stewart (1895-1978) and Douglas Ashton Lofft (1898-1996). In 1911, she had taken three rooms at 20 Grand Parade, St Leonards-on-Sea, Sussex whilst her husband was a visitor at the Holden family home at 2 St John’s Park, Blackheath. Ethel Lofft Wade was of Spa Buildings, Cheltenham, Gloucestershire when she died at Park Nursing Home, Cheltenham, Gloucestershire on 4 November 1938, aged 78.