Ellaline Terriss (postcards c1907/1908)

These postcards are from my collection and feature the actress Allaline Terriss, her husband the actor Seymour Hicks and their daughter Betty Hicks. 

Ellaline Terriss (13 April 1871 – 16 June 1971), born Mary Ellaline Lewin, was a popular English actress and singer, best known for her performances in Edwardian musical comedies. She met and married the actor-producer Seymour Hicks in 1893, and the two collaborated on many projects for the stage and screen.

The couple adopted a daughter, Mabel, in 1889, and Terriss gave birth to another child, Betty, in 1904.  The stamp has been torn off from the below signed postcard making it hard to date.  The other three were from 1907 and 1908 but I would guess this was a little later as if it truly is Betty's signature she was writing remarkably well for a four year old otherwise. 

The daughter of well-known leading man William Terriss, Ellaline Terriss made her London stage debut at the age of 16 in Cupid's Messenger at London's Haymarket Theatre. Impressed with her performance, producer Charles Wyndham gave her a three-year contract, under which she first played Madge in Why Women Weep. In 1892, Terriss starred in Faithful James (by B. C. Stephenson) and the following year, she starred in the title role of Cinderella, produced by Henry Irving. She was featured in W. S. Gilbert's His Excellency in 1894, followed the next year by a starring role in the George Edwardes production of the musical The Shop Girl, playing alongside her husband. The next year she starred in another musical hit, The Circus Girl.

In 1897, her father was murdered. As a result, she received much public sympathy, returning to the stage to star in A Runaway Girl in 1898, one of her most successful shows. In the 1900s, she starred in a series of long-running hits, including Bluebell in Fairyland (1901), Quality Street (1902), The Catch of the Season (1905) and The Beauty of Bath (1906). After 1910, Terriss concentrated on comedy roles and music hall tours. Her one return to musical comedy, Cash on Delivery (1917), confirmed the wisdom of this new career course.

Her later career also included film roles. She began in the silent films Scrooge and David Garrick (both from 1913) and made a successful transfer to talkies in Blighty (1927). Her last film was The Four Just Men in 1939. She died in Hampstead, England, at the age of 100.