bassano

Photograph of Pearl Aufrere Actress by Alexander Bassano (1829-1913) Photographer or possibly by studio of same name given his age at time of this photograph? See Nataional Portrait Gallery for some additional images including some self portraits of photographer. May have been a chorus girl in London who married well after an abortive engagement to Viscount Dangan. Considered a beauty of her time, many photographs on the web including some from post/cigarette cards.

She did indeed marry well! To the heir of the Earl of Crowley. query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9801EFDF143FE633A...

I like how beauty back then did not come in a size zero.

Ha, ha, yeah, she is a bit on the heavy side

On the "heavy" side? No way -- she's got a *perfect* figure.

"Young English primadonna" query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F00D16F63E5D16738...

Stella Carol, age 17, a well-known soprano, and her husband, Albert Leblond, were passengers aboard the White Star Company Arabic when it was torpedoed without warning on August 20, 1915. The liner sank to the bottom of the Atlantic eleven minutes after it was hit. Approximately 175 passengers and 215 crew members survived the German attack.

Stella endeavored to keep up the spirits of her companions in one of the crowded lifeboats by singing "It's a long way to Tipperary" to them, along with other patriotic songs – and she also lent a hand with an oar.

Four years earlier, Stella Carol, whose real name was Lily Furnesse, and her sister were singing Christmas carols on the streets of Hampstead on Christmas Eve, 1910, hoping to get enough money to buy their mother a surprise Christmas present. By a wonderful chance she stopped to sing "Softly the night is sleeping" in the doorway of the well-known teacher of singing, Mme. Amy Sherwin.

Madame Sherwin said, "I was much struck by the compass and the purity of the voice of one of the children. I called them in, chatted with them and made them comfortable. In the intervals of munching an apple, Stella, the elder of the two, told me she was thirteen years of age, one of twelve children, residing with their parents at Holloway."

The following day Mme. Sherwin met with Stella's mother, and moved Stella into her home where she was provided with every resource for her education and professional training.

A photo of Mme. Sherwin in the Library of Congress Collection on Flickr can be seen here:



— Compiled and excerpted: New-York Tribune; The Straits Times; The Advertiser; The Dominion; The New York Times
 
 

A different pose of Stella from this portrait sitting is in the Photographs Collection of The National Portrait Gallery, London. This portrait of Stella Carol was apparently made on February 19, 1915, in the studios formerly of Alexander Bassano on Old Bond Street, London. Bassano retired in around 1903, when the premises were refurbished and relaunched as Bassano Ltd, Royal Photographers. The National Portrait Gallery owns more than 50,000 of the firm's original glass negatives.  

wonderful !

Beautiful!