Terry family

The Terry family was a British theatrical dynasty of the late 19th century and beyond. The family includes not only those members with the surname Terry, but also Neilsons, Craigs and Gielguds, to whom the Terrys were linked by marriage or blood ties.

The dynasty was founded by the actor Benjamin Terry and his wife, Sarah. The first member of the family to achieve national prominence was their eldest surviving daughter, Kate. Her younger sister Ellen achieved international fame, in partnership with Henry Irving. Ellen Terry was seen as the greatest star of the family for many decades, but her great-nephew John Gielgud became at least as celebrated from the 1930s to the end of the 20th century. Among those of the family who did not become actors, Gordon Craig, Ellen's son, was an internationally-known theatre designer and director.

Members of the family who were professionally associated with the theatre, as performers, designers or managers, are given individual paragraphs below. Other members of the family are mentioned in the text.

The graphic below is simplified to show the best-known family members. For example, it shows only three of Gordon Craig's eight children. The names of actors and others connected with the theatre are shown in capital letters.

Benjamin Terry (1817–1896) was a moderately successful actor in the mid-19th century. His father, also called Benjamin, an innkeeper, married Catherine Crawford in 1838. The younger Benjamin's wife, Sarah, née Ballard (1819–1892), was the daughter of Peter Ballard, a builder and Master Sawyer who worked in Portsmouth. She had no theatrical connections before meeting Terry and marrying him without her parents' knowledge. She became an actress, adopting the stage name "Miss Yerrett", but it was Terry who was the stronger theatrical influence on their children. He had been a member of William Charles Macready's company, and shared Macready's regard for good diction. His daughter Ellen recalled that he "always corrected me if I pronounced any word in a slipshod fashion, and if I now speak my language well it is in no small degree due to my early training." The couple had eleven children, two of whom died in infancy. (They had been christened Kate and Ellen after their paternal and maternal grandmothers; Benjamin and Sarah reused the names for their next two daughters.) Of the nine children who survived to adulthood only two, the eldest son, Benjamin, and the next to youngest, Tom, had no theatrical history. Benjamin (b. 1839) went into commerce and emigrated to Australia and then India, and Tom (b. 1860), a drifter, lived on the fringes of criminality and poverty, constantly helped by his parents and siblings.

The most prominent theatrical forebear on the Gielgud side of the family was the Polish actress Aniela Aszpergerowa (1815–1902), described by her great-grandson John Gielgud as "the greatest Shakespearean actress in all Lithuania". Her husband, Wojciech, was also a famous leading actor. Their daughter, also called Aniela, married Adam Gielgud, who had been born at sea during his parents' flight from Poland after the failed rising against Russian rule in 1830. Their son Frank married Kate Terry's daughter, Kate Terry-Lewis.

Listed in order of date of birth.

Kate (1844–1924) was the first of the Terry children to make the family name famous on the English stage, beginning her career as a small child. According to the academic Nina Auerbach, Kate may have been the most accomplished actor among her siblings, quickly gaining praise in the plays of Shakespeare, among others. Contemporary critics thought the same: The Manchester Guardian ended its report of her last performance before her retirement: "In our unwilling acceptance of her farewell, we must now rest satisfied with the memory of the peerless beauty of her merry-hearted acting ... like the music of a bewitching melody piercing the stillness of the night, and ending just when the ear longed for the next note." She gave up acting when she married the businessman Arthur James Lewis (1824–1901) in 1867 when she was 23. She made only two later stage appearances, the first in 1898, in a small role supporting her daughter Mabel in a new play in the West End; the second was in 1906 at her sister Ellen's jubilee celebrations at Drury Lane. Of her four children, all daughters, only the youngest, Mabel, followed her into the theatrical profession. The two middle daughters were Janet and Lucy. Kate's eldest daughter, also named Kate, married Frank Gielgud; their four children included Val and John Gielgud.