Sarah Walmsley

Sarah Walmsley (d. 8 January 1794) was an English stage actress and milliner, and long-time partner of actor John Edwin.

Biography

Hatmaking and meeting John Edwin Walmsley had acquired a reputation for being a "respectable milliner" based in Horse Street, Bath by 1768. At this time, she held shares in her millinery amounting to £1,000 .

Walmsley met Edwin at some point in 1768, shortly after he joined the Bath acting company. Walmsley's financial position exceeded him, as Edwin's acting career was not particularly successful, nor was he financially stable. Edwin convinced Walmsley to sell her shares, amounting to £1,000 ; he used the money to finance his career, but also to satisfy his personal whims. they were never formally married.

John Edwin the Younger (c. 1769 – 1805), who became a successful stage actor in his own right and married Elizabeth Rebecca Edwin, an actress popular in Ireland and Britain Richard (c. 1774) David (1776–1841), who briefly followed his parents into acting Sarah (d. 1793), briefly an actress; died young An unnamed son Edwin earned a permanent contract to perform at Covent Garden in 1779, establishing him in the city's theatre circles. The first record of Walmsley participating in a London play was a July 1781 production of The Baron Kinkvervankotsdorsprakingatchdern, a comedic opera. In 1789, he rekindled a particularly intense affair with a former partner, to the upset of Walmsley and the disgust of their eldest son, John the Younger. His son, John the Younger, published an article claiming that he was his mother's primary source of financial support, and had been for some time. after what the Ipswich Journal described as a period of "gradual decay." Walmsley and her daughter did not attend the funeral, though her sons did. Ursula in The Widow's Vow by Elizabeth Inchbald Mrs. Cheshire in The Agreeable Surprise by Samuel Arnold Dorcas in Richard Coeur de Lion by John Burgoyne Mrs. Cloggit in The Confederacy by John Vanbrugh