Gertrude Jekyll (1843 - 1932)

Born 29 Nov 1843 in London, England

Ancestors

Died 8 Dec 1932 at age 89 in Surrey, England

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Biography

Gertrude Jekyll is Notable.

Father Captain Edward Joseph Hill Jekyll

Mother Julia Hammersley

Jekyll was born at 2 Grafton Street, Mayfair, London, the fifth of the seven children of Captain Edward Joseph Hill Jekyll, an officer in the Grenadier Guards, and his wife Julia Hammersley.^[1]In 1848 her family left London and moved to Bramley House, Surrey, where she spent her formative years.

She attended the Royal College of Art and became a prominent horticulturalist and garden designer, who designed over four hundred gardens in The United Kingdom and the United States. Her influence is still seen today.

Her brother, Walter, was a friend of the author, Robert Louis Stevenson; his name may have been borrowed for the title of his famous Jekyll & Hyde story. The family historian, Sir Herbert Jekyll (1846-1932), was Gertrude’s younger brother. He was a military engineer and civil servant, a man of great talent over a wide area, ranging from founding the Bach Choir in London and laying telegraph lines in Africa to designing the road network from London and master-minding the British Pavilion, with Sir Edwin Lutyens, at the Paris Exhibition of 1900.^[2]

Jekyll is buried in the churchyard of Busbridge Church, formerly known as St John the Baptist, Busbridge, Godalming, next to her brother and sister-in-law, Sir Herbert Jekyll (KCMG) and his wife, Dame Agnes Jekyll (DBE). The monument was designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens.

Sources

1. ↑ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertrude_Jekyll
2. ↑ http://gertrudejekyll.co.uk/