BIOGRAPHY: Ethel Mina Webb
(1886-1954)
Gus's sister Ethel was a colourful character, who lived a bright and exciting life. She was born Ethel Mina Webb on 4th August 1886, the youngest of five children to Henry Richard Webb and Rosa Jane Webb, Like her three older brothers she attended Netherwood Street School (Enlisted on 24th April 1893 while living at 31 Kenilworth Terrace) it is noted in the school register that she previously went to Waterloo college.
Ethel was the last of her siblings to leave home, it is believed that the same Ethel Webb and Rosa Webb resident at 41 Dynham road, Hampstead, listed on the 1901 census are Rita's aunt Ethel and paternal grandmother Rosa. If this is Ethel she was working aged 15 as an assistant in a confectioners shop, although it is believed Ethel worked as a Manicurist in a barbershop at a young age, this is where the widowed Charles Archibald Samuells, a retired Judge, first met her, he was 40 years her senior and they married in 1908 in Hendon.
Ethel had a long term relationship with Archie’s Nephew, Major Ellis Herbert "Brockie" Brocksopp (1878-1940) Archie was in full knowledge of his wife’s infidelity, and the three travelled around the world together, living for many years all over Europe, Ethel who is mentiond in the autobigraphy of Mr Justice Humphreys was also a gaiety girl from 1904 to 1918, under the name of Estelle, and a male impersonator too!
Ethel and Archie had no children, and doted on her sister May's children (Gladys and Barbara) instead of Gus's children (Rita and Henry) it was Ethel who paid for a head stone when her mother Rosa died in 1924.
In 1931 Archie died in Cannes aged 85, and Brockie died on 10th June 1940 at the Mount Zion Hospital in San Francisco, his effects worth just £20.3s were left to Rita's uncle Richard Lewis Webb. Ethel settled in South Africa, where she made her final will and testament there in 1954 leaving most of her money to charity, she died on 3rd December 1954 in South Africa, Ethel left behind a stack of memories from her life including a scrapbook diary of pictures, postcards and comments some of which are included on this page
