John Walden Poulson – The Wastrel – was my great grandfather and his first wife Polly (Mary Ann) was my great grandmother. After she died, he married Polly’s sister Emily, but ran off to Canada leaving his six children behind. It was only recently I learned that he had married a third time – no more children as Bertha was a 45-year-old widow when they were married.

Bertha Hollyer, neé Buckstone, John Walden’s third wife, came from a very famous theatrical family with sisters and brothers who followed in their father John Baldwin Buckstone’s footsteps and became actors. I have no pictures of Bertha, but based on pictures of two of her sisters, I’m guessing she was beautiful. He certainly didn’t marry her for money as there wasn’t any – her famous father had died when Bertha was 3 following a bankruptcy where he lost the lease of the Haymarket Theatre which he had run for over 20 years, in spite of the success of many of the plays he wrote as well as his own performances. Continue reading The Wastrel marries again – a widow from a well-known family →