Miss Agatha Hoare

A carte-de-visite portrait of Miss Agatha Sophia Hoare (1839-1873), later Mrs Digby Fairfield.

Born on 6 February 1839 at Blatherwycke in Northamptonshire, she was the second daughter of Gerald Noel Hoare and his wife Lilias Sophia née O'Brien. According to the 1861 census, Agatha's father was a 'Magistrate and Brewer.' When the 1871 census was taken, he described himself as 'Royal Navy (retired).'

Agatha appears on the 1861 census, staying with her uncle, the Reverend William H. Hoare, a 'Clergyman and Banker, without cure of souls' at Worth in Sussex. She was born at Blatherwycke in Northamptonshire.

On 14 May 1861 she was married at St Thomas's in Orchard Street, Marylebone, by her uncle, the Reverend W. H. Hoare, to Digby Willoughby George Fairfield of the Bengal Artillery, eldest son of the late Charles George Fairfield Esq., formerly of the Scots Fusileer Guards [The Morning Post, 15 May 1861].

Her husband died of cholera at Calcutta on 20 July 1863, while serving as Lieutenant in Bengal Artillery. He was 25 years old.

When the 1871 census was taken, Agatha Fairfield was a widow living with her parents at Osbourne House, Great Malvern in Worcestershire.

Mrs Fairfield died on 22 July 1873 at her father's London residence, 27 Gloucester Square, Hyde Park. She was 34 years old [The Standard, 26 July 1873].

Photographed on 27 March 1861 by Camille Silvy of London.