NOTABLE SISTERS

Timaru Herald, Volume CXLIII, Issue 20731, 19 May 1937, Page 12

NOTABLE SISTERS

VICTORIAN BEAUTIES Miss Edith Macdonald, aunt of Mr Baldwin, the Prime Minister, died at Wilden House, Southport, Worcestershire, on March 29, aged 88, states an overseas exchange. For some years past she had been confined to her room. For over fifty years Miss Macdonald lived at Wilden House, the home of her brother-in-law and sister, Mr and Mrs Alfred Baldwin, the Premier’s parents. Mr Alfred Baldwin died in 1908, and since Mrs Baldwin’s death in 1925 she has lived there alone. Miss Macdonald was the last of the Macdonald sisters, noted for their beauty in Victorian times. They were the daughters of the Rev. G. B. Macdonald, a distinguished Methodist minister. Their only brother, the Rev. Frank Macdonald, ex-president of the Wesleyan Methodist Conference, died a few years ago. Her sisters, besides the Premier’s mother, were Lady Burne-Jones, wife of the artist, Sir Edward Burne-Jones; Mrs Lockwood Kipling, mother of Mr Rudyard Kipling, and Lady Poynter.