Lily Hall Caine

(1869-1914)

Lily Hall Caine’s only role in Shakespeare was as Lady Anne in Richard III in Manchester in 1884. Her brother was Sir Hall Caine (1853-1931), a popular novelist who has since fallen out of fashion. Caine played parts on tour in some of the novels her brother adapted for the stage.

Caine played the part of “Glory” in The Christian in 1898 at the Duke of York’s Theatre, a play which when revised was an immediate success and ran for 182 performances when it opened at the Lyceum in 1907; however, his sister did not play Glory Quayle in that production. Alice Crawford had the part. Her last stage appearance was in 1906-7 in another of her brother’s plays, The Prodigal.

Caine’s obituary appears in the Times of London, June 2, 1914, does not give the year of her birth.

Addendum: since writing this entry, David Vidor, a librarian at Woodruff Library, Emory University, began a search for Caine’s birthdate. Through her husband, George David Day, he eventually found the records for vital statistics for the Isle of Man. Elizabeth Ann Caine, who eventually became Lily Hall Caine, was born in Liverpool on December 13, 1869. Although her date of death is listed in her obituary as May 31, the records in Man say June 1, 1914.