William Haviland

William Haviland (1856 – 19 September 1917) was a British actor-manager specialising in the works of Shakespeare who during his long stage career performed with some of the leading actors of his time including Henry Irving and Herbert Beerbohm Tree. Early life Born as William Alexander Irwin in Bristol in Gloucestershire, he was the son of Adeline Ann née Goode (1830–1905) and Frederick William Irwin (1834–1930), a licensed victualler. He used the stage name William Haviland for much of his theatrical career except for an early period when he was billed as Alexander J. Haviland. His sister Augusta Irwin also took to a career on the stage under the name Augusta Haviland. He began his long career performing Shakespeare when he joined the company of Henry Irving at the Lyceum Theatre in 1882, remaining with Irving until 1895 during which period he played a variety of roles—major and minor, including Altmayer in Faust (1887), Didier in The Lyons Mail (1891) and Fool to Irving's Lear in King Lear (1892). He married the actress Amy Coleridge (born as Amy Matilda Cowlrick, 1864–1951) in Chicago on 1 February 1884. They had two children, Frederick Alexander Irwin (b. 1884) and Ellen Winifred Irwin (b. 1887) but were divorced in 1904 following her adultery with the actor Percy Anstey. As Alexander J. Haviland he acted in The Lady of Lyons alongside his wife in John Martin-Harvey's Lyceum Theatre Company tour of the provinces in 1888. Stage career