WHISTLER , Nancy

1912 - 2011

Nancy Esther Whistler was born at Cintra, Chalfont St Peter, Buckinghamshire on 17 February 1912, daughter of Godfrey James Whistler (1866-25 December 1935), an insurance clerk, and his wife Katherine Isabel née Wood (19 July 1875-11 February 1959), who married at Westminster, London in 1906. Nancy, who used the pseudonym Siān Evans, was the sister to both the author Peggy Eileen Whistler (17 March 1909–17 March 1958) who used the pseudonym Margiad Evans and to Katherine Elizabeth Whistler (20 August 1907-12 November 2001), their paternal grandmother's maiden name was Evans. In 1920 when living at Sunny Lawn, Chalfont St Peters, Nancy won a painting prize in a newspaper competition in the 'Weekly Dispatch' when studying at Danvers House School at Cricklade, Wiltshire. In 1921 the family moved to Lavender Cottage, Bridstow, Ross-on-Wye, Herefordshire where she was living in 1935 but the following year, she was living at 35 Kings Gardens, West End, London NW 6. Nancy served as a plotter in the Women's Royal Air Force during the Second World War and married at Chelsea, London in 1946 Neville Gascoyne Nightingale (20 May 1911-1989) but continued to paint as Nancy Whistler. An artist who later settled at Botesdale, Suffolk on the Suffolk/Norfolk border where she had an antique shop but, together with her husband, later moved to nearby Diss in Norfolk. Nancy Esther Nightingale was of Southrepps, near Cromer, Norfolk when she died in North Walsham Hospital on 29 May 2011 and was buried beside her husband at Redgrave, Suffolk.

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Works by This Artist