Charles Cruft (showman) - Family Life

Family Life

Cruft's first marriage was to Charlotte Hutchinson in 1878. Together they had four children, Charles Francis, Louise, Cecil Arthur and Clara Helen Grace. His second marriage was to Emma Isabel Hartshorn in 1894, they had no children. He remained in close contact with his children, and involved each of them in the dog show business. Such was the relationship with his daughter Clara, who was nicknamed "Birdie", that she alone was listed in his second wife's will as a step daughter.

His wife Emma stated in her book, Mrs Charles Cruft's Famous Dog Book, published in 1949 that there was an unwritten rule that both herself and her husband couldn't own any dogs for fear of making others believe that they favoured one breed over another, even going as far to say "we were determined to own a pet, so we took the least like of resistance and kept a – CAT!" This was disproved in Cruft's memoirs, published posthumously in Charles Cruft's Dog Book in 1952, where Cruft explained that he had lived in households which had Alsatians and Borzois. He went on to make particular reference to the fact that he and his wife Emma had owned at least one Saint Bernard; the same breed of dog he had used in his creation of the Crufts logo.

At the time of the United Kingdom Census 1901, Cruft was living at 325 Holloway Road, N7 with his wife Emma, his father Charles, a boarder named Albert Causfield and a servant named Alice Gregory. He listed his profession as "show promoter". Emma would go on to outlive Charles, she died at the age of 82 on 5 September 1950. At the time of his death, he was living at 12 Highbury Grove, London, N5. His staff included a cook, a chauffeur, two maids and a gardener. Additionally, he owned a country home called Windmill Farm, in Coulsdon, Surrey.