John Guille Millais - Family Life in Sussex

Family Life in Sussex

Millais married Frances "Fanny" Margaret Skipworth, daughter of a Lincolnshire landowner. He settled his family at Horsham in West Sussex. Their first child, Daphne, was born in 1895 (died of appendicitis in 1904). Geoffroy "George" was born in 1896 (killed in action, August 1918). Raoul was born in 1901; he became a noted artist in his own right. Rosamond (or Rosamund) was born in 1904. In 1900 Millais arranged for the building of a house called Compton's Brow in Horsham from where he created a private museum. The collection assembled at Horsham reflected his broad interests and included specimens of big game, deer, waterfowl, bats, seals. The collection even included a whole Grizzly Bear and a Tay Salmon weighing 50 lb. He continually created illustrations and painted his wildlife collection. Millais would regularly take off for months at a time to go hunting and to travel, bringing back numerous specimens to add to his vast collection. This continued until well into the 1920s. When in Horsham he entertained widely and enthusiastically. Hillaire Belloc would come to dinner once a month and would sit up to the early hours of the morning drinking large amounts of beer as the non-imbibing Millais listened to his extravagant tales.

At Horsham Millais created a garden remembered for its beauty. He cultivated a number of new rhododendrons, including one that he named after his wife Fanny and his daughter Rosamond. His son Raoul recalled a chaotic busy house and a father who was 'enormously intelligent, with the energy of a racing car, a workaholic with immense enthusiasm and a keen sense of the ridiculous' The house and garden did not survive his death, but a few smaller notable plants were saved, some of which were replanted in the Windsor Great Park by his nephew E.G. Millais (Ted Millais), a leading Rhododendron and Azalea propagation specialist.

Millais had the ability to convey the subtlety of the natural world with an artistic skill that marks him out as a great bird artist in particular. His gift was to communicate his love and respect for the natural world.

Millais died at Horsham on his sixty-sixth birthday.