Mabel Green (Mabel Gladys Coomber)

John Culme

01 September 2020, 07:35

Mabel Green (1 November 1887- 29 March 1975), English actress and vocalist

Mabel Green, whose real name was Mabel Gladys Coomber, was born in the Notting Hill area of London on 1 November 1887, one of the children of Alfred Coomber (1852-1924), a removal contractor, and his wife Matilda (née Tanner), widow of Samuel Preston Green (1848-1880), a builder/carpenter and joiner. Mabel’s first husband was a solicitor, Tom Stanley Steel (1871-1920), whom she married in South Africa in 1912 and divorced in London in 1917. Her second husband, and his second wife, was Julius Sigismund Wetzlar (1866?-1938), Deputy Chairman of the Anglo American Corporation of South Africa Ltd. Mabel’s third and last husband was Zante Gower Burmester (1885-1971), whom she married at Holy Trinity, Kensington Gore, on 11 January 1940.

In the late 1960s I spent an afternoon with Mr. and Mrs. Burmester at their flat no. 4, 69 Addison Road, Kensington. We chatted about her career and she recalled the motorcar accident near Brooklands on 16 August 1911 in which she and her fellow passengers, including Mrs. Stanley Rhodes (the former actress, Mabel Russell) were injured and the driver, Stanley Rhodes, a nephew of Cecil Rhodes, was killed. (The Guardian, London, Thursday, 17 August 1911, p. 11g) I also asked Mrs. Burmester about the recordings she (as Mabel Green) had made in 1910 in the London studios of Pathé Frères. Unfortunately, she had no recollection of making those recordings but a number of copies have survived and details were published in Pathé's catalogues. For an example, published on 1 January 1911 go to http://www.gepzongora.hu/pathe%201911.pdf (accessed 1 September 2020).

mary greene

30 June 2020, 18:22

According to family legend, she was married to one of the original Warner brothers. She was my father's aunt.