Helen Stratton was born into a military family posted to India in 1867. Her mother settled in Bath and Helen studied first at the South Kensington Art School (first noted in 1891). The Andersen was her first significant commercial work, a profession in which she was firmly established by 1901. Stratton continued her long association with Bath and the West Country as a working professional.

It is too easy to write her off as an Arthur Hughes impersonator. She had considerable invention as a book illustrator and several of her images seize the imagination. I don't suppose any other artist has shown a decorative initial of a new chapter being sexually embraced by a female character.

Helen Stratton died in Cran Hill Nursing Home, Bath at the age of 91.