Alma Power-Waters was the author of a number of young-adult books and biographer of John Barrymore. The only biographic details I've found on-line suggests she was born into the Power-Waters family and never married. Alma was born in 1896 and died in 1983 in Marylands USA. I have been researching Alma Sophie Shelley born 1896 in Hammersmith. Alma married Captain Pierce Power-Waters, an Irishman, in Yorkshire in 1915. Pierce and Alma travelled frequently between the US and London. Alma's occupation was author.
Like you, the only information that I have found online is that she was born into the Power-Waters family and never married. The only reference that I can see has her last known address as being in Church Hill, Queen Annes County, Maryland. I should have thought that there would have been an obituary of some sort in a local newspaper - or at least a funeral notice.
I wonder if an email to the Maryland State Archives might bear fruit: http:// speccol.mdarchives.state.md.us/pages/speccol/index.aspx
Have you seen the report of the marriage between Alma Sophie Shelley and Pierce Power-Waters in Doncaster? Ann
Bearing in mind that married women in the States may retain their maiden name as a middle name, I tried googling for "Shelley Power Waters". This brings up some interesting entries, such as an Open Library catalogue entry for 'John Barrymore, the legend and the man, Foreword by Brooks Atkinson, by Alma (Shelley) Power-Waters' first published in 1941. The same search found this very recent obituary for a Brian Power-Walters, son of Alma Shelley and Pierce Power-Waters: http:// m.myeasternshoremd.com/obituaries/kent_county/article_2c2a9926-6753-55ed-8aea-5cf636a4bed0.html?mode=jqm From dates given there it sounds as if the family settled in New York City in about 1927.
There is an obituary for Capt. P. Power-Waters in the New York Times archive http:// query.nytimes.com/search/sitesearch/#/%22power+waters%22/since1851/allresults/1/allauthors/relevance/obituaries/ but you have to have a sub to read it Ann
Thanks Huncamunca and Ann. What an interesting family. I am yet to establish her relationship to Percy Bysshe Shelley. My connection is through her grandmother Miriam Dawes who married Adolphus Charles Shelley. I found a photo of Pierce with John Barrymore. Pierce was John's agent. Still nothing further on Alma apart from the information found on Ancestry and references to the books she wrote. I'm satisfied however that the biographical details found in post #1 are incorrect.
