Born in Soho, London, March 11th 1907. A brunette with dark brown eyes Jessie Matthews became the nearest that England had to a international singing star in the 1930's. She'd risen to fame via the chorus line as one of C.B. Cochrans "Young Ladies". Her popularity in the 1930's increased despite a much publicised divorce (in the early 1930's divorce was still not the done thing in England and it got her much negative publicity). She went on to ever greater success singing and dancing her way to prominence in a variety of light entertainment vehicles. In the late 1930's she briefly went to America but developed paranoia and her health declined. She returned to England to make one more film in 1944 and then retired with her husband at that time to the simpler life of running a pub! She briefly reappered in "Tom Thumb" (1958). She died in 1981. More to come...

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