Had it not been for her ambition, Alice Gray would have been arrested along with Ford’s Theatre’s other actors and actresses in the aftermath of the assassination.
A month before, on March 18, 1865, she had been John’s leading lady at Ford’s Theatre when he volunteered to come out of retirement to appear in a benefit for his friend, John McCullough. In the week before the assassination she was still at Ford’s Theatre but had been increasingly absent.1 John Ford knew she was pursuing her “New York ambitions” and began grooming Jeannie Gourlay as her replacement. On the night of the assassination, Alice was still away on one of her “absences,” and Jeannie Gourlay stepped in as her replacement in Our American Cousin. Unlike the rest of the cast at Ford’s Theatre, Alice was never arrested.
There is no trace of her for the next few months until July 22, 1865, when she began appearing at P. T. Barnum’s Academy of Music in New York.2 Two months later she was at Barnum’s Winter Garden Theatre as leading lady, filling in for Rose Etyinge, who had fallen ill just before opening night. Alice hadn’t had much time to rehearse her part and at times fumbled her lines. “Otherwise,” the New York Clipper commented, “she is a very acceptable leading stock actress.”3
The next few years were spent barnstorming in and around Ohio. From December through January 1866, the “beautiful and brilliant artiste Miss Alice Gray” was the headliner at Turner’s Opera House in Dayton.4 At Wood’s Theatre in Cincinnati she “riveted the audience;” in Columbus she was lauded as a spellbinding actress “of rare beauty and grace.”5 In the off season she placed an ad in the New York Clipper that “responsible managers” could reach her for the coming fall and winter seasons at her home in Cincinnati.6
In New York, George Wood at the Old Broadway Theatre hired Alice as his leading stock actress for the 1866–1867 season.7 Two weeks after it opened, the New York Herald’s critic noted that Alice was playing to overflow audiences. He commented, “If not already enthroned [she] will undoubtedly become a favorite in New York.”8
The following season Alice was at the Holliday Street Theatre in Baltimore along with Effie Germon, playing opposite Edwin.9 Being together again must have brought back reminiscences of their time with John. After Edwin’s engagement ended in October, Alice and Effie were hired as leading ladies at the Walnut Street Theatre in Philadelphia for the rest of the season.10
Most of the next season was spent in New Orleans as lead stock actress at the Varieties Theatre. A few months after she started there she was almost hit in the face by an apple that someone in the gallery threw at the performers for fun.11 When the season ended in late April, Alice left for Cincinnati for a brief appearance at the National Theatre opposite headliner Charles Pope.12
Pope felt he had good chemistry with Alice and hired her as his leading lady when he took over as manager of the Mobile (Alabama) Theatre in January 1870.13 The Mobile Register was especially complimentary to Alice who “grows nightly upon Mobile audiences and gave us last night a truly womanly presentation of the womanly part of Clara Douglas in Money.”14 The chemistry continued when they both appeared next in New Orleans at the St. Charles Theatre.15
At the end of the season, the Orleans Dramatic Relief Association and Shakespeare Club gave Alice a farewell benefit, which the New Orleans Times-Picayune said she richly deserved: “Few of the actresses who have visited New Orleans have gained more warm friends than Miss Grey [sic],” said the New Orleans Times-Picayune, adding “her unvarying modesty and grace of deportment have won for her that admiration which is worth far more to a true woman than the brief triumphs won by unblushing mediocrity though unladylike actions or indelicate expressions.”16
When Pope agreed to be manager of the new Opera House in Kansas City in 1871, he hired Alice as his leading lady. The Opera House was a commercial flop.17 Alice did not see much future in staying and left in April. A month later Pope also resigned and left.
By the late 1880s, Alice Gray was past her prime and had to settle for unheralded minor roles with small companies. Her final years as an actress were spent with the oddly named “Held by the Enemy Company.” In 1887, she married William L. Lawson in Haverhill, Massachusetts.18 Other than his name, nothing is known about him. On the way to Bridgeport from New York in October 1890, she was not feeling well. Nevertheless, she went on stage that night. The next day she was taken to the hospital where she died of “apoplexy.”19
Her obituary in the Cincinnati Commercial Tribune commented that Alice had been an “exemplary Catholic, and had made more than one fortune but had died poor as a result of her prodigality and generosity to those in and out of the profession.”20