Annie Miller

Annie Miller (1835-1925) was an English artists' model who, among others, sat for the members of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, William Holman Hunt, Dante Gabriel Rossetti and John Everett Millais. Her on-off relationship with Holman Hunt has been dramatised several times.

Annie Miller was born in 1835 in a cottage in Chelsea near the Duke of York public house. Her father Henry had been a soldier in the 14th Dragoons and was wounded in the Napoleonic Wars. Her mother was a cleaner. She had a sister Harriet. When her mother died aged thirty-seven they moved in with relatives and her father worked for a local builder.

She was working as a barmaid when she attracted the attention of Hunt.

Miller appeared as the subject of some of Hunt's paintings, perhaps most famously in his The Awakening Conscience, now in the Tate Gallery, though the face was later repainted by the artist. Hunt had planned to marry Annie and so before he left for Palestine in 1854, he made arrangements for her to be educated while he was away. Hunt also left a list of artists, including Millais, for whom Annie could sit. However, during Hunt's absence and contrary to Hunt's wishes she also sat for George Price Boyce and for Rossetti. For Rossetti she appeared in works such as Dante's Dream and Helen of Troy.

Hunt returned from his travels in 1856. Ford Madox Brown described Annie as 'siren-like' and her connection with Rossetti caused a rift between Rossetti and Hunt. Annie became involved with the seventh Viscount Ranelagh even though Hunt proposed to her. As a result, Hunt finally broke off the engagement in 1859. Thereafter Boyce and Rossetti competed for sittings with her with Rossetti usually winning, though this caused Rossetti’s wife Elizabeth Siddal on one occasion to throw his drawings of Annie out of the window.

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