Ruth Herbert

Louisa Ruth Herbert
Louisa Ruth Herbert, portrait by Dante Gabriel Rossetti
Born	1831
Died	1921 (aged 89–90)
Occupation	London stage actress, theatre manager, artists' model
Spouse(s)	Edward Crabb, Mr. Rochfort

Louisa Ruth Herbert (1831 – 1921) was a well-known Victorian-era English stage actress and model for the artist Dante Gabriel Rossetti.

She was the daughter of a West Country brass founder. She was also known as Mrs. Crabbe, having married Edward Crabb, a share and stock dealer, which gave her a certain measure of respectability generally lacking in actresses in the Victorian era. By the mid-1850s, she was no longer living with her husband. She embellished the surname Crabb with a final "e" but used her maiden name as a stage name.

She had performed at the Theatre Royal, Glasgow in 1855 before she made her London stage debut on 15 October 1855 at the lower-class Royal Strand Theatre. She also acted at the Olympic Theatre before moving on to St. James's Theatre, London.

Her early roles were in comedy and burlesque productions and she drew eyes with her beauty. She drew favorable reviews with her performance as the lead in Tom Taylor's Retribution at the Olympic. One of her well-known roles was the lead in an 1863 stage production of the sensation novel Lady Audley's Secret at St. James's Theatre. Author Mary Elizabeth Braddon said Herbert gave her favorite performance as Lady Audley.

She later managed the St. James's Theatre, London from 1864 to 1868. She hired the then little-known Henry Irving as her leading man and assistant stage manager at the theatre. One of the plays that she commissioned there was W. S. Gilbert's first successful solo play, Dulcamara, or the Little Duck and the Great Quack (1866).