Lillian (Lily) Spender, usually known as Mistress John Kent Spender was born on 22 February 1835, and was the daughter of Edward Headland, a well-known physician of Portland Place, London, by his wife, daughter of Ferdinand de Medina, a Spaniard.
Mission Headland was educated at Queen"s College, Harley Street.
She contributed to the London Quarterly Review, the English Woman"s Journal, the Dublin University Review, the British Quarterly Review, and to a magazine called Meliora. But after 1869 she chiefly confined herself to novel-writing. She was active in educational and social work in Bath until her health failed.
She died at Bath on 4 May 1895.
Of Mistress Spender"s eight children, seven survived her.
