Eileen 'Tirzah' Garwood (1908-51) studied at Eastbourne School of Art, where her future husband Eric Ravilious (1903-42) taught her wood engraving. In 1927 she exhibited with the Society of Wood Engravers. She and Eric married in 1930, living first in Hammersmith, London, and then in Essex, at Great Bardfield with Edward and Charlotte Bawden, at Castle Hedingham and at Shalford. Tirzah designed patterned and hand marbled papers (they are both in the British Museum and the V&A); between 1935 and 1941 she had three children. She was first diagnosed with breast cancer in 1942, and while recovering from an operation began writing an informal autobiography. Eric, an Official War Artist, died in a plane that was lost over Iceland.