Fisher. He was killed the morning after the surrender of the fort when the powder magazine exploded. His brother Edward moved to Iowa and his sister Elisabeth married George Henry Warner, both in 1863, after which William was the only child in the household. At the age of 20, he left Hartford to begin his apprenticeship as an actor. He briefly worked for a stock company in New Orleans and then returned to New England where, on Mark Twain's own recommendation, he debuted at the Globe Theater of Boston with Twain's stage-play The Gilded Age in 1875. Afterward, he was a stock actor for six years through Boston, New York, and the Midwest. He irregularly attended classes at a few institutions, although he never completed their programs. His father Francis had held the strongest objections to the theater in general, but he offered the least resistance and drove him to the train station, telling his son that he had driven two other sons to this same station and they had never returned; William was to make sure that he was the exception. Francis supplied him with an allowance on which to subsist (his apprenticeship was without pay). His father's health began to fail in 1878, and William forsook the stage for more than a year to care for him in his final illness. Upon his father's death, he and George Henry Warner were named executors of Francis' estate, and they, Elisabeth, and Edward shared in the inheritance. Marriage In 1882, Gillette married Helen Nichols of Detroit. She died in 1888 from peritonitis caused by a ruptured appendix. The couple had no children. He never remarried. Playwright, director, actor Gillette was hired as playwright, director, and actor for $50 per week in 1881, while performing at Cincinnati, by two of the Frohman brothers, Gustave and Daniel. The first play that he wrote and produced was The Professor. It debuted in the Madison Square Theatre, lasting 151 performances, with a subsequent tour through many states (as far west as St. Louis, Missouri). That same year, he produced Esmeralda, written together with Frances Hodgson Burnett. Early in his career, Gillette realised that it would be in the triple role of playwright, director, and actor that he could make the most money. He was among the premier matinee idols of his day, and was described by actress/drama critic Amy Leslie as "one of Gibson's