Molly Drake

Born Mary Lloyd 5 November 1915 – died: 4 June 1993, she was married to Rodney Drake and was the mother of the musician Nick Drake and the actress Gabrielle Drake. Nick's mother was born Mary Lloyd in 1915. In the mid-thirties she was in Rangoon, Burma, where she met Rodney Drake. They got married on 14 April 1937 in the cathedral in Rangoon, and lived there together for fifteen years. Because of disturbances in Burma during the forties they had to move between Burma and India on some occasions. In 1944 their first child, Gabrielle, was born and four years later Nick saw the daylight for the first time. In 1952 the family moved back to England and settled in the small village of Tanworth-in-Arden and the house Far Leys, where Molly would stay together with Rodney until his death in 1988. Then she moved to a smaller house in the village. Molly was probably an early influence on Nick, because she played the piano and wrote songs herself. She once composed a whole suite of children's songs for Nick and Gabrielle. Molly passed away in 1993, and is burried next to Nick and Rodney at the St Mary Magdalene churchyard in Tanworth-in-Arden.