Ethel Watts was born in Mile End in 1895, to John Watts, a police constable originally from Carmarthenshire and Caroline Poole, an East-end native. The family lived at 44 Carlton Road, Mile End. John later worked for the Gas Board after retirement from the Metropolitan Police.
Little is known of her early life, although she studied at Bedford College in 1913. After choosing accountancy as a profession she was articled to Mr Sidney Williams FCA and joined Peats after qualifying. In 1925, after obtaining her practicing certificate, she went into practice in the firm Homersham & Watts of Clements Lane, London. Her partner at Homersham & Watts was Miriam Homersham, a member of the Society of Incorporated Accountants and Auditors since 1922 and a co-founder of Britain's first housing association, Women's Pioneer Housing. Watts then went into practice on her own as E. Watts & Co in South West London. She married a doctor, Oscar Tobin, in 1929, but always practiced under her maiden name, officially the couple were known as Watts-Tobin.
Ethel Watts was actively involved with ICAEW and was the first woman to be elected to the committee of the London and District Society of Chartered Accountants. She was a member of the executive committee of the Chartered Accountants’ Benevolent Fund for a number of years. In 1945, when the number of women joining ICAEW was increasing, she founded the Women Chartered Accountants’ Dining Society to provide an opportunity for women in the profession to meet. The Watts prize was established by the Society in her memory. In her final years she was a major contributor to The History of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales 1880 - 1965 (Heinemann, 1965), although she did not live to see it published.
As well as the accountancy profession, she was active in the movement to secure equality for women from the 1920s to the 1960s. She was involved with the London and National Society for Women’s Service and continued this work when it became the Fawcett Society, offering her services as an accountant. She died suddenly in 1963.
Further reading
- Ethel Watts: Paving the way for women in Chartered Accountancy - article on the East End Women's Museum website, September 2020
- Ethel Watts - KPMG film telling Ethel Watts' story
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