Catherine "Kate" Lucy Ward (29 April 1829[1] – 20 October 1915), later Bridgen Carter, was a British composer,[2] teacher, and vocalist.[3]
She was born in Highworth, Wiltshire,[4][5] the fifth daughter of Isaiah, a painter, and Anne Ward.[6] She had five sisters, Lydia Atmore, Anne, Helen Rose, Frances "Fanny" Agnes, and Adelaide, and younger brothers Henry Isaiah, Jabez Paul, and Francis. She was baptised in a non-conformist church in 1829,[7] but was baptised into the Church of England in 1846.[1] She studied at the Royal Academy of Music in London. Felix Mendelssohn praised her compositions during one of his visits to England.[8]
In 1886, she married Alfred Thomas Bridgen Carter.[9] She died in Richmond, Surrey in 1915.[6]
Ward's music was published by A. Hammond & Co.[10] Her compositions include: