Caroline Alice Elgar and he died when Alice was aged only 12. She was from a distinguished family: on her mother's side her grandfather was the Rev. Robert Napier Raikes, her great-grandfather Robert Raikes (1736–1811) was the founder of the Sunday school movement, and her uncle was British Indian Army General Robert Napier Raikes (1813–1909). As a girl she studied with the amateur geologist Rev W. S. Symonds and they and a group of her friends went fossil-hunting on the banks of the river Severn. She wrote the index to a book by him. She studied the piano with Ferdinand Kufferath in Brussels
Henry Cecil Raikes had their voice recorded. George Edward Gouraud recorded him on behalf of Thomas Edison on the evening of 5 October 1888. Raikes married Charlotte Blanche, of Plas Teg, Mold, daughter of Charles Blayney Trevor-Roper, on 26 September 1861. They had several children, including Cecil Dacre Staveley Raikes (1874–1947), a Vice-Admiral in the Royal Navy, and Henry St John Digby Raikes, father of the Conservative politician Sir Victor Raikes. The family lived at Llwynegrin Hall, Wales. Raikes died on 24 August 1891, aged 52. Charlotte Raikes survived her husband by over 30 years and died in September 1922. Henry Cecil Raikes