Edward Downes Edward Downes Sir Edward Thomas ("Ted") Downes, CBE (17 June 1924 – 10 July 2009) was an English conductor, specialising in opera. He was associated with the Royal Opera House from 1952, and with Opera Australia from 1970. He was also well known for his long working relationship with the BBC Philharmonic and for working with the Netherlands Radio Orchestra. Within the field of opera, he was particularly known as a conductor of Verdi. He and his wife, Lady (Joan) Downes, committed assisted suicide at the Dignitas clinic in Switzerland on 10 July 2009, an event that received significant media
Joan Vaux (lady-in-waiting) was Sir Richard Guildford, by whom she had her only child, Sir Henry Guildford. Her second husband was Anthony Poyntz. When King Henry VIII was attempting to divorce his first wife, Catherine of Aragon in order to marry Anne Boleyn, Joan gave a deposition, concerning whether or not Catherine's marriage to Arthur, Prince of Wales, had been consummated, in which she confirmed that Prince Arthur and Catherine had lain together "as man and wife all alone five or six nights after the said marriage". Joan was born in about 1463, the daughter of Sir William Vaux and Katherine Penyston. She