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Gifted press photographer dies aged 65

A gifted photographer who contributed to her local paper for 20 years has died aged 65 after a stroke.

Freelance photographer Fay Tresilian, left, worked for the Bath Chronicle as well as running her own business as a portrait photographer.

Chronicle head of photography Kevin Bates said: “Fay was a lovely lady who was always cheerful, with a smile on her face.

“She was a gifted portrait photographer – getting on with the young or old and having the knack of bringing the inner person out into the picture she was taking.

“She will be missed by all those who have known her and by those who have worked with her. The legacy of her life will be the images she has left behind.”

Mother-of-three Fay was the daughter of high-ranking civil servant Sir Edmund Compton, Britain’s first Ombudsman, and had three sisters and one brother.

She met her broadcaster husband Nicholas while he was working on an art history project in the New Forest and the couple shared their life between Bath and Spain, where Fay also worked as a photographer.

He told the Chronicle: “She had a genius for loving people. The response we have had to her death has been extraordinary.

“She was full of warmth, infectious humour, gaiety, opinions and cheerfulness.

“A glorious wife, an adoring mother, a loving and beloved relative and friend to so many people around the world, Fay was especially proud of her extended families in Great Britain and Chile and of her ‘adoptive’ family of friends in Spain, where she had conquered the hearts of local people young and old in our six summers in Cordoba province.”

  • You can leave your tributes to Fay at Lasting Tribute.