Rilla Blythe

Bertha Marilla "Rilla" Ford (nee Blythe) was the daughter of Anne and Gilbert Blythe, younger sister of Joyce (†) Jem, Walter (†), Nan, Di, and Shirley Blythe, wife of Kenneth Ford and mother of Gilbert and Rilla Ford.

Birth
Rilla was born in the coldest July night of 1899 in Ingleside, Glen St. Mary, to Anne and Gilbert Blythe as their youngest child. She was named Bertha Marilla - after her maternal grandmother Bertha Shirley and mother's guardian Marilla Cuthbert.

When she was born, her older siblings weren't at home. Walter reluctantly went to stay at  Dr. Parker's house although he believed that his parents were trying to get rid of him and he was scared because he thought that instead of having a baby, their mother was going to die. However, Rilla was the sweetest baby, weighing eight pounds at birth and had unusually long eyelashes, according to Gilbert, Anne and Susan.

Childhood
Rilla was described as roly-poly during her childhood, and she had a very decided lisp. Once, she believed that her father was a murderer. Rilla had gotten into her share of adventures, such as throwing one of Susan's silver-and-white cake into the creek. This was she worried she was doing something disgraceful to be carrying that cake to the church. Her mother was understandable as always later on, and assured Rilla that neither she nor her father nor Susan would ever ask Rilla to do anything disgraceful. In Rainbow Valley, she was chased around the Glen village by Mary Vance, a visitor at the Meredith home, with a dried codfish, since Rilla was "strutting" about in her best dress, and Mary thought her very stuck-up.

World War I
Rilla was fifteen years old by the time the rest of her siblings were starting their own lives away from Ingleside. Rilla did not have any ambition nor did she want to have any. She said there had to be at least one dunce in every family, and she was perfectly comfortable with the idea, being young, romantic, and carefree. This changed forever with the outbreak of World War I, and Jem enlisting to go and fight overseas, as well as the Meredith boys and eventually Walter and Shirley. Rilla was devastated when Walter was killed in the war, but soon continued bravely on with life. Rilla adopted a war-baby, did her share of work with the Red Cross, and as it turns out, everything that happened made a woman out of Rilla. She found Kenneth Ford waiting at the door for her after the war has ended.

Later Life
Rilla went to Kingsport with Una to study Household Science.

Personality
Rilla would often become upset if people called her a little girl when she was almost fifteen. She became jealous easily, if anyone had something that she didn't.

Etymology
Bertha is a female given name of Old German origin and means bright, famous. Marilla is a female given name, variant of Muriel or short form of Amaryllis and means shining sea.
 * Rilla was named after her maternal grandmother, Bertha Shirley, and mother's guardian, Marilla Cuthbert.
 * Rilla named her only daughter after herself.

Behind the scenes

 * Rilla was the only child we see being born at Ingleside and the third child in all to have their birth described (first was Joyce and second one was Jem).
 * Rilla was the only Blythe girl who looked like both her parents with red hair like Anne and Gilbert's hazel eyes. (Nan inherited her father's brown hair and hazel eyes and Diana resembled her mother, with her red hair and green eyes.)
 * Jem and Rilla were only Blythe children who looked like both their parents, they were redheaded and had hazel eyes. (Nan and Shirley resembled their father Gilbert, Di looked similar to Anne and Walter had Anne's green eyes, but not father's brown hair.)

Book appearances

 * Anne of Ingleside
 * Rainbow Valley
 * Rilla of Ingleside