Her parents were Sarah Kate (born Phillips) and Arthur William Ranken.
[1] Whilst she was in Hamburg, Ballard met her first husband, Peter Cecil Wilson, who was learning German there.
[1] Helen Ballard worked near Malvern and Elizabeth Strangman had similar interests in Kent.
[4] Ballard arranged for her stock to be given to Gisela Schmiemann in Cologne who established a mail order business based on these varieties.
A book written by Gisela Schmiemann and titled Helen Ballard - The Hellebore Queen was published in 1997.