Annabella Cruikshank Adams was born in Aberdeen on 18 December 1886. She was the eldest child of John Adams and Margaret Michie. She was a fishworker when, in 1906, she married Arthur Cyril Doubtfire, a bugler with the Scottish Rifles who was stationed in the King Street Barracks.
Her husband was killed in the Dardanelles in 1916. He is buried in Sarigol Military Cemetery.
She married James Davie Coutts in 1921. She wasa widowed for a second time and set up shop selling second hand clothes at 1-3 South East Circus Place, Stockbridge Edinburgh. She adopted the name "Madame Doubtfire"