Ellen McCarter Doubleday (May 9, 1898 - April 2, 1978) was the wife of the publisher Nelson Doubleday Sr. The movie Daphne, based on the controversial central chapters in Margaret Forster's 1993 authorised biography of Daphne du Maurier, starred Geraldine Somerville in the role of Du Maurier, and Elizabeth McGovern and Janet McTeer as her two great romantic loves - the American publishing tycoon's wife Ellen Doubleday and the actress Gertrude Lawrence.

Du Maurier wrote a play, September Tide, about her forbidden love for Doubleday, 'the Rebecca of Barberrys', and its staging then led her straight into a life-changing and doomed second lesbian affair with Lawrence, the vivacious actress who had inspired Noel Coward.

Ellen Doubleday, the daughter of Thomas N. McCarter, president of the Public Service Company of New Jersey, and Madeleine Barker of Rumson, N.J., married firstly Atwood Violett of New Orleans. This marriage ended in divorce in 1931 after 10 years. She then married Nelson Doubleday, who succeeded his father as head of Doubleday & Company Inc. After her husband's death in 1949, Doubleday served on the board of directors until she moved to Hawaii in 1965.

Doubleday made, lifetime friends of many authors, among them Daphne du Maurier, Ilka Chase, Noel Coward, W. Somerset Maugham and Edna Ferber.

She ran and maintained a home for children of some English authors in Oyster Bay; LI., where she also had residence before moving to Honolulu.

She died in her reisdence at the Hotel Carlyle in Honolulu after a short illness. She was 79 years old.

Ellen Doubleday left her collection of Doubleday business and personal documents to Princeton University. The Ellen McCarter Doubleday Papers, circa 1930s-1978 contain business and social correspondence, documents by and from Doubleday authors, personal and family letters, and issues related to Doubleday estates.