Brandram was born Rosina Moult in Southwark, London.Wilson, F. W. "Brandram, Rosina", Oxford Music Online (subscription required), accessed 1 January 2010 She was the elder child and only daughter of William Moult and his partner (later wife), Sarah Gosling."Rosina Moult (alias Brandram)", Ancestry UK. Retrieved 30 July 2021 By her own account, she was educated at a boarding school in Cricklewood, North London, and later at Le Havre in Normandy.Edwards, G. S. "Concerning Rosina Brandram", The Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News, 5 March 1904, pp. 24–25 She recalled being taken to Italy by her parents and being introduced to Gaetano Nava, a singing teacher whose pupils had included Charles Santley. After that she studied in London with Frank Romer. She later said that at the time she had no thought of taking up singing as a career, but she had, in the words of one obituarist, "a very thorough musical education in Italy and England".The Manchester Guardian, obituary, 2 March 1907, p. 6 In 1864, aged 19, she married Champnays Charles Butcher, an auctioneer. By the 1880s they were living apart; he died in 1884 aged 49. They had no children."Champnays Charles Butcher", Ancestry UK. Retrieved 30 July 2021
