Wilhelmina Johnson (1895 - c.1976)

FATHER:	MOTHER:	SPOUSE:	OFFSPRING:
John Johnson (b.1857)	Maria Cottrell	William Ingram (b.1894)* Thomas (Tommy) Surtees * not married but was father of her eldest child	Frederick Johnson (b.1914) Thomas (Tommy) Surtees Jenny Surtees

BIRTH:	29 December 1895 - Tunstall, Sunderland
MARRIAGE:	No details
DEATH:	c.1976

KNOWN ADDRESSES:

55 Mary Street, Tunstall, Sunderland - 1895

BIOGRAPHY:

Wilhelmina was born on 29 December 1895. Her parents were John and Maria Johnson (formerly Cottrell). John was a miner in the local coal mine. She had a brother called Benny who lost a leg in the First World War. She may have had other siblings too. At nineteen years of age Wilhelmima gave birth to her eldest son, Frederick. She was not married at the time and she did not go on to marry the child's father, William Ingram. Frederick never had any contact with his father. As a child Frederick would carry Uncle Benny's wooden leg as they went to town on the bus to collect money left for his upkeep by his father. Approximately ten years after the birth of Frederick she married Tommy Surtees and they had two children (Tommy in 1924 and Jenny in 1926). Wilhelmina died in approximately 1976.

IMAGES: (click to enlarge)

Wilhelmina's birth certificate

Wilhelmina, aged 5 in the 1901 census

HISTORICAL EVENTS:

1895 - ROBERT ARTHUR TALBOT GASCOYNE-CECIL, MARQUIS OF SALISBURY (Conservative) becomes Prime Minister for the third time. 1899 – BRITAIN ENTERS THE BOER WAR in South Africa against Dutch and German forces. The war lasts until 1902. Popular opinion at home is against the war and the effect is that further colonial expansion is not favored. 1901 – EDWARD VII ASCENDS THE THRONE following the death of his mother, Queen Victoria, Britain’s longest serving monarch. Edward is the eldest son of Victoria and Albert and marks the start of the House of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha. 1902 – ARTHUR JAMES BALFOUR (Conservative) becomes Prime Minister. 1905 – SIR HENRY CAMPBELL-BANNERMAN (Liberal) becomes Prime Minister. 1908 – HERBERT HENRY ASQUITH (Liberal) becomes Prime Minister. 1910 – GEORGE V ASCENDS THE THRONE following the death of his father, Edward VII. George is Edward’s second son. 1914 – BILL GRANTING HOME RULE TO IRELAND BECOME LAW. 1914 – WORLD WAR I, the Great War, starts. 1916 – DAVID LLOYD GEORGE (Liberal) becomes Prime Minister. 1917 – GEORGE V CHANGES THE NAME OF THE ROYAL HOUSE FROM SAXE-COBURG-GOTHA TO WINDSOR. 1918 – UNIVERSAL SUFFRAGE ACT PASSED giving the vote to women over thirty years old. 1918 – WORLD WAR I ENDS. 1920 – GOVERNMENT OF IRELAND ACT PASSED, superseding an earlier unacceptable act. Six of the nine counties of Ulster are to be known as Northern Ireland while the other three and the provinces of Connaught, Munster and Leinster are to form the Irish Free State. Northern Ireland is given its own parliament and permitted to send representatives to Westminster while the Irish Free State is given a similar status to that of Britain’s commonwealth. The Irish Free State ceases to be part of the United Kingdom from early 1922. 1922 – ANDREW BONAR LAW (Conservative) becomes Prime Minister. 1923 – ALBERT EINSTEIN’S THEORY OF RELATIVITY discards the concept of absolute motion and instead treats only relative motion between two systems or frames of reference. One consequence of the theory is that space and time are no longer viewed as separate, independent entities but rather are seen to form a four-dimensional continuum called space-time. Einstein also sought unsuccessfully for many years to incorporate the theory into a unified field theory valid also for subatomic and electromagnetic phenomena. 1923 – STANLEY BALDWIN (Conservative) becomes Prime Minister. 1924 – JAMES MACDONALD (Labour) becomes Prime Minister. 1926 – DECLARATION MADE AT THE IMPERIAL CONFERENCE stating that all the nations of the British Commonwealth of Nations, notably UK, Canada, Australia, the Irish Free State, South Africa, New Zealand and Newfoundland, were equal in status, each independent of the others but uniting under a common crown. 1928 – UNIVERSAL SUFFRAGE FINALLY ACHIEVED IN 1928, when women were given exactly the same voting rights as males. 1929 – GREAT DEPRESSION EFFECTS BRITAIN after a long period of economic stagnation after the war. 1935 – STANLEY BALDWIN (Conservative) becomes Prime Minister. 1936 – EDWARD VIII ASCENDS THE THRONE following the death of his father George V. 1936 – EDWARD VIII ABDICATES THE THRONE TO MARRY MRS SIMPSON. Edward becomes the Duke of Windsor. 1936 – GEORGE VI ASCENDS THE THRONE following the abdication of his brother, Edward VIII. 1937 – ARTHUR NEVILLE CHAMBERLAIN (Conservative) becomes Prime Minister. 1939 – GERMANY INVADES POLAND AND GREAT BRITAIN ENTERS WORLD WAR II. 1940 – WINSTON CHURCHILL (Conservative) becomes Prime Minister. 1940 – BATTLE OF BRITAIN FOUGHT. 1941 – ATLANTIC CHARTER SIGNED OFF NEWFOUNDLAND whereby the United States gave “all aid short of war”. 1941 – JAPANESE ATTACK ON PEARL HARBOR precipitates American entry into the war. 1941 – BRITAIN LOSES MANY OF IT’S PACIFIC STRONGHOLDS TO THE JAPANESE, most notably Singapore, Burma, Malaya and the British Western Pacific Islands. 1942 – ANGLO-AMERICAN LANDINGS IN NORTHWEST AFRICA start to increase the pressure on German forces. Similar landings in Sicily in 1943 have the same affect. 1944 – D-DAY LANDINGS IN NORMANDY, FRANCE, pushes the Germans back. 1945 – WORLD WAR II ENDS as Germany surrenders in May 1945 and Japan in September 1945. 1945 – CLEMENT ATTLEE (Labour) becomes Prime Minister. 1945 – GREAT BRITIAN IS SEVERELY AFFECTED BY THE WAR. It has lost 360,000 servicemen, 60,000 civilians, 4.5 million dwellings and 3/5 of its merchant fleet. 1946 – NATIONAL HEALTH SERVICE ACT nationalizes hospitals and provides free medical and dental care for all. 1947 – INDIAN INDEPENDENCE IS GRANTED, sparking a religious war between Pakistan and India. 1949 – THE GOVERNMENT OF GREAT BRITAIN IS FORCED TO RADICALLY DE-VALUE THE POUND by decreasing its value against the US dollar from $4.05 to $2.80. This has the dramatic effect of stimulating exports (as UK goods are cheaper) and stifling imports (as overseas goods are more expensive). 1949 – IN THE HEIGHT OF THE COLD WAR, BRITAIN JOINS WITH THE UNITED STATES, FRANCE, ITALY AND EIGHT OTHER NATIONS TO FORM THE NORTH ATLANTIC TREATY ORGANIZATION (NATO), which provides for common defense in the event of Russian aggression. 1949 – THE IRISH FREE STATE SEVERS ALL COMMONWEALTH TIES WITH GREAT BRITAIN and becomes the Republic of Ireland. 1951 – WINSTON CHURCHILL (Conservative) becomes Prime Minister for the second time. 1952 – ELIZABETH II ASCENDS THE THRONE following the death of her father, George VI. 1955 – SIR ANTHONY EDEN (Conservative) becomes Prime Minister. 1956 – SUEZ CRISIS. Egypt, occupied by Britain since 1882, nationalizes the Suez Canal, hitherto controlled by the British, in response to an Anglo-American refusal to assist in the building of the Aswan Dam. The canal is vital to British shipping in providing a sea route to the oil of the Middle East and trade with India. British and French forces attempt to seize the canal but are halted abruptly when world opinion, and lack of US support, become apparent. 1957 – HAROLD MACMILLAN (Conservative) becomes Prime Minister. 1961 – GREAT BRITAIN APPLIES FOR MEMBERSHIP OF THE EUROPEAN COMMON MARKET. However, they are told they will have to cut trade ties with the commonwealth. Great Britain does not join. 1963 – SIR ALEC DOUGLAS-HOME (Conservative) becomes Prime Minister. 1964 – HAROLD WILSON (Labour) becomes Prime Minister. 1969 – MAN LANDS ON THE MOON. Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin walk on the moon on July 20th, 1969, the first time man has set foot on another planetary body. 1973 – GREAT BRITAIN ENTERS THE EUROPEAN ECONOMIC COMMUNITY after a poll of the population narrowly votes in favour.