Alice Mary Wheatland (1880-1958).
My great-grand aunt.
Alice Mary Wheatland was born on 7 December 1880 in Croydon, Surrey, to parents John Wheatland and Mary Coughlan. She was baptised on 31 January 1881 at St Peter’s Church in the town and grew up among her family in Selsdon Road.
In 1888 and 1890 Alice was recorded attending Brighton Road Junior School, South Croydon, when the family’s address was given as 6 and then 95 Sussex Road. She was missing from the 1891 and 1901 censuses but cropped up as a domestic servant living at 12 Northampton Road, Addiscombe, Surrey, in 1911. In March 1913 she married William Barker in Croydon. He hailed from Battersea in Surrey, born on 21 March 1888, worked as a plumber’s mate but then went on to serve in the Royal Navy from 1906 as a stoker on a variety of ships. The 1911 census recorded him on board HMS Swale, a torpedo boat destroyer that was moored at Grimsby at the time. Not long after he was transferred to the Reserve but on the outbreak of the First World War he was recalled to serve on HMS Hawke, one of the older vessels in the fleet having been launched in 1891.
Tragedy struck just months after, on 15 October 1914, when the Hawke was destroyed and William killed. That month the Hawke, which had been one of a number of ships deployed to blockade the seas between Shetland and Norway, joined the the 10th Cruiser Squadron further south in the North Sea in order to prevent German warships from attacking a troop convoy from Canada. The Rear Admiral in charge of the Hawke’s fleet had ordered his vessels to stay well apart and to continually alter course in order to avoid enemy submarines that were known to be active in the area. On 15 October, they were patrolling off Aberdeen when the Hawke positioned to pick up mail from sister ship Endymion. She then sailed back to her station but without the zig-zagging the Rear Admiral had insisted upon. She was out of sight of the rest of the ships when a single torpedo from the German submarine U-9 struck her. The Hawke quickly capsized. One of the survivors said: “We were struck right amidships between the two funnels quite close to one of the magazines. All hands were on deck, and it was a terrible explosion. The vessel immediately took a heavy list to starboard. I have never been on a ship so well equipped with life saving apparatus, but the way the vessel heeled over made it almost impossible to get the boats out. The boat in which I was saved had a narrow escape from being taken down with the suction.”
Only 70 men survived, 524 died. William’s body was never recovered but his name lives on in a memorial to stokers at Chatham Naval Dockyard, listed as a Stoker 1st Class. Alice would not be alone in losing a husband to war so early in her marriage but one can barely imagine the pain she must’ve endured, especially at having no body to bury. In addition, she was bringing up their child William, born in 1913, at her home at 95 Milton Road, Croydon, and was pregnant.
Alice married for a second time on 25 November 1917, at St James’s Church, Croydon. Her new husband was William Gomm, who’d been born in High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, on 26 April 1886. He was also a sailor, an able seaman in the Royal Navy. He joined the service in 1904 and served through until 1923 as an able seaman and then a leading seaman. For much of the First World War he was aboard the battleship HMS Prince of Wales, which saw service in the Channel, the Mediterranean and the Adriatic, briefly supporting the Dardanelles Campaign. He was promoted to Acting Petty Officer in 1923 and then to Petty Officer in 1925. At this point in his naval career he was serving in shore establishments, from 1925 at HMS Vernon in Portsmouth. This base was responsible for the development of various aspects of maritime warfare including mines and torpedoes. William also saw service in the Second World War, again serving as a Petty Officer at various shore establishments such as HMS Ganges and HMS Royal Arthur. He was invalided out of the service in 1944.
Alice was living at home with her children at St Peter’s Road in Croydon at the time of the 1939 Register.
Alice died on 4 February 1958 in hospital. The Croydon Advertiser of 7 February 1958 reported on an inquest, which heard that she had fallen down stairs at home in St Peter’s Road two weeks earlier, suffering fractures to an arm and a leg. William, described as a retired airport porter, said that his wife had been suffering with back trouble for a long time.
William’s death was registered in Croydon in 1967.
Alice’s children with William Barker were:
- William Barker (1913-1989). Born on 1 April 1913 in Croydon, he was working as a lorry driver and living at home with his mother in St Peter’s Road, Croydon, at the time of the 1939 Register. He went on to serve as a Marine in the Second World War (Croydon Times 24 March 1945). He married Ethel Bradford in 1955 and his death was registered in Croydon in 1989.
- Henry John Barker (1915-1997). Born on 19 January 1915 in Croydon, he would never know his father. Henry was described as an unemployed window cleaner in the 1939 Register, when he was living with his mother. He never married and died in Kent in 1997.
Alice’s child with William Gomm was:
- Muriel Kathleen Gomm (1920-1998). Born on 7 January 1920 in Croydon, Surrey, Muriel was working as a buffet attendant and living at home in St Peter’s Road, Croydon, at the time of the 1939 Register. She married Maurice Harvey in the town in 1941 and together they had children. She died in Kent in 1998.
Sources: Birth, marriage, death and burial records including civil registrations from the General Register Office, census returns and other records at Ancestry.co.uk and Findmypast.co.uk.
Family memories.
RootsChat discussion.
The Western Front Association.
Naval records at National Archives.
British Newspaper Archive (titles in text).
Alice married William Gomm and she had another child, Patricia Elizabeth Gomm was the name.she wanted but she was called Muriel Kathleen Gomm. Her nickname was Peg or Peggy, the initials of the original name. She married Maurice Harvey and had 6 children, 1 of them being me, David. I have vague memories of nanny Alice except my mum Peggy said I was nanny’s little bugger. I still have grandads oilskin of his service record somewhere.
Of Alice’s 2 sons, my uncle Billy Barker was married to my Aunty Ethel, their son was called Keith. Uncle Henry lived with my mum and dad his whole life, never marrying, uncle Bill came round once a month to keep a check on my mum and his brother.