Alice Catherine "Lal" JOHNSON [635]

   Cause of her death was hypostatic pneumonia, heart failure, senility.

  General Notes:

Alice and her family lived for many years at 18 Whites Line, Lower Hutt.

The Evening Post 10 July 1944
On July 9 1944 at Wellington Alice Catherine widow of the late T.L.Barker in her 81st year.
The friends of the late Alice catherine Barker, late of 18 Whites Line, Lower Hutt are invited to attend her Funeral Service which will commence at 2pm in the crematorium Karori, Tomorrow (Tuesday) July 11 1944. E.Morris Jun Ltd.

The Evening Post, 18 Aug 1944, Pge 8 - The late Mrs T.L.Barker
The death occurred recently of Mrs Alice Catherine Barker, an early resident of Wellington. Mrs Barker was in her 81st year. She was born in 1864 and arrived at Wellington from England with her parents by the sailing ship 'Wild Duck' in 1866. She was married in 1885 to the late Mr T.L.Barker of the Government Life Insurance Department, and had resided in Lower Hutt for the past 35 years. Possessing a bright and happy personality, Mrs Barker had a large circle of friends. Of a family of ten, seven are still living.

Karori Cemetery Ref: 6/A/8/4
Ref: C McLennan 2013

Reminiscences of Alice (Lal) Catherine Johnson.
By her grandaughter Christine Bull (Cole-Catley)
Alice (whom I called Alice, extraordinary for those days) was the grandmother I really loved. To me she seemed a never-ending font of love and happiness and optimism, the latter a quality she must surely have often needed. Ten children . . . . . the pain of losing two to tuberculosis . . . . . an irascible husband.
Alice (arriving from England) was carried ashore from a sailing ship off Petone Beach when she three. She married Thomas Barker in 1885. I think the family settled in Newtown until Tom, a gardening and botany fanatic, insisted they uproot and move to 18 Whites Line, Lower Hutt, where there was great soil for a big garden. (And a bore, a kind of well, covered, but a source of alarm as I had been warned NEVER to go near it.)
Alice seemed always to be singing, folk songs - Over the Sea to Skye was a favourite -- and old country music, Gilbert & Sullivan and musical comedy. She was one of the few local girls among those auditioned who was chosen to join the D'Oyley Carte G&S Company, when it visited Wellington, to augment the travelling chorus and cast of the G&S opera, Patience. We'd gather round the piano, or her chair or bed, and sing.
Alice was the most generous of people. If someone admired something she was wearing, a blouse, say, she'd whip it off. "It would look much better on you," she'd say, insisting it be accepted. She'd give or share anything, it seemed to me.
Sibling Lil, who called Alice Lal, was competitive. "My washing on the line by 8am - and such a beautiful colour, Lal!" No danger of that with Lal. She was also congenitally untidy. There were always three clothes baskets. One for dirty clothes, one for clean clothes, one for clothes not yet ironed . . . . . Not to mention the clothes scattered around.
Alice, quite short but very elegant, stood ramrod straight, except that she would quickly unbend to hug family and friends. She was always charmingly and elegantly dressed, on very little money too, (ten children).
She'd sometimes seem to forget which of her children she was talking to, and would run down the list as she called out, "Lulu! Doris! Eileen!" One of Alice's favourite words was the optimistic 'just'. "Just sweep down the stairs for me, darling," "Just make a pudding for your father." And my all-time favourite from such stories, as told by my mother, Eina (Eileen): "Just run on ahead, dear, and tell the bus driver Mother's coming!" Oh the shame and embarrassment for my poor mother, ten or twelve years old, as the bus driver and the passengers stared and waited until Alice bustled up, all smiles and charm.
When ever I think of this grandmother I smile.

  Other Records

1. Alice Catherine Johnson: Various images.
Alice's birth certificate; St George in the East London Stepney; the family at the beach (Wellington ?); Alice with her youngest girls Marjorie & Beryl.

2. The Barker Family: At the beach.
Barker family at beach. Right to Left at back: Doris, John, ? . Middle:Beryl, Alice C, Eileen, Bet, Brian, ?. Front: Marjorie.

3. The Barker Family, 1912.
L To R
Front Basil Betty Marjorie
Centre Eileen, Thomas snr Beryl, Alice, Louisa
Back Thomas jnr, Doris, Peter, Brian.

Lal married Thomas Lugg Mankey BARKER [634] [MRIN: 190], son of Thomas Lugg BARKER [638] and Louisa MANKEY [639], on 21 Apr 1885 in Wellington NZ. (Thomas Lugg Mankey BARKER [634] was born on 29 Aug 1859 in Newtown Geelong Aust, died on 11 May 1942 in Otaki Hospital N Z and was cremated on 13 May 1942 in Karori Cemetery Wellington.)