Let me introduce you to Wilhelmina. She’s been part of my family now for about twenty five years, although strictly speaking, I’m part of her family.
My memory is hazy, but I think she came into my possession in the mid eighties when my father died and my mother sold her house in West London and downsized. Exactly where she was before this is a mystery, or how my part of the family came to own this relic is another. I suspect she was pressed between the pages of a huge multi-volume history of the First World War, sadly incomplete so worthless. My father would pore over the pages for ages. I browsed through it a couple of times. It was full of paintings of idealised cavalry charges against the Hun, so was probably largely fiction, as most histories inevitably are.
Wilhelmina is a bit tatty these days, she’s looking a bit moth eaten, but then I reckon she must be at least 120 years old. Once she came into our possession she was packed away in a cupboard or drawer and quietly forgotten, as she dutifully and mutely accompanied us as we relocated several times.
About five years ago I was paying an infrequent visit to my aunt and uncle in Camborne, and the subject of our ancestors arose. I mentioned Wilhelmina and they were surprised I had her. They were unaware of her existence. They did, however, own the Family Bible and they kindly allowed me to photocopy the entries in the front of the bible. I now knew her full name which was Anna Henrietta Wilhelmina Frederika Vollmer and she was born in Prussia in 1840.
So what was she doing in Cornwall in 1863, aside from getting married to one James Henry Hayes also aged 23? Family tradition tells us that she was a governess to the Harvey family’s children. But why Wilhelmina? And why move from Prussia to be a nanny?
I could find no more, so Wilhelmina went back into storage.
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