Hi All, I have always known that the above (and his brother George) were evacuated to my great aunt Emily Holland in Lancing, Sussex from their London home, at the beginning of WWII. I had thought that it was just a random evacuation until someone pointed out to me this morning that Emily's mother Sarah's maiden name was Cooper and perhaps therefore it was not so random.
Thought I would spend a bit of time researching 'our henery' this afternoon but have not got very far. I have established that Henry and twin brother George were born on 3 May 1934 to Henry William Cooper and Lily Cooper (née Nutkins) in Lambeth and there was an older brother Bernard born 1930 in Camberwell.
William Henry Cooper married Lily Nutkins on 8 May 1927 at St. John the Evangelist, Southwark stating on the certificate that he was a 25 year old labourer, therefore b.c. 1902 and that Lily was a 21 year old Hosemaker, therefore b.c 1906. His father is recorded as George Cooper (deceased), a furniture polisher and hers as Henry Harry Nutkins a labourer. I don't need to know anything more about Lily's family as if there is any connection it is through the Cooper line.
Here I am stuck though, I cannot seem to go any further back with William Henry or his supposed father George. An obituary at the time of Sir Henry Cooper's death indicated that his father William Henry (known as Henry I think) was in the Royal Artillery from 1919 and an online tree on Ancestry shows William Henry's parents as Charles Henry Cooper and Isabella Leveridge which doesn't agree with William Henry's father being George.
Emily's mother Sarah Cooper's ancestry is firmly established in Hampshire back to the 1770's so I would expect to find one of Sir Henry's ancestors emanating from Hampshire although of course, some of the Cooper siblings did move away from this part of the country.
I don't need any help with Sarah Cooper (1854-1935) as this is my well-researched direct line but any info concerning Sir Henry Cooper's ancestry would be most welcome.
Thanks, Pheno
