Hetty King

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This article is about the British Music hall entertainer, and not about the unrelated character in the US television series Road to Avonlea, played by the actress Jackie Burroughs.. For other uses, see Hetty King (disambiguation).

Winifred Emms (1883 in Shoreditch, London - September 28, 1972), was an English entertainer who played on the Music Halls over a period of 70 years.

[edit] Biography

1907 sheet music cover

Winifred adopted the stage name Hetty King, when she first appeared on the stage, at the age of six with her father, William Emms (1856-1954), a comedian who used the stage name of Will King. By 1905, she was appearing in Music Halls, with her solo act, as a Male Impersonator, often dressed as a swell. Her career spanned both World Wars when she performed in the uniform of either a soldier or a sailor. She also played the "principal boy" in many pantomimes. She continued to entertain while she was in her seventies.

She was married to actor and writer Ernie Lotinga (aka Ernest) (1876-1951), born in Sunderland. Her husband was a music hall comedian and singer, as Dan Roe from 1898; who appeared in films in the 1920's and '30's, often as the comic character PC Jimmy Josser.

The family were not related to H. Vernon Watson (1886-1949), the music hall artist performing under the sobriquet Nosmo King.