Tributes to city legend who just loved to dance and make folk smile
‘PRETTY’ WAS WELL KNOWN AS A HAPPY CHARACTER
TRIBUTES have been paid to Nottingham’s dancing pensioner Albert Johnson, who was known for putting smiles on people’s faces.
Known to his friends as Pretty, Albert died aged 93 at Queen’s Medical Centre on Friday, March 22.
His friend and carer, Betty Scott, hopes people will remember him for being the “happy” character that he was. Betty, who works as a carer at Nottingham City Hospital, said Albert had been living with her due to not having any family of his own.
She said: “He lived with us for years, he was like part of the family, he was like a dad to me. My kids and my grandkids, they looked at him like a grandad.”
The 61-year-old added: “He was a happy person, he loved to dance and even though he couldn’t move his feet too well he would move his hands and shoulders. He was happy, he was so, so happy.”
Albert moved to the UK in the 1950s from Jamaica as part of the Windrush Generation, and does not have any known relatives, although it was thought that he may have had a sister still in Jamaica. In 2020, Betty helped organise a fundraiser to help Albert go back to Jamaica to try to find any long lost family members. Sadly this was made difficult by the pandemic and he never made it.
Betty said: “He wasn’t able to go to Jamaica because Covid came and everything was on pause and then when we did get the money for him to go he was too
weak and he wasn’t well and I was afraid to take him on the flight.
“I was trying to find a cruise that was leaving for Jamaica as he would be in the open sea rather than in an enclosed space, but we couldn’t find one at the time, but we were still in the process of looking.”
Although Albert could not return to Jamaica, Betty took him on a number of trips in the UK, together with her partner, Adrian Smalley, who also died last week.
Betty said that the three of them had been on trips to Skegness and that when they went to Liverpool it was Adrian who pushed Albert’s wheelchair.
They were close friends and Adrian helped her care for Albert at home.
Adrian passed away on Wednesday,
March 20, after he was taken to Lincoln Hospital on Saturday, March 16, when he collapsed at work and was found to have suffered a bleed to the brain.
As Albert needed constant support due to being unwell himself, he went into Queen’s Medical Centre while Betty dealt with things. She called him regularly, saying he remained in good spirits, but she did not tell him when Adrian died.
Sadly, on March 22 Betty was informed that Albert had passed away in his sleep.
She said: “It was always me, him and my partner and both of them are now gone.
“He was 93, he would have been 94 on April 4.”
Albert was well loved by the community, and Betty is currently planning funerals for both him and Adrian.
However, she is considering starting a fundraiser for Albert’s funeral due to his popularity and so many people wanting to attend, as she is concerned about the financial pressures of organising both funerals.
She added: “My head is not in the right place because I have Adrian’s funeral to sort too. Albert was a happy person, and the good thing is that he was well looked after and happy.”