Madame Wellington Koo (née Hui-lan Oei)







© National Portrait Gallery, London
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Madame Wellington Koo (née Hui-lan Oei)
by Bassano Ltd
bromide print, December 1943
7 5/8 in. x 5 5/8 in. (193 mm x 144 mm)
Purchased, 1996
Photographs Collection
NPG x83698
Sitterback to top
- Madame Wellington Koo (née Hui-lan Oei) (1889-1992), Former wife of Beauchamp Caulfield-Stoker, and later wife of Vi Kyuin Wellington Koo; daughter of Oei Tiong Ham (Oei Tyong Han). Sitter in 7 portraits.
Artistback to top
- Bassano Ltd (active 1901-1962), Photographers. Artist or producer associated with 42747 portraits.
Linked publicationsback to top
- Birkett, Dea; Morris, Jan (foreword), Off the Beaten Track: Three Centuries of Women Travellers, 2004 (accompanying the exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery from 7 July to 31 October 2004), p. 137
Events of 1943back to top
Current affairs
The War effort continues with women recruited to the Home Guard and Ernie Bevin introducing conscription of miners as coal output continues to flag.There is panic when a new anti aircraft weapon is heard for the first time in London and 173 people die in the crush to enter an air-raid shelter at Bethnal Green tube station.
Art and science
Barnes Wallis's bouncing bomb is used during Operation Chastise - the Dam busters Raid - to destroy three dams in the Ruhr area of Germany. The raid was considered a success, knocking out hydroelectric power, cutting off the water supply to industry and causing devastation through flooding. The operation also, however, cost the allies many lives, and the bouncing bomb was not used again.International
The invasion of Sicily is successful thanks to Operation Mincemeat, in which false documents were planted on the body of a dead airman to mislead Germany into thinking that the Allied target was Sardinia. The invasion led to the fall of Mussolini and Italy joining the Allies.42,000 German civilians are killed in a firestorm in Hamburg caused by the Allied bombing in Operation Gomorrah.
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