John Theodore Hewitt was born at Windsor on 12 October 1868, the son of John Hewitt (1840-1874) and Alice Mary Hewitt (
née
Pasmore). The father had a coachbuilding business, which received most of the work from the Castle. He had previously been apprenticed to a hatter and hosier at Tonbridge and met his wife at meetings of the Plymouth Brethren in Windsor. John Hewitt had three children. The eldest died in infancy. John Theodore was the second and Alice Marian the third. John Hewitt was a studious man, who read his New Testament in Greek. He was, however, a victim of tuberculosis and died at the early age of 34. Shortly afterwards his widow purchased the good-will of a small private school for girls and little boys at Newbury. This was a success. She found time to attend classes in chemistry and electricity and magnetism given in Newbury by a German (titular Professor) Hoffert and took John Theodore, then eleven years old, with her. The boy’s interest was aroused and he began to do experiments at home. In 1881 Mrs Hewitt was appointed Headmistress of the Girls’ College and High School at Southampton and succeeded in persuading T. W. Shore, the Principal of the Hartley Institute, to admit her young son, John Theodore, who as a result received instruction in mathematics, classics, machine drawing and chemistry. One of his fellow students was W. R. Bower (later Head of the Physics Department at Huddersfield Technical College) and another was F. W. Lanchester, later of aerodynamic and motor-car fame. The chemistry teaching was in the hands of James Brierley, the Public Analyst for Southampton. At this period Hewitt and Bower became walking enthusiasts: they apparently thought nothing of a day’s walk of thirty or forty miles. Walking remained one of Hewitt’s favourite pastimes.
