Brenda recalled that awful night for the benefit of the court, saying that her raving father had repeatedly shouted, ‘I’ll get seven years for this!’ and that at one point he had stood at the bottom of the stairs wielding a chair and threatening to smash anyone who came near him. The trigger to a very desperate struggle between father and daughter came when, after he had ordered all the children to bed he raised an arm to his wife. This was too much for Brenda to tolerate; she grappled with him and they had a rough fight, Brenda biting his arm in response to him thumping her in the eye. She threw things at him as he raged and swore.

After being holed up in the room, Brenda heard Johnson yell that the house was on fire. He had made a trail of papers and comics all the way upstairs and a breeze had caused the curtains to blaze. Brenda dashed out, still showing plenty of zest for a confrontation with the drunken Johnson, and she put out some of the fire, which was not accelerating in effect. She said that she ‘stamped on the carpets and fetched water to put on the flames around the window-frame and curtains.’ Mrs Johnson ran to bring the fire brigade.

Brenda testified that her father had started a fire in her bedroom as well; she found a pile of blankets and matches there, and many had been burned and were smouldering. Burned matchsticks and papers were strewn everywhere. The fire officer who came and dealt with the blaze, Nathaniel Edmonds, said that when he arrived he found heaps of burned blankets, papers and clothing on the stairs. Some of these things had been completely destroyed.

When the police arrived, led by D S Ferriby, the husband and wife were now standing around, Johnson muttering about his seven-year sentence, and his wife pointing at him, stunned with disbelief, saying, ‘He set the house on fire.’ Ferriby confirmed that Johnson said he was responsible for the blaze. The statement Johnson eventually gave police while under arrest in Scunthorpe was that he had only meant to frighten the family. ‘I wanted more or less to cause smoke … I was going to smother it out again but there seemed to be a draught which set the curtains on fire.’

DI Cottingham tried to prevent bail but it was nevertheless awarded. Prison did indeed await Johnson. The hapless, inept man with very little sense of reality could only say, ‘This is through having a drink. I never thought it would flame up like this.’

It has to be brave Brenda Johnson who comes out of this as a most remarkable young woman; she took on the responsibility for the imminent distaster, and when she had no choice, she even engaged in what can only be called a ‘dogfight’ to overcome a man in a state of disregard and rage. The night had started with Brenda and her mother simply lying in bed, fearful of the man shouting downstairs, and had ended with a situation very close to total ruin of the home – and definitely the destruction of a marriage.