Civilian Internees - Messages Page

AsianPages
WWII Civilian Internees of the Japanese in Singapore:
Messages 2001 | 2000 | 1999 | 1997-8
NOTES: My site about Civilian Internees of the Japanese in Singapore during WWII has prompted a number of messages which would have overwhelmed it, so I have created this page especially for them. If you do not want your e-mail to appear here, please tell me when you write - Alex Glendinning - glen@itl.net

December 2nd: From Ann Dickman
I am seeking information about Eric E.F.Pretty who was interned in Changi during WWII. He played golf and ran a rubber plantation before the war. Can anyone help? Reply.

December 2nd: From Muldoon McMahon
Can anyone confirm knowledge of Thomas Christopher Ryan in Changi throughout the WWII? He originally ran away to sea from Liverpool as a teenager. His ship was torpedoed in the Malacca Straits and he spent most of his time helping in the Hospital helping the Medics from Singapore University. The skills attained stood him in good stead when he eventually qualified as a doctor at University of Liverpool. Later moving to the RAN after GP practice in Cheshire.He died in South Africa but his widow (in PerthW.A.) would like to know if any of his contacts are still alive.

November 26th: From Eunice Robertson
My Aunt and Uncle were both interned in Changi by the Japanese but we don't really know much about where they were staying at the time of capture. Their names were Jack and Kate Greig, he was a marine Engineer and Kate was in nursing. They got married out in Singapore in 1936 .After the war they returned home to Scotland for 3 months leave then went back over till they retired in 1960. Jack died in 1967 but Kate is still living.They lived in various places, Ipoh, Penang,K Lumpa, Johore and Kuala Trenganu. Does anyone remember them at all? If so I'd be glad to hear about it. Kate very rarely spoke of their internment but lost a lot to the Japs. Can anyone give me info on release dates. We still have the post cards sent home from them in Changi via Red Cross.

November 26th: From Jonathan Silk
I have just been having a look at your fascinating website on Johor Bahru and feel absolutely certain that our grandfather's would have known each other. My maternal grandfather's name was Robert Eves, head of the Public Works Department in Johore, and a friend and golfing partner of the Sultan, Ibrahim. Reply

Robert Eves was a native of Scarborough, and came from several generations of fishermen from the town. He was born in 1880, served as an army officer, in a transport and mechanical unit, in the Salonika campaign in WW1, and returned to Johore at the war's end, initially as a marine engineer but was listed a few years later as heading the P.W.D.. He and my grandmother Christina (known there as Eve1901-1994) were in Singapore upon the arrival of the Prince of Wales and Repulse and she was put on the Empress of Japan troop and refugee ship, which I think left on 31st Jan 1942. The Commonwealth and War Graves Commission have a date of death for a civilian named R.Eves of 13th February 1942, and I have asked them recently to confirm this as my grandfather, ie. specific to Singapore.
I think you will agree that this ties in with your grandfather's story and I would love to have any more information you can provide. I regret I have no photos from the time, and only recently acquired a photo of my grandfather from the National Archives of Malaysia, as reproduced from a "Who's Who of Malaya" dated 1925.

November 26th: From Glyn Hezakiah
I read with interest your pages on Singapore during WW2. My grandparents James and Leonie Moore together with their daughters Molly and Marguerite were civillian internees in Changi. I see you mention your father and Johore. My grandfather built the Johore Technical School together with his students and was the first headmaster. This was back in the 1920-1930s. He was, together with a chinese chap by the name of Dr Cheah the fouding member of the original Singapore Island Golf Club.They were great pals of the then Sultan of Johore and another relative trained the Sultans horses in Kedah from memory. How I wished I listened to his stories more intently back then.

November 26th: From Colin Jarvis
Henry Charles Ridsdale my great grandfather lived and worked in Singapore during the early 1930s, as a clerk of works during the building of the Reservoir at Fort Canning. He married at Batu-Gajah to Edith McClelland who was Eurasian, this we understand did not go down well with the other Britons there, they had children. I know their names but only know about my grandmother and her brother. Edward Ridsdale born in 1914 in Batu-gajah, he went to school at the Scottish Ministry and served with the RASC once captured he was sent to Changi, then on up to POW camps in Burma. After he was released and he somehow found found himself on active service in Java! till he was demobbed, he traveled to England on the Capetown Castle taking 24 days. My grandmother Winifred Ridsdale was born in Karla Lumpa in 1918, she attended Raffles Girls School then worked at the Queen Alexander Hospital. Winnie met my grandfather William Ashe who was serving in the RASC, they married at Tanglin Garrison in 1941. He managed to get Winnie on the SS Dutchess of Bedford which was torpedoed as it left Singapore harbour. The ship waited 3 days before leaving again, its thought she was the last ship to leave and make it safely out. It would be four years till she saw her husband and he his son, he didn`t know was born. Meanwhile Edward her brother and William were POW`s in the same camps. Henry Ridsdale was a air raid warden and died when a bomb went off in the street, his wife Edith McClelland died of starvation having been left on her own when Henry died. I am not sure if the other children were interned or not. If anyone knows more about this family or any of the places mentioned above I would be very interested. I have a photo of some people who worked at Fort Canning along with Henry Ridsdale in the 1930s, if this is of any interest.

November 26th: From Linda Rae
I too have found this web site very helpful and have been helped further by one of your contributors. This has encouraged me to see if anyone else out there has any more useful information for me. I am trying to find out about my father's parents. My father is still alive (born 1919) but has only hazy memories and family myths about what happened. My father was born in Singapore. His mother, Janet Dunnett Campbell was born in Penang probably about 1891. However he has no idea why her parents were out there. They were of Scottish origin. She met my grandfather out there and married him. My grandfather was a master mariner called David Straine Harvey and I know something of him. He was born in Edinburgh in about 1878 and went to sea at the age of 15. He later worked for the Straits Steamship Company and captained the Poh Ann and the Darvel. I borrowed a copy of Tregonning's History of the company and it is tantalising in its detail. I was brought up to believe that something pretty awful happened when he captained the Darvel and this led the family to return to Edinburgh leaving him behind. He died at Penang General Hospital in 1942. He was a patient in the hospital before the Japanese invaded and they left him in peace and he died shortly after. Tregonning's book talks about a legendary accident when the Darvel was steered onto and struck a sandbank off Sandakan. I am sure this must have been my grandfather. If anyone has any more information I would be grateful if they could let me know.

September 14th - from Donna L. Boutelle
I have been collecting books, manuscripts and materials about the internment of Americans, British and Dutch civilians and POWs for about the last ten years. I am particularly interested in getting a copy of Guy Heriot's Changi Interlude: Leaves from the Diary of a Fourth Class Internee.

September 14th - from Christina Clarke
My grandfather Henry Pallister Clarke was (I believe) with the Governors staff in Singapore in 1941, although I am unsure of his position exactly. My father (David Trevor -- who is also dead now), and his sister Hilary were evacuated from Singapore in January '42 at the ages of approximately 14 and 12 respectively. I remember my father telling me of being put on the passenger liner and my grandmother crying as she let them go. He told me the ship immediately before theirs was sunk. They landed in Australia. I believe the family also lived in Penang area before the war. My grandfather was take prisoner by the Japanese, and survived the war. My grandmother made it to Simla in northern India, and was friendly with a family by the name of Richardson, and in '44 was reunited with her children there. I have several photographs of this time and place, although unfortunately only one of Singapore.

The family was eventually reunited in England after the war. I believe my grandmother dictated recollections of this time before she died, and I am trying to locate a copy. I am very interested to find out how my grandmother made it to Simla, since I know she was not on the ship with my father and his sister, and also to find out any more details about the children's evacuation. I know it was one of the last civilian ships to leave, but I do not have a name.

August 13th - from Pamela Cohen

I am a university student in Australia looking to do a thesis on the Changi Women. In particular the Changi Quilts and other material evidence that may be seen as a way of reading the experience of the women. I have access to private records from the Australian War Memorial which are very helpful but have no access to the British woman's experience, or indeed that of the New Zealand and Dutch women who were interned there. Any info on diaries available in Britian would be very much appreciated.

From Colin Forster
Christopher William George BOTLY. I have a connection with one of my relatives who was killed in Singapore in 1942. I have a copy of a letter written by a commanding officer who outlines how he died and where he was buried and I have found him on CWG site in Singapore. I know he was 58 when he died and that he was one of the original members of the Penang Local Defence Corps.

From Lynne Copping
A friend of mine was a 17 year old boy when he was evacuated from Singapore on 31/12/41 on the Dutch ship Marnix van St Aldegonde with his mother, brother & sister. His name is Bob Pattemore. He lived (as I did in 58-61 & 63-66) on the small island of Pulau Brani, situated in the harbour, next to the slightly larger island of Blakang Mati. Would you be able to include these details on your web site, please. He does not have a computer, so replies will have to be to my address.

From Peter Hammett
Earlier this year I visited the Chappel while in Singapore, and on display there was a small glass covered tapistry/cross stitch each small panel made by one of the ladies who where interned and signed. One name was Hammett .....
Does anyone know who she was?

From Neil Kitching May 21st 2000
Life and Death in Changi: The Diary of Thomas Kitching who died in Japanese Hands in Singapore in 1944
My father published my grandfather's diary in 1998 and has recently reprinted. It is a detailed and very interesting account of the fall of Singapore and the life of the civilians up to April 1944 when he died. The book contains a useful index of all the people mentioned in it.

Copies are available from Brian Kitching, 20 Beechgrove Drive, Perth, PH1 1JA, United Kingdom for £9.90 plus £2 post and packing. The £2 covers p&p within the UK or by seamail (eg 3 months to Australia). Better to add £5 for overseas and the book can be sent by airmail. If people request a book from abroad they should request a sterling bankers draft from their bank.

From Brian Miller of Canberra, Australia May 3rd 2000

I was born in Penang in 1935 and have a very fragmentary recollection of that period. My father John Edward (Jack) Miller was interned in (I believe) Changi. He was a sanitary officer with the Penang Municipality and also served in the Penang Volunteers. My mother (Connie), sister and I were evacuated on the SS Nellore in December 1941 and spent the remaining war years in Perth, W. Australia. During the period of the evacuation, my mother kept a diary of events which is very interesting and not a little emotional. I recall that during our time in Perth we lived with two other families who had also been evacuated from Penang (Eva Mankin and her children John and Yvonne and Kitty Colebeck).

After the war my family were reunited in England but I never had the opportunity to learn much of my father's experiences during the war. He was very reticent on the matter and, as they returned to Penang leaving me with relatives to conclude my schooling at Felixstowe, I saw little of them during the rest of my childhood. I subsequently married and brought my family to Australia. It would be great to be able to learn more of my father's internment and to pick up on some threads of our family history for that period through your initiative with this site.

From Jonathan Moffatt March 22nd 2000
I am compiling a register of British Malayans 1941-5. The famous Red Book directory of planters and miners still eludes me so if anyone out there has a copy I'd love to arrange a photocopy. However I did find an interesting 1940 Who's Who of British Malaya with about 300 entries in Singapore National Library.

I would be happy to hear from any ex-Malayan or their families. Also interested if anyone knows anything about a Mr Coffey who was a tin miner in the Kuala Kangsar area 1941 or a Lt Gregson of the Selangor FMSVF who escaped
to India with Colonel Cummings VC in 2.42.

From Joe Joseph March 22nd 2000
I was born in Singapore in 1939 and being Jewish was interned with my family in Sime Road. Being a child I was with my mother in the women's huts. Unfortunately (or should it be fortunately ?) I have the vaguest recollection of life in the camp except Sundays when the women and men were allowed to meet in the orchard and a diet of ubi kayu and raw papayas.

I have an uncle who was in the men's hut called Aldgate. He says the camp had a concrete platform outside it and the internees used to play cards and mahjong on it. He also mentions a tunnel that was being built by the internees for the express purpose of blowing everyone up before the war ended.

From Mike Longyear March 22nd 2000
I am transposing a small diary of a POW Alec Howard who worked with the Colonial Office but was captured as a volunteer in the Hong Kong Defence Force. Was eventually shipped to Japan and worked in the Tatayama Heavy Industry Co. until released by Americans. Contains contents of the speech of the SOB (Fl.Lt W Riley) on celebration of peace. Various poems by 2nd Lt Macgregor.
From DM Riley March 22nd 2000
I have some family connections with Singapore - in particular the RILEY family (of Riley & Hargreaves, shipbuilders), Edward John WELLS, the Director of the Gas Company, and Edmund SCOTT-RUSSELL, who worked for John Little & Co. I also have 2 volumes of '100 years of Singapore' by Walter Makepeace, Dr. Gilbert Brooke & Roland St.J.Braddell. I would be very happy to search what sources I have if anyone needs information.

January 6th 2000 from Lesley Bousbaine

My grandparents lived in Singapore for some years up to 1942 and my uncle was born in Johore Bahru, Malaya in 1939. However my grandmother had returned to Scotland before mid 1942 when my mother was born. My grandfather was Alexander Colin Stewart, known as Colin, my grandmother's name is Gladys and my uncle, Ian. I don't know much about my grandfather, or about my grandparents' life in Singapore. If their names mean anything to anybody, please get in touch.

In December 1942 my grandfather, a Civil Engineer, was returning to the UK from Singapore on board the MV Henry Stanley when the ship was sunk by a u-boat off the Azores, killing all on board except the captain who was taken prisoner. If Singapore fell to the Japanese in February 1942, then why was my grandfather able to travel back to the UK in December?

I'm also starting to track my grandfather's journey back to the UK. Did he travel all the way on the Henry Stanley? If anybody can tell me about the journey between Singapore and the UK, however general, then I would like to hear from you.

January 6th 2000 from Peter W Stubbs

Changi Prison Museum
You may be interested to learn that the Changi Prison Museum is on the move. The land on which the museum and replica chapel are is wanted by the prison authorities. As a result of this, the museum and chapel are being moved. I do not know exactly where they are going yet, but it is closer to Changi itself. I have been told that in the new museum will be full size copies of Stanley Warren's Changi Murals. I wonder if this is because the home of the murals is due for demolition as part of the redevelopment of the old Changi Camp. There are moves afoot to preserve the Murals somehow,so perhaps the copies are some sort of insurance.
Comments/Corrections/Additions: glen@itl.net
Alex Glendinning, 1 Tara Heights, New St John's Road, St Helier, Jersey JE2 3LE, UK

Go back to Civilian Internees of the Japanese in Singapore during WWII | The British in Singapore and Malaya | Main Links at Asian Intro Page | Alex Glendinning's Home Page