Burma refugee letters.

I have recently acquired a large amount of letters sent between a young women and her British officer fiance. At the outbreak of war the young lady was living in Maymyo where her father worked for the Burma Posts and Telegraphs. Her fiance was serving with the Indian Army Ordnance Corps attached to the 2nd Burma Division. The young lady was not flown out of northern Burma with the officer's wives, who were mainly from the King's Own Yorkshire Light Infantry. The young lady trekked out with her mother and brothers and sisters and was resettled at Clifden in the Murree Hills with her family and other wives. The officer travelled to India the hard way and was later reunited with his fiancé.

Whilst many of the letters comprise a lot of romantic chit chat, most of which is unsuitable for publication on a family website, there are some useful insights into the resettlement in India of British refugees from Burma. Quite a lot is everyday stuff concerning housing, money and lost relatives but there are a few things that can be verified from other records.

One in particular has puzzled me as it may be hearsay, as the casualty lists give an alternative outcome.

Letter 22/7/1942.

I received another letter from Reenie last evening and she happened to mention that poor Ken Salmon is not dead but very much alive; but is completely useless as he has lost both his legs, and I don’t know what else. Poor, poor Ken. My heart goes out to him. I like him very much. I think he is in Simla. Write to him darling.

The casualty list identifies Ken Salmon as 5182237 T/Sub. Conductor K.C. Salmon of the 1st battalion Gloucestershire Regiment, who was reported as Wounded and Missing on the 19th April 1942.



In 1945 the casualty list is updated to the effect that K.C. Salmon is now presumed to have died from his wounds.



This information appears to be accepted as fact as the C.W.G.C. has the following details.

PRIVATE KENNETH CHARLES SALMON
Service Number: 5182237
Regiment & Unit/Ship Gloucestershire Regiment. 1st Bn. Date of Death. Died 19 April 1942. Age 27 years old. Buried or commemorated at. RANGOON MEMORIAL. Face 12. Myanmar

• Country of Service. United Kingdom
• Additional Info. Foster son of Mrs. A. Salmon, of Finchley, Middlesex. Also served as W.O.I (Sub-Conductor), Burma Army Corps of Clerks.

 

High Wood,

Given the scale of the defeat and retreat into India, is it possible Pvt. Salmon was simply lost - assuming he got to Simla - hence the CWGC data?

 

It is certainly possible that he was reported wounded and missing during the retreat, but if he was so badly wounded that he lost both legs he must have had help to get back to India and I cannot imagine that his admitance to casualty clearing stations and hospitals as well as his arrival in India went unrecorded. The 'death presumed' notification in the casualty list dates from 1945 and it seems that no one informed the CWGC that he had returned to India. It could have been a clerical mistake during the aftermath of the retreat with the medical services being unaware that he had been reported missing.

On the other hand, the only evidence that we have that he did indeed survive is a casual comment in a private letter.

 

Another snippett mentions a couple that did not survive the trek out of Burma.

Letter 18/7/1942.

Did I tell you that I heard that poor old Norman D’Cruze – (Sybil’s brother, who used to work in Maymyo), is dead, both he and his wife, but I dare not tell Sybil yet; he was so fond of us. Which reminds me. I received a letter from Sybil and has asked to be remembered to you. She is so happy as her husband is getting more leave.

The Anglo Burmese Library has the following entry on their databse.

De Cruz. Mr and Mrs and son. Death presumed. Seen on 16th June 1942 at NAMYUNG river. Son was abandoned, a day’s journey the other side of Namyung village. No further news of this family.

 

From the WO361 series, four mentions of Salmon, but with no real definitive explanation of his fate I'm afraid:

 

Thank you very much for posting the information from the Missing enquiries.

 

No worries HW.

 

Some of the early envelopes are interesting. These first few were sent late 1941 and early 1942. Marguerite Mahony is living in Maymyo, being housed in the Telegraph Quarters which were presumably owned by the Burma Posts and Telegraphs and let out to their workers. Her father was employed by the B.P. & T. but also served in an as yet unidentified Auxiliary Battalion. Marguerite would have known many of the regimental wives of both the King's Own Yorkshire Light Infantry and of the Gloucestershire Regiment, who were stationed in the town whilst their husbands were away fighting. Many of these wives and their children were flown out of Burma to India.

 

Marguerite Mahony's fiance was Sub-Conductor Edward Richard Charles Collett of the Indian Army Ordnance Corps. His early letters were posted from Moulmein and Tavoy in Southern Burma.



The femail members of the Mahony family arrived in India on 25th March 1942. Their entry on the Anglo Burma Library evacuees database lists them as 'Mrs Dorothy Mahony and six children'. Presumably Marguerite being just 18 was classed as a child. Their normal place of residence was given as Maymyo. Their intended place of residence was given as 32/2 Clifden, Murree Hills.

Rudolph James Mahony, the father of the family, arrived in India on the 21st June 1942, nearly three months after his family. His ABL entry gives the following details regarding his place of residence, his employer and his intended address in India. 'Mr. Rudolph James Mahony. Maymyo. Burma Post and Telegraphs. To 32/2 Clifden, Murree Hills'.

 

By the 23rd May 1942 Sub Conducter Edward Collett was safely back in India. He sent this letter from the B.M.H. (British Military Hospital?} at Dinapore where he was recuperating after the fighting retreat from Burma.

 

Edward Collett began his military career by enlisting into the Royal Artillery.

 

I am still working my way through these letters. I have started by putting the loose ones into date order and cleaning and ironing those that need it. Many envelopes have come apart and have had to be carefully repaired, At least one bundle has not been touched and nearly fifty letters have only been speed read. I am creating albums for each year and have created a list of those mentioned in the letters to help with the research.

 

Marguerite and her family were not flown out of Burma as some of the officer's wives and family were, but had to walk to India. Edward Collett's letter of the 23rd May, 1942 has the following, "I hope you are fit and well and quite recovered from your walk along the Burma Road, it must have been horrible for you and the children". Probably the understatement of the year.

 

I have also been given the following information by a family member who has contacted me. The surnames in brackets were added by me for clarity.

"Marguerite (Mahony) trekked out of Burma with her family to India, crossing the border at Tamu. I know that Ted (Collett) went via the more arduous route through the Hukawng Valley. Her father, my great grandfather, Rudolph Mahony, was given a commission as a Lieutenant in the Burma Signals and also took part in the retreat, reaching safety in India via the Hukawng Valley."

 

After their arrival in India the Mahony family, less their father, Rudolph, by now commissioned into the Burma Signals Corps having been formerly employed by the Burma Posts and Telegraphs Department, were settled in an evacuation colony in Clifden in the Murree Hills. Marguerite was briefly reunited with her fiancé, who was given a short period of leave but soon found himself back with the army.

A letter, dated 4th July 1942, sent from 36 Mile Road Camp, Lohardaga has the following:

I am very sorry my darling that I haven't written before but as you can see by the address I have been moved. I arrived in Calcutta on the 26th (June) and was told that I had to go to Ranchi the same night, I went round to Laddie* and spent the remainder of the day with him, I arrived in Ranchi and was told to go to the above address. At this place there is no post office or anything else as it is right in the jungle, I have been here five days and am waiting for posting orders and it is rumoured that everybody is going back to where they came from, me I hope will be 'Pindi.

I am sending you Rupees 200 in registered envelope, please, my darling, pay your mother for me and keep the change for yourself so that when you go to Murree you can buy yourself something. I am sorry that I have not sent this before but I have had a job to get any money at all, and the Post Office people still won't pay me my money. Still, when they do pay me it will all go to our great day.

*Laddie was Marguerite's brother Rudolph James Mahony, named after his father but known as Laddie, probably to avoid confusion.

 

As this letter to Marguerite shows, it would seem that there were problems in the Clifden community arising from the number of young women, either married or unmarried, some with young children, trying to lead normal lives with their men folk away at war. I am still working on trying to identify some of the people mentioned in the letter.

45/2

Dagshai

Simla Hills


Marguerite dearest,

Ta ever so much for your letter which I received some says ago. I am ever so sorry for not answering sooner but I have no excuses to give, except that I have been putting off until tomorrow what could be done today.

Well dear I think I told you in my last letter that Uncle had come out of hospital and was on two weeks sick leave. But he seems to be an unlucky devil where leave is concerned, for he hardly been here a week when he got a telegram telling him to report to 2nd Echelon, Jhansi, as soon as possible. He left two or three days later and so he is now in Jhansi. And we will be going there very soon. He wrote and told us the other day that he had got the quarters for us, and that the M.E.S. are doing the repairs needed, as soon as they have done their work Uncle will come and take us there. I don’t know if it is near Murree.

Do you know that Babso was 2 years old on the 1st and not one of us remembered that it was the poor kid’s birthday. Not even his daddy remembered. Mrs Wilson sent him a wire this morning wishing him for the 1st.

I believe that there has been another death in Clifden. Poor people, they must feel the loss of their babies very badly. You remember you wrote and told me that girl Finch married a K.O.Y.L.I. and you didn’t know what his name was. Well, she married Sandy Gravel, ex K.O.Y.L.I. now in the Bush War Fare. Mrs Gill wrote and told us, (she was at the wedding) and I believe that he was more bothered about the bottle than he was about his bride. So far we have had no weddings in Dagshai and there doesn’t seem as if there will be any for a long time as the men can get what they want without getting married.

While Clifden is taking such a toll of infant’s lives, here in Dagshai the children seem to be breaking out in some awful sores that turn septic in about two days’ time. Our Wally has a very bad leg, poor kid he doesn’t half yell when we try to get some of the discharge out. Our Douglas is getting on fine he now has three teeth in his head, and he isn’t half a whopper. “God bless him”. We have taken some snaps of him and if they come out O.K. I shall send you some in my next letter.

I have at last seen the picture, “That night in Rio” and I thoroughly enjoyed it. You remember I missed it in Maymyo, and another picture that is coming out this month that I never saw in Maymyo was “Tall, Dark and Handsome”.

Well dear I don’t think I have much more to tell you except that Lady Betsy went back to Jhansi with her husband, and we hear that Mrs Peace and lots of others are there too.

Lady Zena is expecting her baby very soon and let me tell you that she has not got a stitch of clothes ready for it yet, not a single napkin or guthoir? She expects her relations to sit and do it for her.

8/8/42. I am at last after all these days able to sit down in peace. You see I started your letter on Thursday night and as you can see never finished it. I intended doing it the next morning, but it never got as far as that. For at 5am Friday morning we were knocked up by Mr and Mrs Wilson and Goo Goo. I didn’t half curse when I had to get up so early, and why it wasn’t even light. Mr Wilson and Foster left the same day for Simla and Mrs Wilson and Goo Goo stopped with us until yesterday morning, when Mr Foster and Wilson came back from Simla and carted them back to Rookee.

My word, I can really imagine what a name Clifden has for Mrs Wilson told us some stories about the carryings on there that could not possibly be put down on paper and I quite understand you not wanting to be a Clifden bride.

Well dear I must close now as the boy has to go to the hospital for M.E. So, I have to go into the kitchen and finish the cooking. Regards the samples you sent me, I like them all very much, but I shall have to make up my mind as to which I like best, so in my next letter I will send you the money and also the shade of cloth that I want.

So, until then I will close with lots of love and kisses to self and family.

Your friend forever,

Renee.

I believe that 'Lady Zena' was Zena P Taylor the wife of Daniel Rawson of the K.O.Y.L.I. who she married in Maymyo, in 1939.

 

Renee's second letter.

48/2 Dagshai, Simla Hills. 10-7-42
Marguerite dear,


Ta ever so much for your welcome letter, which I received yesterday, and which I have not had time to answer before now.

You see we have all three kids down with very bad coughs and colds, and the weather here is something awful, I swear we have not seen the sun for over a week, and to crown it all, I must needs go and have some trouble with my back. I think it is a slight attack of rheumatism, and my word it didn’t half cause me some pain, when I lay on the bed, I could not turn into a comfortable position without getting the most awful pains in the small of my back. But I wouldn’t go to the Doctor here because he is such a quack, not if I was dying would I go to him. Do you know that I took Wally and Babso up to see him about their coughs and colds and to have their lungs examined? He asked me how long they had had their coughs. I told him that they had had their coughs since they left Burma and since then had never quite left them. He turns and says, “Then why did you leave Burma?” Anyway, he started examining Wally, and what do you think? He examines Wall for everything else bar what I had taken him up for. It seems that he has seen Wally walking funnily, so he was examining him to see if he was knock kneed and twiddle toed, and all the time the poor kid had only a shoe bite that was giving him trouble. After yapping a lot of nonsense he turns around and says, “Well, I really don’t know what to tell you to do for these kids, they look as if they have been too well looked after and pampered, they are overclothed. Don’t you ever let them get dirty? Take their clothes off and let them run about and play in the rain and mud.” Now, I ask you is that the advice a doctor who knew anything about his job would give a patient? Then they wonder why people keep things till the very last minute before they go up to the hospital for treatment.

Yes, we intended coming and spending two weeks in Clifden while Uncle was on leave, but it all fell through because he was wired for, three weeks before his leave was up so that he only had his two weeks sick leave and one weeks war leave. And while the poor devils who were sent for are slogging to get the office into shape again, the likes of Dykins and a few more of them are sitting here on their behinds doing nothing, why most of the fellows here, including Dykins, have not only had sick leave and war leave but have also been granted extensions which makes their leave come to over two months. It is not fair on our men, is it?

No, Zena is not staying with us now. Ever since Jerry came, she has gone to her own quarter, and she does not even notice us now. You see she is a Lieut.’s wife and we are only the family of a paltry Sgt. You know that you can tell your mummy that she was right when she told mummy she would get kicks for all we did, for I can assure you that that is all we have had after all we did for Zena. What hurt mummy and uncle most was, after we got her through on the first plane with us free, (because as an Officer’s wife she would have to have paid 550 Rupees), and getting her with us all the way because she knew no one else. I don’t know what she wrote and told Mrs Medcalfe of Clifden. But this is what was in the answer, and she forgot herself and read it out to Mrs Gill in front of mummy and me. “I knew you are pregnant although you said nothing, for I cannot imagine you, a Lieut.’s wife, coming across as nurse maid to a Sgt’s wife.” And she didn’t half emphasise the Lieut and the Sgt about it. Of course, Mummy gave her a mouth full. So, since Jerry came, she has been to our house quite twice. It worries us a lot and I don’t think. She mixes with her own crowd now, and we have heard that she told someone that she was only friendly with mummy because she knew no one else at the time. Don’t say anything of this to anyone, most of all to Buddy Houson because they are very friendly, and it will only cause more trouble.

You remember Ma Phillips, don’t you? Well, she has not long since had another baby, a little boy, and need I tell you who it looks like? I will leave you to guess although it should not need much doing. She tries to bung us up with the yarn that she took bottles and bottles of milk of magnesia while she was pregnant, that is why the baby is so white.

Well, I must tell you that we have a new arrival in Dagshai, the great Betsy White, I have not seen her yet but the lady with whom she is sharing quarters told us she arrived yesterday. It seems that the people she was working with have been shifted to Murree, so she left and is now waiting for her darling Vic to come on leave.

No, I have no friends at all in this hole and are not likely to have any in a hurry, I am afraid I have got quite the same mania as you if not a little worse.

I am enclosing your snap which you asked me to send back. I don’t much care for that one of you, I have got the better one here, you know the one we both went and took out in Mita’s, well I managed to get them all across.

You certainly have gone fat and by the way, where did you go and develop that paunch of yours from. Don’t tell me you have already started cultivating a paunch. Ha! Ha!

I notice no more high heeled fancy shoes for us, just the blooming flat duck heeled things otherwise we would break our necks, wouldn’t we?

Well, I think I will close now as there is not much more to say and what is not said in this letter can be said in the next.

I am still as big a grub hawk as ever and am forever on the want. I managed to get a bottle of Balachoney and can hardly stop eating it, but I know all about it when I go to the bathroom for my bottom burns for about an hour afterwards. I also managed to make some Kharen Swea which

turned out lovely in spite of not having all the ingredients, how nice it you were here to enjoy some with us. Never mind perhaps some other time.

Well, I really must bring up I ain’t half a pain in the neck, aren’t I? Give my love to all at home and kiss Bam for me.

Lots of love to you

Your friend forever,

Renee.

 

My attempts to identify Renee, the author of these last two letters have reached a dead end due to the limited amount of information that is available on line. I have found four possible Renees but as the on line India office information does not give the mother's maiden name for births after 1935, it is difficult to identify the mother of Wally and Babso. In the first letter Renee refers to her children using their proper first names. "Our Wally has a very bad leg - our Douglas is getting on fine, he now has three teeth in his head". Wally is probably short for Walter and Babso could therefore be their name for baby Douglas. I have found a Douglas whose birth was registered in Ahmednagar in1942 who is the right age and has a mother called Renee and a father who was a soldier. However, I cannot yet link them to Marguerita as they do not appear to have been in Maymyo. They could have known each other from earlier on in their lives, possibly meeting at school somewhere.



Renee Blanche Lily Lane married Stanley Frederick Francis at St George's Church, Madras on the 26th June 1935. Stanley was a Pte in the 2nd Battalion Suffolk Regiment.

 

A second candidate was Renee de Doucherville, a French widow who was teaching in Karachi when she married the divorced Wilfred Charles Larner, a photographer in the Royal Air Force. They had three children all born in Karachi, Michael, Marcia and Georgia, so I can rule her out.