Whatmore Family History

The story of Alfred Ernest Whatmore (born 1864 at Micheldever, Hampshire) and that of his descendants is one of the most interesting and most tragic in the annals of the Whatmore Family. I am therefore most grateful to Derek Whatmore, the historian of the Hampshire Whatmore Family, who has written this account specially for this blog.

The pictures of Colombo, Sri Lanka, in this post are the copyright of the Institute of Heraldic and Genealogical Studies and are reproduced here by their kind permission. The pictures are from ‘ Portrait of Robert Newstead’ by Jane Swan which can be read via this link to the IHGS website: http://www.ihgs.ac.uk/competition/robert_newstead.html

John Watmore married Ann Holland in Micheldever, Hants, on 5th Sept. 1782.  They had six sons all of whom had children of their own with trees that include living descendants up to today.   Exhaustive research has not traced the parents of John even though there were Watmores in Micheldever in the 1500s and 1600s.  I am descended from Richard, the second son.   However that is another story. 

Dorcus, granddaughter of John`s eldest son, John, contrived to marry Harry Watmore, son of Thomas the second of three illegitimate sons of Sarah Watmore whose origin also remains a mystery but who was probably a sister of cousin of the original John.  It is with Harry’s older brother Alfred Ernest that this tale is concerned.

ALFRED ERNEST WHATMORE was baptised 10th Sept. 1854 in Micheldever (some of the families had by then adopted the “H”). 

He appears in the 1871 census in Winchester Barracks as a private soldier, aged 17.  Incidentally in the same long list of military personnel was a John Watmore, born Winchester, whose origin remains unsolved.

In 1998 I received two letters in the space of a few days from the Isle of Wight and from Australia enquiring about Alfred Ernest Whatmore of the 102nd Dublin Fusiliers who had been sent to Colombo, Ceylon (now Sri Lanka).  Both these descendants believed their ancestor must have been Irish because or the regiment he had joined and it was a little while before I could convince my new correspondents, Maureen and Eileen, that he was English.   

Alfred Ernest had enlisted in Winchester following a recruiting campaign by the Dublin Fusiliers.  Having served his time in the army, he obtained an appointment as a relieving guard at a salary of 720 rupees per annum on the Ceylon Government Railway.  By 1887 he was a guard on a salary of 1500 rupees.  Documents relating to these appointments confirmed his country of birth.  By then he had already been married several years, 20th Jan. 1883 in Colombo to Emily Hudson, one of two daughters of Thomas, an English planter originally of London, whose own story is worthy of mention having had a liaison with a local woman, a situation hard to accept by the British community and clubs in those days.  His brother, William Hudson, also in Ceylon and respectfully married, shared the general concern about the scandal and disgrace surrounding Thomas.

Emily Hudson’s sister, Mary Jane, married Edwin Eban Pate of Dutch East Indian origin, 28th Jan 1880.  They had seven children and the history of the two families have remained closely entwined ever since.

Alfred Ernest Whatmore and Emily had eight children including twins, Constance Emily and Alfred Ernest junior.  A second marriage after Emily’s decease to Janette Anthoney resulted in another two sons, Patrick and Victor. 

Our soldier boy Alfred Ernest senior died Senior Covenanted Guard C G R in the General Hospital, Colombo, 15th May 1931, before the true legacy of his ten children became apparent.  Some had already settled in Malaya and Singapore by the advent of the Second World War and the Japanese invasion of the region in 1941/42.  It was this event that eventually led to many of the families of the original two sisters, Emily  Whatmore (nee Hudson) and Mary Jane Pate (nee Hudson), settling in UK, Canada, USA, and New Zealand, with the majority in the sanctuary of Australia, though even there separated by many miles in NSW, Victoria and Western Australia.  They took with them memories of the traumas of their wartime experiences escaping from or during the Japanese occupation.  It is remarkable how consistent yet diverse the various reports from the several sources have been in telling the harrowing stories of their parents and grand parents.

Violet Whatmore, Alfred Ernest’s first child, and her English husband Ernest  Kennison had fortunately already sent their two sons to England for their education.  The Japanese advance into Malaya in early 1942 was rapid and the scramble to escape came too late for many though others made it to India and Australia.    My first report of Violet Whatmore’s fate tells of the ship carrying her and husband Ernest being attacked by the Japanese as they tried to obtain the safety of Australia.  The women and children, Violet included, were taken off and had to watch the ship destroyed with all their men folk still aboard.  Violet survived the internment camp but in very poor health.   My further correspondent, Rebecca, Violet’s granddaughter, who had contacted me through the Sussex Family History Society, described the incident in more detail as given by her father.  Violet’s husband Ernest Kennison had four sons by a previous marriage and it was “Bonnie”, one of these, that drove them to Singapore.  Safety there was short lived and they joined the clamour to escape to a more secure destination.  They were unable to board the first ship offered, Ernest being too shaky and shocked to make it down the gangplank.  It proved their misfortune.  Subsequently they boarded the M.S.Giang Bee bound for Australia which did not get very far.  The ship was stopped by a Japanese submarine in the Banka Strait off Java.  The submarine captain having discovered there were non-combatants on board allowed the ship to pass.  The submarine was then bombed by a Dutch aircraft out of Java and in retaliation the submarine captain ordered all the woman and children off the Giang Bee which he sank.   The official report in the Roll of Honour, Imperial War Graves Commission, merely states “Sunk by Japanese destroyers in the Banka Strait off the Java coast, 13th Feb.1942.”  Here is an example of how confusing reports of wartime disasters can be.   

The reference book “Dictionary of Disasters at Sea” gives yet a fourth account. “The British steamship Giang Bee, 1646 tons, left Singapore on February 12th 1942 for Australia with 245 passengers, mostly women and children.  On the 13th she was bombed and sunk by Japanese aircraft in the Banka Strait with the loss of 223 lives.”  At least dates, destinations and locality are consistent, but if numbers are correct, Violet and step-niece Betty were very fortunate to be among the pitifully few survivors which may also have included some of the crew.

Violet with step-daughter Betty, the 15 year old daughter of Donald another of Ernest’s four sons, both ended up in Palemberg prison camp in Sumatra, seeing out the rest of the war together After the war, Violet came to England to join her two sons now aged 17 and 19, remaining in Leeds for the next twelve years.  Never in good health as a result of her wartime privations, she suffered a stroke but decided to join her sister Freda in Australia where she died in 1956, or thereabouts.

The third of Ernest’s sons, Charlie Kennison, probably suffered the worst fate of them all.  Having enlisted in the services he had been taken prisoner and interned in Malang Camp in Java from where he attempted to escape.  He was caught, brutally flogged, left overnight, and then beheaded before the whole camp in the morning.

Of the two sons by Alfred Ernest’s second marriage, Victor Whatmore became a Major in the Salvation Army and died in England, but Patrick Whatmore and wife Matilda were the unfortunates who died in March 1942 at the hands of the Japanese.   A priest broke the news to prisoners  that they had had to dig their own graves before being shot.   

Constance Emily Whatmore, grandmother of my original correspondent, Eileen, married into the Dutch line.  Her twin brother, Alfred Ernest Whatmore Junior, has kept the family Whatmore name going to this day, one descendant being an Australian cricketer and international coach of some renown.

So did Alfred Ernest Whatmore, the soldier from deepest Hampshire, ever imagine what a different complexion, in more than dress and appearance of his offspring, he has put on the family name scattered to many points of the world?  Descendants of his ten children and that of Mary Jane his wife’s sister can be numbered in several hundred in Australia alone.  The family reunions are joyful occasions, but how many particularly of the younger generations realise just what traumas their grandparents went through?

Some wonderful old pictures of Sri Lanka can be viewed by following this link: http://www.guruge.com/CeylonOldPics.htm

Pictures of the railways of Sri Lanka can be viewed at this link:  http://contentdm.lib.byu.edu/cdm4/browse.php?CISOROOT=%2FJackson&CISOSTART=1,181

An account of the fall of Singapore is available at this link : http://www.cofepow.org.uk/pages/asia_singapore2.html