Partition Stories

I started this blog after an increased interest in my family history.  I wanted to write something a bit different to the ‘how to’ family history blogs.  Lately my posts have taken a different turn, according to how I have been feeling about the world in general.  However, my own family history is particularly relevant at the moment.  And in a far more direct way than usual.  It is seventy years this week since Partition in India.

This anniversary has led to a flurry of articles and documentaries, many of which are making use of testimony from the dwindling number of eye witnesses.  These testimonies have attested to the previous reluctance to discuss what happened during Partition.  But over a million people died and at least fifteen million were displaced. Due to arbitrary lines drawn on maps by the escaping British.

My own paternal family were (are) Anglo-Indian, as mentioned on previous posts.  Their community existed on the fringes of ‘real’ British society.  Mostly Christian, mostly European-dressed but not white, they had developed their own way of life.  (The photo, which has appeared on this blog before, is of my grandmother - in white - at school.)  Their numbers were substantial at this point.  A distant relation of mine, Sir Henry Gidney, had even managed to represent them at the independence negotiations in the Thirties.

But when Independence actually came and Partition happened, the British had little sense of what was about to be unleashed.  The terror, the violence, the frantic movement of millions of people.

Anglo-Indians were endangered by their positions as ‘assistants’ to the British.  But on a day to day basis, they were endangered simply by having to live in a country where random and terrible violence could break out at any time.  Watch some of the documentaries currently on iPlayer and you get a glimpse of hell. 

Some of my family left almost immediately.  My grandfather stuck it out until 1949, two years after Partition.  But then he upped sticks and took flight remarkably quickly.  He, my grandmother, her mother and brother and my father were all on a ship within days of being caught in a riot, by all accounts.  Presumably, in waiting, he had had the relative luxury, not afforded to so many, of being able to plan a little as regards money.  They were not supposed to take much out of the country.  I don't know if he planned the destination but since his sister-in-law was already in the UK, it seems there was a choice not to join his own parents and siblings in New Zealand.

Since my father subsequently married an English girl, I clearly have reason to be grateful for this move.  Who would wish themselves from existence after all?  But in reading the many accounts being published at the moment, I can see that my family were terribly fortunate in many ways.  Although I am sure, in leaving everything they had ever known, it didn’t feel that way.  Their lives in India were comfortable and their position was one of relative privilege in some ways, despite the discrimination and resentment against them.

Partition is a word which has been used thoughtlessly for seventy years now.  It makes it sound like it was a kind of natural phenomenon that a country was summarily split by civil servants.  And as the current wave of comment is finally admitting, the event is still not given the notice or importance that should be attached to it.  Younger generations are barely aware - if at all - that Pakistan is only seventy years old.  You could wonder, for example, how much the arbitrary agreement to  Muslim state in India has contributed ever since to the ideas of Caliphate which fuel Islamic extremists.  If it could happen there, why not elsewhere?  State sponsored religious sectarianism, anyone?

I hope you will take the time to read or watch some of the anniversary pieces.  And take a moment to explain it to your children.  Independence was long overdue but its accomplishment was an appalling example of the kind of governmental arrogance and gung ho which still exists in our world today.  The actions of these ‘players’  reverberate amongst ordinary people for generations.  Just ask those desperate people still trying to escape across the Mediterranean.

Hold On

For the last few months - and for many reasons -  I have been doing some work on myself, for want of a better phrase.  Rest assured, I have not been dabbling in plastic surgery.  It has been more about my general well-being.  Both mental and physical.

One of the strands which I have been pursuing is the idea of being true to how we actually feel about something.  I have not been good at believing in my right to feel angry or upset.  But I am getting better at holding onto and validating my feelings.

The current news climate, though, has caused me to think that we are all going to have to get better at this. We must not allow ourselves to be convinced by politicians or certain news outlets that our initial feelings of revulsion or anger about something are wrong.  We have to hang on to what we know to be true, to be right, to be fair.

In Nazi Germany, the necessary majority of people were gradually convinced - by way of an improving economy and much militaristic posturing - that the disappearance of the Jews, of the disabled, of any effective opposition was a good thing.  That it was for the greater good.  The Nazis didn't have social media but they had stupendous propaganda.  It was the ultimate in fake news, surely?

Meryl Streep's speech at the Golden Globes was a brilliant example of holding on to how something had really and truly made her feel.  And she used that to show the kind of behaviour we are up against.  Not just in the US either.  Brexit in the UK and the rise of politicians like Marine Le Pen in France have allowed all sorts of horrific things to be said and done which are just plain wrong.  To say nothing of our general malaise towards the continuing situations in the Middle East.

I believe in free speech and honest exchanges of opinions.  But no one, whatever their political colouring, should be allowed to use gender, race, religion or other human characteristics to attack their opponents.  If you do not have the wit and intelligence to put together a coherent, fact-based and fair argument, you should not be in public life.


[Not a family history post but one for our descendants maybe...]

Coatigans and Assumptions

Back on track after holiday.  At last.  Apologies for lack of posts for last two Mondays - between jet lag and then camping, neither Monday was very productive!

Anyway, yesterday I read an article in the Sunday Times Style Magazine.  It was called 'Are You Coatigan Woman?' and discussed the apparent 'rise' of the 'coatigan'.  A coat shaped/style of cardigan.  (Fairly self explanatory really.)

However, the journalist, Laura Craik, used the article mainly to poke fun at the kind of person who might wear such a garment.  It culminated in a list entitled 'You are coatigan woman if...'.  Now, one tries not to take such articles too seriously.  Even if they do feel a little close to home - the list included '...if you can't wait for Poldark tonight'.  Definitely me yesterday.  Hence excuse for gratuitous picture above.)

But the tone of the piece did anger me.  Why should any ordinary person be judged by a fashion journalist?  Fashion magazines are there to show us mortals the way, yes.  But was it necessary to make such statements as 'those who worship at the coatigan's drab beige feet are united less by age or demographic than by outlook' followed by another unworthy list?

We are all guilty of assumptions.  We make daily judgements on how people look, what they might be thinking, how they behave.  The Brexit result was the hideously spectacular result of many completely wrong assumptions about people's thoughts and behaviour.

And everyday that we blithely watch - with increasingly thick skins - the continuing chaos of the refugee crisis, we are making assumptions about the people who are trying to get to Europe.  We are told - or assume - many are criminals or terrorists.  Or 'economic migrants' after our jobs and our lifestyles and leaving perfectly reasonable lives behind.  We begin to believe they risk their children's lives on the Mediterranean because they are irresponsible - when actually they're at their wits' end.

When we look at our own family histories, assumptions are not a new phenomenon.  They are unfortunately a human trait.  And in writing your family history, you are continually making assumptions about people's actions in order to make some sense of the scant information you can glean from official records.  My ancestor who joined the army in 1804 and went to India gave his occupation as 'staymaker'.  I could assume he was a patriot who decided to fight.  More likely, he was in trouble with the law or destitute or even conned into signing up by a sergeant who got him drunk.

My descendants might look at photos of me and assume I was a badly dressed would-be writer who clearly ate quite a lot of cake.  Except for winter 2016/17 photos though!  Because I will be Coatigan Woman.  Yes, after reading the article, I held my head high and proudly purchased said item that very afternoon (that's how cross I was).  From Warehouse - proclaimed by the very same magazine having been 'transformed' this season.  I quote their assumption: 'you'll love this'.

Passports for Aliens

Late posting this week, sorry - although looking at the (very early) time, it might still be Monday somewhere.  This could be a bit of a rant.  However, in an effort to steer myself onto safer ground, I have done a little research, don't panic.

Last week, I tried to renew a passport via the Post Office.  It started badly.  I had to go to the city - no local post offices do 'check and send'.  I stood in a queue labelled 'Travel Services' only to be told that a) I needed an appointment and b) travel services was only money and insurance anyway.  Finally at the correct window, I handed over my - if I may say so - immaculate application and photos.  I have had trouble with these in the past, I had thought, triple checking before attempting 'check and send'.  And lo and behold, my application was returned to me.  'Can't send that, it'll come back,' said the assistant.  'Has to be in biro.'

The form had nothing wrong with it other than this.  I had not used a fountain pen.  I had used a black pen of some kind.  But not a biro.  And this was enough to reject my application.  The Post Office maintained they'd had forms returned for nothing more than this and they would not take the risk of me blaming their 'service'.

I'm afraid I did protest rather loudly at this point.  I insisted on a second opinion.  I think quite a lot of the queue behind me were well informed about the issue.  But really, did you ever hear the like?

In trying to rationalise this, I can find no decent reason why a non-biro black pen should be a problem.  Someone I told about it wondered if biro ink was less likely to smudge if wet.  But what are they doing to the forms in that case?  Leaving them stacked up in the toilets?  Letting people put their coffee down on them?  The mind boggles.

Anyway, given how many times I have posted about the refugee crisis, I thought I'd use my passport travails to look at why we have these increasingly sophisticated pieces of ID in the first place.  Unsurprisingly, the history of the passport has been driven by war and conflict.  'Safe conduct' documents issued by monarchs to their diplomats.  The first formal records of travellers during the French Revolution.  Eventually, an Act of Parliament introducing mandatory passports.  The British Nationality and Status of Aliens Act 1914.  Date looking familiar?

My own first passport was as shown above.  Standard from 1920 until the late 1980s, when the red EU passports appeared.  I do remember, though, having a paper 'visitor passport' which you could collect from the Post Office (!) and lasted for the duration of a holiday.  I was also on a 'family passport' of my dad's.  In true 1970s style, he could travel alone on it but none of the rest of us, including my mother, could use it without him in tow.

Last year, we went to Florida.  It was my first time in in the US in nearly twenty years.  I am so used to travelling within Europe (or to places like Thailand where they look you up and down and then put a lovely stamp in your passport), the US entry procedures were quite a shock.  I won't go into it now other than to say it added hours to our journey.  But apparently, a return trip to the States should be easier because they are allowed to keep all my data on record!

Unless I next visit when Trump is President.  Then they may have introduced at least four more stages.  And I may have a completely different passport too, if we 'Brexit' from Europe after the referendum.  Maybe what we go through to enter the US will become standard for Brits entering the EU and for any 'aliens' entering the UK.  Prime Minister Johnson (worrying but Gove would be worse) may start using the term 'aliens' again in everyday language to refer to refugees and others wishing to enter the UK. 

Why would we want this?  Surely freedom of movement is one of the main benefits of the EU.  Yes, it does make it easier for non-EU nationals as well but think what we will lose in return for trying to restrict refugees.  If the Passport Office is lairy of non-biro completed applications pre-Brexit, think what they will put us through if we leave.  And what other countries will be entitled to put us through upon arrival.  We will be aliens.

As a final thought, I wonder if anyone has planned for immigration when we finally get teleporting systems up and running.  Maybe they will make you carry a biro, just in case.

Work Together

 
I had been preparing another post on the refugee crisis after watching a report on last night's evening news.  It focussed on some of the Syrian women trapped on Lesbos with their small children.  I was horrified by the imagery which was conjured by their words.  One woman told of how she made it to land from a terrifying dinghy voyage only to find that her husband had been crushed to death in the bottom of the overcrowded vessel.  She was young and had three children.  She had nothing of her husband's to remember him by and she had no idea what was going to happen to her.  I have said it before on this blog but I will say it again:  how desperate do you have to be to risk such a journey with small children?  How can any of us in the West really imagine what it must feel like?  None of our histories are immune from people migrations throughout the ages.  We all have a responsibility to help.

Then, as I was driving today, I happened upon the speech being made by Angelina Jolie Pitt on the BBC today.  It was part of a series of programmes for World On The Move Day and she expressed very eloquently exactly what I would have hoped to say.  Her speech and knowledge in the question sessions afterwards were very impressive.

 

I highly recommend listening to the programme. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-36303688 for the article on the news page and http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b07bqjgq to listen.

There is also an excellent series on The World At One on BBC Radio 4.  I have listened to it as often as possible and it really brings home the realities of life as a refugee.  A correspondent has been following the Dhnie family  for some time and reports regularly on their progress.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p037lrj7/episodes/downloads

 

The Nameless

 

I have been pondering all sorts of subjects but most of the things which caught my eye this week have been done to death by the media.  However, there was a piece on the BBC Radio 4 news last week which caught my ear instead.

 

It was an interview with a grave digger on Lesbos.  He was not a grave digger by profession but had taken it upon himself to bury victims of the migrant crisis.  He had personally buried about seventy people.  Fairly certain that most of them were Syrian, he had taken the decision to start burying them facing Mecca and to follow Islamic burial rituals.

 

But there were no names to put on the grave stones.  Only numbers which corresponded to a DNA register.  In the hope, according to the reporter, that one day relatives would come looking for their loved ones.

 

How very modern this all sounds.  Yet surely this number system is simply the modern equivalent of the pauper's grave in Victorian times or a mass lime pit burial of medieval plague victims.  Maybe one or two of these people will one day be identified but one has to presume that any living relatives are themselves under extreme threat in Syria or elsewhere or are in refugee conditions in some European country.  They may be stranded in Turkey.

 

The system certainly didn't sound like it made the grave digger feel any better.  He knew he was burying the unknown and probably never found.

 

At the end of last week, the pope took twelve refugees to the Vatican with him after visiting Lesbos.  Once again, a light briefly shone on this appalling situation.  And then we relapsed into news about some celebrity's private life, the Brexit debate (don't even get me started) and the royal trip to India.

 

I just completely fail to understand how a world which still marks Holocaust Day, still is chasing down Nazi concentration camp guards and still has such an appetite for stories about the Second World War can fail to see what is happening right now.  Can repeat the same errors of burying our collective heads and leaving arrangements to save people to the dedicated few.  While some bureaucrat decides that the best possible solution for these desperate people is to send them back to Turkey, if not to where they came from.  Anyone remember the Kinder Transports? 

 

And anyone remember the bureaucratic mess caused by Indian Partition in 1947?  Or the division of Palestine? Millions displaced and/or killed thanks to the strokes of a civil servants pen on maps.  Human-made disasters.

 

The Nazis were evil personified.  I am not for a minute saying our governments are conspiring to systematically kill the thousands of refugees who want to make it to Europe.  But they are looking at votes and finances.  They are certainly not looking at the situation with humanitarian eyes.  This is about people not numbers.