Kenneth Farmer BODIE (aka Ken) [1916-1969]

Ian Bodie writes:

My father was born in 1916 in Dundee and joined the Hong Kong Police in 1938.  He was interned in Stanley between 1942 and 1945.

Like many who went through the ordeal at the hands of the Japanese, he refused to speak about his experiences in the Camp to his family. I am now trying to find out if anyone in the group has any recollection of him in Stanley.

As far as I can make out from newspaper cuttings, he worked as an orderly in the tuberculosis ward of the hospital and helped to organise entertainment activities in the Camp, so he must have into contact with a number of people. His friends in the camp included fellow police officers, George Watt, Jimmy Ferrier and Alec Leslie who  was later killed on duty in 1950.  His future brother in law, Tom Ross, was also interned.

After the war he married and returned to the HK police, retiring in 1961.  He died in 1969.

I would be very grateful for any information.

Barbara Anslow replies:

I remember Ken Bodie as one of the many HK Police in Stanley but didn't really know him personally.  He probably worked at what we called 'The Leprosarium' .. That was its prewar name, but during interment it was where the camp TB patients were nursed, a building very near to Tweed bay Hospital which housed other patients.

The Police in camp were all great stalwarts, doing all the hardest jobs for us.  As Nicola says I also was a passenger on the repatriation ship Empress of Australia which landed at Liverpool 27 Nov 1945.   I joined that ship at Colombo having travelled there from HK on aircraft carrier HMS Smiter  (with other ex Stanleyites, I think it's possible Ken was also on Smiter)