Charles Gesner van der Voort had started his career in Rotterdam, at Holland-China Trading Company (HCHC). In 1938, he went to Shanghai for the firm. The Japanese interned him, and most other Dutch nationals, from 1943-45. In camp, he met his wife Nancy and they married after the war. After a leave in The Netherlands, they returned to the Orient, where Charles continued to work for HCHC in Hong Kong.
Charles' colleague Frans de Jongh started much earlier at Holland-China Trading Company, in 1919, twenty years before Charles did. In 1930 he worked for the HCHC Hong Kong office. With his wife he lived at 2 Chatham Road, where their daughter Anneke was born, in the same year.
Courtesy De Jongh family archives (c) Anneke Knüppe-de Jongh
Source: This image came from Flickr, see https://flickr.com/photo.gne?id=48090277548
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Christmas blog Mieke Melief, 1929-46
https://hierinhetoostenalleswel.nl/family-christmas-in-china-1929-1946/
Dear reader,
Mieke Melief, author about the De Jongh family history, placed a blog about spending Christmas in China, 1929-46. There are some interesting Hong Kong photos, the train tracks in the photo have resemblence with those in front of the Peninsula Hotel in Kowloon in 1929.
Best wishes,
Pieter