Revision as of 23:22, 3 January 2023 edit Mebigrouxboy (talk \| contribs) Extended confirmed users 7,587 edits never the less → nevertheless ← Previous edit		Revision as of 08:09, 6 January 2023 edit undo Chuckycheez58 (talk \| contribs) 2 edits m My great uncle Douglas Next edit →
Line 269: * [[Walter Fletcher (politician)\|'''Walter Fletcher''']] – A British businessman turned agent. Part of Operation Remorse, sent into China to smuggle rubber products, foreign currency, diamonds and machinery out of Japanese occupied-Malaya and French Indochina. Elected as Member of Parliament for [[Bury (UK Parliament constituency)\|Bury]] in [[Lancashire]] after WWII. * '''{{Interlanguage link\|William Frank Harding Ansell (zoologist)\|lt=William Frank Harding Ansell\|de\|William Frank Harding Ansell}}''' – A British Army officer fought in the Burma campaign while served in the [[3rd Gorkha Rifles\|3rd Gurkha Rifles]]. Attached to Force 136 after being promoted to the rank of Captain. Educated to be a teacher, he became interested in [[zoology]] while fighting in Burma. Became a renowned zoologist after the war including receiving [[Doctor of Philosophy]] in zoologist in 1960. Wrote several books about mammals and has five species named after him (e.g. [[Ansell's mole-rat]]). * A Lt. Douglas Browning, a plantation manager in Malaya during the late 1920's and until the Japanese invasion of Malaya. Browning, with Syme and Edgar, escaped the fall of Singapore to Sumatra then to Australia where they enlisted in the AIF.{{citation needed https://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/C9022348\|date=August 2020}} He originated the idea of Operation Carpenter and was flown from Perth to Ceylon to meet with Mountbatten. After returning to Australia (by sub tender) he was sent to Exmouth to join a submarine to drop him off near Singapore. He was evacuated because of malaria and a hernia. Peace broke out before he could rejoin the fight. Returning to England in 1946, passing from malaria complications in 1948. * 'Edward Cairney' (1911-2006) was a British operative. Having previously volunteered and worked in bomb disposal in London, he was recruited into SOE special forces commando early in 1944. He subsequently saw action behind German lines before D-Day engaged in hit and run operations against German target. He related that in one instance his unit overran a small SS garrison in a night raid. He also told a story about being sent to take out a machine gun emplacement as part of the D-Day landings, he said that the experience was terrifying. After D-Day he was sent the far east as part of force 136. He was part of an eight-man unit that operated out of Trincomalee, in what was then Ceylon, to carry out covert missions in Malaya. One of the aspects he hated was having to hack his way through the jungle. They had to cross many rivers so one person was tasked with swimming across and securing a rope the opposite bank to allow the rest to follow. Since he was a strong swimmer, he volunteered to be the rope man. He was also a jungle sniper which involved climbing a tree and tying yourself in with a rope. He related that once you fired a shot you had to get down as quickly as possible. He was ordered to test a new inflatable dingy in Mount Lavinia Bay in Sri Lanka, but the dinghy deflated whilst he was far out in the bay. He was nevertheless required to ensure he returned with the dingy, so had to swim back dragging the deflated dinghy behind. He also spoke of being asked to guard some Americans who had been freed from a Japanese prisoner of war camp. The Americans were so emaciated and starved that he was asked to forcefully stop them from eating at gun point to avoid them overeating and injuring themselves. He mentioned that all members of his unit were required to carry a cyanide capsules on missions as capture wasn't an option

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