A FORMER soldier who served in Burma after the Second World War is travelling back to the Asian country for a remembrance service marking 60 years since the end of fighting.
Peter Dowd, 78, of King Edward Street, Normanton, was a 19-year-old soldier in the Royal Army Service Corp and stationed in the war torn country between 1946 and 1948.
The Normanton, Altofts and Whitwood British Legion member is now making a pil
grimage back to Burma to visit the graves of fallen soldiers from Wakefield and elsewhere.
His special mission is to find one belonging to a Wakefield soldier which he photographed in 1946 but which was then moved in the 1950s to Rangoon.
Mr Dowd said: “While in the early part of my service there, probably 1946, I received in my weekly letter from my mother, a request to find, and if possible take a photograph of, the grave of a Wakefield soldier who was buried in the cemetery at Mandalay.
“At this time few soldiers had cameras so I borrowed one and bought a film. My mother received the result and said how pleased the family were with it, although, in hindsight, it is very poor. It can be identified as two graves with crosses and Mandalay Hill behind them.”
Since then the bodies of service personnel killed in the eastern and southern parts of the country were re-buried at two large war cemeteries in Rangoon in the 1950s.
Mr Dowd will visit Burma with the legion for remembrance on November 11 and will put poppy memorials on graves of people he knew or knew of – who died during his service and is very keen to find the new location of that grave.
Mr Dowd’s parents were Joe and Pollie Dowd, and the family home was 39, Parkgate Avenue, Eastmoor, from 1932 to 1956.
He always thought that perhaps his mother’s request came from a member of her family but cannot remember the name of the soldier and it is not readable on the small old photograph.
Mr Dowd says it may have been a neighbour or a friend of his mother who asked for the picture to be taken.
He said: “If there is anyone who knows of a relative who died in Burma during the war, and whose parents, or grandparents knew the Dowd family, and who may still have in their family archive this photo, I would like to identify him, pay my respects and bring a photograph of the present grave back to the family.”
Mr Dowd can be contacted on 01924 897258.
