Guernsey - Petit Port Bay Prior to 1946. And the Death of Count Hisaichi Terauchi.

            The Postcard

A postcard that was published by Valentine and Sons of Dundee and London. The image is a glossy real photograph.

The card was posted in Guernsey using a 2d. stamp on Wednesday the 12th. June 1946. It was sent to:

Miss A. K. Butt,
89, Marchmont Road,
Wallington,
Surrey.

The message on the divided back of the card was as follows:

"Tuesday.
We are sitting on the
left-hand side of the
beach facing the sea.
The tide is coming in
and we are toying with
the idea of bathing, only
there have only been
children in so far - I'd
rather have the company
of some adults!
The food is definitely
good here, and eggs are
plentiful.
We like White Gables
very much.
Laura & Prue."

The Creation of a Jewish State

So what else happened on the day that the card was posted?

Well, on the 12th. June 1946, after the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry had unanimously recommended that up to 100,000 European Jews be allowed to immigrate to Palestine, British Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin declared that the United Kingdom would reject the plan. 

Speaking at the annual conference of Britain's Labour Party, Bevin commented that:

"The motive for American support for 
a Jewish state is because they do not 
want too many of them in New York." 

Following the rejection of the proposal, Zionist leaders began a campaign of violence against the British government in the future state of Israel.

Count Hisaichi Terauchi

The day also marked the death of Count Hisaichi Terauchi.

Count Hisaichi, who was born on the 8th. August 1879, was a Gensui (or field marshal) in the Imperial Japanese Army.

Terauchi was given command of Southern Expeditionary Army, responsible for the opening Japanese offensive of the Pacific War in WWII. He was critical of Masaharu Homma for being too "soft" on Filipinos, and of Hitoshi Imamura for being too lenient to the Indonesian independence movement. 

As the war in the Pacific drew to a close, Terauchi surrendered his family heirloom wakizashi short sword to Lord Louis Mountbatten in Saigon in 1945. The sword dates from 1413, and is now kept at Windsor Castle. 

The sword was almost the subject of a diplomatic incident in the mid-1980's, when Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother wanted to place it on prominent display during a dinner held for Crown Prince Naruhito of Japan. However, her daughter, Queen Elizabeth II, vetoed the idea.

When told that Terauchi was in too poor health to attend the surrender ceremony in Singapore, Mountbatten sent his own doctor to examine Terauchi. 

The doctor confirmed his fragile health, and Mountbatten had him transferred to a bungalow in Malaya in March 1946. On the 11th. June 1946, Terauchi became angered by a report of a Kempeitai lieutenant colonel who had threatened to disclose Japanese war crimes to the Allies.

In consequence he suffered a massive stroke and died early the next morning at the age of 66. He therefore never stood trial for war crimes, such as his responsibility for the mistreatment of laborers on the Burma-Siam Railroad and his order that all Allied prisoners of war in his command area were to be massacred if Japan was invaded.

He was buried at the Japanese cemetery in Singapore.
   

Taken on: December 21, 2024

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