Willy Ah Poy, in this 1890’s photograph a respectable fruit and vegetable storekeeper in Chiltern, Victoria. He married Louisa Coon from the Victorian goldfields. They had nine children. Willy travelled frequently to China to see his parents, and possibly also had a wife and children there. He did not return from his last trip and was presumed dead. Louisa moved to Albury with the eight surviving children where she met and married Edward (Teddy) Mahlook, a local market gardener. Private collection
During World War II, three of Louisa’s sons, William, Roy and Lindsay, were in different parts of Asia fighting the Japanese. William joined the British army in Hong Kong where he was a motor bike dispatch rider and won the Military Medal. He was captured when the city was taken on Christmas Day 1941, but managed to blend in with the locals and escape soon after. For months he sold rice to the Japanese before stealing it and selling it back again, later managing to get his family on a diplomatic exchange ship to Canada. Roy was not so fortunate and was captured at the fall of Singapore in February 1942. He was imprisoned in Singapore’s Changi gaol, and later forced to work on the notorious Thai-Burma railway.429 Lindsay put his age up so he could join the army. His turn for overseas duty came in May 1945 when as a trained engineer he went to Borneo (present day Sabah), where his main task was to help destroy concrete beach obstacles in preparation for the Australian landing on Tarakan Island. After the landing he went on numerous jungle patrols, eventually becoming victim to a booby trap. He was saved by the belt on which he hung his pliers, which deflected much of the shrapnel. Years later, on their return, Roy became a bookmaker. His son Roy followed in his father‘s occupation,
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Border Mail, 12 August 1989, 15 February 1992.