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GERMAN WHO DIED AS A BRITISH SOLDIER

HOW EIS WIFE LEARNED HIS NATIONALITY. < . After ho had served 19 years in tho British Army, and died, on the field in France, it was discovered that Squadron Sorgeant-Major Harry William Baker, Uth Hussars, was a German. Recently the Home Office granted a certificate of naturalisation to his widow, Mrs. Joan Mowat Bredalbane Sutherland Baker, ol The Bungalow. Peper Harow Road, Godaiming, Surrey, declaring her to be a British subject. Mrs.. Baker was born at Loch Fyne, in Argyllshire, but marriage created her a German, and according to law an "alien enemy." A remarkable fact is that although she had been happily married since March, 1008, it was only a few months ago? after her husband had been dead eight months, that the discovery was made that he was a German. It became necessary for Mrs Baker to register under the Aliens Restriction Order, and she also for a time forfeited her pension. ' Now-her nationality has been restored, with 'the pension and the arrears had accumulated during the suspension. "I never had the remotest idea that my husband was a, German," said Mrs. Baker. "In fact, he hated anything, German. Before the war he never' liked ine to get any toys for our little girl that bore the words 'Made in Germany.' After my husband was killed at Meisines, France, on October 31, 1914 I received the official notification from "the War Office. Eight months later I read in a Daper that a. Mrs. Leibold. a German, had been prosecuted for failing to register. In the report of the case it was stated that Mrs. Loibold came to England from Germany 33 years ago, and that she had a son a squadron sergeantmajor in the British Army who, in the name of Baker, had served in the 11th Hussars and had .been killed in action. It startled me when I read it." continued Mrs. Baker, "for I felt that there could only be one Squadron Sergt.-Mn-jor Baker in the 11th. The inquiries I made established beyond all douli't Hint it was my husband. I had undersVoil from him that he was horn at East Hvn. Tt now appeared that he was born in Germany. and that his mother brrmtrht him. here when he vns 121 Tears old."

Permanent link to this item
Hononga pūmau ki tēnei tūemi

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/DOM19160205.2.98

Bibliographic details
Ngā taipitopito pukapuka

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2687, 5 February 1916, Page 13

Word count
Tapeke kupu
384

GERMAN WHO DIED AS A BRITISH SOLDIER Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2687, 5 February 1916, Page 13

GERMAN WHO DIED AS A BRITISH SOLDIER Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2687, 5 February 1916, Page 13

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