Terry Sarten: Home for Christmas in 1944

If you have any further information it would be great to hear from you.

It has become something of a tradition for Tel's Tales to be a Christmas story.

This year the inspiration has come from a second-hand book found in a shop in Bulls.

It is a small volume called A Pocket Atlas of the British Isles. Inside the front cover there is a hand-written note that book as the travel companion of a I.J. Shearer who in October 1942 left the home address of 114 Portal St Whanganui and sailed out of Wellington, destination Britain.

On the back pages of the pocket atlas are listed places visited along the way. The writing is not always clear but place names include; San Diego, Los Angeles, Oakland, San Francisco, Vancouver, Edmonton, Winnipeg, Toronto, Hamilton, Dunnville, Welland, St Catherine, Niagara Falls, Buffalo, Windoor, Wallaceburg and New York.

The distances between these places make it quite feasible that this was done by bicycle although that is a guess. The second stage of the journey commences by ship, sailing in a convoy as this is during WW2, and arriving in Liverpool.

It is not clear whether the journey across America was by bike but in Britain it clearly was as the Frame No. TM1339 is noted in the margins next to a long list of places.

This list has every one of the 63 destination in order - each village, town or city. This tiny pocket atlas was the equivalent of GPS and this traveller obviously had great eyesight as the maps are dense with tiny print, some areas being a miniature maze of roads.

The shading to show elevation would have been a boon and perhaps a bust to a cyclist traversing the country.

The place names do not give any indication of how long was spent in each location, give any clues to weather conditions or reasons for taking a particular route.

There is no information to tell whether there were family connections to be made or what motivated the journey. Maybe it was an early version of the great Kiwi OE?

1942 to 1944 were an extraordinary time to be traveling. It was wartime in Europe and Britain when ocean voyagers could be perilous and travel had its dangers but Shearer was determined to be home for Christmas.

Terry Sarten

Brighton is the last UK destination noted and then place names shift direction as the journey bends homeward by boat, via Port Said in Egypt, Taranto Italy, Suez, Colombo, Freemantle to Perth then Lyttleton before arriving back in Wellington on the 20/12 / 1944 and presumably then home to Whanganui for Christmas.

1942 to 1944 were an extraordinary time to be traveling. It was wartime in Europe and Britain when ocean voyagers could be perilous and travel had its dangers but Shearer was determined to be home for Christmas.

It would be interesting to know more about this person beyond the glimpse provided by the hand-written notes in the pocket atlas. If any of you out there in newspaper reading land have any further information it would be great to hear from you.

Terry Sarten (Tel) is writer, musician and social worker. Feedback: tgs@inspire.net.nz