Barton on Sea Remembers

Barton on Sea overlooks the English Channel. On very clear days the Isle of Wight stands proud and clear on the horizon. Even on dull days it can still be seen like a shadowy monster lying in wait to attack the mainland. France is far far away over the horizon. Even further away is India.

As the visitor drives into Barton on Sea along Barton Court Avenue, they will become aware that they are getting close to the sea and be focusing on what they can do on their day out. That focus may be so strong that they may not see a cream coloured memorial at the apex of a traffic island they are driving by. They may or may not see a golden coloured onion dome to their left that would look more at home in Delhi than here in a British seaside town.

The building where the onion dome sprouts from used to be a hotel until in 1914 when it was conscripted into military service as a convalescence home for British and Indian soldiers injured on the European battlefields of World War I. And that is the backstory to the memorial.

It is the Indian soldiers who dominate the photographs and the short stories on the notice board. The memory of them and their brief presence in this cliff top town will liveth forever. The memorial does not mention the names of those who died and nor does it mention the hospital but it does name two of the camp commandants responsible for this convalescent home in both English and Indo-Aryan script.

Lt Colonel J Chaytor White was the Commandant of the convalescent home. There is very little information around for this named officer. However, for Lt Colonel W A Mawson (1852 – 1925) there is more available thanks to the provenance Bonhams, the auction house, prepared when they auctioned his medals in 2013. He served in the "Indian Medical Service" from 1876 onward as a surgeon attaining the rank of Lt Colonel by 1896. The medals show that he served in Kabul, Charasia, Ali Musjid, Waziristan and the Punjab Frontier before arriving in Barton Sea.

The convalescent home was one of three medical facilities for Indian soldiers located in the New Forest area. The other two were at Brockenhurst and Milford on Sea.

Here in the UK there are metal silhouettes of a World War I British soldier holding his rifle and wearing the "Tommie’s" distinctive tin helmet. They will catch the unwary by surprise on the walls of buildings or in public gardens. The one next to the memorial catches the unwary by even greater surprise. Instead of the silhouette of a "Tommie" it is that of an Indian soldier who does not wear a tin helmet but is wearing a turban.

While I was looking at the memorial in the warm sunshine I just could not help thinking of the men who stayed at the hospital.

A quote from an Indian soldier’s letter home describes the home as "very quiet and cold but close to the sea."

What were their deeper thoughts going through their minds behind the masks of smiling turbaned faces in the grainy black and white photographs near the memorial? Thoughts that had to remain buried and unexpressed for fear of being branded weak. So far from home, suffering from injuries and convalescing? Those that were able to must have gone for walks overlooking the sea knowing that in all probability the next time they crossed it they would not be going home but back to the trenches of mainland Europe.

The memorial was paid for with voluntary contributions from the military staff of the convalescent home and erected in 1917 the year before World War I ended. It is believed to be one of the earliest memorials erected to commemorate World War I.

So, the next time or even the first time you visit Barton On Sea, take a few minutes to visit the memorial and stand where a small piece of the history of World War I and of the Indian Military met briefly on a cliff top on the south coast of Britain.