LEICESTER – DUNN Kathleen Olivia Leicester was born on 28 January 1909. She was the daughter of Charles Edward Barnaby Lewis Leicester (born 6 July 1885 – Kuching, Sarawak and deceased in 1945 – Singapore, aged 60 years old). Around 1910, Charles married Kathleen’s mother – Winnifred Susan Van Royen (born about 1884. Deceased 20 May 1940 – Singapore, aged about 56 years old).
Sometime around 1932, Kathleen Leicester married Cecil Dickson Pennefather. He was born on 27 January 1907 at Singapore and deceased on 4 April 1983 – Singapore, aged 76 years old. His parents were Arthur Pyne Pennefather (ca 1856-1932) and Celestine Feliciana Augustus Augustine.
Kathleen and Cecil had two children: Maureen and Percy. At some point Cecil and Kathleen divorced and in 1941 Kathleen married Neale Dunn (b. 25 September 1915). The records for these events have not yet been located.
Neale changed his name from Dunn to Leicester Dunn in 1941 (ST 1.9.41) probably on marrying Kathleen and adopting her two children Percy and Maureen who also became Leicester-Dunn.
Neale was a Royal Artillery gunner. He enlisted in England on 24 June 1935 as part of the 9th Coast Regiment.
When Singapore fell, he was held there as a POW and later transferred to Thailand.
Kathleen and her two children, Maureen and Percy, were evacuated from Singapore on the Giang Bee and all three survived its sinking on 13.2.42. Of the two lifeboats that carried away survivors, the Leicester-Dunn family was most likely in the lifeboat that reached the shore near Jebus on Banka Island. According to the Netherlands Indies Red Cross: ” … Mrs. N. L. Dunn and two children were interned in Palembang … ” till 9.9.42 – the date on which the internees were moved to Muntok.
When at Palembang, Mrs. Leicester-Dunn and her two children were interned in House # 3 on Irene Laan with a Nurse Kong, Mrs. Iris Robinson, and Granny Stubbs, according to a list of internees (along with the houses in which they were accommodated) provided by Ralph Armstrong in 2016.
After they were liberated, presumably from Belalau Camp, the family was returned to Singapore on 27 September 1945. They were repatriated to Ceylon on 29.10.45 (list of GB passengers at PRO) and then England.
This ‘repatriation’ was probably based on the fact that they were the wife and adopted family of a British subject. However, they returned to Singapore from the UK in 1946. (Passenger lists & ST 30.11.52).
Below is Neale’s discharge card from the British Army.
Below, the family in 1953:
Maureen died in Singapore in 1973:
The Children:
Percy Dunn, whose name prior to 1941 had been Percy Barnaby Pennefather (ST 1.9.41).
At a concert held in the Palembang camp Percy sang a duet with young Maisie Boswell called “Soldier, soldier, won’t you marry me?’
Oh soldier, soldier, won’t you marry me?
With your musket, fife, and drum?
Oh no, sweet maid, I cannot marry thee
For I have no coat to put on
Then up she went to her grandfather’s chest
And got him a coat of the very, very best
She got him a coat of the very, very best
And the soldier put it on
Oh soldier, soldier, won’t you marry me?
With your musket, fife, and drum?
Oh no, sweet maid, I cannot marry thee
For I have no hat to put on
Then up she went to her grandfather’s chest
And got him a hat of the very, very best
She got him a hat of the very, very best
And the soldier put it on
Etc.
Percy was known for crawling under the camp fence to get sweet potatoes and tapioca from the other side and throwing them over the fence to Maisie and her family.
Post war Percy got into some trouble with the law as an 18 year old student after ‘dishonestly receiving a tricycle stolen belonging to Leonard Patrick, and was fined $50 (ST. 8.12.50).
Percy’s next brush with the law (and apparently his last) was somewhat more egregious:
5 MTHS. JAIL FOR CHEATING
Singapore Standard 26 February 1954
Percy Leicester Dunn, 22, was sentenced to five month’s rigorous imprisonment by the Singapore Fifth Police Court Magistrate. Mr. D. H. Chapman, yesterday. Dunn admitted cheating Messrs. Mansfield Co. by dishonestly inducing them to deliver to him a cash cheque for $154.50, …
In the 1960’s Percy became well known as the female impersonator called “Singapore’s Carmen Miranda” (ST. 29.1.80):
By 1988, aged 57 years, he was working at the ‘Magnolia’ snack bar in the Capitol Building in Singapore and his name had become Percy Lester. In an article about the snack bar, Percy reminisced that he had breakfasted there as a choir boy in 1941.
Maureen Dunn, previous name had been Winifred Maureen Pennefather (ST. 1.9.41). She was born on 19th November, 1937 and died on 2 August 1979 at Hampshire, England. She married Thomas Waggett (born 1932 on the Isle of Man).
Post war she was employed as a telephone operator for a rubber company (ST. 7.7.53) and later was an entrant in the “Miss Golden Rotary” beauty pageant in Singapore (ST.7.4.55).
Galaxy of Beauty, The Singapore Free Press, 24 June 1954, Page 3:
