Burma

Burma (now officially called the Union of Myanmar) was a province of the Bengal Presidency until the establishment of the Burma Office in 1937 after which it was administered separately until independence in 1948.

Geography

Places in Burma:

• Ava
• Bassein
• Martaban
• Mandalay
• Moulmein
• Negrais Island
• Pegu
• Prome
• Rangoon

History

The British annexed parts of Burmese territory after their victory in the 1st Burma War. Lower Burma was annexed in 1852 after the 2nd Burma War. In 1862, these territories were designated the minor province of British India, British Burma. After the 3rd Burma War in 1885, Upper Burma was annexed, and the following year, the province of Burma in British India was created, becoming a major province in 1897. This arrangement lasted until 1937, when Burma began to be administered separately by the Burma Office and the Secretary of State for India and Burma. Burma achieved independence from British rule on January 4, 1948.

Military

• 1st Burma War - 1823-24. View the FIBIS Google Books Library

• 2nd Burma War - 1852-53. View the FIBIS Google Books Library

• 3rd Burma War - 1885.

• Second World War

Also see

• Burma Volunteer Corps
• British Army
• Indian Army

Trek Out of Burma in 1942

Following the Japanese bombing in 1942, half a million refugees attempted to walk to India. Many died.

• Koi-Hai website
  • Forgotten Frontier by Geoffrey Tyson, first published 1945, may be downloaded as a pdf from the Koi-Hai website. This book is about the Trek and the help provided by the tea planters of Assam assisting people from North Burma into India.
• Anglo-Burmese Library - transcriptions and report. Also the list of internees.
• This India List post and this British Raj post are about a young boy, whose family perished in the Trek Out of Burma, who was given into the care of some Gurkhas and raised as a Gurkha. He was subsequently traced, but had died. The India List post mentions Red Cross records in Geneva, probably those of the ICRC Archives
• This India List post and this India List post are about books about the Trek Out of Burma. Refer also Planet Burma Book World below.
• The Elephant Man is about the rescue of refugees by Gyles Mackrell , an Assam tea planter. He mounted an operation to save refugees who were trapped by flooded rivers at the border with India using the only means available to get them across - elephants. Includes YouTube film clip from the Centre of South Asian Studies, Cambridge
• The story of Sam and Marg Acomb The War period commences page 28. In 1941 the author escaped from Thailand to Rangoon where he joined the Army in Burma Reserve of Officers. In 1942 he trekked for three weeks out of Burma to India. Subsequently he was assigned as Intelligence Officer in Dibrugahr Assam, Deolali, Ceylon and Bangkok(1944) until he was discharged in August 1946. BYU Digital Collections
• Listen to a radio interview with Felicity Goodall, author of Exodus Burma. news.bbc.co.uk. Today,Tuesday, 13 December 2011. Details of Exodus Burma, the British Escape Through the Jungles of Death 1942 by Felicity Goodall 2011. Available to buy through Amazon.co.uk from the FIBIS Shop
• Tales of wartime courage revealed Yorkshire Post Wednesday 11 January 2012
• Exodus from Burma by Krishnan Gurumurthy, aged 9 in 1942. His father was employed in the Burma Railways and was one of the many Indian working in Burma. amitavghosh.com

Railways

• Burma Railway

Records

British Library

• Baptisms, Marriages and Burials for Burma are included in the Bengal returns (N/1) up to 1936. Records for 1937 to 1959 are in a separate series N/10 with a single index for Burma BMBs.
• Burma Gazette IOR/V/11/3406-3694 1875-1952.This publication was one of the Government Gazettes which were the official newspapers of the Government of India and its provincial governments where information, such as appointments, promotions,etc was 'gazetted'.

LDS (Mormon)

The LDS film catalogue has the following entries:

• Burma ecclesiastical returns, registered 1937-1957.
• Registers and indexes of the Burma Office. It is unclear from the catalogue just what records these are. However, from the film notes, they appear to be indexes only (Z/M records).
• Extracts from St. Andrew's Outlook, quarterly messenger of the Presbyterian Churches in Malaya, Sumatra, Burma and Siam : marriages and deaths, March 1914 - July 1951 Microfilm number 87992
• Extracts from Scots Kirk', the church magazine of the Presbyterian Church in Signal Pagoda Road, Rangoon, Burma : baptisms, marriages and deaths, June 1930-June 1941 Microfilm number 87993
• Microfilm of manuscript vol. of St. John the Baptist Armenian Apostolic Church in Rangoon, Burma. Births and baptisms, 1867-1980; marriages, 1858-1981; deaths, 1857-1957. Text in Armenian. Microfilm number 1356948 Item 2

Other

• From the catalogue of the Centre for Jewish History, New York and available through the American Sephardi Federation:
  • Birth Register Book: Musmeah Yeshua Synagogue Rangoon. Published 1979 In English, available from 1896. In Hebrew, available from 1888
  • Death Register Book: Musmeah Yeshua Synagogue Rangoon. Published 1979. Available from 1888. In Hebrew with Sephardi Script.

FIBIS resources

• Images of Burma
• FIBIS database:Burmese cemeteries inscriptions and photographs
• "The Life of a Madras Artilleryman: The William Porter Letters" by Peter Bailey FIBIS Journal Number 3 (Spring 2000). FIBIS members may read this article online.

Extracts from "The Private Letters of William Porter, Gunner, 3rd Batt., Madras Artillery (1826-1857) (Mss Eur. G128, British Library)", including time spent in Burma

Economy and business

The leading British firms in Burma were the Burma Oil Company, which controlled the oil industry, Steel Brothers and Company Limited, which worked in oil, rice and general trading business, the Rangoon Electric Tramway and Supply Company Limited, the Anglo-Burma Tin Company , and the Burma Corporation Limited, which operated the Bawdwin Mines.

The book Electric Traction in the Burmese Capital: A History of the Rangoon Electric Tramway and Supply Company, Limited by Robert P Sechler 1981 is available at the National Tramway Museum, Crich Tramway Village, Derbyshire and Cornell University Library, Ithaca, NY, USA

Also refer Twentieth century impressions of Burma: its history, people, commerce, industries, and resources by Arnold Wright in Online books below

Recommended Reading

• The book Old Soldier Sahib by Frank Richards, is about the early 1900s in India and Burma and mentioned in Military reading list. Further reviews can be read in this Victorian Wars Forum post and on thread Victorian Wars forum blog and on Mark Simner's military history blog. The book was first published in 1936.
• Details of the book A Soldier’s Story-From the Khyber Pass to the Jungles of Burma: The Memoir of a British Officer in the Indian Army 1933-1947 by John Archibald Hislop, edited by Penny Kocher 2010. There is a review by Richard Morgan of A Soldier’s Story in FIBIS Journal Number 26 Autumn 2011, page 52. For details of how to access this article, see FIBIS Journals. The review may also be read in this link, along with other reviews.

External links

	The FIBIS Google Books Library has books tagged: Burma

• Burma Wikipedia
• British rule in Burma Wikipedia
• The Anglo-Burmese Library. This website contains extracts from a number of directories including lists of inhabitants, as well as muster rolls of Volunteer Forces. They can obtain copies of files from the Myanmar National Archives, some samples of which are shown on their "Projects" page.
  • Message Boards page states "Given the historic close connection between Burma and Siam we do collect incidental records relating to Siam, especially BMDs for the 19th century, so we welcome any questions regarding that country. The Andaman Islands BMD returns were always included in the Burma returns, and so we feel justified in including these Islands in our remit".
• Planet Burma, website of the Britain- Burma Society including Book World
• Online Burma/Myanmar Library, Burmalibrary.org, under the subject History has many categories including
  • Historical periods / British Colonial Period [1824-1948]
  • Economic History/Overseas trade/Trade with Europeans and the East India Companies
  • Historical documents/Memoirs and accounts of Burma by missionaries
• Burma Auxiliary Force following separation of Burma from India in April 1937 rothwell.force9.co.uk

Online Books

• Oriental Repertory by Alexander Dalrymple Volume 1 1793 and Volume 2 1808 contain a number of references to early Burma. See Scientific books online
• Shipwreck of the Juno on the coast of Aracan in 1795 and history of Aracan. Google Books
• Report on the Eastern Frontier of British India by Robert Boileau Pemberton 1835 Google Books
• Travels in south-eastern Asia, embracing Hindustan, Malaya, Siam, and China: with notices of numerous missionary stations, and a full account of the Burman Empire; with dissertations, tables, etc by Howard Malcolm 2nd edition 1839 2 volumes in one. Book 2 with index follows page 276 of Book 1 Google Books.
• "Notes on Arakan by the late Rev GS Comstock, American Baptist Missionary in that country 1834-1844" from Journal of the American Oriental Society Volume 1, No 3 1847, page 219 Google Books
• Selections from the Records of the Government of Bengal: no 6: Report on the Tin and Other Mineral Productions of the Tenasserim Provinces 1852 Archive.org
• Selections from the Records of the Government of Bengal: no 9: Report on the Teak Forests of Tenasserim Provinces with an Index 1852 Archive.org
• Rough Pencillings of a Rough Trip to Rangoon in 1846 by Colesworthey Grant 1853. With illustrations Archive.org.
• Tenasserim Provinces , page 685 A Gazetteer of Southern India: with the Tenasserim Provinces and Singapore by Pharoah & Co 1855 Google Books.
• Hand-book for British Burmaby George Edward Fryer 1867 Google Books
• Bhamo Expedition: Report on the practicability of re-opening the trade route, between Burma and Western China by Captain A Bowers 1869 Google Books includes
  • Preface to the Administration Report of British Burmah for 1867-68 by Major General A. Fytche, C. S. I. Chief Commissioner , page 129
• The British Burma Gazetteer, Volume 2 A-Z 1879 Archive.org
• Correspondence respecting the Ruby Mines of Upper Burmah presented to both houses of Parliament by command of Her Majesty 1887 Archive.org
• Gazetteer of Upper Burma and the Shan States 1900-1901 (Archive.org)
  • Part 1, Volume 1 includes Chapter 10, Ethnology with Vocabularies Part 2, Volume 1 A-K Part 2, Volume 2 L-P Part 2, Volume 3 R-Z
• Wild sports of Burma and Assam By Fitz William Thomas Pollok and W. S. Thom 1900 Archive.org
• Burma, painted and described Robert Talbot Kelly, 1905 Archive.org
• Twentieth century impressions of Burma : its history, people, commerce, industries, and resources by Arnold Wright 1910 Southeast Asia Visions "Contents" "Index"
• Experiences of a jungle-wallah by Hugh Nisbet 1910 Southeast Asia Visions. The author worked for the Bombay Burmah Trading Corporation from 1879. The company logged teak in the Burma forests
• Burma Through The Centuries by John Stuart 1910 Archive.org
• Big Game Shooting in Upper Burma George Patrick Elystan Evans 1911 Archive.org
• A civil servant in Burma by Sir Herbert Thirkell White, 1913 Archive.org
• History of Upper Assam, Upper Burmah and North-Eastern Frontier by Leslie Waterfield Shakespear 1914 Archive.org
• Tourist guide and shopping list : where to go, what to see, where to shop in Calcutta and Burma 1920 Southeast Asia Visions
• Burma Pictures c 1920 Archive.org
• Songs of The Survivors, including the Editor’s Preface Google Books. Stories about the Goan community in Burma and the Trek of 1942
• Burmese Days, a novel by George Orwell, first published 1934. Gutenberg.net.au. The author’s real name was Eric Arthur Blair and the novel is based on his experiences in the Indian Imperial Police in Burma from 1922 to 1927. This article by Steve Martin (www.orwell.ru) gives details of Katha, the northern town where Orwell was stationed from December 1926 to June 1927, on which the fictional town of Kyauktada in Upper Burma in the novel is based.
• Many editions of the SOAS Bulletin of Burma Research are available on Archive.org. The SOAS Bulletin of Burma Research offers current information on Burma research, activities, and resources at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, as well as information on international Burma research of relevance to Burma scholars in the United Kingdom.
  • Wil Dijk's "Report on the Archives Of The Dutch East India Company (VOC) as they relate to Burma" Published in the SOAS Bulletin of Burma Research 1.1 (Spring 2003). Archive.org

Other

• Adoniram Judson, Ann Judson-Pioneer American Baptist Missionaries to Burma Wholesomewords.org
• Joseph Valu's World War 2 Burma Diaries
• Obituary of Reuben Solomon born Rangoon 1921, from the Sydney Morning Herald dated 24 October 2009. He is mentioned in Burmese Nights tajmahalfoxtrot.com
• De La Salle Brothers in Myanmar
• "Fire-Hearted Pebbles from Burma" by C.M. Enriquez, reprinted from Asia Magazine, October, 1930, Vol. 30, No. 10, pp. 722–725, 733. , is about the ruby mines of Burma and the Burma Ruby Mines Company. Palagems.com
• This British Raj List thread led to a British Raj list post with a transcription of a newspaper report about the Lillywhite family, poisoned by arsenic by the family cook in Mandalay, c 1899, resulting in three deaths. The Times of Burma is mentioned as a research resource.
• This India List post is about the book The Autobiography of a Wanderer In England and Burma: Memoirs of a Former Mayor of Rangoon by Charles Haswell Campagnac, published 2011, with more details here. The author was a lawyer born 1886 in India, with a French Huguenot ancestor. Covers the period to World War 2, including the bombing by the Japanese and subsequent flight to India.
• Burmese Prince Moung Lat was a British state prisoner in India for 54 years during which time he married the daughter of an Australian widow. Tehelka.com
• Family budgets in 1920s India by John O’Brien 27 February 2012 British Library Blog: Untold Lives: Sharing stories from the past. Includes a mention of Rangoon.
• Joseph Robert Milner describes his time in Burma performing primarily clerical duties for the Army from December 1945 to 1947 from page 17 of this document. He was posted by the British Army to a Unit in Rangoon known as AdvancereforsecSEAC ,or Advanced Reinforcement Section, South East Asia Command ronbaileyscarvings.com
• "Browsing Through a Treasure House: The Literature of the Burma Campaign" by Gordon Graham. From the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London 2011 pdf, html version Abstract