SS MONTEVIDEO MARU
LEFT TO RIGHT : COLIN TAIT CHARLES HOUGHTON DAVID BELL THOMAS EVANS MOORE ETTERSHANK KENNETH KENNEDY
on 7 May 1938 . Ken was a keen baseball player , and played cricket for the Brighton , Melbourne and Ivanhoe Cricket Clubs . He joined the AIF in 1940 and was a Lance Corporal at the time of his death . An only son , he had no children , and Elizabeth never remarried . Another Lark Force member was David Leith Bell ( born 20.12.1909 at North Carlton , SC 1924-25 ). David married Edna May Gray in 1936 . He was a bank clerk at the National Bank . As a bank teller at Collingwood , he was reported for confessing to misappropriating £ 1770 and two pence , resulting in his dismissal and subsequent jailing in 1938 for three years . David was trying to cover horseracing gambling debts . After his release he joined the AIF in 1941 and became a Gunner in the L Heavy Battery . He had no children , and Edna never remarried .
Also in Lark Force was Moore Ettershank ( born 5.12.1912 at East Loddon , SC 1927-28 ). One of four sons at Scotch , he was a boarder from Murray View , Benjeroop . Moore left after Year 10 and worked in an unspecified business role in Moonee Ponds . In 1939 he married Margaret Stewart Ross in Victoria .
Moore joined the AIF in 1940 and was a private in the Machinegun company of the 2 / 22nd Battalion when he was captured . He had no children . Margaret inserted ‘ in memoriam ’ notices in
newspapers for many years , and remarried to Old Boy Alexander Cecil James Williams about 26 years after Moore ’ s death .
Frederick Edmund Oaten ( born 12.6.1912 at Seymour , SC 1929 ) boarded in McMeckan in Year 10 then returned home to work alongside his father , a pharmacist , after whom he was named , with the intention of also becoming a pharmacist . However , he went to Papua New Guinea to manage a tobacco plantation . On the outbreak of war , Frederick and other Australians decided to return to Australia to enlist , but he was captured before he could do so . He was consequently considered a civilian casualty .
Scotch ’ s youngest Montevideo Maru victim was Lark Force member Colin Alexander Tait ( born 4.10.1919 , SC 1934-35 ), the younger of two brothers at Scotch . After repeating Year 9 he left Scotch and became a salesman . Joining the AIF in 1940 , he was a private in the 2 / 22nd Battalion when he was captured . Colin was engaged to be married . Other family members have followed him at Scotch .
As most of Scotch ’ s Montevideo Maru victims were childless , photographs of them and details about them are sparse . Any information that will enhance our knowledge of their tragically shortened lives will be gratefully received .
www . scotch . vic . edu . au Great Scot 99