The tragic death of a long-time family's friend

Mr. Kiet wattananikorn and Malee, his wife, moved to Ngao the second time in 1940, and settled down there since then. Malee recounted that on the morning of December 8th, 1941, the radio of Thailand announced Field Marshal Plaek Phibunsongkhram’s declaration of the Thai government’s consent for the Japanese troops to march through Thailand. After Hartley and Kinder learned about the situation, with the United Kingdom was already at war with Japan, the only choice for them was to escape into British Burma. On the next morning, both of them left Ngao by car for Chiang Rai. After having got permit from Chiang Rai’s Governor, they immediately entered into Burma via Shan State.

When the Greater East Asia War ended in September 1945, Stanley Kinder and Evelyn Guy Stuart Hartley returned from England to Amphoe Ngao with their newlywed wives, Mollie and Merry, in November 1945 and January 1946 respectively. Hartley resumed his work as forest manager for the Anglo-Thai Company and proposed Kiet to be appointed as the assistant manager. Later Guy Hartley and Merry had two children together, Clare and Alan, who were born in Bangkok Nursing Home in 1950 and 1953. This family lived together in the forest manager’s residence at the company’s headquarter in Ngao.