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Record #9736
Name :
: Anthony Roger CHAMBERS (1942 - )
  aka : Tony Chambers


Father
:
Mother
:
BMD and other details
Date of Birth
: 26 Aug 1942

Marriage (1)
:
Marriage (2)
:

Date of Death
:
Abode (1) : Place of BirthEngland, Hertfordshire, Hemel Hempstead
Abode (2) : Place of Death / Burial
Sailing Information
Date of Arrival
: Jan 1952
Country
: New Zealand

Ship
: Rangitoto

Placement Family
:
Homes / Agencys
Institution (GB)
:

Agency
: Unknown
NotesChambers is my New Zealand adoptive name and the only last name I go by.

I was born in Hemel Hempstead, Hertfordshire, England. 26th August 1942.

December 3rd 1951... I sailed out of Tilbury London on the "Rangitoto" bound for Wellington New Zealand as a British Child Migrant.

I never knew my father, I did live in a house with my birth mother and other family members. My mother did ask the local services for help, thinking they would only send me somewhere in Britain...while she could go to work. They suggested sending me to another British type country. It seems my mother misunderstood the implications. There was still the strong memory of the War evacuee children who had a repatriation clause for their temporary embarkation. My mother seemed to have thought that is what would happen to myself.(Only a temporary situation).

I was a happy child in my old home town and did not suffer any abuse in my family...I loved my family & town. We were very close to lovely green hilly countryside and the long Grand Union Canal. London was only 25 miles away...but it was another world that I had not ever visited.

I maintain I should never have been sent out of the country.

My child & teenager group was of 16 including three teenage girls. We had two supervisors (a youngish man & women) I think they were New Zealander's and were very kind to us. Our ship sea/route was: Across the Atlantic to Curosao for a port call, Panama Canal call....and off shore Picton Island. The voyage took about a month.

I broke my wrist & sprained my ankle on board by rough & and tumble fun. (The joke was they had to stop the ship in the Pacific to set & plaster my wrist.) (I had a photo taken in the Lifebuoy.We had Xmas & New Year on board in the middle of the ocean. (All the children were given Xmas presents...whether motherless(ourselves) or mothered (normal family migrant children).

Upon arrival in Wellington NZ... I was met on board the ship by my respective new parents to be....but I already had a mum I thought). I seemed to be the only one met on board in that manner. My new folks asked me to call them mum & dad. They took me by an overnight ferry down to Christchurch in the South Island. There I met my extended family of cousins Aunties & Uncles to be. Including friendly family neighbours. I was told. "Tony we will make a Kiwi out of you in no time....you poor little Pommie kid. But you must learn to pay Rugby". Many of my new relatives were farmers. I was to go on to have wonderful farm family holidays. (Not as a farm kid labour like so many sad stories I would learn years in the future).

After my adoption by October of the same year 1952 (I had arrived in January). I became a full integrated member of the Chambers family. (My mother had been, I was only to learn also years later, advised to allow my adoption. Thus she suffered the rest of her life for her two mistakes. I, too, although I grew up a happy healthy New Zealander young man...) I suffered from the implications of family and country identity. (A legacy although trivial compared to the really unfortunate ones... due to the British Child Migration schemes)

I was properly fed, clothed & schooled from my new parents personal finances... I was only ever fostered with them until adopted. At school I did receive some "pommie" bashing mostly verbal from NZ kids until they realized I had a Kiwi mum & dad. Other British children I met at school (not child migrants)... went home after school to little/Britain: I went home to Kiwi/land and that is the difference of myself from normal family migrant children and sadly many other former child migrants.)

I went on to learn my trade at the local newspaper as a typesetting machine engineer. By the time my apprenticeship was complete and a little later in January of 1965...I had told my new parents I was going on a round the world trip. (Typical of many young New Zealanders & Australians of the time. They did not want me to look up my old family in England. That was how much they loved me. I them also. But I had a nagging desire to do so. I could of my own finances go anywhere in the world. I choose to travel mostly overland via parts of Asia, the Middle East & Europe before crossing the Channel from France to see what my once upon a time country had to offer. (a six month
journey)as a new New Zealander not English or British.

By memory did I locate my old home town and birth mother and family. It was only 13 years after my first migration. (This trip was a migration back under my own steam). But those years were a lifetime to me. As in my film documentary [EDITORS NOTE: The film can be viewed on the main BHCD site]... I stepped down from the Hemel station to the same green, green grass of my old home town. (But nobody in all of not so great/Britain knew I was in the country. I had not had any contact with my birth mother for the last ten years or so. I had no idea if she was alive or even wanted to meet me again. (You see I felt deep down forsaken). Likewise my first mother would not have known of my health or interests ever to see her again.

We did meet after I located a house my mother was living in.(There was still no other man in her life). She was a much saddened lady now around fifty. I had been nine years when I had left. I was now 22years of age. My 23rd birthday in August and my birth mothers the same month coming up (a twin present for each other). However I was only to stay on in England for another year.

During that year I met Maria my Spanish wife to be. We were married in London in July of 1966. After a prolonged honeymoon in Spain plus meeting Maria's two different social families (due to the old Spanish Civil War).

We came back to England to say goodbye to my old family and friends with view to travel to New Zealand to raise our family. I did not wish to stay then in England the country that had sent me packing. New Zealand was my utopia.

We travelled en route throughout all Central America. From Liverpool to New Orleans by American cargo ship. And hence from Panama to Auckland NZ by British cargo ship.

After 21 years of living mostly in NZ but also Australia... we had a round the world visit back to see our old families in Britain & Spain. A further European visit in 1991. But it was 1994 before we finely decided to live in Hemel my birth town. To which I am now at 67 retired but do part time work.

In a factory complex just along the canal from the house I had been born in. And by the canal locks and green grass of my old playing lttle English boy fields...Its as though I may never have been sent away. But I still call NZ and Australia HOME. I am also a new/Australian citizen as with Maria. Our two sons born in NZ but finished schooling and first work in Sydney Australia. We are however British...of a sorts. although my case/history has been a positive one... I offer my wishes to all former child migrants and know that so many in so many countries over a long period of time suffered so badly.

I have visited other commonwealth countries including Canada: I now call myself for purposes of my film and possible book for publication: "Anthony of the Commonwealth". A little pretentious but apt of my nostalgia. As my pen name for writing is "tonykiwi"... in honour of a great little country that knew how to nurture me. 
ContributorsCreated : 2009-09-05 12:44:22 / From original database

Last Updated : 2009-09-05 12:53:35 /

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Surnames starting with:   A  B  C  D  E  F  G  H  I  J  K  L  M  N  O  P  Q  R  S  T  U  V  W  X  Y  Z  16 Entries        
IDNameDOBPlace of birthArrivals & ShipsDest.AgencyFamily links
9736 CHAMBERS, Anthony Roger1942ENG, HRT, Hemel Hempstead Jan 1952 : Rangitoto NZ_ Unknown  
17301 CHAMBERS, Bertie1887ENG,     Jul 1899 : Lake Huron CAN Barnardos  
18799 CHAMBERS, E. H.1891ENG,     Sep 1899 : Arawa CAN Barnardos  
12765 CHAMBERS, Ernest1899ENG,     Aug 1906 : Dominion CAN Barnardos  
8483 CHAMBERS, Harold 1912ENG, NTT, Nottingham May 1927 : Samaria CAN Dakeyne Boys Farm  
19187 CHAMBERS, James1903ENG,     Sep 1912 : Victorian CAN MacPherson Homes  
8197 CHAMBERS, James W1914ENG, LDN, London Sep 1928 : Antonia CAN National Childrens Home  
14982 CHAMBERS, John1886ENG,     Aug 1899 : Laurentian CAN Canadian Catholic Emigration Committee  
24006 CHAMBERS, John1913ENG,     Jun 1916 : Scandinavian CAN Middlemore  
3392 CHAMBERS, Kate1902ENG,     May 1908 : Tunisian CAN MacPherson Homes  
17471 CHAMBERS, Nellie 1896ENG,     May 1907 : Tunisian CAN Waifs & Strays  
3974 CHAMBERS, Nellie Jane1897ENG, SRY, Wandsworth May 1907 : Tunisian CAN Waifs & Strays  
3975 CHAMBERS, Rose Margaret1895ENG, SRY, Wandsworth May 1907 : Tunisian CAN Waifs & Strays  
11905 CHAMBERS, Therese1898ENG,     Mar 1911 : Sicilian CAN Barnardos  
14154 CHAMBERS, Thomas1885ENG,     Aug 1899 : Laurentian CAN Canadian Catholic Emigration Committee  
6457 CHAMBERS, Walter1890ENG,     Apr 1900 : Cambroman CAN Barnardos