Description
Physical description
A large quilt made up of small hexagonal patches created from scraps of material, some of the patches are patterned and these have been used to create rosette designs the centres of which are created from a black material, in some of the centres names have been embroidered, 20 in all, and there are also four flowers, one of the patches has the Girl Guide emblem sewn into it. The quilt has some patches of dirt and a few stains, some of the edges appear frayed, the original quilt has been attached to a pale coloured rectangular backing sheet.
The names on the quilt are as follow -
NELLIE SYMONS
OSSIE HANDCOCK
OLGA MORRIS
THERESA WALTERS
BESSY SANGER
QUEENIE SMITH
EILEEN HARRIS
CYNTHIA SMITH
A SILBERMAN
PANSY NG
R REILLEY
T. VAN ROODE (Trudie, she was a helper)
EVELYN HARRIS
JANE DAVIDSON
HELEN HARRIS
SHEILA SUMMERS
MARY GILFILLAN
MARY TREVOR
NELLY CUMMINGS
SHIRLEY HARRIS
History note
Changi Prison housed civilians following the Japanese conquest of Singapore in 1942. Elizabeth Ennis, an internee, had previous experience of the Girl Guides being captain of the 4th Singapore Company prior to the war. In June 1943 she set up the Changi Girl Guides which would meet once a week in a corner of the exercise yard. The girls would all wear white dresses as their uniform and made badges and emblems from scraps of material they found. This continued until the Japanese guards raided the camp on 10/Oct/1943. It was during this time that the girls began meeting in secret to work on this quilt as a birthday present for Mrs Ennis using any scraps of material they could find. Twenty girls aged 8-16 years were involved in the making of the quilt. Each girl embroidered her name on it. Mrs Ennis later wrote; "I believe that because of my early training I was able to pass on something of the aims and ideals of Guiding and out of the grimness and misery of that internment camp something so beautiful could be made by the Guides who had lost all their possessions but still had courage" ('Guiding in Changi Gaol', The Guide, 25/Oct/1963).
After the war Elizabeth Ennis and her husband Jack kept the quilt with them at their home in Australia. In 1995 they temporarily put it into the care of Sheila Bruhn (nee Allan) who used it to help illustrate lectures that she gave about her time in Changi Prison. In 2006 Mr Ennis agreed to donate the quilt to the Imperial War Museum so that it could be preserved for future generations. A presentation took place on the 26/Sep/2006 attended by Jackie Yuille (Mr Ennis's daughter), Sheila Bruhn and other survivors from Changi and their relatives, including, of those who helped make the quilt -Eileen Harris (now Mrs Page), Sheila Summers (now Mrs Martin) & Olga Morris (now Mrs Henderson).
Elizabeth Ennis, quoted in Bernice Archer's 'A Patchwork of Internment', p.117:
'I have been told by Australian women that I could not have been in Changi because their husbands were POWs there and there were no women in the camp. Worse still, in 1980 I joined a small group who were visiting Changi prison...As we sat in a small room the British warder who was taking us round explained the various badges around the walls and gave a brief history of the fall of Singapore. 'Any questions?' he said when he had finished his talk. I piped up, 'You never mentioned the women who were interned here'. He had never heard that there were women.'
Embroidered
GG
NELLIE SYMONS
OSSIE HANDCOCK
OLGA MORRIS
THERESA WALTERS
BESSY SANGER
QUEENIE SMITH
EILEEN HARRIS
CYNTHIA SMITH
A SILBERMAN
PANSY NG
R REILLEY
T. VAN ROODE (Trudie, she was a helper)
EVELYN HARRIS
JANE DAVIDSON
HELEN HARRIS
SHEILA SUMMERS
MARY GILFILLAN
MARY TREVOR
NELLY CUMMINGS
SHIRLEY HARRIS
