Exploring the rich multicultural history of Devon.

Maggie Teuten

Posted on

15th January 2025

Posted by

Wendy Milne

Posted in

Honiton Community Stories

 

MAGGIE’S FATHER CAME from Jamaica to fight in World War II. He was 27 years old when he arrived in England, having led an interesting life before the war. Jamaica, being a British colony, had strong ties to the UK, and when the war broke out, there was significant talk of supporting the “mother country.” 

Responding to the call to the colonies, Maggie’s father and his two brothers decided to join the fight. They worked for a company called Eddie Hanna, whose owner had to let go of three of his best workers for them to enlist.

After the war, none of Maggie’s father and his brothers returned to live in Jamaica, though they did visit. They married women from the UK – one a Scotswoman and the other two English women. Maggie’s father kept introductory letters that travellers used to carry, which spoke highly of their character. These letters were cherished by Maggie’s father throughout his life.

Maggie remembers her father as incredibly patriotic, a sentiment shared by many from the colonies who saw the UK as their mother country.

Maggie’s knowledge of her father’s heritage expanded through this project, tracing back to the 1600s. Her family had connections to Scotland and Jamaica, with ancestors who took on various roles, includi

ng doctors and judges. Her grandmother’s family possibly had a history of slavery, though this was hard to confirm. Maggie finds pride in her mixed-race heritage, even though it isn’t visible to others.

During World War II, Churchill’s call for commandos led both Maggie’s father and Uncle Ernest to volunteer, while their third brother joined the RAF. They trained in the cold Scottish mountains, which was a harsh contrast to their Jamaican roots. Maggie recalls her father’s struggles with the cold, a trait she also inherited.

Her father was deeply affected by his wartime experiences but was not assessed as having PTSD until later in life.

She discusses how he went on to work in ‘helping’ professions, briefly for the police as a volunteer, the prison service and then the fire service where he spent the rest of his working life, all the time managing his own PTSD.

Maggie experienced prejudice due to her heritage. Her mother was uncomfortable discussing her West Indian background, often trying to silence Maggie.

In school Maggie wrote an essay about her pride in her father’s West Indian heritage, highlighting their unique food and customs but it led to her isolation in school due to ignorance and fear of the unfamiliar. She believes that meeting and experiencing other cultures can overcome such fear.

Maggie got involved as a volunteer when Ugandan Asian refugees arrived in Honiton in 1972. Her father’s experience of moving to England influenced her to help people who were relocating with nothing. This project also allowed her to connect with her family history, deepening her understanding of her roots. 

IN HER INTERVIEW, Maggie recalls an incident from the war in which her father was involved. She would like to add to this memory with the following, which was collated from papers that she holds:

“At the end of the war, (April 26, 1945) when about 10,000 surviving prisoners left the Neuengamme camp and the SS were ordered to load them onto four ships including the  two passenger liners, one of which was the Cap Arcona and two large steamers and they were put in the ships holds for several days without food or water. (I hold a  write-up of this incident.) On top of the passenger ships there were SS and they were thought to be heading for Sweden or elsewhere. The idea was, when they got there, to scuttle all four ships once the SS were off. These were human beings.

“My father arrived with No 6 Commandos, having got into Lubeck quite easily and were informed that 8,000 prisoners were aboard the four ships in the Bay of Lubeck. The following day, the ships were attacked by three squadrons of the RAF Hawker Typhoons believing that the ships carried SS personnel only who were being transferred to Norway.  The information that the ships carried concentration camp prisoners did not reach the squadrons in time to halt the attack. The Cap Arcona which my father spoke of in particular, was set alight and later sank. Those prisoners who survived were trying to swim, even though they were emaciated, and in very bad condition drowned in the freezing cold Baltic sea, but many of them were shot by the SS and strafted by cannon fire by RAF aircraft as they swam away.

“Thousands of dead were washed ashore just as the British Army including No 6 Commandos occupied the area.  The British forced German prisoners of war and civilians to dig mass graves to dispose of the bodies. They had to put all these bodies, and there were nearly 8000 that were killed. I mean, a huge amount of bodies and right up until ’71 bones and things were coming ashore in Lubeck.  So it’s a horrible story. The reason I tell this is to give reason for my father when he eventually arrived home in November ’45, I was not yet two years old and he couldn’t bear to touch me or have me near him because he felt that he had spent so long taking bodies and burying them, and he didn’t want to in fear that he would contaminate me as an innocent baby. You can imagine how much that affected him. It was a horrendous story. All I know is that my father did not want to touch me as my mother and grandmother would always encourage him to do and when, as a toddler, I would happily go towards him, he would absolutely go rigid. It wasn’t that he… I now know, it wasn’t that he didn’t love me or didn’t want me, it was that he couldn’t bear it.”

Listen to highlights from Maggie’s interview below:

 

Highlight1: The Mother Country [00:00:00 – 00:01:31]

Highlight 2: Discovering my heritage… [00:01:33 – 00:05:24]

Highlight 3: Difference and otherness, Finding my roots [00:05:24 – 00:07:50]

Highlight 4: You’re British and you don’t drink tea? [00:07:52 – 00:09:44]

Highlight 5: The Fear of being different [00:09:45 – 00:10:49]

Highlight 6: Why is it important to tell your story? [00:10:50 – 00:12:41]

 

Listen to Maggie’s full interview here:

 

Click on the logo below to read the transcript from Maggie’s full interview