Marjorie Daphne COOK / SAVAGE (née WARNES) [1908-????]

Majorie Warnes was the daughter of Elizabeth Warnes (nee Olson) who was my great aunt. Elizabeth  (who is in the Gwulo picture file) died in 1917 and is buried in Happy Valley. I have  pictures of her and many of the two children, Marjorie and Iris, who seem to have spent many of their teenage years in HK with my Great Uncle Charles, their uncle, and his wife Ellen. I believe their father Cyril Warnes, who was originally from London, may have been involved in ship salvage and have pictures of him in heavy diving gear.

I knew one daughter went to Shanghai and had assumed stayed in the house my family had there,  and one stayed in HK but nothing of Stanley and the camp there.

I think Iris may have made an unfortunate marriage before the war and  had the a child she asked her sister to bring up. Not sure where that information came from.

The Australian side of the family were only discovered by accident by my generation though I now know they did not lose touch with John and Annie Lousia Olson who were my grandparents.

Jill Fell - who is my half cousin -  says her father Reginard Warren who was the youngest son of Charles Warren, never talked of his past. Recently, thanks to www.thehongkongegacy more family in Australia have come to light which she is following up.

The picture mentioned above is in the 1910 section of Gwulo picture library. Caption is something like "1913- where is this" and shows a woman walking to a Model T Ford carrying a Box Brownie.

Sean

Yes, Marjorie’s mother, Elizabeth Warnes died in 1917 a year ahead of her father, John Olson, who is buried just in front of her. Where we lack information about the orphaned Warnes girls is for the period after 1919 when Annie Louisa Olson left Hong Kong with her four boys, also taking Iris and Marjorie's younger brother, Cyril Warnes, to be educated in England. I haven't found a record of their voyage, for which I have searched, as it is possible my grandmother Hannah Warren went with them. Cyril was her nephew and all her children were already in England. Sean Olson and his cousin Jenny Maslen have kindly shown me a photo of my father with Iris and Marjorie in their teens at a croquet party at the house of Charles Olson and his wife, who I believe was called Ethel. Whether the girls actually lived with the childless Charles (described by Sean as a playboy) and Ethel, or whether they were invited out from the Canossian Convent, (whose address Iris gave at the time of her marriage), is not certain. Iris's granddaughter was told that they were placed in an orphanage or home. The convent might fit the bill, as Annie Louisa herself was educated there. Provision would have been made for their upkeep.

The name of Iris and Marjorie's father was actually Charles Aspinell Warnes, who can be found in the HK jurors' lists and is given as an assistant at Lane, Crawford & Co. Although the children’s mother, Elizabeth, lies in the Happy Valley Protestant cemetery, Charles Warnes does not and I haven't been able to discover anything about his death. More information about him would be useful. 

 It is confusing that Iris married a man with the same first name as her brother, Cyril, Cyril Gaby. Through his autobiography "A Man of the Sea" we know that he and Iris took Marjorie's baby with them to Shanghai in 1932, not the other way round. Gaby was involved in salvage there and is actually the man in the diving suit in Sean’s photo. Through the name Gaby, recorded on Hannah Warren’s Picton death certificate, I was able to contact Iris’s family-in-law by phoning all the Gabys in the Sydney telephone directory, and eventually talk to Iris’s daughter, Sally, now dead. 

 Recently Barbara Anslow and Tony Banham have given me details of Marjorie’s internment in Stanley, but not much has been retained about her life after the war when she went to England, except that her second marriage to Bill Savage, an ex-POW, was a happy one. Neither the Warrens nor the Olsons possess correspondence from her. Cyril Warnes also disappeared from view after he emigrated from England to Canada. His family remains to be traced. In Stanley’s record Marjorie’s profession is given as teacher. Invoking her women’s prerogative, she decided to deduct 5 years from her age!

My memory has been jogged and I cannot but agree with the general thrust of this account of the family.

With regard to the "orphaned" Majorie and iris I suspect it is correct that as small children they were in the care of the Canossians. I have pictures of them with their other cousins and their dress indicates a certain instutionalisation.

I am not sure that my grandmother Annie Louisa Olson (nee Moore Burke) was educated at the convent. She may have been but I have never been able to get confirmation.

It fits well though with the fact that my grandfather lived at 33 Caine Road at the time she would have been at school. The marriage took place in 1906 at St Josephs, Kowloon, which jars a little with close connections with the Canossians as my grandfather was not a Catholic and I have all the papers he had to sign at St Josephs.

She and her sister Clara called themselves Moore Burke as their father was James Moore and their stepfather Edward Burke. They had a brother who went by the name of Pat Moore so somehow I think the second marriage may not have been approved of by the children of a dead father.

It would be very interesting if anybody could shed any light on Pat Moore, he worked in Singapore for my Grandfather in the late 1920s, and was in Shanghai between the wars. It would also be interesting to see why his sisters styled themselves as Moore Bourke and he simply used Moore.

I think that the Warnes girls spent some considerable time with Charles and Ethel Olson and make this judgment from family photos or beach outings, tennis parties, and various social gatherings etc., notated on the reverse by Ethel. Charles and wife did not leave HK until 1927.

With regard to their father Cyril Aspinall Warnes many years ago when I ws researching the family in general I discovered Warnes was born to a large family in Lambeth who lived in very cramped conditions. I suspect it was a census report I read. At the time I had little interest in that side of the family but from what I can remember I suspect he, like many more, must have left the UK in search of a new life. It may have been the 1891 UK Census.

A small point of disagreement. Cyril Warnes jnr did not travel to the UK with my grandmother Annie Louisa in 1919. I know this for certain because her four sons did and were registered on the same date at St John's College, Southsea. My grandmother stayed a year in the UK and then my grandfather John went to see his sons and returned to HK with wife and the youngest son - my father who had obviously not settled in - in 1920 via New York, Banff and Vancouver. This is certain as I have postcards from them to the three sons they left behind in the UK. There is no mention at all of Cyril in any of the postcards. Also, as a matter of record these three Olsons did not finally leave HK until 1923.

I have no knowledge of Hannah Warren (nee Olson) travelling to the UK at that time but suspect she may gave gone as early as 1913 when her eldest son was admitted to Churchers. I wonder if it is possible she then became trapped in the UK because of WW1? She did stay with the Olson family when they set up home on Chiswick, London, and was there when Charles Warren died in HK. I have postcards to my father and uncles from her on her way out to HK immediately after the death was announced.

Cyril Warnes did live with my fanily in London in the 20s while at school. I stand to be corrected by a slightly older cousin but recall him visiting Chiswick in th early 1950s. He had served in the war in a Canadian unit. After that things seem to have gone downhill. There was some talk of a large sum of money borrowed for a project of some sort which disapperared! I remember my grandmother Annie Louisa not being amused in the slighted if his name came up.

Much of the information here can be found at www.thehongkonglegacy.com

Sean

David, is there a way of registering more than one married name? Marjorie Cook became Marjorie Savage when she married Bill Savage after the war. When her divorce to the Rev. John Turnbull Cook went through in Macao on 5th January 1942, her name was given as Aurora Marjorie Daphne Warnes Cook. I think Aurora must have been her Catholic baptismal name. I don't know if she retained Warnes as a part of her surname officially. She died in Australia, where her daughter, Daphne is still living.

Jill

I've added in the extra names. Not perfect, but should help it match if anyone is using Google to search for the other names.

Regards, David