Artindale

When my family moved to Shanghai after WW1, and my grandfather became a partner in Geddes Trading, the accountant for the firm was Fred Artindale. His family roots were Eurasian, having a European grandfather and an Asian grandmother. It’s possible our families knew each other during their time in Hong Kong. As far as I know Fred was born in Shanghai but his roots may have been in Hong Kong or even Macau. He and his wife Bertha, along with their daughters were all interned in Shanghai during WW2 as were Fred’s parents.

A few years ago I made the acquaintance of Desmond Power who was a Tientsin boy and wrote several books on his life and times in China. “Little Foreign Devil” was one of them. He was in his early 90s then and sadly has passed away since but on the few occasions where we were able to get together, he was very helpful. As he had been interned in Shanghai, I was eager to learn if he might have known any of my family, so I enlarged and printed some old photos to show him. The first photo I showed him was a group with my family and the Artindales, taken in the 1950s in California. Right away he said “I know him! That’s Fred Artindale. We played in a band together at Lunghwa Camp!” Desmond was fluent in Chinese and consulted on Greg Leck’s book, “Captives of Empire” which must be the definitive “Historical record” of the Japanese prisoner camps in China. Desmond also left me many books, and the most useful, “Desk Hong for Shanghai, 1937” This book is a treasure!

Fred and his family also ended up in California after the war. He was a maker and repairer of violins and other stringed instruments. He had his business in downtown Los Angeles and I remember as a child riding the streetcar and going to his shop. It was upstairs in one of the older buildings and the door had frosted glass with his name on it, like in the TV detective shows. In the mid 1950s Fred moved his family up to San Luis Obispo, where he continued his craft as well as performing with the local orchestras.