John Burrows RIP

Kyt · Sep 24, 2008

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/3069589/John-Burrows.html

John Burrows, who died on August 28 aged 96, was a Japanese military expert at Bletchley Park, the wartime code-breaking organisation, and went on to become Chief Inspector of Schools during the 1970s.

Before being sent to Bletchley, Burrows had been a sergeant on the intelligence staff at Singapore and was witness to the shambles of the British defence of Malaya during the Japanese invasion, which coincided with the attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941.

"I was heading up the intelligence support for the commander-in-chief," Burrows said later. "I was on duty on the night of the invasion. I remember sitting there and seeing Japanese aircraft flying overhead and dropping bombs on parts of Singapore, which was still brilliantly lit up."

Then the messages started coming through of the Japanese landing at Kota Bahru, in the north. "I remember one of my superior officers telling me that at that time there was only one telephone line from Kota Bahru to Singapore. That may not actually be true, but as an indication of the unpreparedness it is quite vivid.

"The planter society was very comfortable and had always been able to depend on the British to defend them. They totally underestimated Japanese military power.

"All the able generals were collected in the Middle East, and it was the duds who were shipped out to the Far East, some of them with no understanding of reality at all. It was cloud-cuckoo land and to someone like myself who had come from wartime Britain it was unbelievable."

Burrows was evacuated to Java and then back to Britain, where he briefed generals at the War Office on the complacency that had led to the fall of Singapore, one of the greatest setbacks suffered by the British during the war.

Lionel John Burrows was born at Hornsey, north London, on March 9 1912. He was brought up in Southampton, where his father was a schoolmaster, and in 1930 went up to Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, to read French. He then followed his father into the teaching profession.

In August 1939 he married Enid Carter, an employee of the British Sugar Corporation, and a few weeks later, on the outbreak of war, he volunteered for the Intelligence Corps. "When I joined the Army, I was a teacher of modern languages," he said. "I admitted to a working knowledge of German and was immediately posted to Singapore."

After the fall of Singapore Burrows was sent to Bletchley Park, where new Japanese sections were hurriedly being set up. Eventually there were so many sections dealing with different aspects of Japanese material that the main corridor in Block F, where most were based, became known as "the Burma Road", after the key 700-mile link over the mountains between China and Burma.

Burrows had by this stage received a commission, and was one of a number of captains in charge of a section which analysed decrypted material from the Far East and Pacific theatre. The work involved in-depth analysis of the locations of Japanese units and personnel and writing reports detailing what was happening in south-east Asia.

At the end of war against Japan in August 1945, Burrows was demobilised. But instead of returning to teaching he instead took a post as a school inspector, working initially in Norwich, then at Darlington, before taking over responsibility for the whole of the London metropolitan area.

In the 1960s he was appointed Chief Inspector of Schools at the Department of Education and Science. He retired in 1973 and was appointed CBE.

Burrows retired to Ratby, Leicestershire, where he returned to teaching, lecturing in poetry and history as part of the local adult education programme.

He had become a Methodist lay preacher in his forties and continued preaching until a few years before his death.

John Burrows's wife predeceased him, and he is survived by a son and a daughter.
Click to expand...

liverpool annie · Sep 24, 2008

Kyt said: ↑

John Burrows - Telegraph
Click to expand...

My goodness ... he worked on the Enigma !! .... I bet he was a fascinating man to talk to ... RIP John Burrows

A BRILLIANT MAN AND SO UNASSUMING

BY IAN WISHART
EDUCATION CORRESPONDENT

10:30 - 11 September 2008

Tributes have been paid to a "brilliant" man who was Chief Inspector of Schools under Margaret Thatcher.

Lionel Burrows, known by his middle name, John, died on August 28, at the age of 96.

He rose to prominence in the 1960s and '70s and worked under Lady Thatcher when she was Education Secretary. He was at the forefront of some of the major changes in schools in England and Wales, and was awarded a CBE for services to education in 1974.
During the Second World War, Mr Burrows worked on the Enigma code-breaking machine at Bletchley Park and, in 1945, received a commendation from the US Army Chief of Staff.

He and his wife, Enid, settled in Ratby, in 1981 after his retirement and until five years ago, he was a methodist preacher.

Despite working with some of the country's most influential figures in education, friends and relatives were struck by his unassuming nature.

His daughter, Rosalind Goldson, who lives in Desford, said: "A neighbour of my father's in Ratby described him as so many others have as 'such a gentleman'.

"He was so unassuming despite his brilliant mind that he was a gentleman in every sense of the words.

"He was a very compassionate man. You would never have thought he was such a high-flyer.

"He had incredible intellect but hid his light under a bushel."

Mr Burrows attended adult education classes, where he pursued his love of history and poetry, well into his 80s.

He went to school in Southampton and earned a first-class degree from Cambridge in modern languages before becoming a teacher in Devon, London and Surrey.

When war broke out, he worked in the Intelligence Corps at Bletchley Park but in peacetime found teaching jobs hard to find.

He entered England and Wales' Schools' Inspectorate at a time when Leicestershire was seen as a pioneer in setting up its middle school system.

In 1978, he analysed the system in a publication called The Middle School: High Road or Dead End.

Before he retired, he worked overseas, selecting and training teachers for British Forces Schools.

He was vice president of the National Association of Gifted Children and Who's Who listed his interests as national history and fell-walking.

Mr Burrows, whose funeral took place at Ratby Methodist Church last week, had two children and three grandchildren - one of who has followed in his footsteps and is a teacher in Leicester.

This is leicestershire - news, sport and entertainment

Log in or Sign up

John Burrows RIP

Kyt Άρης

liverpool annie New Member

Share This Page

Log in or Sign up

John Burrows RIP

Thread Tools

Kyt Άρης

liverpool annie New Member

Share This Page

Useful Searches