21.04.09 - Batu Gajah - The Search for Great Uncle Alfred

We get up early to start our journey for Batu Gajah to see the grave of my Great Uncle Alfred Williams, we get a bus and ferry to the train station only to find that the train times online are completely different to the actual train station. The train for Batu Gajah is a night train but we can't wait all day here so decide to go to Kuala Lumpar instead and go from there. We arrive in KL about 4.00pm and eventually find a hostel that isn't fully booked. In the evening we walk around china town and through the busy market, we eat at Kenny Rogers BBQ Grill as well as book our ticket to Batu Gajah and Singapore later in the week.

The next day we get the earliest train we can to Batu Gajah, bearing in mind the only information we had to start out with is that my Great Uncle Alfred was burried in Bath Cajah in 1923, after we googled this place it only came up with Batu Gajah. Further investigation we find info on 'Gods Little Acre' which is a cemetary to commemerate people that died during the communist emergency from 1949-1960, unfortunately my G.U. Alfred isn't on the roll of honour for that time and the year he died isn't right for the communist emergency, but we figure it's our best bet. So we're pretty blind going into this but get the train there anyway.

It doesn't start very well, we arrive at Batu Gajah train station in the middle of nowhere. There is no bus service so we have to get a taxi. Our taxi man doesn't speak english and wants to take us to Ipoh a different town. We do get to Batu Gajah town and talk to some locals, a lot of time was spent talking to three young men, about 'Gods Little Acre' but no one has heard of it, they keep trying to send us to a tourist castle. We go back to the internet to get more info. Armed with notes we talk to two policeman, taxi men, a waitress, the owner of the internet place, lady in 7/11, some more strangers and no one has heard of this place. Oh Dear! We find the three young men again and start drawing pictures etc, we know the cemetary is opposite an old court house and they seem to know where this is. They draw a 'spectacular' map to the old court house. We walk about 20 minutes and find the court house, we immediatley worry because opposite it is a very new looking Football Pitch and a small stadium!!! Surely they haven't replaced a cemetary with a football pitch and if they have we still don't even know if Uncle Alfred is here?! We walk for about an hour near the court house, we ask a security guard who tells us to follow the road. We find two cemetaries, he has to be here!! We search and search for another hour but we can't find him and it isn't 'God's Little Acre' anyway. We walk back down the road to the back of the court house but still can't see it. We ask a man fittingly called Amen, can this man answer our prayers? Once he understands war memorial he asks us to follow him on his bike, he leads us to 'Gods Little Acre', horray! Now we hope G.U. Alfred is here. Amen loves it and helps us to look, he finds a Alfred William Sayer but it's no good. Then I come across a grave with Carn Brea, Cornwall and the name Louisa Williams with the same year and month, I slowly realise this is the name of my Great Gran and see the name Alfred written above her name, we found him!!!!!!

We clean up the grave, pull weeds, lay some flowers and unfortunately have to recover some bits of the cross. Amen stays the whole time, asking questions about my long lost relative and talking about the mining in Batu Gajah as G.U. Alfred was a Mining Engineer. Karen and I are absolutely elated to have found him and after a while we thank Amen and make our way back to town. In town we bump into the three young men again, who are just as happy we found it, we thank them again. We then get a taxi back to the train station and head back to KL.