Kallang Air Crash Victims Mass Funeral (former Bidadari Cemetery)

On 15 March 1954, a mass funeral was held for 23 of the Kallang crash victims. At exactly 5 pm to the accompaniment of the Funeral March, 3 R.A.F trailers and 2 hearses bearing the 23 coffins-all but one one draped with the Union Jack. The solitary one was draped with Stars and Stripes. 17 were placed by the recently dug graves (as you can see picture below) while along one little path in Bidadari lay the other 6 victims awaiting at the end of the funeral service to be taken to the crematorium. 

From the newspaper, the known people buried in this mass funeral includes;

Known identity 

1. Charles William Bailey (57, single, British electrical engineer of the merchant navy)
2. Miss Josephine Butler (Flight Stewardess, British )
3. Francis Cecil Chalkin (single, Professor of physics at Christchurch University, New Zealand)
4. B. Herbert (Flight Steward, Britain)
5. Allan Julius Harte (Australian)
6. G. Hoffman (Dutch, Borneo Sumatra Trading Company)
7. Windston Francis Monk (41, married, New Zealand, University lecturer of Wellington)
8. Prof. Robert McGechan (47, married New Zealand, University lecturer of Wellington)
9. Mrs. Francis Betty Steer (41, New Zealand, housewife)

Doubtful 

1. Either Bernard Theodore Giles or Joan Terry Giles (New Zealand)
2. Mrs. Dora Tonkin (Australia)
3. Dr. Harold Rutledge (married, Britain, University Lecturer)

Unknown - Five unidentified 

Preparing shipment to their respective countries

1. Mr. G.F Olson, an American whose remains were flown to his family at Fort Madison, Iowa
2. R. Bintang Soedibbie remains were returned to his hometown in Semarang.
3. Pieter Nieuwland (Shell Company, Djakarta, remains returned 

Taken by friends and relatives for burial in Singapore (in other cemeteries);

1. Mrs. Lim Siang Hin alias Madam Teo Siew Keng (Singapore)
2. Sie Yok Swie (Indonesia)
3. Ami Chandraan (52, Fiji, teacher of Suva. Fiji)

3 other Indian victims were cremated :

1. A.P Sen Gupta (Indian, managing director of Indian Overseas Bank of Madras)
2.  Amir Chand Chandra
3. M.C.T. Chitambaram Chettiar (Indian, district manager of the United Commercial Bank, Rangoon)

[still trying to figure out the list] 

Mass funeral for the Kallang crash victims 1954

I am very fortunate to able to see how this row of graves looks like in Bidadari just before they were exhumed to make way for development. (This was made possible from the photo contributions [1 & 2] of Liesel Strauss to NLB)

Kallang air crash victims graves (source: NLB)

The Constellation Crash - First Air Crash in Kallang Airport 

A British Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC) Lockheed L-749A Constellation carrying 40 crashed and caught fire as it attempted to land at Singapore-Kallang Airport on 13 March 1954 at 3:04 pm resulting in 33 fatalities (all 31 of its passengers died and 2 out of 9 of its crew members were killed). Details of how the airplane crashed and flipped over and the rescue attempts that took place and finally the public enquiry and investigation that took place can be found online at various sources, [Infopedia, Wikipedia], so i will not repeat them.

Headlines [source: NewspaperSG]