This photo is an image that is very well known. I think it’s a wonderful photo. It was taken by the photographer Harry Todd and has been republished countless times all around the world in the 80 years since it was first published on 16th October 1945. In 2014 I decided to try to find out more about the photo. This is the story – much of which is told for the very first time.
People often see the downsides of social media, but there are undoubtedly some major upsides too. I posted the photo on Facebook in 2014 and in 2021 I was then contacted by Abbie Cureton, whose grandfather was Hector Murdoch’s brother. Abbie had just seen my post. Via Abbie I was able to get in contact with the 5 year old boy in the photo – John Murdoch, by 2021 who was 80 years old. Within a few days I was speaking to John on the phone and we spoke yet again in early October 2025.
John’s father, Gunner Hector Murdoch, was in the Royal Artillery 11th Division – 80th Anti Tank Regiment. He was born on 12th October 1908 and he married Rosina Hearn in Uxbridge in June 1936. Their son John was born on 22nd August 1940. Hector enlisted on 16th January 1941 at the age of 32. Later that year his unit were shipped to Singapore and on the 15th February 1942 he was captured when the British Army surrendered to the Imperial Japanese Army. What Churchill described as “the worst disaster and largest capitulation in British History”.
Hector contracted malaria and he was quite seriously ill. As a result, he stayed in Singapore and wasn’t sent up country to work on the Thai Burma Railway. Whilst in Singapore he became Batman to Colonel Litton. He was allowed by the Japanese camp guards to keep chickens. Their eggs were no doubt a very valuable source of protein for Hector. Before the war Hector had been a butcher and he knew the importance of diet.
The Murdoch family home was 87 Barnwell Road, Brixton, London SW2. What Hector was unaware of whilst imprisoned in Singapore was that in 1944 his wife Rosina and son John were out one day and they returned home to find the house totally wrecked by a V1 flying bomb. The elderly woman in the house next door was killed. Within a short time John and his mother moved to a prefabricated house in Tulse Hill – 30 Tulse Hill Gardens, the house shown in the Harry Todd photo. It was 10 minutes walk from their old house.
In 1950 the council wanted the site for a school and the houses were demolished. The Murdochs then went to live in West Norwood. John recalls that some of the temporary housing nearby in Tulse Hill were actually old Army Nissen huts. The prefabs had outside toilets. There was no hot water and the bath was a tin bath that hung on the outside wall of the house. After the war mum had the first bath, Hector the second and John the third one. John’s bathwater wasn’t great!
On 15th August 1945 the Japanese surrendered. After a few weeks Hector boarded a ship in Singapore and he arrived home on his 37th birthday – Friday 12th October 1945 after docking in Liverpool. Hector then travelled by train to Kings Cross station. John and his mother went to greet him, but there were hundreds of soldiers there and they couldn’t spot Hector. Hector travelled to the old family home and fortunately he was redirected to 30 Tulse Hill Gardens.
News travelled quickly and the photographer Harry Todd took the photo on Monday 15th October 1945, three days after Hector’s actual return. So this famous photo was actually staged. It was originally a Hulton Picture Library, later a Radio Times Library photo and is now Getty Images. Harry Todd took many other wonderful photos that are well worth seeking out.
The photo was published on Tuesday 16th October 1945 in the Liverpool Echo and Birmingham Gazette, amongst other news papers. By 11th November 1945 it was on the front page of the New York Sunday News.
In 1974 the picture archives were being moved. The Daily Mail printed the photo again. One of six photos that were regarded as classic images. By this time John Murdoch was working as a lithographer and he had a copy made.
In November 1985 the BBC broadcast the television series “Now the war is over” to mark 40 years since the end of World War Two. The photo was used in the Radio Times with the caption “do you know where Hector Murdoch is?”. John and his mother responded and were invited to an accompanying exhibition at the Museum of London in the Barbican. The next edition of the Radio Times featured a photo of John and his mother taken at the exhibition.
In 1995 the photo was used on posters all over London – 50 years since VE Day and VJ Day. Copies of the posters were sent to John. John wishes he had the rights to the photo! A Brazilian news reporter even visited John in Carlisle, where he has lived since 1974, to interview him about the story. The story was broadcast on television in Brazil. It’s become an internationally famous photo.
To quote John “The photo captures joy.” John didn’t remember his father when he returned. He was only 6 months old when Hector left for the war. He does recall though that his father’s army kit bag shown in the 1945 photo was full of Swiss Red Cross chocolate!
Hector died aged 64 in 1972 – he was a year away from retirement. He always felt that he was fortunate to come back though, when so many others did not.
All rights reserved – Martin Percival
Footnotes:
The address was 30 Tulse Hill Gardens. Cleared away to build a school on the site apparently around 1950 (Martin Percival)
The prefab in this famous photo is a Seco hut, which was utilised along with Nissen huts as very temporary accommodation before the prefabs were manufactured. These huts had outside toilets and none of the mod cons like a fitted kitchen, bathroom or back boiler. Nevertheless people continued to be housed in them until the mid 1950s. (Jane Hearn, Prefab Museum)
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