Sir Paw Tun (c. 1883 – 28 February 1953), also known as U Paw Tun, Maung Paw Tun, and Joseph Porter, was a Burmese administrator, barrister and politician who served as prime minister of British Burma in 1942, following the dismissal and arrest of

U Saw U Saw, also known as Galon U Saw ( my-Mymr, ဦးစော or my-Mymr, ဂဠုန်ဦးစော, lit. Garuda U Saw, ; 16 March 1900 – 8 May 1948), was a leading Burmese politician who served as Prime Minister of British Burma dur ...

until the evacuation of the Burmese government to India. A moderate nationalist and leading figure in pre-war Burmese politics, he was eventually displaced by the

Anti-Fascist People's Freedom League The Anti-Fascist People's Freedom League (AFPFL), ; abbreviated , ''hpa hsa pa la'' was the dominant political alliance in Burma from 1945 to 1958. It consisted of political parties and mass and class organizations. The league evolved out of t ...

, led by

Aung San Aung San (, ; 13 February 191519 July 1947) was a Burmese politician, independence activist and revolutionary. He was instrumental in Myanmar's struggle for independence from British rule, but he was assassinated just six months before his go ...

Biography

Early life and career

The son of U Rai Phaw of

Akyab Sittwe (; ; formerly Akyab) is the capital of Rakhine State, Myanmar (Burma). Sittwe, pronounced ''sait-tway'' in the Rakhine language, is located on an estuarial island created at the confluence of the Kaladan, Mayu, and Lay Mro rivers emptyi ...

, U Paw Tun was headmaster of the Methodist High and Government High School, Rangoon from 1904 to 1908 and a district official from 1912 to 1925, as a member of the subordinate civil service of Burma. He proceeded to England to read for the English bar, was admitted to the

Middle Temple The Honourable Society of the Middle Temple, commonly known simply as Middle Temple, is one of the four Inns of Court exclusively entitled to call their members to the English Bar as barristers, the others being the Inner Temple, Gray's Inn an ...

in November 1921, and was called to the bar in June 1923. Returning Burma, he began to practice law in Rangoon, and became President of the Rangoon Municipal Council and a member of the Legislative Council from 1925. In the early 1930s, U Paw Tun was the leader of the

Swaraj Party The Swaraj Party, established as the ''Congress-Khilafat Swaraj Party'', was a political party formed in India on 1 January 1923 after the Gaya annual conference in December 1922 of the National Congress, that sought greater self-government and ...

after the death of U Toke Gyi. An opponent of Burma's separation from British India, he was a member of the

Anti-Separation League The Anti-Separation League was a political alliance in Burma. History The alliance was formed in July 1932 by parties that were not in favour of Burma being separated from British Raj in order to contest the 1932 general elections,Haruhiro Fukui ...

, then followed

Chit Hlaing Chit Hlaing ( my, ချစ်လှိုင်, 1879 – 31 October 1952) was a notable Burmese politician. During his time, he was called a Burmese king without a crown, and was popular in rural Burma. He was imprisoned when the British Crown ...

when the League split in two. He contested the

1936 Burmese general election General elections were held in Burma on 26 November 1936. The Government of Burma Act 1935 separated Burma from British India as of 1 April 1937, and created a 36-seat Senate and a 132-seat House of Representatives."Legislature and Electors Burma ...

with the

Hlaing-Myat-Paw GCBA The Hlaing-Myat-Paw GCBA was a political party in Burma led by Chit Hlaing. History One of several parties originating from the General Council of Burmese Associations, the Hlaing-Myat-Paw GCBA was a merger of the factions led by Chit Hlaing and ...

coalition. He joined the first post-separation Burmese government as Minister of Home and Judicial Affairs from 1937 to 1938, also acting as chief minister in 1937. From 1939 to 1941 he was Minister of Lands and Revenue. In 1939, he was appointed to the Burma Defence Council. His ability to keep office despite changes of government earned him a reputation as a Burmese

Vicar of Bray Vicar of Bray may refer to: * The Vicar of Bray (song), "The Vicar of Bray" (song), an 18th-century satirical song about a quasi-fictional clergyman, to which all other uses refer *The Vicar of Bray, a satirical description of an individual fundame ...

Premiership and exile in India

In 1941, he was acting premier when

was arrested abroad for secretly communicating with Japan. U Paw Tun was asked by Sir Reginald Dorman-Smith, the

Governor of Burma The colonial governors of Burma were the colonial administrators responsible for the territory of British Burma, an area equivalent to modern-day Myanmar. As a result of the Second Anglo-Burmese War, Burma was initially setup as a province o ...

, to form a new government, becoming prime minister in January 1942. When the Burmese government was evacuated to India following the Japanese invasion later that year, U Paw Tun followed the Governor to

Simla Shimla (; ; also known as Simla, the official name until 1972) is the capital and the largest city of the northern Indian state of Himachal Pradesh. In 1864, Shimla was declared as the summer capital of British India. After independence, the ...

along with another minister, Sir Htoon Aung Gyaw. When the Governor assumed the powers of government under Section 139 of the Burma Act, Paw Tun ceased to be a minister and instead became one of the Dorman-Smith's advisers, to whom he was by then closely associated. During the war, he was a strong supporter of the Allied cause, which he thought linked to the cause of Burmese freedom.

Post-war

In 1945, he returned to Burma with the Governor and became Home and Judicial Minister in the new Executive Council as well as its head, over the objections of the

(AFPFL). U Paw Tun in turn pushed for the arrest of

, the leader of the AFPFL, for the murder of a village henchman during the war. The order for his arrest was issued, then countermanded by London. Unable to compete with Aung Sang and AFPFL despite his belief that he could form the necessary political front, Paw Tun was dropped from the new Executive Council in 1946, formed by the new Governor, Sir Hubert Rance. After Burma's independence, he was one of the organizers of the Union of Burma League, a party which contested the

1951–52 Burmese general election General elections were held in Burma over several months between June 1951 and April 1952 due to internal conflict within the country. The first elections since independence, they saw the Anti-Fascist People's Freedom League (AFPFL) win 60% of th ...

. A recipient of the Ahmudan gaung Tazeik ya Min medal, Paw Tun was

knighted A knight is a person granted an honorary title of knighthood by a head of state (including the Pope) or representative for service to the monarch, the Christian denomination, church or the country, especially in a military capacity. Knighthood ...

in 1938.

Family

Paw Tun's second wife was Sarah Elisabeth Jewitt, daughter of Dr E. H. Jewitt, of

Cleveland Cleveland ( ), officially the City of Cleveland, is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County. Located in the northeastern part of the state, it is situated along the southern shore of Lake Erie, across the U.S. ...

, Ohio; they had one daughter. Lady Paw Tun ran a kindergarten for European and Burmese children in Rangoon. She died on 10 June 1965 in

Azamgarh Azamgarh is a city in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. It is the headquarters of Azamgarh division, which consists of Ballia, Mau and Azamgarh districts. Azamgarh is situated on the bank of Tamsa River (Tons). It is located east of the st ...

, India. Their daughter, Florence Paw Tun (died 1981), was married to the American diplomat Herbert D. Spivack.

Assessments

Robert H. Taylor describes Paw Tun as "one of the most adept of pre-war politicians. His most important political role was that of go-between among the British, Indian, and Burmese political communities." However, Taylor also notes that "it was generally conceded that he had no popular base, and had he had to stand for election in 1942 he would not have been re-elected."{{Cite journal , last=Taylor , first=Robert H. , date=1976 , title=Politics in Late Colonial Burma: The Case of U Saw , url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/311805 , journal=Modern Asian Studies , volume=10 , issue=2 , page=167 , jstor=

References

* https://www.ukwhoswho.com/view/10.1093/ww/9780199540891.001.0001/ww-9780199540884-e-243889?rskey=MtayCI&result=1 Knights Bachelor Members of the Middle Temple People of British Burma 1953 deaths 1880s births Burmese knights Arakanese politicians Administrators in British Burma Burmese educators Members of the Legislative Council of Burma