Mona Best - India

India

Alice Mona Shaw was born on 3 January 1924, in Delhi, India, to Thomas (an Irish major) and Mary Shaw. She was the youngest of four children: Brian, Patrick and Aileen. Her first son, Randolph Peter (Pete Best), was born on 24 November 1941—his biological father was marine engineer Donald Peter Scanland, who subsequently died during World War II. Mona was training with the Red Cross when she met Johnny Best, who came from a family of sports promoters in Liverpool that once owned and ran the Liverpool Stadium. At the time of their meeting, Best was a commissioned officer serving as a Physical Training Instructor in India, and was the British Army's middleweight boxing champion. After their marriage on 7 March 1944, at St. Thomas's Cathedral, Bombay, the Bests had one child: Rory Best (b. January 1945). In late 1945, the family sailed for four weeks to Liverpool on the Georgic, which was the last troop ship to leave India, carrying single and married ranks who had previously been a part of General Sir William Slim's forces in southeast Asia. The ship docked in Liverpool on 25 December 1945.