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In Hong Kong the shadow of Japanese aggression was scarcely perceptible when Manchuria was attacked, darkened somewhat with the fall of Shanghai in 1937 and lay over the Colony, heavy and menacing, after the fall of Canton at the end of 1938. The Colony's population grew to over one million and a half, swelled by homeless refugees from South China who could be neither housed nor turned away; after the outbreak of war in Europe the precarious security of Hong Kong carried little conviction.
Shortly after dawn on 8th December, 1941, reconnais- sance and bomber aircraft of the Japanese air force based at Canton appeared overhead and the first bombs fell on the Colony's aerodrome. At the same time first-line troops of the Japanese army deployed and methodically crossed the frontier from the points in occupied Chinese territory where they had been drawn up for a carefully planned attack. After 48 hours Shingmun Redoubt, vital point in the New Territories' defence line, had been assaulted and had fallen with many casualties on either side. The garrison fell back on Hong Kong Island which in turn was successfully assaulted on the night of the 18th-19th December, 1941. On Christmas Day, after a week's fighting on the island, the Colony was surren- dered to the Japanese forces.
It remained in Japanese hands for over three and a half years. The population fell quickly from about one and a half million to less than half that number. In the face of increas- ing oppression and brutality the fundamental loyalty to the Allied cause of the Chinese who remained was never in doubt; parts of the New Territories remained in the hands of Chinese guerillas throughout the war, in spite of the most vigorous punitive measures which the enemy could devise; passive resistance to every enemy enterprise was nicely calculated; Allied personnel escaping or evading capture were assured of assistance from the peasants of the New Territories (one American fighter pilot, landing by parachute in early 1943 within half a mile of the urban area of Kowloon, found himself spirited to safety); Allied subversive organisations had no difficulty in securing the help of every class of Chinese resident in the Colony.
The Colony was liberated by units of the British Pacific Fleet on 30th August, 1945.
The preceding chapters have attempted to outline the circumstances of the Colony and its people at the time of the re-occupation and to describe such headway as was made with the tasks of reconstruction during the year under review.
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