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APPENDIX
In the Report proper I have set forth my principal conclusions on the matters referred to me by the Order of His Excellency the Governor General in Council, P.C. 1160. A full statement of the facts and a full discussion of the evidence and conclusions appear in the following Appendix to my Report.
This is the Appendix to my Report, made pursuant to the order of His Excellency, the Governor General in Council, P.C. 1160.
OTTAWA, June 4, 1942.
SECTION 1.-INTRODUCTION
It should be noticed at the outset that the inquiry as defined by the Order in Council does not embrace within its scope all matters which may have had some connection with the military defeat at Hong Kong. My duty is to determine whether there occurred any dereliction of duty or error in judg- ment "on the part of any of the personnel or of any of the departments of the Government whose duty it was to arrange for the authorization, organization and dispatch of the Expeditionary Force" and whether, if such dereliction or error occurred, there resulted detriment or injury to the expedition or the troops comprising it. We do not know the whole story of the defeat at Hong Kong, or the causes of it. It is not within my province to consider the adequacy of the preparations of the United Nations in the Pacific late in 1941. This inquiry is concerned solely with the decisions and the acts of Canadian statesmen and military and administrative officers who were responsible for the authorization, organization and despatch of the Canadian expedition to Hong Kong.
Unhappily, as a result of the Japanese attack, the Hong Kong Expedi- tionary Force suffered disaster. That attack began on December 8th and con- tinued until the surrender of the garrison on December 25. In resisting attack, Canadian soldiers were killed and wounded; in the surrender, the rest of the Canadian force became prisoners of war. No detailed and complete lists of casualties and prisoners have yet been received by the Department of National Defence. Certain information was contained in a message from the Canadian Minister for the Argentine, dated February 24, 1942, which states that the Japanese Government officially communicates that 1,689 Canadians were taken prisoners of war at Hong Kong. As the expedition comprised 1,985 officers and men, it would appear that 296 members of the force were killed or are missing.
The Order in Council directed me to engage the services of such counsel as I might deem necessary and advisable. I appointed Mr. R. L. Kellock, K.C., and Mr. R. M. Fowler to act as Counsel for the Commission, with instructions to prepare and present all evidence relevant to the matters under investigation. I also invited the Government of Canada and the Hon. R. B. Hanson, K.C., the Leader of His Majesty's Opposition, to nominate counsel to assist in the inquiry. On the nomination of the Government I appointed, as counsel for the Commission, Mr. Geo. A. Campbell, K.C., and Mr. Geo. A. Drew, K.C., on the nomination of Mr. Hanson. In this way, I had at the hearings the benefit of examination and cross-examination of witnesses and the presentation in argument before me of divergent opinions and points of view.
I appointed Mr. W. Kenneth Campbell as Secretary of the Commission, and secured the services of excellent reporters who provided with speed and accuracy daily copy of the evidence for my use and the use of counsel.
While I have had, as I have stated, the advantage of the presence of Mr. Geo. A. Campbell, K.C., whose duty it was to call attention to aspects of the facts and evidence from the point of view of the Government, and of Mr. Geo. A. Drew, K.C., whose duty it was to present the point of view of the Hon. R. B. Hanson, K.C., who asked for a Parliamentary investigation, nevertheless, the responsibility for the conduct of the inquiry rested upon myself and these gentlemen were present merely to assist me. Counsel for the Commission, therefore, felt it their duty, as it was their duty, to probe in every direction for the purpose of getting the facts; and in this process a mass of oral evi- dence and of documents was placed before me. This resulted in lengthy hearings, but it was unavoidable and indispensable to a thorough investiga- tion.
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