CO129-454 - Acting Governor Claud Severn - 1919 [4-6] — Page 679

No

210.

RECO

51363

4

GOVERNMENT HOUSE,

HONGKONG. 27th. June, 1919.

Enclosure L

675

My Lord,

I have the homur to inform Your Lordship

that the question of establishing an efficient and satisfacto - -ry Police patrol on the shallow waters at the head of Deep

Bay has become urgent.

2.

I enclose a sketch map showing the portion

of the New Territories affected, and the adjoining Chinese territory. The raide by robbers into British territory have become so frequent that the panic created among the inhabit- -ants of the district bounded roughly by the railway to the East, and the main road from Fanling to Castle Peak to the South, is tending to retard development. The establishment of the Police Station at Lok Ma-chau on the Sham-chun river in 1913, and the launch patrols in Deep Bay were expected to put

but a stop to these incursions of robber and pirate bands, the large area of shallow water extending for several miles in Deep Bay, and the impossibility of maintaining an adequate patrol with a rowing boat, have rendered it necessary to obtain some more speedy means of conveying the Police about.

3.

Sir Henry May went very fully into the matter in the year 1913, but eventually found himself unable to provide for anything in the 1914 Estimates, giving his opinion that further experience would show whether a shallow

draft

THE RIGHT HONOURABLE

VISCOUNT MILNER, G.C.B.,

&c..

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