CO129-622-4 War damage compensation- requisitioned railway stores and materials 28-1-1949 - 16-2-1950 — Page 12

Kowloon-

in having missing materials manufactured and in this connection I quote from a recent communication of the Governor's;- #

it has been possible to collect some further though indirect evidence of the type of material supplied for preparing the 600 wagons.

This consists of a letter from Mr. L. C. Su, Managing Director of the South China Iron Works Ltd. to the General Manager of the Canton Railway. Contracts totalling approximately $900,000 are believed to have been placed with this firm and with Mesers. Liu Ho Kou Iron Works Ltd. and Mr. Su indicates the type of article which his firm was asked to manufacture. This clearly shows that the Kowloon-Canton Railway in preparing the 600 wagons for fabrication, had more to do than

sorting, marking, preparing and delivering to ship". Furthermore, it is known that the requirements of the War Supplies Board were considered of sufficient magnitude to justify the engagement temporarily of a Chinese Engineer to supervise their supply and in particular, to ensure that the 600 railway wagons were properly completed and shipped.....

I

attach a copy of the letter to which the Governor refers.

The War office on the other hand, maintains that this interpretation of the matter is not correct and that Hong Kong did not in fact incur the cost of manufacturing the missing matetials to complete the fabrication of these 600 wagons. They say that

/the

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