Old Hong Kong-3 — Page 228

POLICE

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Perhaps other readers will be able to give their endorsement of these claims regarding the age of the "Albany."

The Mr. Charles May referred to, arrived in Hong Kong on February 28, 1845, on appointment as Superintendent of Police, with two British Inspectors. Mr. May had been connected with the London Police Force, and was evidently a man who knew his job.

Prior to that, the acting Superintendent had been Captain Bruce, of the 18th Royal Irish Regiment (1844) and this gives us a clue to one of the military units stationed here in the early days; another unit serving at the time (1844-45) was the 98th Regiment. Captain Bruce had done excellently, reorganising the early force of policemen, and instituting an Indian night guard, which had proved a great weapon in diminishing the epidemic of robberies.

The two Inspectors who came out with Mr. May were Mr. Thomas Smithers and Mr. Hugh McGregor. A few years later Mr. May became a Magistrate.

It would take several columns to give an adequate history of the Hong Kong Police Force, but a few notes can be included here as of general interest.

The military had a great deal to do with the early Police, and the Superintendent before Captain Bruce was also an Army officer, Captain Haly, of the 41st Madras Native Infantry. He was appointed in February, 1844, but was required to return to his unit the following month, and Capt. Bruce was appointed and served, as has been seen, for a year until Mr. May's arrival.

The reference by "Another Colonial" in his most interesting letter to the origin of the name "Green Clothes" or Green Coats for the Police is correct. The Government in 1844 reorganised the force under a special Ordinance, and they were known as the Colonial Police Force. At first the recruits were time-expired British and Indian soldiers, a semi-military and most efficient body except for one drawback - their ignorance of the Chinese language. The unit was, it would seem, equipped with green uniforms, hence the name Luk Yee or Lukee.

That efficient body, the Water Police, was not formed until much later. We find that the first Water Police Station was in a wooden hulk moored in the harbour. She had been the trading vessel John Adams, employed in the opium trade, and was bought by the Government in 1868. A fire broke out aboard in 1884, but no casualties occurred. The hulk was eventually sunk by H.M.S. Merlin, which blew it to pieces with a torpedo.

For a few months afterwards, the Water Police were accommodated in what was known as Crosby's Store, on the Hong Kong Praya, but in September of that year, 1884, they were transferred to the newly-built station at Tsim-tsa-tsui, and have been there ever since.

Older residents of the Colony will recall the former Lukongs' uniform, with belted tunic, white leggings and Chinese shoes, and peaked Chinese hats. They were picturesque, if not so efficient-looking as the present uniform.

Reference was made the other day (see 30-9-33) to the numbering of the local Police Stations in the old days, and the two maps of the early Seventies already published have shown the sites of two stations, No. 3 on the south side of Queen's Road East and No. 4 on the eastern corner of the Naval Yard, which have long since been abandoned. It is interesting to find the survivals of this numbering system a somewhat archaic survival, which prompts one to hope that all the numbers will in time be done away with and the obvious more convenient naming after locality substituted in all cases.