Old Hong Kong-3 — Page 77

MILITARY (Contd.)

A Mr. Morrison is mentioned as liaison officer (interpreter), and is identified as the famous translator and Sinologue.

To return to Black's Link, it is understood that this was named after a former General Officer Commanding who also administered the Government for two periods, in 1896 and 1898. He was Major-General Wilsone Black, C.B. Those who take walks in the neighbourhood might like to know of an interesting relic of the old military fortifications of the island. Reference has already been made (30-6-33) to the old battery near the P.W.D. offices. There was also a battery at Wongneichong Gap in use some years ago. The position is just above the Gap, on the western side, and can be reached from Black's Link by scrambling a little way up the hillside (Mount Nicholson). The old cannon has been removed, but the gun-pit remains in a good state of preservation, with the ammunition recesses and shelters, and a large, rusty iron turntable still in position. The emplacement was an ideal one for the ordnance of that time as it commanded the harbour on one side, and Deep Water Bay and the area beyond, on the other.

It is worthy of note that Major-General Black was one of the last two military administrators of the Colony, the other (and last) being Major-General Gascoigne (1902). Since then the Governors and Administrators have all been members of the Civil Service, the Colonial Secretaries administering on occasions when the Governors have been absent from the Colony.

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Here is a further note on the military garrisons of the old days—the case of the 59th Regiment was stationed in Hong Kong in the year 1856, for we note that six soldiers of that regiment were seen to embark at Shek-o on board an American vessel supposed to be the whaler Montpelier. H.M.S. Barracouta was sent in search of her, but returned unsuccessful.

In this same connexion it is also of interest to note that two weeks previous to the above occurrence, nine deserters from the 59th Regiment who had been taken on board the American Whaler Canton, with a tenth who was apprehended in the street dressed as a seaman, were tried by Court Martial, found guilty, and sentenced to terms of imprisonment ranging from one to five years.

I am not, at the moment, able to identify the 59th Regiment, but it will not be out of place to refer back to the 18th (Royal Irish) Regiment (see 15-7-33), one of the original units to land in Hong Kong when the place was taken over by the British. The Royal Irish were disbanded on July 31, 1922, along with other Irish Regiments. They had a distinguished career, their first big engagement being at Namur, in 1695; and in commemoration of their part in the China War they included in their badges a Dragon, superscribed "China".

Looking through some of the old "Journals" and "Narratives" (long out of print) of various soldiers, sailors and civilians who sojourned here in the Forties and Fifties, we are able to pick up various pointers such, for instance, as a definite reference to the 95th Regiment (see 8-7-33). We find that it had been stationed in Ceylon up to the beginning of 1847 when it was transferred to Hong Kong, and was stationed here three years.

One of its officers was Captain (afterwards Colonel) J. G. Champion, a keen botanist, who spent most of his time here collecting specimens of the local flora, so that he is commemorated in the names of a number of the Colony's wild plants.