[ { "id": 207502, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1975", "page_number": 270, "title": "RAS-1975", "content_text": "262\n\nDONALD C. BOWIE\n\nA R.A.F. sergeant got married on 28 August and Miss M. da Roza, a local lady offered her services as a masseuse for our patients.\n\nAt this time I had to deal with complaints arising from long standing antagonisms in P.O.W. camps now openly displayed after long repression. I am glad to say that this phase subsided eventually without overt official action becoming necessary. We also prepared a system of recording the medical condition of Hong Kong Volunteers before they were freed to their homes in the Colony. Doctor Newton, the deputy Chief Medical Officer in the civil medical service, took charge of the Internee Camp nearby and we were allotted a motor car which we shared with the Indian camp.\n\nIt was on 28 August that Saito came in with Hasegawa after 9 p.m. and told me formally that all our medical records had been burned about 15 August along with their own records which the Japanese were burning at that time. As I have reported earlier I got his written acknowledgement that these records had been destroyed and also that none of the plain clothes removed by him from us remained. My diary records that I spoke sternly on this matter, which must have given me some pleasure at the time.\n\nBy now a party was going each day from the hospital to visit relatives and friends in Stanley. The journey was made by ferry and took about two hours. On 29 August some planes came over just after 7 a.m. and some food and cigarettes were dropped later the same day in Sham Shui Po. Included in the drop were some medical boxes and my diary records that the contents of these came as a marvellous revelation to us. We were doing well about this time because the Japanese delivered about eleven thousand packets of cigarettes and jam to us and we heard that British warships and aircraft carriers had been seen off Stanley. On 30 August planes were flying over Hong Kong all morning and a B.B.C. radio report said that the fleet had come. Nomura asked for lists of our patients and I required him to come and get these himself. This action was possibly required of him by our relieving force.\n\nTrue enough a large fleet came into harbour on 30 August, which was 14 days after the Japanese surrender. This delay seemed a long time to us but the arrival of the fleet brought to an end a confused situation in which we were increasingly managing our own affairs. We sent our car for Admiral Harcourt to go to Sham Shui Po and he later went round our hospital with Mr. Gimson who\n\nPage 270\n\nPage 271", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208017, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1977", "page_number": 56, "title": "RAS-1977", "content_text": "40\n\nG. C. EMERSON\n\nwas summoned to Japanese Headquarters in Camp and informed of the surrender.\n\nThe first days after the surrender were tremendously exciting ones as friends and relatives arrived from the city and prisoners-of-war came from the two Kowloon P.O.W. camps. On 23rd August, Mr. Gimson moved into the city and began re-establishing the Government. Nearly two weeks passed after the surrender before the British fleet arrived on 30th August. At 5.00 p.m. that afternoon, the Commander of the Fleet, Rear Admiral Cecil Harcourt, came to Camp and attended a very moving flag-raising ceremony. It was several weeks before the Camp was finally closed. Many ventured into the city to begin picking up the lost threads of their lives but many, particularly those whose health was poor, remained in Camp waiting to board the ships which took them away from Hong Kong.\n\nFrom this brief account, it may sound as if internment was not a particularly bad experience. Such an impression would be far from the truth. Internment was a dreadful experience. Not only were the physical aspects - lack of food and of clothing, the over-crowding, the insufficient food, etc.- most unpleasant, but the mental aspects were extremely bad also. The humiliation of defeat, the separation from loved ones and the years of waiting for release are impossible to imagine for those of us who have never had such experiences. While the horrors of the German concentration camps fortunately never were experienced in Hong Kong, internment in Stanley Camp was a terrible experience for almost all the internees.\n\nI would like to finish by reading you a few lines from a poem written by Mr. C. J. Norman, later Commissioner of Prisons, Hong Kong, in 1954. The poem is entitled “A Farewell to Stanley”.\n\nA Farewell to Stanley! It's over.\n\nOf Internees there isn't a sign. They've left for Newhaven & Dover\n\nFor Hull & Newcastle-on-Tyne.\n\nNo tales where the rumours once started.\n\nThe kitchen's devoid of its queues.\n\nThe strategists all have departed\n\nWith the lies which they peddled as 'news'.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1977.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/np198x23n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208019, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1977", "page_number": 58, "title": "RAS-1977", "content_text": "42 \n\nG. C. EMERSON \n\nJanuary 5 \n\n21 \n\n24 \n\nFebruary \n\nAssembly at Murray Parade Grounds; internment in waterfront hotels \n\nMove to Stanley \n\n1st meeting of Temporary Committee \n\n1st meeting of British Communal Council \n\nJune 29 American repatriation on \"Asama Maru\" \n\n1st meeting of First British Community Council \n\n1st Allied air raid on Hong Kong 1st Red Cross parcels, from Britain \n\nAugust \n\nNovember \n\nFebruary April/May \n\n1st meeting of Second British Community Council Arrests of bankers & Dr. Selwyn-Clarke (Director of Medical Services) \n\n1st meeting of Third-British Community Council \n\nCanadians repatriated on \"Teia Maru\" \n\nExecutions of seven internees \n\nSeptember \n\nOctober \n\nJanuary \n\nFebruary \n\nSeptember \n\n2nd Red Cross parcels, from Canada \n\nMilitary took control: Civilian Internment Camp, H.K. became military Internment Camp, H.K. \n\nBritish Community Council dissolved; District Chairmen to run Camp \n\n1944 \n\nJanuary 16 Bombing of Bungalow C-14 internees killed \n\nMarch \n\nMay \n\nAugust \n\n15 \n\n3rd Red Cross parcels (part of Nov. 1942 shipment, from Britain) \n\nNews of Germany's surrender \n\nEmperor's broadcast in Tokyo \n\n16 Japanese informed Mr. Gimson of surrender \n\n30 Rear Admiral Harcourt arrived; flag-raising ceremony in Camp", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1977.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/np198x23n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208547, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1979", "page_number": 4, "title": "RAS-1979", "content_text": "THE U.S. AND THE QUESTION OF HONG KONG 1941-45\n\n15\n\nurgent consent of the United States Chiefs of Staff to detach a British naval force from the British Pacific Fleet to accept Japan's surrender and assume full powers of military administration in the colony.63 The Japanese accepted defeat on 14 August. However, the British Pacific Fleet assigned for service at Hong Kong, under the command of Rear-Admiral Sir Cecil Harcourt, did not arrive until 30 August. During this interval of a fortnight, the question of Hong Kong sorely tried the British government and placed the United States government in an uncomfortable position.\n\nHong Kong again became a serious point of contention between Britain and China. This time the argument was not whose sovereignty was to be set up but who was to receive Japan's surrender there. Despite the assurances given by Chiang Kai-shek on 16 August, and repeated on 24 August, that China had \"no territorial ambitions\" in Hong Kong and regarded it \"as a matter which would require eventual settlement through diplomatic channel\", the British Foreign and Colonial Offices insisted that Sir Cecil Harcourt receive Japan's surrender on behalf of Britain by virtue of her sovereignty over Hong Kong.64\n\nThe prime minister, now C.R. Attlee, appealed to the American president for assistance. Fortunately for Britain, Truman, who had assumed the presidency on Roosevelt's death in April, was in favour of a cautious policy. While being conscious of his predecessor's views regarding the future status of Hong Kong, he, however, decided to adhere to the \"recognition of the established rights\", although he told both Britain and China that such recognition \"did not in any way represent U.S. views regarding the future status of Hong Kong.\" General Douglas MacArthur was therefore instructed to arrange for the surrender of Hong Kong to the British commander.65 Again fortunately for Britain, MacArthur was known for \"his support for the cause of the British Empire in the Far East.\" In fact in October 1944 he had specifically expressed that he \"fully appreciated the need for British forces to recapture Hong Kong.\"66\n\nChiang Kai-shek, on the other hand, insisted on his right to accept Japan's surrender at Hong Kong as commander-in-chief of the China theatre. He was therefore most distressed by Truman's agreement with the British. To avoid embarrassing Truman, Chiang now suggested that the Japanese forces in Hong Kong should surrender to his representative in a ceremony in which both", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1979.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2801w5938", "rank": 0 } ]