[ { "id": 208618, "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": 75, "title": "RAS-1979", "content_text": "48 \n\nREVS. J. SMITH AND WM, DOWNS \n\nports, visas and so on, and on their return the bus which they had boarded took them only as far as Repulse Bay Hotel. From there they began walking to Stanley, and they had not gone far when the command rang out: Halt!. They saw no one in the gathering darkness and continued on, when suddenly a bullet whistled over their heads. Some British Tommies on sentry duty stopped them and demanded their credentials. These having been verified they were allowed to proceed, none the worse for their experience. \n\nDuring these eventful days, Father Toomey did great work in visiting the Prison, on occasional sick calls. He also went to Point d'Aguilar where volunteers were holding an advance position. He was likewise at the Fort on the Hill when it was being bombed by the Japanese planes. While at the Prison he attempted to visit the interned Italian Fathers, but was not allowed. However, he managed to have delivered to them a Mass kit or two with the necessary supplies. \n\nAt the Carmelite Convent just below our hill, Father Hessler said daily Mass for the Sisters and later on remained with them during the actual fighting at Stanley. \n\nAs the days wore on in the second week of the war, things began to get pretty \"hot\" around Stanley. An occasional shell whistled overhead, reports came in that the Japanese landed in Hong Kong and were even now converging on the Tytam reservoir just to the east of us; in fact, they were even said to have captured a red brick house close by. Finally, on the twenty-second of the month, without warning, eight of the Royal Engineers' coolies who were standing just outside our garage on the west of the house, were wounded by machine gun bullets fired from across the valley. Also a little beggar girl who used to come frequently for food received a flesh wound. We brought them all into our house and laid them on the floor and did what we could for them, bandaging up their wounds. Just across this valley the British had built some ammunition dumps and had placed there an anti-aircraft battery or two. These batteries fired at enemy planes in the beginning but eventually we heard them no more and no doubt they were removed elsewhere, for now the Japanese were in possession of this hill. As a measure of safety we moved our kitchen away from this western exposure and also kept away as much as possible from that end of the house. \n\nPage 75\n\nPage 76", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1979.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2801w5938", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213167, "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-1993", "page_number": 235, "title": "RAS-1993", "content_text": "217\n\nREPORT ON VISITS TO\n\nTHE SWIRE INSTITUTE OF MARINE SCIENCE AND CAPE D'AGUILAR, 1993 AND 1994\n\nGEOFFREY ROPER\n\nOn Saturdays, 6 November, 1993 and 5 November, 1994 parties from the Branch visited the Swire Institute of Marine Science at Cape D'Aguilar, Hong Kong Island and also toured areas of historic interest on the Cape\n\nOn the first visit, the Institute was still known as the Swire Marine Laboratory but by the second visit had become an Institute - a mark of the progress it had achieved in the study of marine science in Hong Kong. Progress was also demonstrated by the expansion of facilities seen on the second visit and by the imminence of marine protected area status for the adjacent sea shore ecological research area, Lobster Bay. Professor Brian Morton, Director of the Institute, and a very welcoming host, addressed the Society on both visits. He spoke in particular on the recent history of marine biology in Hong Kong, the work of the Institute, support from the Swire Group, problems caused by increasing sea pollution, and a wide range of items of local natural science interest, including the bird life.\n\nOn both visits the parties visited the nearby Cape D'Aguilar Lighthouse, first put into service in 1875, and viewed the remnants of the Cape D'Aguilar Gun Battery.\n\nAn area of especial historical interest visited on both occasions was Hok Tsui (Crane's Bill) Village, with its mid-to-late 19th Century granite watchtower and Pak Tai Temple. For the second visit we were fortunate enough to be accompanied by Dr. James Hayes, Past President of the Branch, who spoke about the pattern of pre-1841 (i.e. pre-British) settlements in Hong Kong, of which Hok Tsui was one of the few remaining examples on Hong Kong Island remaining close to its original form and still settled, at least in part, by descendants of the original settlers.\n\nAccording to clan records, quoted by Dr. Hayes, the first ancestor of the Chu family arrived in Hong Kong in 1762 and opened a stone quarry in Shek Tong Tsui, Western District. He prospered and started a farming village at Hok Tsui before dying there in 1781 A highlight of", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1993.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833t302", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215872, "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-2002", "page_number": 171, "title": "RAS-2002", "content_text": "104\n\nPottinger Battery were relocated to Bokhara Battery, Cape D'Aguilar in 1939 or 1940 (Rollo: 201). The batteries' arc of fire at Devil's Peak in 1938 reached the southwestern tip of Lamma Island and the south of the Po Toi Group of islands, whereas those at Stanley reached beyond the southwestern part of the Lema Islands (Dangan Liedao).\n\nThus, before the Japanese invasion of Hong Kong on 8th December 1941, there were no guns at either the Gough or Pottinger Battery. However, the sites at Devil's Peak had become part of the Gin Drinker's Line in the 1930s. This Line runs from Gin Drinker's Bay (Kwai Chung) in the west to Port Shelter in the east. The Devil's Peak was a crucial component of the Kowloon segment of the Line. The Japanese had good maps about the location of the defences of Hong Kong. Some remarks on the defence works at Devil's Peak are registered in a map produced in 1939/1940 (Empson 1992). Defensive positions in the military sites on Devil's Peak were taken up by the 5/7 Rajputs of the Hong Kong Garrison on 12 December, after the fall of the Shing Mun Redoubt in the western part of the Line three days before.\n\nThe sites at Devil's Peak witnessed heavy defensive fighting by the 5/7 Rajputs and the First Mountain Battery of the Hong Kong and Singapore Artillery. The latter expended 400 rounds with their four 3.7 inch field guns before the evacuation of the defenders to Hong Kong Island on the morning of 13th December. The defenders destroyed all equipment before they crossed the Harbour during the night. Thereafter, the Japanese used the sites to bombard the Island and the defenders' gun returned fire.\n\nAfter the defeat of Japan, the Devil's Peak sites were abandoned by the British, although the batteries on the Island side of Lei Yue Mun Pass were reoccupied and put into active military use until the mid-1980s. Before 1997, there had been little news connected with British military activities at Devil's Peak, save for an air accident in the 1950s. In March 1956, two Royal Navy Sea Hawks struck fog-shrouded Devil's Peak, killing the pilots and an elderly lady (Eather 1996).\n\nA surviving example of the 9.2-inch guns that were deployed on the batteries at Devil's Peak can be seen at the Buyu Battery (Siu 1997: Plate 6 at p.76) that guards Humen (The Bogue). This battery was modernised in 1883 with the assistance of British and German military experts.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278", "rank": 0 } ]