[ { "id": 206013, "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-1970", "page_number": 93, "title": "RAS-1970", "content_text": "88 \n\nA. D. BLUE \n\nAlmost every China coaster was equipped to carry several hundred deck passengers, although ‘equipped' is too grandiose a word to use when describing the very modest preparations this entailed. Deck passengers were usually carried on the main deck and in the 'tween decks, wooden decks on most ships, but without beds, bunks, or any luxuries of that nature. Each passenger or family was simply allotted so many square feet of deck space, and supplied their own bedding, mats, and wooden pillows. As the weather was usually warm and mild, male passengers spent most of their time on the main deck, which was sheltered from the sun by awnings. Female passengers, however, often spent the whole passage in the 'tween decks, in semi-private enclaves constructed with their baggage. Washing and sanitary facilities may have been primitive, but were reasonably adequate for a voyage rarely lasting more than nine or ten days, and were probably superior to what the passengers were accustomed to in their native villages. Numerous taps provided fresh water several times per day, and on a well-found ship passengers could fill buckets and other receptacles to last them through the dry periods. Thus Conrad's \"Typhoon\" does not give a very accurate description of an emigrant ship: the Nanyang was not a regular emigrant ship, and even Captain MacWhirr's well-intentioned efforts cannot have secured his passengers a comfortable passage before running into the typhoon.\n\nIn the heyday of the trade, deck passengers were usually provided with at least two Spartan meals per day, whose main ingredients were rice with a little dried fish and vegetables, and bought any extras and luxuries themselves. The compradore's staff cooked the two meals and kept the decks clean; but the whole crew were financially interested in the deck passengers. Some ran food and drink stalls where a wide range of Chinese delicacies were on sale; others ran opium dens and gambling schools; while others again hired out their accommodation. Under such circumstances the passenger with money to spare could have a very pleasant passage. There were the occasional periods of discomfort during bad weather and typhoons, when it might be necessary to confine the passengers in the battened down 'tween decks for their own safety. During the late 1920s and the 30s on the Bangkok, Singapore, Manila, and Haiphong trades I saw very little real hardship, and few destitute passengers. Most", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1970.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ww72j0241", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207649, "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-1976", "page_number": 37, "title": "RAS-1976", "content_text": "22 \n\nRICHARD J. SMITH \n\n11 Comparative studies on selected aspects of modernizing change in these two time periods would be illuminating. One might compare, for example, the aims and accomplishments of the Peking Tung-wen kuan (established in 1862) and the Bansho Shirabesho (established in 1858). On the former, see Wright, The Last Stand of Chinese Conservatism: The T'ung-chih Restoration, 1862-1874 (New York, 1967), 241-248; on the latter, consult Marius Jansen, \"New Materials for the Intellectual History of Nineteenth-Century Japan,\" Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies, 20 (1957), 569-582. On the use of Westerners in military affairs in Japan from 1853-1868, see Presseisen, 1-23; H. J. Jones, \"Bakumatsu Foreign Employees,\" Monumenta Serica, 29.3 (Autumn, 1974).\n\n12 Presseisen, chapter 1; Smith, , chapter 4.\n\n13 Albert Craig, Chôshu in the Meiji Restoration (Cambridge, Mass., 1961), 131-136, 201-203, etc.; Richard J. Smith, \"Foreign-Training and China's Self-Strengthening: The Case of Fenghuang-shan, 1864-1873,” Modern Asian Studies, 10.2 (1976).\n\n14 Presseisen, 22-23.\n\n15 See notes 7 and 8; also Hyman Kublin, \"The 'Modern' Army of Early Meiji Japan,\" Far Eastern Quarterly, 9.1 (November, 1949), 24-26; Meron Medzini, French Policy in Japan during the Closing Years of the Tokugawa Regime (Cambridge, Mass., 1971), 125-133.\n\n16 For a discussion of Li's modernizing efforts, his extensive use of foreign assistance, and the obstacles he encountered, see S. Y. Teng and John K. Fairbank, China's Response to the West (New York, 1966), 111-112; K. C. Liu, “The Confucian as Patriot and Pragmatist: Li Hung-chang's Formative Years, 1823-1866,” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies, 30 (1970); Kenneth Folsom, Friends, Guests and Colleagues (Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1968), 152-157; and K. C. Liu, “Li Hung-chang in Chihli,” in Albert Feuerwerker, et al., eds. Approaches to Modern Chinese History (Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1967).\n\n17 See, for example, Lord Charles Beresford, The Break-up of China (New York and London, 1899), 267-289, esp. 270-280; Major A. E. J. Cavendish, \"The Armed Strength (?) of China,\" Journal of the Royal United Service Institution, 42 (June, 1898), 709-710, 713-714, 717; Richard J. Smith, \"Chinese Military Institutions in the Mid-Nineteenth Century, 1850-1860,\" Journal of Asian History, 8.2 (1974), 127.\n\n18 See Smith, \"Foreign-Training,\" 212; Cavendish, 709-710, 713-714.\n\n19 See, for example, Cavendish, esp. 720-723; Captain W. R. E. Gill, \"The Chinese Army,\" Journal of the Royal United Service Institution, 24 (1881), 371-377; Chester Holcombe, China's Past and Future (London, 1904), 81-88; \"The Chinese and Japanese Armies,\" reprinted from the Army and Navy Gazette in the Journal of the Military Service Institution of the United States, 15 (1894), 1258; James Scott, \"The Chinese Brave,\" Asiatic Quarterly Review, 1 (1886), esp. 240; etc.\n\n20 See Smith, , Chapters 8 and 9.\n\n21 See Yang-wu yün-tung cited in Smith, \"Foreign-Training,\" 218. On Chinese resistance to foreign instructors and officers, see ibid.; also Cavendish, 720-721.\n\n22 See, for example, L. C. Arlington, Through the Dragon's Eyes (London, 1931), 18; Stanley Wright, Hart and the Chinese Customs (Belfast, 1950), 478-481; John Rawlinson, China's Struggle for Naval Development, 1839-1895 (Cambridge, Mass., 1967), 65-78, 93-94, 163; Holcombe, 80-85, esp. 83.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1976.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/hq382988q", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210851, "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-1986", "page_number": 202, "title": "RAS-1986", "content_text": "185\n\nWith the promise of marriage, he induced the girl to leave the brothel and live with him, leaving behind her mother's unpaid debt as well as his own unsettled bill.\n\nThe brothel-keeper threatened to bring suit for the recovery of her debts. Tong A-chick tried to settle the two accounts with a token payment hoping to delay court proceedings. Meanwhile, he was dismissed from his Government post. This gave the brothel mistress new courage to bring her demands before the court.\n\nThe girl was imprisoned as a debtor; but when the case was tried in the Court of Summary Jurisdiction, the magistrate dismissed the claims on the ground that it had not been proper to secure the original debt by a pledge of “a body” for obviously immoral purposes.\n\nWith the case decided in favour of A-chick's friend, he took out a summons in the name of the girl against the brothel-keeper for certain property she had kept when the girl had left to live with A-chick. Before the case was heard, A-chick's uncle, who had been a compradore to a former sheriff and was still rendering service to the Government, tried to use his connections to intimidate the brothel-keeper. The girl, however, lost the case.\n\nThe publicity connected with this sordid affair did not enhance A-chick's reputation in the community. It seemed better to leave Hongkong to try his fortunes in another place. At this time his uncle was planning to go to California so it was natural for A-chick to join him.\n\nTong A-chick left Hongkong about the middle of January 1852. The departure had been delayed by the disastrous Lower Bazaar fire at the close of 1851. In the four hundred or so buildings destroyed were most of the provisions, clothing and necessaries accumulated by the emigrants for their voyage to San Francisco, together with their written contracts with the captain and charterers of the ship on which they were to sail.\n\nThe loss resulted in a dispute with the captain. An appeal was made to the Rev. S. W. Bonney at Whampoa, where the arrangements were made.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1986.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211811, "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-1989", "page_number": 226, "title": "RAS-1989", "content_text": "201\n\n+\n\nhimself uncomfortable, with one of the nicest looking creatures for a wife imaginable. (...) Mr. BRUSHWOOD did the 'green eyed monster' admirably and the character suited him well—we mean of course artistically. By a skilful arrangement the warmth of a kiss was made to be followed by Cool as a Cucumber. Did the manager intend this to impart a deeper meaning than is conveyed on the face of the \"play-bill\"? We have an esteem for him and hope not: for although a kiss is, sometimes, but the prelude of a coolness that surpasses even that of a cucumber, we would not have Mr PROTEUS openly hint as much\". This piece called forth all the powers of the manager himself, and so perfectly was the coolness of Mr. Plumper exhibited, whether as regards the criticism of Mr. Barkins' face or his sherry, that, had he stepped from the neighbouring ice-house directly upon the stage, he could not have looked cooler (this was a reference to the Commercial Hotel; see note 94) What a desirable companion he would make, we thought, for the hot weather, but Mr. Proteus must be so, indeed, in any weather. The playing was well sustained throughout and Mr. BRUSHWOOD did his best — and that was not a little — to fret and fume as ‘Old Barkins' — but we can scarcely say that he looked a heavy father\" (the heavy father was one of the specialist roles in a stock company). A Conjugal Lesson was \"decidedly the crowning piece of the evening and was performed with an amount of case and artistic ability which elicited loud and well merited applause\". And as the critic had evidently taken a fancy to \"Mrs. NESBIT” he continued that she “looked more fascinating and piquant than ever and quite won the hearts of the bachelor portion of the audience who were altogether at a loss to understand the bad taste of Mr. Lullaby who could stay away from such an attraction till three in the morning!” (NCH 28.3.1857).\n\n23.4.1857 (Thur)\n\nT. TAYLOR: \"Still Waters Run Deep\" (1856)\n\nT: Comedy (3 acts)\n\nJ.M. MORTON: “A Capital Match” (1852)\n\nT: Farce (1 act)\n\nC: Amateurs\n\nTh: N.N. (C\n\n—\n\nR: That other favourite of the reviewer, Peter PROTEUS, had resigned and so the evening had to do without him. In the introduction to his report, the \"Man on the Bund\" referred to the playbill which informed him \"in capitals of vermillion that Still Waters Run Deep and of other matters besides in the like flaming manner”. About the piece he was not at all content: \"Muddy waters, however, as well as still, they turned out to be. This piece is one of those incongruous mixtures of French novel morality and English domestic life, which is as offensive and preposterous, as it is ludicrous. London milliners may persist in imitating the extravagances of French crinoline and superabundant circumference: they dress up our wives and sisters until they have destroyed every graceful curve they may have and make them look like balloons endowed with feminine heads and shoulders; and with a growl we may submit to this perversion of taste and whim of fashion. But when our playwrights, in their dearth of invention, ransack the repertories of the minor Parisian theatres for something new, which they themselves cannot originate, and stumbling upon the old and stale subject of Parisian conjugal infidelity, try to fit it into English social life, especially that of the middle class, the attempt excites at once our scorn and laughter, and ought, like monstrous bandorgans and other nuisances, to be put a stop to\". Small wonder then that in it \"there was much good acting thrown away. Mr. CLAY performed, throughout, the part he had undertaken, admirably. His conception of his character was good and was given with fidelity and ability. It was just how a blunt, honest Englishman might have been expected to act when, by some extraordinary chance, his domestic privacy is invaded by such a frenchified monstrosity as Captain Hawkesley. Mr. ROLLER too did the lean and slippered Pantaloon most successfully. His ease of manner on the stage and finished...", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1989.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8336pm92h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211867, "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-1989", "page_number": 282, "title": "RAS-1989", "content_text": "257\n\ndropped, and shifted just where we did not want it.\n\nThursday, [March] 14th\n\nToday we were tacking about but have made little progress, since the wind is dead against us. The weather is beautifully serene and calm. Nothing to be seen on all sides but the wide ocean, except here and there a ship in the distance. Pleasant walking on deck, though the wind was very cold.\n\nOften are my thoughts going back to bygone days. Were I not naturally sanguine, and of a cheerful disposition, I should deeply feel at having left so many friends, among whom since Christmas I had spent so many social happy hours. Yet I cannot help feeling that there will be no more enjoyment till my wanderings are all over, and I am once more safely settled down in old England.\n\nWednesday, March 20th\n\nSince last Wednesday I have had rather a strange week of it, and have been unable to make any addition to my journal. How the time has gone I cannot imagine, and today having aroused from a sort of stupor, I inquired the day of the month and was quite astonished. I will endeavor to give some idea, as far as memory goes, just what I have gone through.\n\nOn Friday the 15th we had a stormy day, and the weather being dead against us we had to keep tacking about. We came in sight of the Isle of Wight, and then off again in sight of France, then turned about and came back again. The seasickness came on with a vengeance, and I felt that poorly, I was a misery to myself, and all on board. The only consolation I had as I sat in the cabin, over a basin, labouring away, was to hear the captain's wife in the opposite room, doing the same thing. So I felt I was not quite alone in the world. My only comfort was to get to bed and try and sleep as much as possible. As to eating it was entirely out of the question.\n\nOn Saturday we came off Portland Bill, and then turned round and came again in sight of France. The seasickness increased to a considerable degree, and all I could do was to lay in bed, and be sick, and think over the past, lament over the present, and look forward with gloomy thoughts into the future.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1989.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8336pm92h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211891, "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-1989", "page_number": 306, "title": "RAS-1989", "content_text": "281\n\ninhabitants of the tropics which I encountered.\n\nAs the moon rose the scene was grand beyond description, and the sailors' voices as they pulled the ropes echoed far and wide among the forest covered hills in the distance, and far away over the calm clear water, which reflected the moon's rays. The splendour of the moonlight and stars is far beyond what is ever seen in England.\n\nOn the following afternoon we began to move a little, and I made several drawings of the land as we went past. Never did I see such a fertile island as Java, even at the distance. Its lofty hills were partly hidden by clouds, yet where they could be seen they were covered with trees up to their very summits.\n\nOn the next day we were fairly in the Strait of Sunda, and could easily see Java on the right and Sumatra on the left. One peak in Sumatra called Krakatoa was in sight for a day or two. It was dreary work to sit on deck under the awning all day long, and see how slowly we moved. About noon the sea breeze blew toward the shore, and at five in the evening the land breeze blows from the island. No one who has not experienced the land breeze, after a hot day, can imagine how cool and refreshing it is, and it has such a delightful perfume which it brings with it from the land, that you seem in the midst of a blooming flower garden. In the early morning it is just about the same.\n\nAt last we sighted Anjer Hill in the evening, and in the morning I rose at four o'clock to see the village as we passed it, which however we did not do till nearly noon. The sun rose behind the hills, and was the grandest sight I ever saw,\n\nAbout eight o'clock the steward came and told me a boat was alongside, so I went on deck to see it. It came off from the observatory and lighthouse on shore, which we saw very plainly, and the headman had a paper for the ship to fill up. There were plenty of fruit and provisions which the man brought on his own account. He and his crew were Javanese, and their appearance was not more prepossessing than their language, which is a strange conglomeration of harsh sounds as they speak it. They were all but naked. Every rag that one of them had on was hardly so large as a pocket handkerchief. Only fancy a fellow to come stalking on board in such a condition. The captain's wife instead of acting with modesty in such a case, was one of the foremost to go", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1989.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8336pm92h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212750, "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-1992", "page_number": 59, "title": "RAS-1992", "content_text": "44\n\nacknowledging the initial concept having been his, or so he claimed.\n\n+\n\nHe has been described as 'an adventurer and an explorer, a plant collector and a Chinese general. He was certainly an adventurer though nowadays he would be referred to as a soldier of fortune, an adviser, an opportunist, and even a mercenary.\n\nThe question remains, how successful was he? Money certainly came his way at times though judging from his Will, he was not a particularly successful businessman. He certainly collected plants and sent them back to the British Consul in Canton and has one specimen, Jasminum Mesnyii, named after him. He bore the brevet rank of Lieutenant General in the Chinese Imperial army but to what extent this was a genuine rank rather than an honour and a courtesy rank, though fully earned during his military service, is hard to judge. Again, though accurately described as an explorer, he was in fact much more of a traveller in parts of China already settled by Chinese and visited earlier by other foreigners. The trek he made, as recorded by Captain Gill, from Ch’eng-tu in Szechuan province to Burma through what was then called lower Tibet has a different slant to what would have been Mesny's account. In Gill's Mesny is scarcely mentioned and he would appear to have been taken along by Gill as his interpreter. It would have been interesting to have read what Mesny would have, and indeed may have written about his journey of very nearly four months with Gill.\n\nHe saw himself as what nowadays would be called a go-between, a consultant, and in those days regarded, perhaps, as a fixer. Mesny had a few major bees in his bonnet the most barefaced of which was the value he put on the advice he constantly proffered to every senior Chinese official whose ear he could reach on how to modernise China. He had, for example, prepared a list of some nineteen items, suggestions presented to the Viceroy Chang Chih-tung, and although Mesny assures us that Chang accepted the list there is no evidence that he did anything about it or if he did, that he even mentioned Mesny in any memorials to the throne. Mesny wrote indignantly at one point in his Miscellany about his list of suggestions to Chang having been ignored, or put into practice piecemeal and inexpertly, penny pinching and ineffectually without any reference whatsoever to Mesny.\n\nIn 1906 at the very end of his fourth and final volume of his Miscellany he prided himself on his advice with the words 'All those great industrial", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1992.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qf85tx75x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212768, "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-1992", "page_number": 77, "title": "RAS-1992", "content_text": "62 \n\n1874 April \n\nJuly October \n\n1874 \n\n1874 December Late 1874 \n\n1875 Summer? 1875 Winter \n\n1877 February \n\nKueichou, but Mesny had already departed \n\nTo Ch'engtu (six month stay] \n\nVisited the temple dedicated to Tu Fu the poet in Ch’engtu Returned by very large houseboat via Sui-fu, Chungking and I-ch'ang to Hankow. Mesny entertained at the palace of General Viscount Pao Chao in K'uei-chou en route on the Yangtze. In Hankow he met Rev. David Hill \n\nPublished 'Tungking' [date in the book itself: Mesny however, claimed later that it was published in 1875] \n\nOfficially married Nien Suey-tsen in Hankow \n\nTravelled overland from Chin-kiang, through Shantung [Chi-nan], en route for Peking. Spent winter in Chi-nan at invitation of Ting Pao-chen, the Governor of Shantung, to whom he claimed he had been an adviser \n\nPeking \n\nReturned to Kueichou via Shanghai [November]. Hankow and Human [1876] Re-appointed Superintendent of the Kueichou Armouries, an appointment he held until March 1877 \n\nMesny entertained two British Protestant missionaries in Kuei-yang \n\nOverland Trek to Western China, through Burma to India and by sea to England \n\n28 May \n\nJune 1878 8 January \n\nNovember \n\n26 December 28 December \n\n1879 February \n\n9 March 4 June \n\nDeparted Kuei-yang for Szechuan [his third visit to the province (en route for England, via Tibet, Burma and India, with Captain Gill)] Arrived Ch'engtu \n\nArrived in England from Calcutta \n\nVisited Channel Islands \n\nReceived telegram from Chinese Minister in London desiring Mesny to accompany the returning Chinese Minister at Berlin to China: departed! Marseilles for Hong Kong aboard the Irrawaddy Arrived Hong Kong from England \n\nDeparted Hong Kong for Canton \n\nVisited Amoy \n\nDeparted Canton for Kueichou, via Kuei-lin (Kuangsi] Arrived Kuei-lin \n\n25 July \n\nArrived Tu-yun Fu \n\n4 August [1880/1881] \n\n1880 February \n\n15 March \n\nAugust \n\n1881 January \n\nFebruary \n\nArrived Kuei-yang \n\nPossibly visited Hanoi? \n\nGovernor of Kueichou province recommended Mesny to the Throne for the bestowal of posthumous honours for three generations [San-tai Erh-p'in Kao-feng] \n\nSet out for Lan-chou via Chungking [where he had remained six months] \n\nMesny spent the night at Ch'ien-hsi Chou, some 90 kms NNW of Kuei-yang, where he was attacked by an armed mob Departed Chungking [after 'delay due to unexpected contretemps\" which Mesny did not clarify] \n\nArrived Lanchou \n\nDeparted Lanchou, crossed Gobi to Ham taking six to seven weeks", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1992.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qf85tx75x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216409, "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-2003", "page_number": 168, "title": "RAS-2003", "content_text": "118\n\nIn addition to her usual cruising on the China coast the ship paid one visit to Nagasaki and, early in 1933, another to the Philippine Islands.\n\nOn 11 June 1933 the carrier EAGLE, Captain L.V. Wells, DSO, arrived at Hong Kong to replace her on the station. Accordingly the next day HERMES slipped for Singapore and after a pleasant passage reached Sheerness on Saturday, 22 July 1933.\n\nAlthough while in the East mention has been made above of the activity of pirates, actual direct involvement with any such deed had been about the only experience she missed between 1930 and 1933. She was to fill that gap during her following commission, also on the China Station when under the command of Captain The Hon. George Fraser.\n\nNOTES\n\n[Hon Ed.] HMS HERMES, a small aircraft carrier of some 10,950 tons, was the first purpose-built such warship in the Royal Navy. On 15th January 1918 she was laid down at the Armstrong Whitworth yard and launched on 11 September 1919. The yard was scheduled to close, and no great post-World War I urgency to complete her was perceived, so she was towed to Devonport for completion. There she was commissioned on 6th August 1923. Several of her pre-World War II commissions were spent on the China Station. At the outbreak of World War II she \"worked up\" in the English Channel, carried out one patrol, and then in October 1939 was ordered to Dakar to work with the French Navy on anti-enemy blockade runner and surface raider patrols. With the ship operating twelve Swordfish aircraft, generally speaking these operations took place out across the Atlantic towards the coast of South America. On 8 July, 1940, with the advent of Vichy then at Dakar, the ship launched a daring night-time attack first using her motor boat immediately followed by Swordfish aircraft torpedoes, crippling the new battleship RICHELIEU which was lying in Dakar Roads. Subsequently, when returning to Freetown, she was damaged in collision with the P & O liner CORFU, then an armed merchant cruiser engaged in convoy protection duties. She was repaired at Simonstown, South Africa. Following repairs she saw further service, enjoying some notable successes, in the South Atlantic, Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf.\n\nFrom Trincomalee late on 8th April 1942, the approaching Japanese fleet having", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390", "rank": 0 } ]