[ { "id": 207409, "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": 177, "title": "RAS-1975", "content_text": "CAPTIVE SURGEON IN HONG KONG\n\n169\n\nrelease. His nerve was not shaken by his experience, and it was a privilege to have him on the staff.\n\nMajor Charles Boxer had studied the Japanese language in Japan and when hostilities broke out was a staff officer in China Command. Towards the end of the battle on the Island he went out to help the defence in the field and was very seriously wounded. He was taken first to the Queen Mary Hospital and thence to Bowen Road in early January 1942. The Japanese of course knew that he was in Hong Kong and sought him out after our surrender. After the immediate danger of his wound had passed his services as an interpreter were much in demand both by Shackleton and by the Japanese. The surgical problems of our wounded were being brought under better control when on 7 August 1942 Boxer gave me a message from the Japanese that on the following day Simson the A.D.M.S., Shackleton the commanding officer, a named number of officers and other ranks of the staff and 40 patients were to leave Bowen Road and that all women staff were to be transferred away from the hospital 48 hours later. At the time we considered that only twelve patients were fit to go to P.O.W. camp. All except two of the women staff were to be transferred to the Civil Internment Camp on the Stanley Peninsula. The two exceptions, as noted earlier, were released, in Hong Kong. I was promised 30 “first aiders” to replace our nurses but it was much later before 10 Canadian volunteers arrived to help us. The Japanese instruction to me was to take charge of the hospital with Major Gerald Harrison as my deputy. My own position was secure enough for I was much senior to my medical colleagues in the hospital, but Harrison was not the next in seniority in the British army. Before his departure Colonel Simson was good enough to give me a letter in which he “promoted” me to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel and to take charge of the hospital. As an interpolation this development did not forward my career in any way and it was not till 16 January 1946 that I was promoted to the substantive rank of Lieutenant Colonel. My pay in this rank began only upon this date though my seniority was slightly ante-dated. By 1946 I had nearly 28 years service, so my forebodings of 1939 and 1940 about my career were justified. This little story shows that it is always unwise to be captured in war; the effect on the career of a regular soldier can be calamitous. It also illustrates the slow rate of promotion thirty years ago. I was however grateful for Colonel Simson’s", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207496, "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": 264, "title": "RAS-1975", "content_text": "256\n\nDONALD C. BOWIE\n\nOn 4 August Mr. Zindel carried out a Red Cross inspection of the hospital together with Colonel Tokunaga and his staff, the whole lasting only about twenty minutes and I had no conversation with him. At this time we had been receiving small quantities of fresh meat at weekends and this had gone on for a few weeks before meat was replaced by salted fish, the first fish we had had for a long time. In early August the weather was remarkably cool, dull and showery with the wind varying from S.W. to N.E. The barbed wire was now being brought closer to the hospital and excluded the playing field. We had two dangerously ill patients on 7 August and we received a drum of diesel oil from Saito via our engineers.\n\nMr. Sims was able to repair a burned out high tension cable on our X-ray set and I noted that we put an extra lock on the linen store, a further indication that active trading was still going on. The last Red Cross supplies we had received came in on 29 June and we were running short. Our wheat stock was exhausted and we stopped cooking buns but continued to produce a so-called cake each week and bread made from rice and beans was issued every second day. The Japanese issue of cigarettes for workers which had been due on 20 July arrived on 8 August and Saito told me that wood for fuel was very difficult to get and asked me to economise. We had made two attempts without success to make a wood saw from iron bedsteads. We had now a working party wiring and installing a water supply and a lavatory in the school sports pavilion for the use of the Japanese. We were given 186 small towels, enough for one to each person in hospital and the remainder were raffled. By now the hospital was tired of the lack of news, but remained fairly cheerful except for the blight of three patients on the dangerously ill list. On 15 August one British patient died, thus making the fifth death which had occurred in the Central British School. On 16 August we had a funeral, and a young bull was sighted in the hospital compound but just escaped us. On the same day my diary contains a note to the effect that the war was over, news which reached us via the guards. It is rather remarkable that the official surrender had been made only the previous day in Tokyo. I tackled Saito directly, asking for news but he replied that he had none, though he did promise to tell me as soon as any was available. Next day I asked Saito again in the morning for news and was answered very brusquely that he did not understand my question.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207498, "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": 266, "title": "RAS-1975", "content_text": "258\n\nDONALD C. BOWIE\n\nS.M.O. Sham Shui Po and Crawford would be in medical charge in the officers' camp. I asked Swyer to send us five members of the R.A.M.C. including one sanitary assistant. The day before I had received a letter from Miss Dyson, our Matron from Stanley Camp who wanted her sisters with her there to rejoin us and this gave us pleasure.\n\nDuring one of my absences from the hospital an incident had occurred over a flag. Someone had hoisted the Union flag on the hospital flag staff and Japanese troops with machine guns surrounded the hospital and for safety's sake we stopped all expeditions from the hospital for the time being. Saito had been observed by our people leaving the hospital with some trucks apparently filled with papers and documents and he had a drawn sword in his hand. On 20 August the Japanese again mounted an armed guard early in the afternoon. In the morning I had been told by Saito and Nomura that the Japanese were still in control and they arranged for Takami the supplies warrant officer to deal with us over food. I pressed him especially for milk and certain other urgently needed foods for medical purposes and required Saito to return to us all the records he had removed. He asked about the numbers we had in the hospital, a foolish but typical request because he must have known all about these already. Nomura told me that the gendarmerie must have been responsible for surrounding the hospital on the day before and we thought it wise not to fly the Union flag for a time. Colonel Field, as the senior officer in command of British troops visited us, and said he would send any food that he could and he approved of our action over the flag incident. He also agreed that following a request from Saito we should not make any large scale moves before he had seen Tokunaga. Saito asked me to give medical and other help to the Indian camp. I found this a queer request indicating a concern of which I had had no great evidence before and of course we were already doing all we could to help. Nomura and another Japanese, Sekiguchi, were busy on plans of our cemeteries and some of our people who had relatives in Stanley left to visit them.\n\nWe exchanged our older men and those who were crippled with patients from Sham Shui Po who needed active treatment, and then a further 14 people who had been in Japanese prisons were admitted including Major Boxer who was an old friend of ours from the early days. Half of the fourteen were civilians. Colonel Tokunaga", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207499, "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": 267, "title": "RAS-1975", "content_text": "CAPTIVE SURGEON IN HONG KONG\n\n259\n\narrived accompanied by interpreters and the Japanese sent in 3000 packets of cigarettes, 12 bottles of saki, 36 tins of coffee, 40 kilos of salt, 180 kilos of sugar, 240 tins of milk, 48 kilos of butter and a sack of coffee beans. We were now doing very well because Major Crewe a R.A.S.C. officer came from Sham Shui Po to learn what supplies we needed and brought with him 26 pints of fresh milk which we gratefully received. Mr. C.E. D'Almeida brought us a gramophone and records and other gifts from 10 Ice House Street, and promised us supplies of drugs free which he was going to send over. A refrigerator and five bread tins came from the Red Cross in Hong Kong and I was told that stores were arriving the next day from Sham Shui Po for us to split between internees, Indian prisoners and ourselves. The internees numbered about 300, including sick and about 30 children. I was able to meet a request from Sham Shui Po for various regulations including Kings Regulations and Financial Instructions.\n\nOn 22 August we arranged with Colonel Field for all our Q.A. sisters to return, and Saito and Sekiguchi came to ask what they could do. The Governor of Hong Kong had been removed from the Colony by the Japanese and Mr. Gimson who had been Colonial Secretary at the time of our capitulation came with Mr. Nakimura from the Japanese Foreign Affairs Department. Major Lamb R.A.S.C. had been appointed to take charge of supplies and his policy was for us to rely upon Japanese rations supplemented by Red Cross stores and to indent on Sham Shui Po for our additional needs. A radio, with some mugs and gifts of milk were gratefully received by us from Mr. C.E. D'Almeida and gifts also came from Messrs. Ruttonjee of 11 Duddell Street. Eight of our civilians left for Stanley with Mr. Gimson and were delighted to go. The radio was working well indeed and on 23 August I asked Dr. Selwyn-Clarke to get us some vegetables, fruit, invalid jellies and flour. I telephoned Nomura about our records and on 24 August I wrote to Colonel Tokunaga formally requiring the return of our hospital records. Mr. Campbell and I presented this letter to him personally at Japanese headquarters in the presence of Nomura. I said that we held Tokunaga personally responsible and he accepted the letter.\n\nA batch of 19 visitors arrived from Stanley including two children, and we had to put them up overnight because of stormy weather in the harbour. British headquarters now required us to set out prominently a sign, \"P.W.\" each letter to be 20 feet by 20", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207500, "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": 268, "title": "RAS-1975", "content_text": "260\n\nDONALD C. BOWIE\n\nfeet to help aircraft expected to drop supplies the next day. The sign had to be yellow, and the Japanese straw sleeping mats called tatami were used to construct the sign. Some huts in the Indian camp were blown down. We got Tokunaga and Saito to turn over St. Teresa's Hospital to us while we helped also by housing a number of people in our Assembly Hall. Our staff of rice grinders had stopped functioning and we had to use R.A.M.C. orderlies to help. We had been hoping that our sisters would have arrived but a party of them had apparently missed a ferry connection. A nearby typhoon accompanied by heavy rain caused the air drop of supplies to be postponed but the weather moderated and our marooned visitors were able to leave. Two women members of a religious order arrived from St. Teresa's Hospital distressed that a Japanese officer had disturbed them the previous night and I took them to the Indian camp where I arranged the move of patients and staff through Indian Army officers to St. Teresa's Hospital and I set about compiling lists of patients from all centres in order to classify those needing treatment and special transportation when relief arrived. We had a number of Canadian officers to lunch and Major Crawford was a welcome visitor later when he came to see the Canadian patients in hospital. He himself seemed in reasonably good shape by the standards of those days.\n\nIn consultation with Colonel Field certain difficulties over medical arrangements in some camps were remedied. The sisters in St. Teresa's Hospital were keeping three rooms for their own use and the Japanese were moving out. The St. Teresa's staff and patients would be fed from the Indian camp and we were now getting news over the radio which suggested that a relief force might arrive about the end of the month. An emergency operation was performed in our hospital on a patient admitted from camp. The disease was the same as that in the case of the patient whom I reported earlier had been received by us in Bowen Road in 1942 after ten days illness, when he died before surgery could be undertaken. Early surgery would have saved this patient and operation was totally successful in the case of the patient we had just admitted. Staff and patients were again being allowed out locally.\n\nBy 26 August I had occupied the office which Saito had used, and in St. Teresa's Hospital the sisters were now content with the arrangements while they also had access to houses at No. 317 Prince Edward Road, Major Evans was in charge here with Captain", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207504, "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": 272, "title": "RAS-1975", "content_text": "264\n\nDONALD C. BOWIE\n\nto go to St. Albert's Hospital. There was sporadic small arms fire near the places that I visited, but none seemed to be directed at us and who was shooting at whom I do not know.\n\nMy diary records, to my considerable surprise now, that I suggested to the senior British officer, Colonel Field that if the Empress of Australia was taking away the rest of the prisoners, perhaps the quartermaster and I should be left for a short time to liaise with the incoming medical services, moving to the Gloucester Hotel for this purpose. I could only have done this with Mr. Campbell's agreement and why on earth we had such a foolish idea I cannot now imagine. I considered another suggestion from Selwyn-Clarke that I should take over and organise the surgical services in the Queen Mary Hospital, but this meant an extra two months in Hong Kong and I declined the offer. Selwyn-Clarke also wanted us to send six doctors to Stanley and four to Victoria, but none stayed for this purpose so far as I know.\n\nIt was about now that I heard a story that in the last stages of hostilities in 1942, Brigade Headquarters in the area had allocated alternative accommodation in Stanley prison for St. Stephen's Hospital which was nearby. The hospital did not move and so was overrun in the fighting there. It was then that the tragedies affecting patients, nurses and medical staff occurred. This story did not give the time at which the move of the hospital was suggested, but the notice was probably short and with the small staff available, the numbers of wounded being cared for and the total involvement of our fighting troops with the enemy and so unable to help, such a move probably seemed to be impracticable to the commanding officer, as it does to me. There was also a story that the Japanese had taken photographs of empty beds fitted with sheets in the upper part of St. Albert's Hospital which were stated to be reserved for British patients while Indians who were wounded were left lying on the floor. It was said that much use of these photographs had been made in the Japanese propaganda directed at Indian troops to induce them to join the Indian National Army which collaborated with the Japanese. I knew the Matron, the nursing and medical staff of St. Albert's Hospital very well and they would never have allowed separation of patients on grounds of race. I have no doubt at all that just as we did in Bowen Road, the staff in St. Albert's would nurse side by side all patients irrespective of race.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207505, "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": 273, "title": "RAS-1975", "content_text": "CAPTIVE SURGEON IN HONG KONG\n\n265\n\nAt this time I took part in some discussions on any action to be taken to report on the conduct of individuals while prisoners and I took the view that adverse reports should only be made in cases of the grossest neglect of duty and I made no report of this kind. Our staff and patients, apart from an occasional minor misdemeanour by one or two, conducted themselves splendidly.\n\nOn 4 September the large Empress of Australia arrived. I took two R.A.F. doctors to the Central British School where they saw something of the population of bugs and very understandably wanted to occupy apartments in nearby flats. By now the R.A.F. had brought 3000 troops into the Colony and they needed hospital services for their sick. There was, as might be expected, some confusion in the various administrations. Some people were moving too fast with too little thought, while others thought too long before moving.\n\nOn 5 September I went off to the Empress of Australia early and later found that Surgeon-Captain George Abercrombie was now Fleet P.M.O. in the battleship H.M.S. Anson. Abercrombie was later to be a founder member and in due course a distinguished President of the College of General Practitioners (later a Royal College), and I had the pleasure of meeting him quite frequently in London later. He kindly invited me to lunch in the Anson one day. Long voyages in warships in wartime conditions had left him looking rather pale, while of course I was pretty thin by that time. The main dish at lunch was a mutton stew in which the mutton was extremely fat and the watery part of the stew was laden with fat globules. I well remember the look of horror on his face as he watched me dispose of what to him must have been a repulsive dish.\n\nAt this time I learned that Colonel Lindsay Ride was replacing Field as senior officer in the army in Hong Kong. Ride had commanded our Field Ambulance during the fighting in Hong Kong. He was a professor in the University and his Chinese students helped him to escape as soon as we surrendered to Mainland China, where he set up an organisation to keep in touch with events in Hong Kong and which helped people to escape from the Colony. I believe that it was through his thoughtfulness that my wife learned that I was still alive after hostilities ended but none of the messages I sent off from Hong Kong after our release ever arrived. Ride was later Vice-Chancellor of the University of Hong Kong, and knighted for his services to the Colony.\n\nThe R.A.F. hospital moved into the Central British School", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207508, "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": 276, "title": "RAS-1975", "content_text": "268\n\nDONALD C. BOWIE\n\nNone of the foregoing figures can be taken as more than approximately correct. A figure however for which I can vouch with certainty is the total number of wounded treated in Bowen Road. This figure was 646 and was carefully computed by me in the studies I made of our records during the months and years of captivity before the Japanese finally destroyed them. The Bowen Road figures include all who were seriously wounded during hostilities, because all wounded admitted to other hospitals in the Colony and who were unfit for discharge to P.O.W. camps after our surrender were eventually concentrated in Bowen Road by the end of February 1942. The last patients who suffered war injuries to be admitted came from St. Teresa's Hospital in Kowloon when this closed on 11 August 1942. My record of the total Bowen Road casualties amounting to 646 is likely to be less than the actual total number of wounded, because when other hospitals were closing and evacuating their more seriously wounded patients to Bowen Road it is likely that a number of other patients had by then recovered sufficiently to be able to go to P.O.W. camps and it must be remembered that it was the Japanese who decided where these patients must go.\n\nThe official figures suggest that, excluding Indian casualties, some 855 soldiers were seriously wounded during hostilities. In Bowen Road we treated 646 of these. It is evident therefore that about 75% of seriously wounded other than Indians were evacuated by the medical services to hospitals. This represents a major success having regard to the conditions, and the system of evacuation and the skill and determination with which it was carried out must be judged to have worked well. The Field Ambulance commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Ride, which achieved these results was responsible also for recovering Indian casualties, and I have no doubt that these were evacuated with the same degree of success as were the British casualties. Figures however are lacking since the Indian Hospital was overrun during the Japanese advance and records were lost. Readers will recall that early in the hostilities the Chinese ambulance drivers deserted, understandably enough especially to those familiar with the Japanese treatment of captured Chinese opponents. Thereafter ambulance cars were driven by Field Ambulance personnel usually drawn from the medical services. This makes their achievement all the more notable.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207509, "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": 277, "title": "RAS-1975", "content_text": "CAPTIVE SURGEON IN HONG KONG\n\n269\n\nThe Official History gives a break down of the Bowen Road casualties taken from tables which I compiled. The many patients, who had suffered severe wounds of the head, neck and spine, the chest, those who had suffered compound fractures, and penetrating wounds of the large joints and abdominal wounds can only have reached hospital as a result of the heavy and devoted work on the part of the Field Ambulance Companies.\n\nOur defence of Hong Kong was therefore very costly in terms of casualties, and the medical services engaged in recovering the wounded achieved a degree of success of which all concerned can be proud.\n\nRESPONSIBILITY WITHOUT POWER\n\nUp to August 1942 my activities were recorded only in the case sheets of patients and the surgical records. Thereafter I kept a careful note of events.\n\nI suppose I was chosen by the Japanese to take charge because of my seniority in the British Army, but up to then I had little contact with them and I can only conjecture now that they made enquiries of others and then decided on me. It was fortunate for me that my British seniority was undoubted, just as it was fortunate that the Japanese choice for the second in command never had to assume responsibility over the head of a more senior officer in the British army.\n\nHaving been \"promoted\" by Col. Simson to be lieutenant-colonel, before his departure he told me to take charge of the hospital. The Japanese order transmitted to me by Major Boxer was only that I should take charge and no clearer instructions were ever given. Looking back I seem to have slipped into a routine to meet the situation which existed. I operated my charge on simple lines. In all matters of importance affecting residents in the hospital, consultations took place between me and them. Sometimes this was achieved through formal committees, sometimes by personal chats with many individuals. In matters of internal discipline of course I retained my authority, though here again I tried to understand conditions and motives in the cases of individuals who had transgressed. I left the hospital only once between August 1942 and March 1945 and that was only to help a working party to unload from a lighter, patients coming from Kowloon. I had no say as to what patients came in; so far as discharges were concerned", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211671, "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": 86, "title": "RAS-1989", "content_text": "61\n\nTHE KIUKIANG INCIDENT OF 1927\n\nP. H. MUNRO-Faure\n\nThe turgid waters of the Yangtze rolled by to the sea, four hundred and eighty miles away. They swirled past the two hulks, alongside which river steamers came to discharge the cargoes of cotton material, hardware, salt, and those edible sea-products so dear to the heart of the Chinese gourmet; loading in return tea, porcelain, grass-cloth, and camphor.\n\nInshore small wavelets glistened in the wintry sun, and lapped along the edge of the dark mud, which sloped down to the water in front of\n\n* Editor's Note. Paul Hector Munro-Faure was born in 1894 of Swiss/Scottish parentage. Educated in England, he entered the Supplementary Army Reserve in 1912, and volunteered on the outbreak of War, being commissioned in the Sherwood Foresters. He was wounded on the Somme in 1916, and, on his recovery, was attached to the King's African Rifles, with whom he saw action in Tanganyika. By the end of the War he had risen to the rank of Captain. He was Mentioned in a Despatch for distinguished services in the field, and was commended in writing by the Secretary of State for War.\n\nAfter the War, he joined the Asiatic Petroleum Company, and remained in their service until the outbreak of the Second World War, as Manager of one or other of their offices in China. In 1937 he established a Chinese Refugee Safety Centre in Shanghai, and was later decorated for this by the Chinese Government with the Brilliant Star with Ribbon. In 1938 he was connected with the International Relief Committee in Nanking, by whose Chairman he was commended for his work for the displaced. He was also commended at this date by the Secretary of the Admiralty for his work in evacuating from that city civilians at risk.\n\nOn the outbreak of the Second World War he was commissioned as Major (shortly afterwards Lieutenant-Colonel) in the Special Operations Executive. He worked at first in the Bush Warfare School at Maymyo, Burma, which trained Chinese guerillas for behind-the-lines work. (For this school, see \"Prisoners of Hope\", Michael Calvert, (London, 1951), where Lt. Col. Munro-Faure is mentioned at p. 11). He then opened a similar school near the front lines in the Hangchow-Nanking area. For this he was awarded an OBE in 1943. Later still he worked between the front lines on the north-east frontier of Burma, attempting to ensure the continuing support for the British of the native princes of the region, in the face of Japanese, and particularly Chinese, attempts to replace the British as the dominant local power. He was commended for this work by his Commanding Officer. In 1944, he was recalled to England. After the War he was seconded as Oil Attache to the British Embassy in Romania. He retired in 1949, and died in 1956.\n\nLt. Col. Munro-Faure wrote a book of Memoirs in 1944-1945, in 11 chapters, covering his experiences in the Kiu Kiang Incident (1927), and between 1937 and 1944, together with an exposition of his views on the proper role of foreigners in China. The text is in the Imperial War Museum, London,\n\nBecause of the immensely valuable picture these Memoirs paint of the Kiu Kiang Incident (in which the writer was closely involved), of China during the early War years, and of the border areas of Burma during the period when the present troubles in the area were first developing, it is proposed to print them as a series in this and the next several issues of the Journal.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1989.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8336pm92h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212200, "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-1990", "page_number": 142, "title": "RAS-1990", "content_text": "119\n\nLiuchow where one of Colonel Chennault's schools for training Chinese pilots was at that time established. I arrived just in time to observe the results of a Japanese air-raid on the field, when they succeeded in shooting up two of the latest type of Curtis Hawk fighters, the only two at that time in China, concealed in some trees on the edge of the field. Training under such conditions was not easy and the school soon had to move west again into Yunnan province.\n\nThree hundred kilometres a day is good going on these lightly metalled roads. I reached Kweilin on the evening of the third day after leaving Wuchow, and put up at the government hostel. From time immemorial the idea of travel has filled Chinese with apprehension, induced not only by fear of the ubiquitous bandit, but also by the abomination of the fetid roadside inn. With the advent of the motor car, the need for better hotel accommodation became evident, and the various provincial governments opened official hostelries at key points. While these left much to be desired by western standards, they were a prodigious improvement on the old-style inn.\n\nKwangsi is one of the more progressive provinces, for long controlled by Generals Li Tsung Jen and Pai Chung Hsi, who rank next to the Generalissimo himself. The hostel at Kweilin was better than average. There was a wireless in the lounge, and a small crowd of us sat and listened to the news as it came in. It was the period before Munich. A young German amongst us, flushed with arrogance, gloated over Hitler's successes. My first contact with the aboriginal Nazi spirit left me angry and dismayed.\n\nChinese buildings are flimsy. The rooms are small and dark, and not clean. When you have made allowance for this idiosyncrasy, Kweilin appears a delightful little town. The city wall circumambulates from shrine-crowned hill to hill; the river is full of junks that sail down to Wuchow; the roads are wide and straight, and shop arcades cover the pavements on either side. The little separate hills rise steeply from the plain, in those fantastic shapes seen in Chinese paintings. Their rocky tree-fringed summits staggered drunkenly beneath the sky. The hills are full of natural caves, most convenient for storing war supplies, or to act as shelters in the event of raids. But Kweilin was still far from the war. The Kweilin merchants believed that the Japanese planes would have difficulty in locating their little city snuggling amongst the hills. The excitement was all about the new railway,", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1990.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/d79206299", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212732, "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": 41, "title": "RAS-1992", "content_text": "26\n\nname had eventually appeared in the Peking Gazette. In 1871, he added, he was recommended for special honours on account of distinguished services on the field of battle and received the order of merit called Yung Hao with the title of Ying Yung Pa-t'u-lu [i.e. ‘Brigadier-General, the title of Knight Ying of the Order of Pa-t'u-lu, Mesny\"]. Mesny was awarded the Ying-yung for having penetrated a Miao stronghold with a few Chinese riflemen and turned the tide of battle from defeat into victory. In April 1896 Mesny wrote: 'Having lived in Hankow for some years and acquired some notoriety amongst the Chinese there, if not actual fame, the characters Wen-kao 'Eminent', were chosen and given me as a Hao or familiar by my friends.' His Chinese name is Mai Wen-kao or using a transliteration 'Mai-shih-ni [i.e. mai-knee) and his rank, Tsung-ping **General**]. In another autobiographical 'obituary' printed after his death in the Celestial Empire, a Shanghai paper, he described himself as 'I, Wen-kao William Mesny, F.R.G.S., Brevet Lieutenant-General of the Chinese Army; Knight, Ying Yung of the Order of the Pa-t'u-lu..................\n\nMesny noted on one occasion long after he had completed his military service that he had come across a battalion of Kueichou field troops with the men wearing the cuirass-shaped uniform or Pa-t'u-lu vesture, invented by Mesny in 1868 for the An-ting and Ko-i Rifle Brigades. [\"The ancient Manchu Knights of the order of the Pa-t'u-lu wore such vests as uniform when not wearing the metal cuirass, hence its significant name Pa-t'u-lu.']\n\n[NOTE: Liu Ming-ch'uan, Governor of Taiwan 1884-1891, referred to in the text as having met Mesny, initially was a freebooter who, during the Taiping Rebellion supported Li Hung-chang and the Imperial forces, and opposed the Taipings. He was at that stage a fairly lowly officer and is recorded as having received 'the honorary title of military merit, baturu': Later, when more senior he was awarded the much greater award of the Yellow Riding Jacket.]\n\nMesny was awarded the 'flowery plume' [hua-ling ##4] in 1869 together with the brevet rank of colonel after battles with the Miao tribesmen. He was also presented with the Pao-hsing in 1869. He refers to the Pao-hsing #, the Precious Planet [or decoration of the Star of China] implying that it was the same decoration as the Double Dragon Jewelled Star which he also later referred to. It was, he said, instituted after the Taiping Rebellion as a form of reward for foreigners who", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1992.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qf85tx75x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212775, "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": 84, "title": "RAS-1992", "content_text": "69\n\nGreen Standard forces and not so about the Lien-chün, we can assume that he was a member of, or attached to one of the Lien-chün.\n\nMesny wrote relatively short explanatory notes in the first volume of his Miscellanies on the three armies, the Army of the Huai River, the Army of the Hsiang River and the Army of Ch'u, about which he felt he had unique knowledge having served with the Chinese military.\n\n'The Huai Army, an important Field Force raised in the area drained by the River Huai, did such good service to the Imperial cause under the C-in-C Li Hung-chang, who had been wise enough to advocate and introduce the use of foreign weapons. The Ever-victorious Army, styled Chang-sheng Chün, first organised and disciplined in a foreign manner by General Ward and subsequently rendered so famous under the command of General Gordon, was the principal corps of this army, and consisted of 5,000 men all told. The Ming-tzu Ying, another corps of the same army, raised by General and later Governor Liu Ming-ch'uan, and disciplined by General Pinel and Colonel Lucas, though senior to the Ever-victorious was, however, secondary in importance at the time' [but still existed when Mesny was writing this in 1895].\n\nAt no time did Mesny allude to a general staff in the sense we understand it today. This raises the question what did the Force have by way of what we now call an operations staff or department? Nor did Mesny refer to staff officers responsible for the organisation of manpower or materials; and although he mentioned procurement officers and a staff of officers surrounding the General commanding to carry out his bidding, 'operations' as such, the most crucial aspect of an army's functioning was kept strictly in the hands of the Szechuan force C-in-C. It would appear that military operations in their wider sense were directed by civil mandarins who were more interested in cost cutting than in the direction of the campaign, whereas the military officers, who grade for grade were very much the juniors to the civil mandarins, were responsible for the day to day running of the various forces.\n\nForward planning was always limited by financial constraints. Arms and ammunition, rations and reinforcements had to be reviewed and planned well in advance, but with the attitude of the Viceroy in Ch'eng-tu [according to Mesny] and the restraints imposed by him little could ever be expected to be achieved.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1992.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qf85tx75x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212783, "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": 92, "title": "RAS-1992", "content_text": "77\n\narmy in itself, especially organised to meet the requirements of its own territorial demands or necessities. The various provincial army corps [chün] consisted of two or more territorial divisions called chen besides several [from 3-10] territorial brigades called hsieh. The divisions consisted of several regiments and battalions, both of which were called ying; the regiments were commanded by ts'an-chiang [colonels] or yu-chi [lieutenant-colonels], and battalions by tu-ssu [majors]. Most regiments and battalions were divided into two or more companies, shao; however, a few regiments and battalions were not divided at all, with the officers in each regiment or battalion holding common authority over all portions of the regiment or brigade.\n\nMesny frequently referred to individuals as holding the rank of lieutenant-colonel in one context whilst elsewhere describing them as generals. This was finally clarified in a throwaway line buried in other text when he wrote, 'In China Brigadier-Generals, Colonels and Lieutenant-Colonels in command were all considered to be General officers, that is Chiang-Chün.' General officers, chiang-kuan, in the territorial army were those brigadiers, colonels and lieutenant colonels in command. In field forces the commanders of battalions were also so styled by courtesy irrespective of rank. The same courtesy was extended to the chief of battalion, ying-kuan, in field forces where many of them had only permission to wear a button sometimes of the lowest civil rank and degree.\n\nMesny summarised the order of battle including the Chinese naval forces, with two provinces, Kuangtung and Fukien each having a naval force, and another stationed on the Yangtze. Finally, with the northern steam fleet of iron-clads there was a total of twenty-one army corps, i.e. provincial forces, and four naval corps for the whole Chinese empire. To these had to be added the Tartar Banner forces forming the garrisons of several important towns, Canton, Foochou, Hangchou, Cha-pu, Chinkiang, Nanking, Peking and elsewhere. Also the numerous regular field troops denominated Yung or Lien-chün which had been kept under arms in various parts of the empire since the Taiping Rebellion (which, he added, were a great deal more formidable in numbers as well as effectiveness than the whole of the sedentary garrisons or ordinary chün or army).\n\nIt was not until, literally, the latter days of the first campaign that an overall commander was appointed, with the Szechuan Force commander", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1992.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qf85tx75x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212792, "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": 101, "title": "RAS-1992", "content_text": "86\n\nNOTES\n\nIn one of the notes written by Mesny in his Miscellany, [Volume 4 page 34], he listed the various classes and degrees of military rank in what he terms the Chinese Militia Service. A marshal or general was a T'i-tu Chün-men, a lieutenant-general was a Tsung-ping Kuan, a major-general a Fu-chiang; and a colonel a Ts'an-chiang.\n\n2 Mesny gives various totals for the number of battalions serving with the Szechuan Force and in particular with the Ko-i Brigade, with a grand total of thirty-three battalions in the whole Force. These vary from eight to fifteen and a half operating with the Ko-i Brigade. Presumably the explanation lies in the arrival of new battalions to support the Force from time to time, though we are unable to be certain how many battalions were serving at any one particular moment.\n\nMesny states at the beginning of Volume 1 of his Miscellanies that in 1861 General Ward had organised a disciplined force for the Chinese Government, at first locally styled \"Ward's Force\" and later as the 'Ever-victorious Legion'.\n\n4 Mesny later keeps referring to thirty-five battalions.\n\nThe I-ho-t'uan, the \"Patriotic Train Band\", was the official title of the Boxers, of ill-repute.\n\n6 Mesny too had been a member of a train band, the volunteer force in Hankow between 1863-67, under arms several times during the approach of the Nien-fei rebels, when he wore the uniform of the Queen's Western Rifles [sic].\n\n7 Mesny goes into some detail providing recruitment policy, promotion schemes, ranks and titles, training and duties.\n\nUse of the term Disciplined Force was a contemporary fashion. It later became popular to refer to the Lien-chun Ying as Field Forces.\n\n9\n\nMost of the ranks of unit commanders given by Mesny do not tally with those given by Hucker in his Dictionary of Official Titles in Imperial China.\n\n10 All commanders of divisions and corps had one or more battalions, regiments or brigades, serving a sort of staff brigade and forming the headquarters of that particular army corps. It was popularly designated the Body Guard Battalion or Regiment.\n\nPresumably Han Chinese rebels such as the Huang-hao or the Pai-hao, the remnants of the Taipings or even the Moslem rebels.\n\n12 This is the same title as the Force previously operating under the command of General Gordon during the Taiping Rebellion. Either Mesny has incorrectly recalled the title of the new Force or the new Force continued to bear the former title.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1992.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qf85tx75x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212833, "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": 142, "title": "RAS-1992", "content_text": "127\n\nAlthough modern methods have reduced the danger of infections in the field, — plague, meningitis, cholera, typhoid, dysentery and small-pox all yield to inoculations or drugs — that still left typhus and the most dangerous disease to us, the deadly cerebral malaria, which lurked in these border valleys. Apart from the hazard of wounds and accidents, to be left without a doctor in such a situation was not too pleasant.\n\nAt Tetang we were provided with an escort by the Nth Division, a Central Government Division, and we were instructed to call on one of their battalion headquarters on this side of the border to surrender our pass. Two days later, on arrival at these headquarters, I called on the colonel. I had already learnt that the main Chinese defence line here was well back from the Salween, not in Burma, but on the Chinese side of the boundary. The Japanese had small posts along the Salween, so that in Kokang we should be between the two forces, with only the Salween to separate us from the enemy. I began to take a close interest in the width of the river and the speed of its current.\n\nThe battalion commander said that he would give us an escort and that the officer in charge of the escort would arrange with the local population for any services we might require in Kokang. One of the chief complaints of our parachute party, when they had been in Kokang in December, was that the escort provided by the Chinese acted to prevent the local inhabitants speaking freely to them; so I now explained to the colonel that in Kokang we would make our own arrangements direct with the natives, but I would, of course, keep him informed of all our movements. In view of our need for further supplies we were anxious to have a 'drop' as soon as possible, and as at the moment the only level place of which we knew was just inside China, where the first parachute party had been dropped, I asked the colonel whether he would have any objection to our receiving it there. He readily agreed and undertook to provide the necessary covering party. It should be remembered that during the next few months we were at no time more than a night's march from the Japanese; but the situation was not as dangerous as it may sound because we could expect to receive at least a few hours' notice of any unusual movement by the enemy.\n\nSo we moved forward of the Chinese defence line into the valley next to Kokang, set up our W/T, and passed signals to arrange for the sortie. We went out to prepare the signal fires, and Stan showed me the clump of cactus thorn near which he had landed; the site of the long thick spikes", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1992.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qf85tx75x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213321, "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-1994", "page_number": 143, "title": "RAS-1994", "content_text": "124\n\nup a rocket projector failed to breach them. For the first time in the three hours since the Tatars had taken refuge in the temple did their discipline begin to slip, a few tried to escape in ones and twos down the valley towards the harbour, only to be picked off on the way. It was now decided by the British to set fire to the building, and a second breach having been blown in the opposite side a fire was kindled which soon spread to the roof and in a short time the whole was reduced to ruins. When finally the Tatar resistance ceased and they were forced to abandon the temple only fifty-three were still alive to be taken prisoner. They were found crouching on the ground, with their arms folded and their matchlocks and swords laid aside, in evident expectation of a violent death. They were secured by having their queues tied together, whilst those with wounds were bandaged by British doctors which created considerable goodwill. In the midst of the smoke and death sat an old Tatar colonel who, when the red coats began to appear through the smoke, laid down his pipe, snatched up a sword and cut his own throat. He failed to kill himself and was bandaged up by the British doctors and then, along with all the other prisoners, was released. Ilipu, the Manchu, wrote thanking the British for their kindness in caring for the wounded.\n\nThe Manchu force in the temple was commanded by a company commander Lung Fu of the Bordered Red Banner * and he, like many of the 270 men within the temple, killed himself rather than be taken prisoner.\n\nMeanwhile, as this was the first time that the Manchu Tatars had encountered the British on the field of battle, and fearing that the British would slaughter and rape indiscriminately or probably more so because the Tatars were unable to bear the shame, they destroyed themselves in large numbers, first killing their wives and children. Whole families seem to have done away with themselves hanging from beams in their own homes, and the wells and every place where they could find water enough were full of bodies. Chinese gangs plundered the abandoned Tatar part of the town, and when the British entered the town the only noise was screams of those being killed or killing their own families.\n\nIn a Chinese account of the battle the British bombarded Chapu on the 18th May and landed a force to attack the east gate of the city. Here they were met by troops from Shensi and Kansu provinces armed with gingalls, and received such rough treatment that they went round to the south gate. As the Manchu Tatar garrison had been in the habit of", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1994.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zk522640g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215897, "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": 196, "title": "RAS-2002", "content_text": "1900\n\nGough Battery first mentioned with two 6-inch BL Mark VII guns.\n\nRollo, 1992, p.187\n\nGough Battery was in existence as early as 1900:\n\n1901\n\nA compass sketch drawn by Colonel L. Brown, C.R.E. in China, and dated 13.0.1901 shows the \"Plan of Proposed Site for New Barracks: Devil's Peak\" at the present Yau Tong industrial zone. The plan had the annotation \"new road to batteries.\"\n\nCO129/305\n\nIt had a history of more than a century by the date of production of this paper.\n\n1902\n\n1902\n\n6 October 1906\n\nA compass sketch of ground to north of Devil's Peak showed land to be acquired by the War Department, with the locations of Gough and Pottinger Batteries indicated as \"New Batteries.\" Signs of quarrying at the present Lei Yue Mun Valley were shown.\n\nThe construction of Taikoo Docks at Quarry Bay on the island of Hong Kong commenced.\n\nAugust 1902: a 9.2-inch gun was delivered to Pottinger Battery.\n\nOwen Committee Report dated 6 October 1906 stated that Hong Kong was the principal naval base of the British fleet in the Far East and a commercial port of great importance liable to a Class A Attack by Battleships.\n\n[Therefore, one of the 6-inch guns proposed for Gough Battery by the 1898 Committee was replaced by a 9.2-inch BL Mark X gun by 1910.]\n\n6 February 1907 Royal visit by Field Marshal His Royal Highness the Duke of Connaught, who arrived at the Colony on 6 February 1907.\n\nLater, the Duke observed firing exercises for the 9.2-inch guns at Pottinger Battery and the 6-inch guns at Gough Battery.\n\nPRO219\n\nEastern District Board 1994, p.25\n\nRollo, 1992, p.70, p.79\n\nRollo, 1992, p.79, p.80, 187\n\nRollo, 1992, p.83\n\n129", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278", "rank": 0 } ]