[
    {
        "id": 212666,
        "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-1991",
        "page_number": 220,
        "title": "RAS-1991",
        "content_text": "201\n\n# THE RE-OCCUPATION OF HONG KONG\n\n## IN AUGUST 1945\n\n### DAN WATERS\n\nIn May 1992, on a Royal British Legion pilgrimage to Italy to visit graves of comrades killed when my company fought there in World War II, I became friends with ex-company sergeant major John McLaren. We later exchanged letters and he enclosed comments by his stepbrother, a Fleet Air Arm naval rating, about the return of the Allied Forces to Hong Kong in August 1945. From Mr Roland Davidson's comments I have compiled the following. It should be remembered, of course, that recollections can become distorted over half a century.\n\nWhen the atom bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki both the American 7th Fleet and the British 5th Fleet attached to it were at sea ready for strikes at the Japanese mainland. Everyone was delighted that Japan had surrendered. As Singapore and Hong Kong were both holding out the 7th Fleet was dispatched to Singapore and the 5th Fleet to Hong Kong. We arrived quite quickly and American Admiral Bill Halsey lost no time in demanding the presence of the Hong Kong garrison Japanese commander aboard the flagship “Indomitable” on which I was a crew member. One of our aircraft, a Fairy Fulmar if my memory serves me right, was sent to pick this worthy gentleman up. After a short time the plane returned. I might add that our ship was still at sea in a state of readiness.\n\nOut of the aircraft stepped this very well dressed, debonair Japanese army officer who treated the armed marine guard as if it was his guard of honour. Admiral Halsey was none too pleased and called down to the flight deck: 'Bring that man to the \"island\" (the bridge) at the double!' Documents of surrender were placed ready for signature on a small table.\n\nWhen the poor fellow arrived he was asked if he was indeed the Japanese commanding officer. He replied in perfect English that he was in fact the second-in-command. He said his commanding officer had absconded the previous day. The second-in-command was rather arrogant and swanky, and smartly dressed in uniform with high boots which had high heels. Halsey ordered a marine to break off the heel of his right boot who then had to hobble around the bridge and across the decks to the amusement of the ship's crew. I never saw a man's arrogance",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 212669,
        "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-1991",
        "page_number": 223,
        "title": "RAS-1991",
        "content_text": "204\n\nsoap. I also gave each one a loaf or two, a large tin of bully beef cut into chunks, tins of condensed milk and hard-tack biscuits. All of this was quite irregular, of course.\n\nAfter a few days we were back at sea. We were carrying about a dozen European nurses who were being repatriated. All were emaciated. They were placed under strict medical supervision, and the crew was warned under penalty not to give them food, which might very well have killed them in their state. We found them all kinds of clothing. Some of the men had acquired various articles of female attire as presents for wives and girlfriends on return to Britain. These items were pooled without a quibble. On our way back to Australia, all high explosives and other articles of war were disposed of in deep water.\n\nUpon our arrival in Sydney, I left HMS Indomitable for the last time with deepest regret. For me, she was a happy ship, an aircraft carrier, a warship, but a happy ship.\n\nThe above information, in note form, was supplied to me for compilation by Mr. Davidson, through his stepbrother, ex-Company Sergeant Major McLaren. Mr. Davidson's own wording has been retained where possible. [Phrases with pejorative overtones have been edited — Editor].\n\nDan Waters",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 214840,
        "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-1999",
        "page_number": 255,
        "title": "RAS-1999",
        "content_text": "222 \n\nA Bold Approach to War \n\nI have referred to the indomitable spirit that animated the British troops and sailors of the War. This was something one cannot fail to notice in the various accounts of the War. As in the First Burma War, there was a boldness that must have taken the Chinese aback whenever it was demonstrated. Being practically universal, one minor example may serve to illustrate the rest. It comes from J.D. Vaughan, later a magistrate in the Straits Settlements, who had served as a midshipman on the Honourable East India Company's steam frigate Tenasserim in 1842, and is recounted here largely in his own words.46 \n\nA few days after the capture of the Yangtse city of Chin-kiang-foo, his captain took two of the ship's boats with twenty or thirty men each, with a brass three-pounder at the bow, and went to a town on a canal flowing into the great river. The writer was in one of these boats. The ship's Chinese carpenter, a Southern Chinese picked up at Singapore, could write but could not speak the Mandarin language of the area. Armed with a slate, and a truly astonishing degree of sang-froid, he made the captain's wishes to purchase provisions known to a large throng of citizens and soldiers who had assembled on the banks. Negotiating with a mandarin, they got all that they wanted, and during their brief stay were treated with the greatest civility and kindness. “A table and chairs were brought, and the elders of the city had a most interesting conversation with us through the invaluable carpenter. It was a curious sight to see the skipper sitting as cool as a cucumber smoking his cigar surrounded by our foes.\" \n\n“Few men,” Vaughan says, “would have ventured so fearlessly into the very clutches of an armed foe within a few miles of a captured city with war raging all around; and strange to say we came away un-harmed and not an angry face was to be seen amongst the crowds of men who flocked out of the gate of the town to see us.” \n\nMany other instances can be found in the books on the War, and indeed it was the norm. This verve derived from military and naval discipline and tradition, and from the leadership shown by, and expected of, British officers of the day. Only when that leadership failed, as in the contemporary disasters at Kabul in the First Afghan War, when a British army was annihilated through hesitation and mismanagement, \n\nPage 255\n\nPage 256",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1999.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/s178b887x",
        "rank": 0
    }
]