[ { "id": 206104, "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": 184, "title": "RAS-1970", "content_text": "HONG KONG BEFORE THE BRITISH\n\n179\n\nSao, and her confederate, Cheung Pao Tsai, who equipped a fleet of foreign-style ships and held off an attack of government ships for a week in Tung Ch'ung harbour. Another is about a pirate called Wang whose treasure remains hidden in an inaccessible cliff in the most westerly of the Lema or Tam Kon Shan group of islands.\n\nA final word must be said about the Hakkas. Their advent has certainly been the most important modern development in the history of the population. Many families who arrived just after the evacuation are now indistinguishable from the Punti since they talk and dress like them. The later arrivals have, however a distinctive dress and several different sub-dialects of the language. They tend more and more to encroach on the land of the Punti. Hong Kong Island, which was originally owned by the Tang clan, was found by the British almost entirely inhabited by Hakkas, who paid no rent and as far as is known received themselves the compensation for some of the land. Lantao Island which has been recently depopulated owing to malaria is gradually being filled up with Hakka squatters. The only part of our region which seems immune from their encroachment is the belt of fertile land chiefly owned by the Tang clan in which the history of the Chinese population of our region apparently began.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1970.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ww72j0241", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206173, "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": 253, "title": "RAS-1970", "content_text": "Plate 20. An early map of the region showing the forts and Portuguese ships passing between Cheung Chau and Lantau and the Lama Islands.\n\n(Plates 16-20 are reproduced here by courtesy of Mrs Halfour (now Glock) and with the kind assistance of the Curator, City Museum & Art Gallery)", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1970.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ww72j0241", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207045, "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-1974", "page_number": 116, "title": "RAS-1974", "content_text": "CHAN TSUEN\n\nTƯỞNG CƯ HẢI P\n\nI\n\nSHEK KI\n\nPEARL\n\nRIVER\n\nDELTA\n\nMACAU\n\nНАМ ТАЏ\n\nتي\n\nPAD-AN HSIEN\n\nĮPRESENT. KOWLOON.\n\nAWELSHIN MAVEN\n\nT\n\nTAM SHUI\n\nTAI PANG\n\nx\n\nGHUM CHUN\n\nISHA TAG KOK\n\nAHAS PAY\n\nТаг\n\nYUEN LONG\n\n* KAM TIN\n\nPING SHAN\n\nCASTLE PEAK\n\nTSUẸN WAN SHA TINKUNGA\n\nSAI\n\nL KOWLNOW CITY\n\nTING\n\nCHEUNG x\n\nנל\n\nSHA WAMLINE\n\nLINGAU TAU KOK\n\nSHA LÓ WANTE\n\nTRUNG CHUNG LANTAU ISLAND\n\nPUI 01\n\nPENG CHAJ\n\n„MUT WO\n\nISLAND\n\nITẠI TAM TUK\n\nSHEK PIK\n\nABERDEEN.\n\n(CHEUNG\n\nCHAU LAMMA,\n\nISLAND\n\nAP LET CHAU\n\nBELŞ\n\nBAY\n\nдо\n\n+2\n\n110\n\nLO MAN SHAR\n\nTAM VON SHAN (LEMA ISLANDS)\n\nMAP OF HONG KONG REGION\n\nJAMES HAYES", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1974.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209871, "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-1983", "page_number": 130, "title": "RAS-1983", "content_text": "108\n\nand more than half of them still live within two miles of these ancient sites, which speak of hundreds of years of settlement and progress, before the Han emperors conquered the coast with a fleet and army.\n\nLeaving aside the islands close to Hong Kong, which have little of interest, we next pass the Potoi group off Cape d'Aguilar (named after a Major-General who commanded the troops in Hong Kong in its early years). All are of granitic rocks seamed with dykes of dark green stone which decay more rapidly than the granite and so often form valleys, caves and hollows. All but Potoi itself are barren and deserted, except for the light on Waglan (Wang Lan \"Barrier Fence\"). About nine years ago, the Chinese second officer of a ship distinguished himself by steering straight on to the island, where the ship not unnaturally stopped. There was no discoverable reason for this exploit; it was not bad weather, though dark it was about 2 a.m. and the light showed clearly. A similar but more excusable disaster occurred in 1916 on the east end of the Lema's eight miles to the south on Tam Kon Shan (“Carrying Pole Mountain\"), when the Chiyo Maru, which was a big trans-Pacific liner, ran aground. I believe few or no lives were lost.\n\nnets.\n\nPotoi has a small but good harbour, very popular with boat people, and with a handsome temple. There are a few shops, and its economic centre is Stanley. The beach is used for drying. Once in 1930 an ingenious fellow tried to monopolize the beach by applying for a matshed site right in the middle of it. I saw the place, saw through his game, and turned him down. Up in the hills are three tiny hamlets, living on the scanty crops their fields produce, and probably selling to the boat people as well; their names mean \"Long Stone Ridge\", \"Cow Lake\", and \"Mountain Hut\" 27.\n\nTo the north, at the entrance to Junk Bay, known in Chinese as \"General's Haven\" (Tseung Kwan O), is an island called Fat or Fu Tau Chau (“Buddha's or Tiger's Head Island\"). It was the site of one of the \"Blockade of Hong Kong\" customs stations; the station is in ruins, although the island has a few inhabitants.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1983.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j9607p61v", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214427, "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-1998", "page_number": 285, "title": "RAS-1998", "content_text": "251\n\nThe Stanley Battery\n\nThe 9.2 inch three gun battery at Stanley Fort was probably one of the most modern of its kind in 1937 in spite of the fact that the guns were second-hand, having come from the batteries at Devil's Peak and Mount Davis. The Mark X 9.2 inch 28 ton Breech Loader was the premier coast defence gun at that time and was used extensively in all major defences. In the UK it was sometimes railway-mounted so that it could be moved about together with its ammunition wagon. Rail-mounted guns, before being fired, had to be secured with heavy iron guys known as chain pickets to stop them toppling over from the force of their recoil. In fixed guns like those at Stanley Fort, the recoil was absorbed by a spring accumulator mounted to the rear of the gun. The Mark X had been developed from the Mark IX in 1899. It had a single motion breech mechanism with an electrical or percussion firing mechanism. Its maximum range was 29,200 yards, which meant that the upper gun at Stanley, which was mounted on a traverser, could reach targets in Kowloon and also the Lema Islands to the south of Hong Kong.\n\nThe weight of the Mark X B.L. including breech assembly was 28 tons, and the weight of the cradle mounting nearly 130 tons. As previously explained, the guns were transported from their old batteries by sea, as the roads would not have supported such heavy axle loads. The transportation of the guns and the construction of their huge concrete bases would have been carried out by civilian contractors, but the actual installation of the guns would have been undertaken by the Royal Artillery using a special portal crane known as a gantry crane. The installed guns would have been disguised with huge camouflage nets draped over them, and protected from the weather when not in use by canvas tarpaulins. The concrete gunhouses built over the two lower guns by the Japanese were probably not bombproof casemates and would only have given the gunners protection from the weather and from strafing by enemy fighters. Judging by old photographs of the gunhouses, the arc of fire must have been severely restricted.\n\nThe Stanley Battery, situated at the south-east corner of the peninsula, was made up of three gun emplacements and a large number of magazines, bunkers, and other battery support buildings spread over a fairly wide area. Most of these structures are still in existence.\n\nPage 285\n\nPage 286", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1998.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/1g05n0794", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215562, "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-2001", "page_number": 339, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "289\n\nIn 1888 the Chinese and Hong Kong Governments reached agreement. Gap Rock Lighthouse would be built by the British and maintained by them. The island remained Chinese territory not to be used for any other purpose. On the Chinese part, the Kowloon Customs was to contribute $7,500 towards the initial cost of the light and $750 annually towards its maintenance.22 The agreement was not put into effect. Towards the close of the nineteenth century, however, the proposal for lighthouses at the two main approaches to Hong Kong, on Gap Rock and Waglan Island, was revived. The previous agreement was then implemented.\n\nIn 1891 a lighthouse was built on Gap Rock, at the south-western extremity of Lema and Kypong Islands. Lighting equipment was constructed in Sweden and the light was first shown in April 1892. Three years later the lantern was smashed by a severe typhoon. According to experts' opinions later the lighthouse should have been built on the northern part instead of the southern part of the rock. But to rebuild it would cost somewhere near $140,000. So, the original light continued to function usefully through forty years of typhoons until the Japanese invasion in 1941.\n\nGap Rock is in the form of two hillocks, about 80 to 100 feet high, and the gap between gave the place its name (in Chinese it is called Man Mei Chau, meaning the last island or Mosquito Tail Island). The lighthouse tower is nearly 50 feet high, and the light is thus about 142 feet above mean sea level. In heavy storms seas broke right over the lighthouse but it stood, as a tribute to its builders and a pointer to the developments which have marked the growth of the port of Hong Kong.23\n\nWaglan Lighthouse\n\nUnlike Gap Rock Lighthouse, Waglan Lighthouse has a different history. It was constructed by a Paris company for the Chinese Customs Light Department of the Imperial Maritime Customs in 1893. It started to operate on 9th May in the same year. It was run by the Chinese Maritime Customs from Shanghai. Following the lease of the New Territories by Britain, in 1898, it was transferred to the administration and control of the Hong Kong Government on 1st January 1901.\n\nWaglan was a First Order light of 45,000 candle-power burning", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "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 } ]