RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1999
https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/s178b887x
293

BOOK REVIEW

Gillian Bickley (2201), Hong Kong Invaded! A '97 Nightmare, with a foreword by Arthur Gomes, Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 303 pages.

A97NIGHTMARE

In 1897, a series of anonymous articles appeared in the China Mail. Together they constituted a story entitled The Back Door. This was a fictional account of a successful invasion of Hong Kong by the combined forces of fin-de-siècle aggressors, France and Russia. The inference is that the author was perturbed that Hong Kong's defences at the time were inadequate and so, in an attempt to galvanise the authorities, wrote this "wake up call." Copies of the story ultimately found their way to Whitehall in London.

Gillian Bickley

As the title of the story infers, the superior invading forces entered Hong Kong by way of the south side of Hong Kong Island. There was the bloody Battle of Deepwater Bay, fought in "the jungle" around the Golf Club and on the beach. There was shelling of the Peak from the sea and the sea battle of Sulphur Channel. Matters neared their end when the enemy captured the Kowloon Forts and the dynamite and gunpowder stored on Stonecutters' Island were fired. At the last stand, on Stonecutters', the defenders were ultimately annihilated.

The Back Door evidently arose from the same anxiety that drove Britain's negotiations with China; concluded in 1898 when China granted the ninety-nine year lease of the New Territories, which Britain had requested as a protective buffer against attack.

Gillian Bickley discovered a copy of this story some years ago and it evidently fired her imagination, probably because as we all know, Hong Kong was invaded on 8th December, 1941, by the Japanese - also by superior forces - and ultimately capitulated on Christmas day. The Japanese, however, entered Hong Kong from the north, through the New Territories. Had the Japanese, she wonders, read The Back Door?
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RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1999
https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/s178b887x
294

I don't for one moment think they had. The Japanese invasion of Hong Kong was a "natural extension" of their campaign in China in the sense that they had already occupied southern China - across the border from Hong Kong - a considerable time before. Also, although there are innumerable examples to show that invasion from the sea can be a costly business if the beaches are in any way defended, in Hong Kong's case they weren't. A number of gun emplacements had been built on Hong Kong Island before the war but these would not have prevented an invasion at Deepwater Bay. And there certainly weren't any Allied troops around. The Japanese knew all this. I rather suspect that they invaded from the New Territories rather than assault Hong Kong Island at the outset because they believed that if and when they overran Hong Kong Island, the Allied forces would cross to Kowloon and thence to the New Territories and continue to wage guerrilla warfare for months, if not years. The Japanese had every reason to think that conquering the New Territories and Kowloon first would result in the Allied forces retreating to Hong Kong Island - which they did - where they could be "bottled up" - which they were.

In the round, however, this discussion is academic. The hard fact of the matter is that Hong Kong was simply not defendable with the forces available in December 1941. A successful defence would have required a force of enormous size and superbly equipped, supported by comprehensive fortifications. The "protective buffer" of the New Territories was never any more than an illusion. These arguments, incidentally, were as valid in 1897 as they were in 1941 and to that extent The Back Door was both disingenuous and unhelpful. September 1897 was evidently what the media refer to as a "slow news" month!

Hong Kong Invaded! A '97 Nightmare is a 'new, integrated and corrected' edition of The Back Door. Incidentally, although The Back Door was written in 1897, it is hard to avoid the suspicion that Gillian is having a gentle swipe at the momentous event in Hong Kong's history that occurred exactly 100 years later.

The actual story occupies but 56 pages of Gillian's book, including illustrations by Arthur Hacker. These, incidentally, are a disappointment. They are supposed to be illustrating a serious account of a battle fought to the last, with heroism and heavy loss of life on both sides. One would have thought, therefore, that they would have been
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