RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1975 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d CORRIGENDA (i) Readers may find the following list of sub-heads in Dr. Bowie's article on The British Military Hospital Hong Kong 1942-1945 useful for reference purposes. Introduction Prelude: up to 8 December 1941 8-25 December 1941 26 December 1941-7 August 1942 The Period of the Infections The Period of the Deficiency Diseases The Period of Slow Decline Food Japanese Rations Additions to Japanese Supplies of Food Gifts from Friends in Hong Kong Supplies bought with Officers' Money Red Cross Food Supplies Effects of Supplements on General Diet Feeding the Patients Feeding the Staff Deliveries of Japanese Rations Storing the Food Cooking the Food Distribution of Food Arrangement made by our Friends in Hong Kong Body Weights Japanese Administrative Staff and Guards. Trading Supplies of Drugs and Dressings Entertainment August-December 1942 The Year 1943 1 January 1944-23 March 1945 Reasons for the Move of the Hospital in 1945 24 March-9 September 1945 Casualties and Evacuation of Wounded During Hostilities Responsibility without Power Sex The Atomic Bomb ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1975 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d 158 DONALD C. BOWIE thought fit to fight was discharged from hospital, but there must have been many of those manning the mainland defences whose legs felt weak and shaky following the fever and anaemia of the disease as they covered the hilly and terribly uneven country they were called on to defend, The news from Europe, North Africa and the United Kingdom during 1940 and the first part of 1941 was very bad, while the stories of the German advances in Russia after June 1941 added to the general depression. In October 1941, two battalions of Canadian infantry, the Winnipeg Grenadiers and the Royal Rifles of Canada, disembarked in Hong Kong. With these came a number of Canadian Army Medical Officers, with Major John Crawford in charge, and two Canadian Army Nursing Sisters. The sight of these strongly built young men was momentarily, and quite irrationally comforting, but this feeling was soon replaced by astonishment that anyone should have dreamed that reinforcements of this order could possibly have altered the situation. In the event the Japanese attacked before the poor Canadians, who were not even accompanied by their transport, had time to settle down and they merely added to the numbers of casualties incurred and prisoners taken by the enemy. In February 1941 it might have been agreed that there were no ships available to withdraw the troops from Hong Kong, but in October of the same year ships were found to bring in more. I have chronicled my own thoughts on the situation in Hong Kong in the years leading up to December 1941 only to give some idea of the position as it appeared to one individual and as a background to an account of the events which followed. I do not know that these thoughts were shared by many others though it would be strange if they were not. There was certainly no defeatist spirit abroad and the general feeling seemed to be one of some confidence in our ability to hold the Japanese for a time. I imagine that many shared my own feeling in 1941 that since I could not change the situation I would have to put up with it. And so, on the morning of 8 December 1941, Dr. J.W. Anderson, who had most generously shared his house with me, and I stood at Magazine Gap and had a spectacular grandstand view of the short Japanese air attack on Kai Tak airport by the end of which no British planes remained able to fly. Together he, now a Major R.A.M.C., and I moved into ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1975 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d 178 DONALD C. BOWIE he did not explain his meaning. I concluded that the fish had probably been taken from the harbour whose waters were thoroughly polluted. Some of the fish was quite horrid and my diary recorded on 8 August 1942 that I could not touch mine. This was quite an admission for it was rare for me to boggle at any sort of food. Our cooks at first removed the fish heads before cooking but Seino pointed out to us that this was a waste. As a result we began to make what we called fish head soup; this proved to be not to everybody's taste but it did add a new if not always attractive flavour to plain boiled rice and vegetables. Additions to the Japanese supplies of Food. (a) Gifts from Friends in Hong Kong Unfortunately I have no record to show the date on which these gifts started, but by August 1942 visitors from the City of Victoria were being allowed to bring gifts of food to the hospital on Mondays and Thursdays. The food was usually contained in gunny sacks and included tins which contained food sealed in by the makers e.g., jam, or which were filled by the donors with for example peanut butter. I have never learned the whole story about these supplies and I hope that Sir Selwyn Selwyn-Clarke, then Dr. P.S. Selwyn-Clarke, will find it possible to relate this in detail.* A little later I shall have more to say about this remarkable man who was Director of Medical Services in Hong Kong at the outbreak of war. As may be imagined the tins and containers became the vehicles for an exchange of notes between the hospital and citizens in Hong Kong. These notes contained personal and family items of news but very useful information came in from our friends to us suggesting methods of combating the deficiency diseases. Small supplies of important drugs were sent in by this route and information was given on methods of cultivating yeast, hop barm and other preparations thought to remedy vitamin deficiencies. Much ingenuity was expended in the hospital in making false bottoms and lids to tins and I can remember only one time when a communication was discovered. The culprit, a Hong Kong man, reacted by his cries and behaviour in a most satisfactory manner to the slapping he * Sir Selwyn's autobiography, Footprints, the Memoirs of Sir Selwyn Selwyn-Clarke, was published by Sino-American Publishing Company, Hong Kong in 1975. ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1975 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d 290 Editor's Footnotes DONALD C. BOWIE 1. Dr. Bowie's own career and achievements, before and after the historic events of which he writes, will be of interest to readers of this Journal. They are as follows: M.B. 1918. University of Glasgow. F.R.C.S. Royal College of Surgeons, Edinburgh 1929. Honorary F.R.C.G.P. (Royal College of General Practitioners) 1969. Sir Arthur Keith Medallist, Royal College of Surgeons, England, 1969. Main Appointments, Army. Commissioned R.A.M.C. 1918. Served in U.K., France, Germany, Turkey. Seconded to Egyptian Army 1923-25. Shanghai Defence Force 1927. Territorial Adjutant, 54th East Anglian Division T.A. 1928-30, Surgical Specialist, British Troops in Egypt 1930-35. Surgical Specialist, Queen Alexandra Military Hospital, London 1936-39, Surgical Specialist, British Troops in China, Hong Kong, 1939. Prisoner of War, 1941-45. Reader in Military Surgery, Royal Army Medical College, London 1946-48. Consulting Surgeon, Middle East Land Forces 1948-50. Retired 1950. (voluntarily) Civil. Regional Postgraduate Dean, British Postgraduate Medical Federation, University of London in North West, South West Metropolitan and Wessex Hospital Regions, 1950-70. Now Retired. Dr. Bowie was awarded the O.B.E. (Military) in 1946. 2. Dr. Bowie's account of Japanese attitudes and behaviour can usefully be set beside the comments of Sir Selwyn Selwyn-Clarke and Dr. Li Shu-fan, the eminent Hong Kong surgeon, who both experienced them at first hand. Sir Selwyn writes (pp. 71-72 of his autobiography referred to at p. 178 above): Nobody can deny that man's potential for cruelty was exhibited on an appalling scale by the Japanese in the stress of war. It was predictable in the circumstances that I should suffer my share of ill-treatment at their hands, and this is what presently came about. Yet the feature of their character that stood out from that whole experience was in fact their unpredictability. They would be acquiescent, even humane, when least expected, vicious with sudden fury after a phase almost of apathy. They could respect, sometimes, a principled stand or an unflinching argument, and yet visit a meaningless rage upon the helpless. To attempt to understand them was the plain duty of anyone seeking to protect a community that was at their mercy, and the first lesson to be learned was that surrender violated their military code, making a prisoner a non-person. But this too was a generalization, and as such to be guarded against as one guarded against racial prejudice. For men are not cast in one mould, even by war, even by a code or an ideology. Dr. Li's account of Hong Kong under Japanese rule is given in chapters 6-9 of his autobiography, Hong Kong Surgeon (London, Victor Gollancz, 1964) in which his comments at pp. 159-160 are relevant here. ================================================================================