RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1995 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/95941j25g CONTENTS PRESIDENT'S REPORT ...... HON AUDITOR'S REPORT vii xxiv ARTICLES: Edwin Haydon - Chinese Customary Law in Hong Kong's New Territories: some Legal Premises.... 1 D.H. Liu - The Peking Opera 43 Alfred Y.K. Lau - An Outline of the Urban Development of Sai Ying Pun in the Nineteenth Century 59 David Faure - The Emperor in the Village: Representing the State in South China 75 Anne and Stephen Selby - China Coast Pidgin English......... 113 Richard Webb - the Use of Hill Land for Village Forestry and Fuel Gathering in the New Territories of Hong Kong 143 NOTES AND QUERIES: John Hodgkiss - Life on the Fringes: The Biology of Mangroves and the Role They Play in Hong Kong 155 R.G. Horsnell - The MacIntosh Cathedrals 171 Keith Stevens - Singapore's Disappearing Temples and The Decline and Apparent Demise of a Popular Religion Cult 181 Keith Stevens - Two Groups of Chinese Deities Rarely Seen on Chinese Altars ........... 187 Dan Waters - The Chinese Labour Corps in the First World War: Labourers Buried in France 199 Peter Vine - Experiences as a War Crimes Prosecutor in Hong Kong. BOOK REVIEW vi 205 217 ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1995 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/95941j25g The MacIntosh Cathedrals R.G. Horsnell 171 Introduction The author of this article has been working in Hong Kong since 1971. He started in the Architectural Office of the old Public Works Department, and is at present a Chief Maintenance Surveyor in the Architectural Services Department which celebrated its Tenth Anniversary in 1996. He has been assisting the Antiquities and Monuments Office in recording historical buildings and structures since 1992. In this article, he gives a brief history of the police border observation posts known as the MacIntosh Cathedrals, which were named after Commissioner of Police, Mr. D.W. MacIntosh, whose idea it was to build them. The article has been compiled from information in the Hong Kong Police Force Library, also the Force Museum in Coombe Road to which due acknowledgements are made. In 1945, when Hong Kong was liberated, the population was estimated at 500,000. As the Territory regrouped and normality returned, it saw an upturn in immigration and by the end of 1947, the population had increased to an estimated 1,800,000. In 1948/49, as a result of unsettled conditions in China caused by the civil war and the increasing successes of the communist armies, a large influx of refugees from the mainland commenced. Approximately 750,000, mainly from Kwantung Province, Shanghai, and other commercial centres, entered Hong Kong during 1949 and early 1950. This reached its height in the Spring of 1950, when the estimated population was 2,360,000. Amongst the refugees were the defeated remnants of the Kuo Min Tang Nationalist armies and also a fair number of common criminals. Arms of all descriptions were available, and gangs of armed men raided villages near the Border. There were frequent gun battles between the police and gangsters, and there were several cases of policemen being killed and their revolvers stolen. In May 1949, two incidents occurred on the Border, which were to lead to a change of design and use of police posts in that particular area. On May 2, 1949, a four-man police patrol left Ta Kwu Ling Police ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1995 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/95941j25g 172 Station and shortly after midnight was ambushed at Chung Yuen Ha on the Border Road between Ta Kwu Ling and Lin Ma Hang. The attackers, a gang of more than ten men, fired on the officers and one police constable was killed instantly, while another was slightly wounded. The culprits escaped, taking with them the dead constable's service revolver. The same gang struck again fifteen days later on the night of May 17 with an attack on Nga Yiu Post, near Ta Kwu Ling, where four constables were on duty. In those days the Post was only a brick structure of two rooms without any form of perimeter fence or facilities of any kind. Two constables left the post to visit a local teahouse, situated about 100 yards away, but out of sight of the post. A third constable decided to take a bath at a nearby matshed structure, leaving the fourth constable on guard duty outside the post. Whilst away from the Post the three constables heard the sound of shots being fired. Three men were seen running from the Post carrying weapons and the body of the constable who had been left on duty was found outside the Post where he had been shot twice in the back. The two constables in the teahouse were prevented from taking action by two armed men in what was obviously a well-planned operation. The gang escaped in the direction of the Shum Chun River, and took with them a Sten gun and two rifles, and the dead constable's revolver. Three days later, acting on information provided by New Territories officers, a large body of Chinese troops mounted an attack on the gang's hideout in a village four miles north of Shum Chun. In the encounter, three of the gang were killed and five were captured. Seized in the raid were all the weapons stolen from the Post, including the revolver taken from the constable killed in the previous ambush on the Border Road. It was as a direct result of the Nga Yiu incident that the then Commissioner of Police, Mr. Duncan Macintosh, decided to improve the design of border posts and the conditions of officers deployed at such outposts. On the hilltops lining the Border, a string of strongposts was erected which gave a view across the Border at strategic spots. The imposing concrete structures with their distinctive appearance and outline against the skyline were dubbed the "MacIntosh Cathedrals". The posts, of which seven in all were built up to 1953, provided police ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1995 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/95941j25g 176 14 1966, at the age of 62. His name is remembered in Hong Kong not only in the MacIntosh Cathedrals, but also in the MacIntosh tartan kilts of the Force Band. In the Force Museum in Coombe Road a special display case is dedicated to Commissioner MacIntosh and is full of memorabilia including a brass model of a MacIntosh Cathedral which was presented to him on his retirement by his Chief Inspectors and donated to the museum by his widow. In conclusion although the MacIntosh Cathedrals are perhaps not architecturally significant, they have a certain appeal and are historically important as a key element in the development and improvement of Hong Kong's frontier defences and in the control of illegal immigration in the post-war years. REFERENCES Policing Hong Kong, pamphlet by D W MacIntosh, CMG, OBE, Commissioner of Police, Hong Kong, 1952 Observation Posts, by Sub-Inspector ME Davis, The Hong Kong Police Magazine, Vol 3 #4. Dec 1953 Asia's Finest : An Illustrated Account of the Royal Hong Kong Police, by Kevin Sinclair, Unicorn Books Lid, 1983 Force History: Origins of Border MacIntosh Cathedrals, by Mike Watson, "Off Beat", Mar 22, 1989 Byways of History : Territory Regroups After the War Years, South China Morning Post, Dec 12, 1989 ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1995 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/95941j25g 177 Old frontier police post near Lin Ma Hang now abandoned. It was the vulnerability to attack of such outposts which led to the construction of the fortified observation posts known as "MacIntosh Cathedrals" along the Border. (Photograph provided by Mr. J.P. Cartwright, HKPF) ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1995 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/95941j25g 178 Fortified observation post known as a "MacIntosh Cathedral". (Photo by courtesy of the HKP Force Museum) ================================================================================