ENG-1953 — Page 262

HISTORY

September 1939, the position of the Colony became precarious, and on December 8th, 1941, the blow fell. Powerful units of the Japanese Army, supported by the Japanese Air Force based on Canton, struck at the Colony. The first attempt of the Japanese to land on Hong Kong Island was repulsed on the night of December 15th-16th, but a second attempt on the night of the 18th-19th could not be held. After some bloody fighting on the Island, the Colony was surrendered to the Japanese forces on Christmas day. The isolated brigade on Stanley peninsula held out for a further day before capitulating on superior orders.

Hong Kong remained in Japanese hands for over three and a half years. The population fell from more than one and a half million to a third of that number.

The Colony was liberated when units of the British Pacific Fleet entered the harbour on August 30th, 1945, about two weeks after the capitulation of Japan. A brief period of military administration was followed by the re-establishment of civil government on May 1st, 1946.

The Colony made an astonishing recovery in the years that followed. Thousands of Chinese returned to Hong Kong from the mainland and the population quickly reached and surpassed its pre-war level, producing a housing problem which became acute when, as the result of the success of the Communist armies in the Chinese civil war, thousands more Chinese, particularly from Shanghai and other centres of Chinese commerce, started entering the Colony as refugees. This second phase in the Colony's increase of population began in 1947, and reached its height in May 1950, when the Colony had an estimated population of 2,360,000, the highest in its history. During the last three years the population, partly due to immigration restrictions enforced in 1950 both by the Colonial Authorities and by the Chinese Government, has became more or less stable and remained unchanged at approximately two and a quarter million.

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