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History

Chater Road, Connaught Road and Des Voeux Road, and another in Wan Chai between 1921 and 1929.

Public education began in 1847 with grants to Chinese vernacular schools. In 1873, the voluntary schools, run mainly by missionaries, were included in a grant scheme. The College of Medicine for the Chinese, founded in 1887 with Sun Yat Sen as one of its first two students, developed into the University of Hong Kong in 1911 and offered arts, engineering and medical faculties.

After the Chinese revolution of 1911 overthrew the Qing dynasty, China underwent a period of unrest and many people found shelter in Hong Kong. The Chinese authorities sought to abolish all foreign treaty privileges in China. Foreign goods were boycotted and the unrest spread to Hong Kong, where a seamen's strike in 1922 was followed by a serious general strike in 1925-26 arising from an incident in Canton. Britain was at that time a main target of anti- foreign sentiment, but Japan soon replaced it.

The 1930s and World War II

During World War I, Japan presented '21 demands' to China. In 1931, Japan occupied Manchuria and tried to detach China's northern provinces, leading to Japan's full-scale invasion of China in 1937. Canton fell to the Japanese in 1938, resulting in an exodus to Hong Kong. It was estimated that some 100,000 refugees entered in 1937, 500,000 in 1938 and 150,000 in 1939, bringing Hong Kong's population at the outbreak of World War II to an estimated 1.6 million. It was thought that at the height of the influx, about 500,000 people were sleeping in the streets.

Japan entered World War II on 7 December 1941, when it bombed United States warships at Pearl Harbour. At about the same time (8 December 1941, Hong Kong time), Japanese armed forces attacked Hong Kong. They invaded the city across the border from China and pushed the British from the New Territories and Kowloon onto Hong Kong Island.

After a week of stubborn resistance on Hong Kong Island, the defenders, including the Hong Kong Volunteer Defence Corps, were overwhelmed and Hong Kong surrendered on Christmas Day.

The Japanese occupation lasted for three years and eight months. Trade virtually disappeared, currency lost its value, food supplies were disrupted, and government services and public utilities were seriously impaired. Many residents moved to Macao, the neutral Portuguese enclave hospitably opening its doors to them. Towards the end of the occupation, the Japanese sought to ease the food problems by organising mass deportations.

In the face of increasing oppression, the bulk of the community remained loyal to the anti- Japanese cause. In February 1942, the Hong Kong-Kowloon Independent Battalion of the East River Column was established in Wong Mo Ying, a village in Sai Kung. It attacked Japanese bases and shipping lines on the sea. Together with Allied forces, it rescued prisoners of war. Soon after news of the Japanese surrender was received on 15 August 1945, a provisional government was set up by the Colonial Secretary, Mr (later Sir) Frank Gimson, who had spent the occupation imprisoned in Stanley Gaol. On 30 August, Rear Admiral Sir Cecil Harcourt

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