Rear Admiral Harcourt transferred
from HMS Vengence to HMS Swiftsure. The fleet anchored in the Bay but the Royal
Canadian Navy Prince Robert, after carefully scanning the Kowloon jetties, went
alongside Holt’s Wharf, the only vessel to do so. They were to provide a shore
party to bring order to the process of taking over the administration of the
Colony.
Prior to the event there had been
much political debate about what would happen in the event of surrender, that
was becoming inevitable, about the role of the British Government in Hong Kong
and who should accept the surrender. At this stage the leader of the Chinese
Nationalist Party KMT or Kuomintang was Chiang Kei Shek. He was trying to exert
authority over China but
within a few years the resumption of the Chinese Civil War was to drive him to Taiwan . In the
end it was the British Admiral (later Sir) Cecil Harcourt who took the
surrender on behalf of Britain and the Commonwealth and the Chinese on board
HMS Anson. On 1st September Hong Kong
was declared a Military Administration and Admiral Harcourt was the Governor.
When the fleet arrived the
Japanese were still free and were trying to keep order. There had been much
looting despite the Japanese efforts. The shore party from HMCS Prince Robert
were among the first ashore and immediately came across a troop of Japanese
soldiers emptying a godown (warehouse) in to a small coaster. The Canadians
only had 6 bullets each and they had no idea what the situation was ashore.
There was a face off resulting in the Japanese laying down their weapons and
going to leave the jetty in some vehicles. It was made clear to them that they
could not take the vehicles and so they left with out them. There was no plan
of what to do with them so they could not be taken in custody at that stage.
It was to be a week or so before
all the Japanese had been rounded up, and longer out in the New Territories. A
pilot from carrier HMS Vengeance recalls that once in custody some of them were
still committing ritual suicide rather than admit defeat. All Japanese gear had
to be searched several times to find weapons and despite this some found
inventive ways of ending their lives. The only people available for policing
the Colony were the Marines and men from the naval ships and a team of RAF
airfield repair guys who had been on the way to Okinawa to build an airfield
for the British to bomb Japan
from.
There are other reports from this
time that there were regular sounds of shooting etc. I have found no reports of
Japanese resistance but it could have been trying to prevent looting. It seems
that the locals did a great job of clearing out unoccupied premises stripping
every wooden item and taking the wiring too. Very slowly over the first few
days more food became available and life started to get back to normal in Hong
Kong. There was a curfew at 2100 every evening. This was extended to 2200 on 7th
September. The curfew was dropped altogether on 16th September.
Collecting Japanese weapons after the
surrender. Japanese troops were used for this task as there were very few
Allied troops available.
On 14th September
Admiral Sir Bruce Fraser arrived. He was the CinC of the British Pacific Fleet and
he had his flag aboard the Battleship HMS Duke of York. Admiral Harcourt had
been the Commander of this vessel earlier in the war. On 16th
September the official surrender of the Japanese in Hong
Kong took place at Government House. Admiral Harcourt as the CinC
and Military Governor of Hong Kong signed the
document and Admiral Fraser as CinC BPF was an observer. Admiral Harcourt
accepted two samurai swords at the surrender, one from Vice Admiral Fujita
Ruitaro and one from Major General Okada Umekichi.
Dad remains on the Indomitable
until 30th September. This would fit in with the fact that it would
have taken them about a month to set up headquarters communications etc that
were on a par with the ship. Great strides were made with the civil administration
with the trams and ferries running and a new Hong Kong
currency reintroduced by 14th September. The Yen was compulsory
during the Japanese occupation. The new currency was cleverly introduced by partly
paying the 40000 Chinese who had been taken on to clean up the city with it and
also with goods and food. Dad is down as on the staff of A.C. II which I think
is Aircraft Carrier 11th Group. Up until this time Dad had been on
the staff of Admiral Sir Cecil Harcourt as Flag Officer Commanding the 11th
Aircraft Squadron which included the carriers Colossus, Venerable, Vengeance
and Glory. After this he was employed on the Staff of the Commander in Chief
Hong Kong, which was still Admiral Sir Cecil Harcourt but now ashore as the
Military Ruler and Governor of Hong Kong.
No comments:
Post a Comment