70 years ago: Hong Kong's wartime diaries

We had a bit of excitement on Wednesday last, 25th.  We were mostly in our blocks at midday when we heard the drone of an aeroplane. It sounded at a low altitude and had the somewhat uneven and tinny sound of a Japanese made or tuned engine. It was coming from West to East and we went onto our balcony to see it when it had passed over our blocks. (We face East). As the drone grew louder we suddenly heard a distinct swishing and whistling noise which I took to be the shrieking of the wind in the fuselage and the propeller which you hear when a plane passes close overhead. Then the plane came into view – a fairly big two engined Jap flying boat that often comes round here on patrol. Then we saw people in the ‘A’ Blocks pointing excitedly in the direction of ‘the hill’ and saying that the plane had dropped something. At that moment the air raid alarm was sounded, whereupon we watched the plane with renewed interest. No one could remember seeing the red spots on its wing tips and (later) I heard one or two people say they had seen what looked like white stripes on it somewhere; but they seemed a bit vague about it. But everyone agreed that it looked an old type of plane and certainly not one used nowadays by the Americans. All kinds of conjectures were made as to what had been dropped – they ranged from vitamin pills to news of the declaration of peace! Soon after, we saw someone running down to the hospital and presently the stretcher trolley was brought out and wheeled off. After a good deal of suspense we heard that 5 missiles of some sort had been dropped, some of which had struck bungalow ‘A’, injuring several people. 

Now it is all over, I can give the true facts. All together eleven cylinders were dropped. They differed in size apparently. The one that Trevor Edwards had seen and which he described  to me was a cylinder, about 2’ long and 9” in circumference and rounded at both ends – that must have been the one that fell in St Stephens, Block 8 – and was painted black. Some others, apparently, are bigger. Most of these objects fell onto the ground round about the bungalows; one in the roadway by St Stephens and most of these entirely buried themselves in the ground. Two more fell near St Stephens, while a third struck the roof of Block 8 (the West wing of St S) penetrated the ceiling over one of the upstairs bedrooms (these rooms are cubicles whose partitions do not reach the ceiling) and ended, because of the angle at which it was falling, in the next room. It struck one bed and bounced onto the next (both, fortunately unoccupied at the time). Croucher, who was lying down on his bed, received considerable but superficial cuts about the head and shoulders from flying fragments from the roof, and several other men were similarly damaged. These rooms are now occupied by about 4 men a piece, though they vary in size to some extent. 

Two of these missiles struck bungalow ‘A’, one penetrating to the bathroom where it hit and smashed the bath (which happened to be half full with water!) and the other landing within 4’ of Revd Myhill where he sat reading. He was badly cut about and slightly stunned by falling debris and at first his condition was thought to be critical, but when they had got him cleaned up in the hospital they found nothing very serious – apart from fairly severe shock. Three other people in the bungalow received injuries:- Lila Wood, a girl of about 16, who received cuts and suffered from shock, and the two Hansen children who suffered slight cuts. The mysterious (and merciful) thing about these missiles (I purposely refrain from calling them ‘bombs’) is that, of all eleven not one exploded. Had they been bombs that had exploded the results would have been appalling – bungalows ‘A’ and ‘B’ would have been wiped out and most of a large part of St Stephens, and the death roll would have been well over 100 not to mention scores of bad cases of shock and serious injury.

Well, God be thanked, they did not explode. I know a matter of 500 or even 1000 casualties would be a mere nothing compared to what happened in London, Plymouth or still worse, the German towns, but the result here would have been completely shattering to this camp. What a merciful escape. It seems, if this place is to be retaken, that we must be prepared for this kind of thing. All I can say is: if it has to happen I wish they’d get a move on and finish it off: this waiting, waiting, waiting is really becoming unbearable.

All kinds of theories have been put forward as to the why and where for of this incident. Some little time after the first air raid signal went on Wednesday, a second one was sounded and this time people saw some American P-38 fighters about. Harold said he saw one clearly from his bed on the balcony; it had the twin body fuselage peculiar to the P-38 machines. One possible explanation is that this Jap machine received wireless warning of approaching enemy machines, where upon, in the stress and excitement of the moment the pilot, in order to gain height and speed, released all these cylinders without looking to see where he was. The plane, after passing this camp, flew over Waglan Island where there is a big wireless station. It banked steeply over Waglan (possibly picking up signals) and then continued in a due easterly direction, straight out to sea. This plane is, we think, the Jap flying boat that is used for patrolling HK waters – it frequently cruises around about this vicinity and may be engaged on anti-submarine patrol. In this case it is quite probable that these cylinders are depth charges which would not explode on contact, but would depend on contact with water and a certain pressure being attained. One theory is that they are just practice ‘bombs’ filled with sand.

Another curious thing is that someone is alleged to have seen the non Japanese figures and letters ‘100 lbs 43’ upon one of the smaller cylinders. I have not been able to verify this however. But, whereas on the last occasion there was no doubt that the plane that did the damage was American, this time we are all equally positive that the plane was Japanese. Quite a number of Japanese officers arrived by car from town within about 2 hours of the incident (some 7 of them). They inspected the casualties – photographed Myhill swathed in his bandages. I don’t know why they made such a fuss on this occasion. On the previous occasion the Colonel and one other came out on the day after the mishap.

On Friday we were told that at the morning parade Lt Kadawakie would address the various blocks. We had been told it was to be a ‘pep talk’ of sorts. We had to wait ages (we being the last blocks to be inspected) while the party inspected the various districts of the camp and Kadawakie said his little say. Eventually they arrived, and after the inspection, we were all marched to the space in front of Block 2 and when the ‘A’ blocks also had joined us Kadawakie and Gimson, with Bickerton between them as interpreter, mounted a table and the address began.

Kadawakie addressed us, with considerable animation, in Japanese (which about 2 people understood) and then Gimson gave Bickerton’s translated version. They (Gimson and Bickerton) appeared a trifle bored by the time the entourage had reached us. Kadawakie first said that he wished to confess his regret and that of the Japanese Authorities to the camp as a whole and the victims in particular of the mishap last Wednesday when an American plane dropped bombs onto this camp, injuring several persons. There was just a slight murmur after this! It seemed to us tantamount to an admission that it was a Jap plane. Incidentally, the Japs had had Gimson and Bickerton up the hill until 2 a.m. on Wed. night making Gimson sign papers about the injured people. The following morning he was up the hill again when our big friend the American  B-29 (probably B-24 Liberator), which so frequently comes over, appeared on his morning patrol. The Japs gave Gimson a pair of binoculars and tried to get him to admit that it was the same plane that had dropped these things on the camp the previous day. Incidentally, no alarm was sounded on this occasion – it seldom is when this particular plane appears! So I think the Japs have troublesome consciences about this incident.

Kadawakie then proceeded to reprimand us for failing to observe the Japanese regulations with regard to bowing to Japanese officers. On the whole he was very reasonable about it. He said that he realised that customs varied in different countries but that while we were under the protection of the Japanese we were expected to observe this custom of bowing. He said that women were the chief offenders and that he personally, had been reprimanded because when several senior officers came to inspect the camp on Wednesday, most internees in passing them had paid no attention to them at all. He said that in this respect this was the worst of all the internment camps in Hong Kong. He held forth at some length and at the end he called the Japanese sergeant to mount the table and give a demonstration. First he demonstrated how a Japanese wearing his military cap saluted in response to a bow or salutation; and then he demonstrated the bow given by a Japanese, when not wearing his cap, this being the bow we had to emulate or perform. We understood that we have to hold this pose until the officer in question had acknowledged it. No wonder the officers hardly ever walk around the camp – it must be a wearisome business!

As a result of this ‘bombing’ on Wednesday, the residents of bungalows A, B and C and those in St. Stephens Block 8 were ordered to vacate their rooms in case these missiles were time bombs. They have had to find temporary accommodation where they can in blocks 9 and 10. Poor things, they have been sleeping on the hard cement floors of the halls, landings and bathrooms and along the open cloisters. The women and children have been crowded into the ‘all womens’ second floor of block 10 where most of them are sleeping on the floor. Maudie has taken in Mrs Maitland and they have to move half the furniture out of the room at night in order to arrange ‘Auntie Maitland’s’ bed on the floor. They have had four nights of it so far and are wondering when they will be allowed back.