Overbays [????- ] | Gwulo: Old Hong Kong

Overbays [????- ]

The original area of Overbays - RBL 164

Comments

I think Kui Lok Villa - 99 Repulse Bay Road and the house at No. 77 (left of Circle Lodge on Belleview Drive on the map) are both quite interesting.

It is rumoured that Jackie Chan owns Kui Lok now, but it had been owned by the Lee Kum Kee family.  From the looks of it on satellite imagery, the original house may have been demolished though I am not sure.

No. 77 is a colonial style house with red window frames and it looks to be in its original state.

The original Overbays was the site of one of the massacres committed by the Japanese in WW2. Quotes below from Tony Banham's book, 'Not the slightest chance':

  • Dec 22, 1941. 19:30. Overbays is evacuted, but about thirty-five men are left behind by accident.
  • 24:00. Some men left behind at Overbays are found by RAOC Quartermaster Sergeant Singleton. He tells them that the house is being surrendered in order to give the responsibility for the wounded to the Japanese. The men are ordered to pile up their arms.
  • Dec 23. 08:00. As forces withdraw, the wounded at Overbays are left for the Japanese who promptly murder them. Private L. Canivet:
    the Japs stormed the house using hand grenades and a small portable machine gun. The wounded men downstairs were literally murdered in cold blood. Our white flag was torn down, and our interpreter was bayoneted and pinned to a door to die. The Japs came upstairs and kicked open the door of the room we were in, there being about thirty of us. First they sprayed the room with machine gun fire and followed it up with a barrage of grenades ... we got as many of the wounded out of the windows as possible and then jumped out ourselves.