The Battle for Hong Kong 1941-1945

by Oliver Lindsay

  As the exhausted Rajputs and the last of the guns were being evacuated from the Devil’s Peak Peninsula, Lieutenant General Sakai despatched at 9.00 a.m. on 13th December a launch flying a white truce flag. Aboard were two Japanese officials, a civilian administrator, and two British hostages – Mrs Macdonald who was very pregnant, and Mrs C R Lee, the wife of the Secretary to the Governor, who brought her two dachshunds, Otto and Mitzi, with her. A young American reporter of the Detroit News, Gwen Dew, obtained a notable scoop by running to the scene at Queen’s Pier to report the conversation. The Japanese leader politely introduced himself as Colonel Tala of Military Information. The bespectacled, younger, stocky figure clutching the flag was Lieutenant Mizuno while the third Japanese carrying a portfolio was Mr Othsu Dak.

  Major Charles Boxer met the delegation and immediately recognised the dark, thickset Mr Othsu, whom he had come to know during his frequent liaison trips to the Japanese at the border. To the dismay of some observers including Gwen Dew, Boxer and the Japanese spent some time bowing and saluting each other. Gwen Dew asked Mr Othsu what the conditions were for the surrender offer. “Equitable terms for both sides and safe conduct for all,” was his reply. Boxer quickly intervened with “Let’s leave the terms to the Governor.” Travelling by staff car, he took the surrender terms to Sir Mark Young in Government House. The terms consisted of General Sakai demanding the Island’s immediate surrender, with threats of unrestricted bombardment if he refused.

  An hour later Boxer returned with the Governor’s categorical rejection of the terms. The Japanese, expecting such a reply, said that their forces would refrain from resuming the bombardment until 4.00 p.m. to give Sir Mark Young time to reconsider. After further salutes and bows, they re-boarded their launch and returned to Kowloon with Mrs Lee and the two dogs.

  General Sakai, who commanded the forces attacking Hong Kong, read the Governor’s reply with growing irritation and impatience. “Not only is this Colony strong enough to resist all attempts at invasion, but it has the backing of the people of the British Empire, of the United States of America and of the Republic of China. British subjects and all who have sought the protection of the British Empire can rest assured that there will never be any surrender to the Japanese.”

  Sakai reluctantly contemplated the many problems of invading the Island, but he never doubted the success of his mission, knowing that Hong Kong was cut off and could not be reinforced, for the Japanese had complete control of the air and seas.

  After all, three days before, torpedo and bombing attacks on Repulse and the Prince of Wales had sunk both ships off Malaya. Admiral Phillips had been keeping wireless silence and so no fighter aircraft had been sent from Singapore because the RAF did not know his position until it was too late. “The efficiency of the Japanese in air warfare was at this time greatly under-estimated both by ourselves and by the Americans,” recorded Churchill. “In all the war I never received a more direct shock. As I turned over and twisted in bed the full horror of the news sank in upon me. There were no British or American capital ships in the Indian Ocean or the Pacific except for the American survivors of Pearl Harbor, who were hastening back to California. Over all this vast expanse of waters Japan was supreme, and we everywhere were weak and naked.”

  When most people in Hong Kong heard of the loss of these two great ships, their morale was badly shaken. However, a new hope arose: the local Hong Kong radio announced that the Nationalist Chinese Seventh army was only a little more than 100 miles away and rushing to relieve the Colony. Many prayed that this was true. Certainly, the constant hope that Chinese armies were marching south encouraged the garrison and civilians to sustain their efforts. General Maltby was not confident that Chiang Kai-Shek’s divisions would arrive in time, if at all. Nevertheless, according to Japanese records examined in 1946, the Chinese did step up their guerrilla campaign and attempt to divert attention from the Hong Kong operation. They also sent reinforcements to the Canton area and moved a force, about one and a half divisions strong, towards Hong Kong.1

  General Sakai took the Chinese threat to his rear very seriously and ensured that a Japanese regimental group, the Akari Detachment, was positioned some 40 miles northeast of Hong Kong to prevent Chinese interference. They reported later that the Chinese effort to reach Hong Kong was minimal.

  General Maltby appeared confident that the Colony could be held; the battle for the Mainland had not amounted to a major defeat, in as much as the enemy had received more casualties than they had inflicted. Numerically, he had a force equal in number to the Japanese. It is only with the benefit of hindsight that we know the truth: the complete lack of air support and inadequate sea power, referred to earlier, made the defeat of the Colony a foregone conclusion.

  Maltby’s dilemma on how best to defend the Island was acute. Lieutenant General Percival in Singapore favoured putting his troops well forward to overlook the beaches. Similarly, Field Marshal Rommel in the Spring of 1944 wanted to hold his Panzer Corps close to the coastal defences in Normandy, knowing that the Allied air forces would bomb any subsequent forward movement.

  The factors facing Maltby were, first, lack of transport. Secondly, the narrow roads over mountain passes were quite inadequate to move any battalion quickly in any direction. He anticipated the enemy attacking from the northwest, across the harbour, landing in Victoria. This was because the distance was short; Victoria was within easy reach of the Japanese mortars, and mobile artillery was already starting to destroy one pill-box after another with remarkable accuracy.

  Maltby therefore deployed his troops, after many confusing changes. (See Map overleaf.) The Punjabis and Rajputs would man the forward defences on the left and right respectively. The Royal Scots would be held centrally, well forward. His greatest strength therefore covered the threat to Victoria. The Winnipeg Grenadiers and Royal Rifles would be spread out behind them, guarding against an invasion from the sea. Maltby believed his best plan involved the Middlesex machine-gunners, supported by scattered companies including the Volunteers, who would hold and destroy the enemy while ‘flying columns’, consisting of Winnipeg Grenadier reserve companies, hurried forward. The General felt that a Japanese landing on the northeast coast was improbable because ships sunk under the demolition plan would hinder any approach.

  The RAF had earlier destroyed their last remaining aircraft on the ground to prevent the Japanese capturing it and so reconnaissance from the air was impossible. When Japan first attacked the Colony, the cruiser squadron and submarine flotilla had immediately been despatched to Singapore. One destroyer, Thracian, four gun boats, eight Motor Torpedo Boats, seven auxiliary patrol vessels and an auxiliary craft used for minefield duty were the only ships left in Hong Kong. Naval personnel numbered 1,300 British and 300 Chinese. The naval base at Aberdeen was sheltered from enemy artillery firing from the Mainland, being protected by the massive mountain, Victoria Peak. As many sea approaches as possible had been mined.

  Hong Kong was divided by a narrow, winding road which led from Happy Valley, close to the Wanchai, and ran between Mount Nicholson and Jardine’s Lookout. (See Map overleaf.) From there the road met with three others at Wong Nei Chong Gap before dropping 300 feet towards the beautiful Repulse Bay and its famous hotel. Three miles farther to the south, beyond Stanley Mound, lay the Chung Hom Kok peninsula and Stanley Village. Stanley Fort was on the most southern tip of Hong Kong.

  By 14th December, West Brigade consisted of the Royal Scots, Punjabis and Winnipeg Grenadiers. East Brigade comprised the Rajputs and the Royal Rifles of Canada. Both Brigades contained units of the Hong Kong Volunteer Defence Corps, which consisted of five batteries and seven rifle companies in defensive positions spread throughout the Island.

  The inter-brigade boundary lay largely to the east of Happy Valley, Jardine’s Lookout, Wong Nei Chong Reservoir to Chung Hom Kok.

  Western Brigade was commanded by Brigadier J K Lawson MC. He had been born in England, but his family had emigrated to Canada w
hen he was still a child. He had served in the Canadian Expeditionary Force and the Motor Machine Gun Brigade in the First World War. In 1941 he was the Canadian Army’s Director of Military Training before being promoted to Brigadier to command the 2,000 men destined for Hong Kong. He lacked experience of handling anything more than a Company – 100 men. He was largely responsible for selecting the two Canadian Battalions for Hong Kong.

  Eastern Brigade was commanded by Brigadier Wallis, who had no knowledge of the ground in Hong Kong Island because he had always been stationed with his Rajputs on the Mainland. He also had not met any of the officers or men of the Royal Rifles of Canada and through no fault of his own never discovered, before the Japanese attacked the Island, what the Battalion might achieve.

  Neither Canadian Battalion had radios, 3-inch mortars or transport. Although the Force had been allotted 212 vehicles in Canada, the Awatea was a troopship not a freighter: there was room for only 20 vehicles in her holds. Owing to incompetence, none of the 20 reached Vancouver before the Awatea sailed. The 212 vehicles were loaded on another ship, which was diverted to Manila and never reached Hong Kong.

  The Commanding Officer of the Royal Rifles was a veteran of the First World War – Lieutenant Colonel W J Home MC. He had been removed from command of a company of the Royal Canadian Regiment in 1939 as “unfit to command in war”.2

  The Royal Rifles had spent ten months in Newfoundland, mostly guarding a railway line and airport. There was neither time nor opportunity for worthwhile training. Three months before arriving in Hong Kong they were on coast defence in New Brunswick where “anything more complicated than section or platoon tactics was abandoned”.

  The Winnipeg Grenadiers had been mobilised as a machine-gun unit, converted to conventional artillery and posted to Jamaica in May 1940. They too had found little opportunity for serious training. “One ex-corporal (who deserted before the unit sailed for Hong Kong) told the subsequent Royal Commission that, while in Jamaica, he ‘saw’ a 3-inch mortar once, but was not allowed to examine the sight as he was told that it was too delicate. This prohibition applied to the men of the Mortar Platoon as well.”3 There were some misgivings about the ability of the Commanding Officer, Lieutenant Colonel J L R Sutcliffe, who “made a series of elementary mistakes in regard to the state of training and equipment of his men in a report submitted to National Defence Headquarters Ottawa on 6th October 1941. Officers who get the simplest facts about their men wrong are rarely found in command of efficient, well motivated units,” wrote a distinguished Canadian historian.4

  When the two Battalions were selected for Hong Kong 151 men were eliminated when they failed a subsequent medical examination. Moreover, each Battalion was required to take six officers and 150 men over establishment as “first reinforcements”. Suddenly, therefore, at the eleventh hour 16 officers and 436 men, or almost a quarter of the total force, were needed to bring the two units up to the required numbers. Reinforcements were quickly posted in; most had completed their basic training, but nearly a quarter of them were still only partway through it. They had virtually no knowledge of mortars, which were essential for Hong Kong. Fifty Canadians attempted to go absent from the ship in Vancouver and others were restrained by force from joining them. Compared to the 1,000 Australians who went absent at Cape Town en route to Britain in 1941, 50 may seem a paltry figure. These, then, were the Canadians whom Brigadiers Lawson and Wallis were about to command in battle.5

  Who was to blame for such a shambles? Certainly not the men of the Royal Rifles or Winnipeg Grenadiers who had volunteered to fight. Nor, to some extent, those who had chosen or ‘trained’ the individuals, because it was anticipated that they would receive thorough training in Hong Kong for perhaps a year or two before, possibly, the war spread to the Far East.

  Can similarities be drawn with other theatres of war, both during the Second World War and more recently?

  Lieutenant General Charles Foulkes, the CGS in Canada, stated in a report to the Minister of National Defence on 9th February 1948 that a unit which contains men who have not completed their recruit training is not fit for battle. “We found, in training formations for war, that even after recruit training, section, platoon, company and battalion exercises had to be carried out,” he said. “Then battle inoculation using live ammunition and exercises in every phase of operations were necessary. I can say without fear of contradiction that even after four years of arduous training I found the 2nd Canadian Division just ready for battle when we landed in North West Europe, and even after the first battle it was necessary for me to make several very serious changes in order to win further battles. The training of men for war is like training a racehorse for a race. It is necessary to re-train after each battle, eliminate the weak, tired or battle-weary, and correcting the mistakes in the last battle to ensure victory in the next.”

  The above was, and is, equally applicable, of course, to any other army. From the end of the Dunkirk evacuation in 1940 to the start of the fighting in France in 1944, the Guards battalions in the British Army, for example, undertook exhaustive exercises to prepare for battle. Tactics evolved, they felt, to best defeat the Germans. Yet at their very first major operation, in the breakout southeast of Caen during Operation Goodwood, it became immediately apparent from the British defeat then, that the Guards Armoured Division’s organisation was faulty. Lorried infantry following the advancing armour should instead fight alongside, if not in front of, the tanks in the close bocage country of hedgerows and ditches, behind which lurked the deadly German anti-tank weapons.

  The Territorial Army units sent earlier to fight in the British Expeditionary Force in France and Belgium in 1939 and 1940 were found to be woefully ill-trained, just as the men fighting in Malaya, Burma and Singapore in 1941 and 1942, against a smaller Japanese force, proved to be unable to move fast across country or fight against an enemy which was trained to bypass and then set up road blocks behind the road-bound British formations.

  The 1982 Falklands War can certainly be contrasted to the despatch of the Canadians to Hong Kong. The 2nd Battalion Scots Guards and 1st Battalion Welsh Guards were Public Duty battalions on London ceremonial duties when the possibility of their being sent 8,000 miles to the South Atlantic arose. “Few really believed that they would actually leave Britain (a view apparently shared at a high level within the Ministry of Defence) and, if they did, the battalions’ role was expected to be that of garrison troops, the Argentinians being assumed to have surrendered [to the Royal Marines and Parachute battalions] long before 5th Infantry Brigade could arrive to influence events,” wrote Major General Murray Naylor in the Scots Guards Regimental History.6 As so often happens in war, plans went awry. At the vital battle of Tumbledown Mountain, on the approaches to Port Stanley, the Scots Guards on 13th June 1982 had to undertake a night attack against a strong, motivated enemy, sited on dominating and often insurmountable crags, well-entrenched with machine guns covering their minefields. Due to the outstanding courage and leadership of the officers and NCOs, such as Lieutenant Colonel Mike Scott DSO and Major John Kiszely MC, the Guardsmen overwhelmed the enemy. The following day all the Argentinians in the Falklands surrendered. (By 2005 Lieutenant General Sir John Kiszely was commanding all the British forces in Iraq.)

  Just as the Canadians en route to Hong Kong were told in 1941, “Don’t worry, lads, you will be training in Hong Kong, there’s ample time,” and the Guardsmen 41 years later were assured, “the Argies will have surrendered; it’s garrison troops for you,” so recriminations in the 21st century, as to where the blame lies, will not get us far.

  * * * * *

  On 17th December, four days after the withdrawal from the Mainland to Hong Kong Island, Lieutenant Zempei Masushima led a patrol of four Japanese to choose landing sites on the Island’s north shore. Dressed in Chinese clothes, they approached the Tai Koo Docks in the northeast. A British searchlight spotted them; a Rajput pill-box quickly opened fire, so the patrol jumped into the water and s
wam on, pulling the boat behind them. After landing at the docks, which had a 600-yard frontage with a Rajput pill-box at each end, Zempei carried out a full reconnaissance. He noted the location of pill-boxes, obstacles and wire and found several pill-boxes to be empty. The patrol then returned to Kowloon, being fired upon once more. Zempei was decorated for his gallantry. “Owing to the success of this officer’s patrol it was decided to make the landings at this point,” concluded the citation.7

  Ironically, Captain C M M Man of the Middlesex Regiment was also in the area of the Tai Koo Docks that night because it was regarded as a possible enemy landing point. “I shall never forget the eerie sensation of walking through this large complex of sheds and workshops, all apparently empty with no sight of life,” he wrote. “All the time I was conscious of the feeling that I was being observed. Try as I could I could not see anyone.”8

  Brigadier Wallis had established his East Brigade HQ alongside the Royal Rifles HQ at Tytam Gap well to the east of the Island, nearly two miles from the Tai Koo Docks. Sir Mark Young, the Governor, visited him there and asked him for his frank opinion on what the chances were. “I told him that once again we were spread too thin with little depth,” recalled Wallis. “That lacking air cover and with widely dispersed machine-gun posts, and as the Japanese had ample artillery and mortars, while our own men had had little rest from incessant bombardment, it would only be a matter of time before we were forced back. I think Sir Mark was shocked by my reply.”9

  Brigadier Lawson had moved his West Brigade HQ from the Wanchai to the Wong Nei Chong Gap where several steel-doored anti-aircraft shelters cut into the rock. He had, unwittingly, placed himself on the vital ground which was a key Japanese objective because whoever controlled the Gap and the high ground which overlooked it, controlled the key crossroads, the very heart of Hong Kong Island. The harbour to the north and Repulse Bay to the south were both within 15 minutes’ drive.