Central British School / King George V School / KGV School [1936- ]

(Originally posted over here by richops)

    Can anyone shed light on the truncated body of a Spitfire aircraft that was present in the lower south east corner classroom of KGV School up until the late fiftees. There was also a cut-away R.R. Merlin engine on display with it. It would be interesting to know this aircraft's history as I had heard that after the occupation, KGV was an R.A.F. hospital and that the aircraft was there for rehabilitation purposes.

Spitfire story - as told to me:

The story of the Spitfire in parts at KGV after the occupation was one of those "legends" which no one really had too much detail. I had heard when I attended KGV that there were parts of a spitfire after the war stored in the basement of the "sports" pavilion. The rumour was that the Air Commodore had it removed, restored and one year it was place at the cenotaph in Central for remembrance day painted in the 'colours' of the air commodore's fighter plane during the war. It then disappeared and was not heard of again.

Notes & photos from Bruce Gordon:

Rare angle of KGV taken in 1949 by alumnus Bruce Gordon who currently resides in the States:

Kai Tak airport in the background, a very large cemetery to the right, police firing range in the bottom centre.

Bruce used to walk from his home at 48 Ho Man Tin Hill Rd. (shown in the photo below) to KGV in 1949.

The area housed a heavily eroded cemetery, but there were small farms in the valleys. He bought fresh corn from the farmers as he walked home from school. People would squat beside the stream and clean the bones of their ancestors before putting them into pots for storage in the hillside crypts.

The Royal Air Force was flying Spitfires out of Kai Tak in 1949, all easily spotted from KGV. Organized pirates captured a modern passenger ship and sailed it to Bias Bay ((called Daya Bay today)), holding the ship and passengers for ransom. After dealing with their release, the British mounted a punitive expedition against Bias Bay, but the pirates had Japanese artillery and it was a big battle. Spitfires armed with rockets on flying missions to Bias Bay could also be seen 

HK Telegraph 6 February 1937

I can't shed any light on this but I remember it well, as we used to climb all over it during our lunch breaks in 1955-6. It was in one of the physics labs which was almost like a museum of technology, though I can remember little else in there.

For the first issue of The Lion in May 1931 please refer to here