About 400 'bachelor-husbands' (officially the Evacuation Representation Committee) meet at the Peninsula Hotel, Committee Chairman R. J. Banks presiding.
Mr. Banks states that even if the evacuation should be undone immediately, he would still demand a public enquiry into its operation.
Hon. Sec. W. V. Taylor gives the meeting the apparently good news that the Governor will recommend to the Home Government the revocation of the decree at the 'earliest possible moment'. But derisory noises are made when he adds that the Governor will act on the 'counsel of his military and civil advisers', as it's felt that their opinions are known and will not change.
The meeting collects a shade under $740 for Committee funds, and when this is announced a voice shouts, 'This money might have gone to the Bomber Fund if not for the evacuation'.
The meeting, which is attended by some women, attests its patriotism by closing with the singing of the National Anthem.
Dr. Selwyn-Clarke reports that data collected over a three months period at the Infectious Diseases Hospital in Kennedy Town lent a degree of confirmation to the theory that malnutrition contributes to death from cholera - patients given Vitamin B1 showed a mortality rate of 20.5% and the controls 33%.
Sources:
Enquiry: Hong Kong Daily Press, September 25, 1941, page 1
All else: Hong Kong Telegraph, September 29, 1941, page 3
Selwyn-Clarke: Hong Kong Daily Press, September 25, 1941, page 9