Following on from David’s Club Lusitano’s historic propeller story here are two flags that could also be categorised as ‘items of interest displayed on walls’. These framed flags currently hang in the Marine Police Headquarters in Sai Ying Pun.
The first is the Japanese flag that flew over the old Marine Police Headquarters building in Tsim Sha Tsui during the World War II. During the occupation the Japanese navy used the old MPHQ building as a local headquarters.
The story behind this flag: Upon being freed from Stanley Internment Camp in August 1945 two Marine Police officers, Sergeants Tony Rose and Ray White, walked across Hong Kong Island to the Star Ferry terminal where they scrounged a lift across the harbour. After walking up the ramp to the Marine Headquarters building they found (probably to their surprise) members of the Japanese navy still woking in the various offices. According to Ray White ‘the Japanese moved out without argument’. Sergeant Tony Rose then lowered the Japanese flag in a simple ceremony. But this could only take place after a request had gone out to British forces in the harbour, asking them to stop taking potshots at the flag. The bullet holes are clear to see in the photograph. It was Tony Rose that presented the flag to the Marine Police Officers Mess, where it hangs to this day.
The second flag, that is displayed in the corridors of Marine Police Headquarters, is a scorched and blackened red ensign.
It was removed from the burning Queen Elizabeth II (then known as the Seawise University) before she rolled and sank in the western harbour on 10 January 1972. This ensign was rescued by Marine Sergeant Peter Cheuk Man-kei. Sergeant Cheuk, on board a harbour patrol launch, was one of the first on the scene after the fire broke out. In addition to the ensign Peter Cheuk also rescued over 150 people from the burning ship.
Seawise University - QE2 Fire, 9 Jan 1972
As an addendum to Mr Bird's story of PL15 and the fire that consumed the Seawise University - formerly the RMS Queen Elizabeth - in Hong Kong waters on 9 January 1972, I was at the Marine Police Headquarters at Tsim Sha Tsui the morning that it happened. I recall that it was a beautiful sunny day and that I was sitting in the MPHQ mess with Superintendent P. P. O'Regan, who was my father. He had just come off a three-day shift on PL1 or PL2, a shift on which I had accompanied him. At the time, I was one month short of my 10th birthday. I recall that we were sitting in the mess waiting to be picked up by my mother, when a marine officer rushed in and informed my father that the Seawise was on fire. He immediately left to go out to the ship. At the site of the fire, rescue efforts were already underway through PL10 (Inspector Ted Ho Sze-ming) and PL15 (Sergeant Peter Cheuk Man-Kei). Both launches were in the vicinity when the fire broke out. This was sometime between 10.00 and 11.00am. 547 crew were on board. The plume of smoke rising from the ship could be distinctly seen from many places in Hong Kong, including I remember from the MPHQ. Mr O’Regan went out (probably on PL2 - Senior Inspector Colin Reigate) to coordinate the evolving rescue response. The fire spread rapidly, and by the time Mr O’Regan got there at 12.15, it was blazing strongly in many parts of the ship. Hong Kong's largest fireboats - the Alexander Grantham and Fire Boat 2 – also had yet to arrive.
In the circumstances, the priority was to get everyone off the ship, and the police launches under Mr O’Regan’s direction worked in tandem to do this. In the meantime the fireboats also arrived. By 12.58, having satisfied himself that everyone on board had been evacuated, Mr O’Regan gave instructions for all the police launches in attendance, some 12 or so by then, to pull back and form a cordon. The fireboats and attendant firefighters fought through the rest of the day and into the night to bring the fire under control, but it was to no avail, and by 20.20 that evening they called off the effort. Senior Inspector Reigate stayed on PL2 all through the night to coordinate the cordon and was one of those who witnessed the ship’s final moments. These came at 11.55am the next day, when under the weight of the water that had been pumped over her decks, the ship rolled over and sank in 8 fathoms (14.6 metres). So huge was the girth of the ship that its starboard side remained prominently visible above the waterline. I remember that it remained a spectacular sight in Hong Kong waters for some time afterwards.
Apart from my own personal recollection, the remaining detail of this event can be found in Ward, I. (1999). Mariners: The Hong Kong Marine Police 1948-1997, Wivenhoe, Essex: IEW Publications (pp. 144-7).
Former Marine Police HQ - Japanese Flag
Taken in 1996.