During the night the enemy landed on the island - at North Point (in what strength it is too early yet to know). There is quite a racket going on at the North side of the island. A column of black smoke lying like a pall over Causeway Bay and extending gradually towards the West in the direction of the City. (I heard later the A.P.C. fuel tanks had been hit at North Point) apparently with the object of giving their troops cover when landing along the foreshore. clever.
Onboard “Robin" with several M.T.B.'s alongside.
Signal has just come in from Commodore - "M.T.B.'s to intercept and attack enemy landing craft- — return to base after all ammo used up”.
No. 7 and 9 were the first in, followed short ly by 11, 12 and 26 and later stilI by 10 and 27.
No 7 and 9 returned - 9 got away unscathed but 7 was quite badly knocked about and almost in a sinking condition - two of her crew were killed.
Later, No. 11 returned, little damage, but the cox'n wounded (a Machine Gun bullet passing clean through his throat but fortunately missed all vital areas).
No. 12 and 26 never returned, both being badly shot up, and No. 12, after being hit on her C. Tower by a shell, burst into flames and crashed into the wall along Chatham Road. Nothing about 26 and nobody seems to know how she met her end.
No. 10 and 27 did not take part.
Undoubtedly 7 and 9 were lucky to be the first - they got in a surprise attack - but the following boats had a tougher job, the enemy were waiting this time.
In this show we lost two boats 4 officers and 14 men - heavy casualties. It was a fine effort on the part of the Flotilla, but I feel rather wasted and should have been unnecessary - a few mobile guns would have done far more damage.
One doesn't think much of the army after a show like this.
A great pity we did not attack at night.
After all, night work should really be our job. (I heard later that the reason why Commodore would not send in the M.T.B.'s at night was because of the sunken ships and wreckage in the harbour - a justifiable reason I must agree, it would have been highly dangerous from a navigational point of view).
Why didn't the Army have their guns, every one of them if necessary, blazing away at the landing boats as they came across the harbour?
As it was, it was just fantastic - the enemy were virtually running a ferry service and apart from the M.T.B.'s no one was doing a damn thing about it.