The British Fleet is in!! We have been living in such a whirl of excitement of late that I haven’t had time to write up my diary.
On the afternoon of Aug. 29th a big American bomber flew very low over camp, flying in across Tytam Bay and coming in low over the Indian Quarters green. Twice it circled over and we could see the door in the side wide open and two men in short sleeved vests and slacks standing in the opening and waving. We guessed they were going to drop something, for we had heard supplies had been dropped over other camps. Sure enough, on the third time round the plane came in at a height of about 300’. We could see two boxes standing in the doorway and as the plane flew over they came sailing down. The plane circled round and two more came down; then three, then another three. This time one of the parachutes failed to open and the case went hurtling against the end of the Dutch Block, striking the wall just at the side of one of the 1st floor amah’s room windows. This was the only case of medical supplies (it had a red parachute) and it contained some bottles of ether. These smashed and sprayed right into the amah’s room whose occupant fortunately was out at the time. I am told ether is highly inflammable and a lighted cigarette might have ignited the vapour; I don’t know if this is true. Fortunately no one was damaged.
Four more parachutes came down, making 14 in all; then the plane circled round and again the crew waved to us and made the V for Victory sign and then flew off. The parachutes were mostly either white or a vivid green. Most of them were collected and handed in but one green one was cut up and people made little souvenir table centres or dinner mats out of it – Masie Bruce got a piece, it was heavy silk and must have been very expensive to produce. The cases contained US Army supplies which were divided out amongst the internees. They were beautifully done up in waterproof paper – Y and I had a man’s supply between us. All the food was in concentrated form and highly vitaminised and the package even contained a piece of chocolate and three cigarettes! It was certainly different from the supplies the Jap soldiers were getting. Of course it was most exciting to see these supplies dropped, and the whole camp turned out to watch, regardless of the rain which soaked most of us to the skin, but by this time we were getting as much food as we needed. However, we appreciated the gesture. Quite a number of the cases and parachutes landed on the flat roofs of the Indian Quarters and had to be lowered down.
Later in the afternoon our party went down to the beach for a bathe. On our way back we noticed people all standing and gazing in the direction of the Lamma’s and after looking hard we discerned a long, low, grey shape huddled right under the lee of the islands. We dashed back and found that people with binoculars could pick out 6 ships and, after we had looked hard in the failing light, we made them out too. It was most thrilling. Was it the British Fleet or part of it or the Americans?
During the first few weeks after the surrender we had heard competing tales: the American Fleet was coming to relieve Hong Kong; the Chinese Army around Canton was on its way and would occupy HK and rumour had it that the Colony was to revert to China. We did so want our own Fleet to come in first. So we were pretty excited that night and were up next day at the crack of dawn to see what was happening. We felt pretty sure it was our own men because we had had a wireless message that Admiral Harcourt was coming flat out from Sydney with his Fleet and was due to arrive on Aug 31st. We imagined the normal entrance to the harbour through Lei Yue Mun Pass would not be used because of danger from mines and we hoped the Fleet would steam past Stanley through the Lamma Channel. We watched the gap between Beaufort and Waglan and we saw long low ships come cautiously creeping in. It was thrilling!
I had to get on with my wood chopping and could not watch for long but I saw amongst others the high flat silhouette of a huge aircraft carrier. Later we saw it going back again and wondered why. Actually the Fleet did go in through Lei Yue Mun. The powerful Anson had to wait outside for fear of mines and Admiral Harcourt transferred to HMS Swiftsure, the leading cruiser and made that his flagship. Then the paper came into camp and we heard that Admiral Harcourt was due to land at 1 o’clock! And we expected him in camp on the following day!
I should have said earlier that about a week after the surrender, Gimson and a dozen or so Govt Officers and other leading members of the community in camp had gone into town and established a provisional British Govt. Gimson, later, received a cable from the Colonial Secretary commending him for his initiative and we hear that he and Dr Selwyn-Clarke have been awarded the C.M.G.
Also Mr Ben Wylie of the South China Morning Post and Gordon Burnett of the Sunday Herald and the China Mail had gone to town to get their respective papers going again. They had to make a start with single hand printed sheets.
Well, later in the afternoon of that memorable day we heard the Admiral was coming straight out to Stanley to hoist the flag.
We had arranged with Maudie to stand together at the ceremony and when we heard the news I started off for Block 10 to fetch her along. I met her half way and as we were coming back, a large car with the Admiral’s pennant came sailing along. We waved and cheered and hurried along after it, back to the Married Quarters. In front of which the ceremony was to take place. A second car with Gimson and North and others followed and the rear was brought up by a ‘Jeep’ (a completely new name to us!) manned by the driver and three Marines with tommy guns mounted. They looked so hefty and pink! It was quite incredible to see them after the normal skinny, suntanned internee.
The flag was hoisted at a simple but most impressive ceremony. The flag was lowered to half mast while prayers were offered for those who had lost their lives. We sang a hymn and, of course ended with our National Anthem – it brought tears to many eyes. Then Admiral Harcourt called for “Three cheers for HM the King” and rousing cheers they were, followed by ‘a tiger’ and after that someone called for “Three cheers for the Admiral”. Before Admiral Harcourt left he said; “The thing that made us - me and my blue jackets – come here as fast as we could was the thought of you people.”
Then he left as he said he wanted to visit the other camps that day.
What a memorable day it was. Bunny ((John’s Best Man)) had come over from Sham Shui Po that day and so he too was with us at the ceremony.
I forgot to mention that beside the main flagstaff, nine small poles had been erected and from these nine of our allied flags were hoisted after the Union Jack: China, America, Russia, Holland, France, Poland, Norway, Greece and Belgium were all represented. The respective flags were hoisted in each case by nationals of each of the different countries residing in camp. The Polish flag was hoisted by an old Polish lady (I have forgotten her name) of 71 ((Mrs Dobrijtsky)). She was of the typical sturdy peasant type in appearance with a face wrinkled like a Coxes Orange Pippin. Her daughter, Mrs Robinson, had married an Englishman so whether her mother too had taken out British papers I do not know. All these people were, at all events, in origin nationals of the countries they represented. These nine flags did not represent quite all the different nationalities in camp but most of the others were naturalised British and could not very well be represented – Italy for instance.
((This is the end of John Charter's Journal. Thanks again to the Charter family for sharing this valuable document with us, and to Bill Lake for all his hard work in typing up the hand-written journal, and re-assembling it into its correct order.))