In his early career, Capt. Richard Lindsay Stephen Gaisford, RN, OBE was one of the officers on HM Submarine L3 serving on the China Station in 1928-29. Photos taken by Capt. WR Fell at the time show him with fellow officers enjoying walking and boating excursions in and around Hong Kong. He married Cecily Margaret de Vitré in 1933. From 1940-1942 he served on HMS Clyde and HMS Vansittart respectively.
George Menzies was an officer in the 4th Submarine Flotilla serving on the China station in 1928-1929 commanding one of the L Class submarines. He had already served in the 1st World War 1916-1919 and in the 2nd World War commanded the Submarine Depot ship HMS Forth. He married Constance Grice-Hutchinson in April 1936.
Born into a working-class family in Warrington, Northern England, John Hansbury grew up in grinding poverty among the steel mills of Lancashire (now Cheshire). He had a gift for mathematics, and was able to take advantage of scholarships to get the education necessary to become a draftsman. As a youth he discovered the joys of the outdoors, and became a skilled mountaineer as a young man. As he worked in a protected occupation he could not be conscripted when WW2 started, so in late 1941 he volunteered with the RAF and became a navigator in Beaufighters over India, Burma, and Nepal.
I'm so pleased to have found this group! I come from Vancouver (which is practically a colony of Hong Kong), and I'm so excited to be planning my first visit to the island in November of this year. My grandfather was a pre-war mountaineer who joined the RAF in late 1941. He spent the next few years flying over Burma, plus 2 seasons running fitness and survival training to RAF pilots in Kashmir. Following the war, he delayed his return home to England in order to see a bit of the world, and volunteered for a 6-month posting to Hong Kong.
I went up Sharp Peak for the first time yesterday. If you've ever been to the beach at Ham Tin / Tai Long Wan, you'll have seen this pointy hill in the background.