Journal of the
Royal Asiatic Society
Hong Kong
香港皇家亞洲學會學報
Volume 59
2019
Civilian Fatalities in WWII
31
Hong Kong’s Civilian Fatalities of the
Second World War
Tony Banham
The author has studied the Battle of Hong Kong for a quarter of a century
and has written on the subject, aided in the production of television
documentaries, and helped many children of veterans in their researches into
their parents’ war years. His most recent book is Reduced to a Symbolical Scale:
The Evacuation of British Women and Children from Hong Kong to Australia in
1940.
Abstract
Hong Kong, when war invaded at the end of 1941, was a successful and
expanding Colony celebrating its hundredth birthday. In the preceding ten
years it had also become the refuge of many escaping from the fighting in
China. The population, which had numbered in the low thousands when
British gunboat diplomacy originally took the island, had now swollen to over
one and a half million people. And yet by the time that peace finally returned
in 1945, some two thirds of those people—one million, in round numbers—
were no longer present. This paper attempts to analyse who this missing
million were, what happened to them, and questions why they have been
forgotten in the years since peace resumed.
Keywords
Hong Kong (Hongkong), Civilian, Population, Second World War (Wartime),
Fatalities, Demographics
二戰時平民的死亡數字
Tony Banham
作者致力研究香港保衛戰已逾四分一個世紀，曾以此題材撰寫多部
著作，協助製作電視紀錄片，並幫助不少退役軍人子女研究其父母
的戰時歲月。其最新近的著作是：《1940 年居港英籍婦孺撤離赴
澳洲紀事》(Reduced to a Symbolical Scale :The Evacuation of British Women and
Children from Hong Kong to Australia in 1940)
32
Tony Banham
摘要
在太平洋戰爭中，香港人口從最高峰約一百六十萬人跌至和平後的
五十萬人左右。本文試圖盡量精確地推算此下降數字是於何時及如
何造成，並計算在這一百多萬「失蹤」人口中，實際上有多少是在
香港解放以前喪生的。文中為第二次世界大戰中香港過高的平民死
亡人數結論出一個可靠的數字。
關詞詞
香港、平民、人口、第二次世界大戰（戰時）、死亡數字、人口統
計資料
Immediate Pre-war and Post-war Populations
O
n the nights of 14 and 15 March 1941 Hong Kong’s Corps of Air
Raid Precautions conducted a census of the Colony’s population.1
They concluded that 709,294 people lived on Hong Kong Island,
581,431 in Kowloon, and a further 154,000 lived on the water. This gave
a total of 1,444,725, to which the number living in the New Territories
(uncounted, but estimated as 120,000–150,000) should be added to complete
the picture.2 However, upon liberation in August 1945, the population
had dropped to an estimated 500,000–600,000. 3 These figures suggest a
minimum population decrease, between April 1941 and the end of August
1945 of 964,725 (1,564,725 minus 600,000), and a maximum of 1,094,725
(1,594,725 minus 500,000).4
Natural and Immigrant Demographics
A decade earlier in 1931 the previous census had given an overall total
population of 849,751.5 Over the next ten years, therefore, the population had
increased by between 714,974 and 744,974. Clearly this was not all natural;
the war in China had led to a major influx of refugees. Taking a crude birth
rate of 20 per thousand per year (and subtracting a model mortality rate of ten
per thousand per year) we would expect the natural increase to be in the order
of 84,975 over a decade, giving a total ‘natural’ population of 934,726. Thus
Civilian Fatalities in WWII
33
we can estimate that some 630,000 to 660,000 refugees and immigrants from
mainland China had arrived during that period.
Population as of December 1941
Unfortunately we have no data after the census of March of that year. But that
year was a year of turmoil and aside from the relatively small number of births
that would have occurred in the nine months before the invasion, the flow of
refugees clearly also continued. As noted above, some 630,000 to 660,000
refugees had entered Hong Kong over the previous ten years, but their arrival
was by no means linear. The Hong Kong Government had estimated the
December 1937 population at 997,982, thus the great majority had entered
the Colony since that date, and as ‘The Colonial Secretary estimated that,
during the twelve months ended July 1938, a quarter of a million persons
entered the Colony by railway and steamer alone and that 30,000 of them
were sleeping in the streets’,6 it seems likely that a further quarter of a million
or so arrived in the year or two after that. With the fighting on the mainland
continuing it seems reasonable to suppose that a high rate of immigration
continued. For the purposes of this paper it seems conservative to assume that
the population increased by a further 100,000 from all causes between March
and December 1941.7
1941: Deaths During the Fighting
Once war commenced in Hong Kong on 8 December 1941, civilian casualties
began. Bombing, shelling, and summary executions, together with disease and
starvation (even at that early date) were the primary causes. In the confusion
of the time, few records of civilian deaths were kept and evidence tends to be
anecdotal with no clear view of numbers. However, every account remaining
from that period includes descriptions of civilian deaths from a variety of
repeated causes: Shelling: ‘From the 14th. December 1941 the camp was
shelled daily usually in the afternoons and evenings resulting in 2 killed and
37 wounded. The two killed were buried by Inspector Trimble, Sanitary
Department. Their names were Chan Pan Kwai, Chinese, male, age 26 years,
fireman from SS Ethel Moller. He was killed on the 16th. December. The
other, killed on the 17th. December was Chan Shui, Chinese, male, age about
50 years, carpenter, Taikoo Dockyard.’8 Bombing: ‘[Father Ryan] went down
34
Tony Banham
at once to the spot where the [bomb] had fallen—almost in the mathematical
centre of the building—and not a yard away from the spot where he had stood
for several hours during the distribution of rice on that morning. Mangled
bodies were strewn about, two of the cooks to whom he had spoken only a
few minutes before being blown to pieces. Blood and dust seemed to cover
everything around the spot of the explosion’.9 And from shooting (in this
less common case, by British police): ‘A man in coolie dress ran desperately
across the lines. His face was grey with fear. He was screaming madly. He
turned halfway down the block and, as he turned, a bullet struck him. He fell
and blood gushed from his forehead. The British policeman did not stop to
examine the body. He had done his duty. He had shot a looter.’10
Clearly these isolated but common incidents added up to considerable
numbers, and the authorities had to take care of the bodies. In an earlier book
I quoted a British child, Bill Bethell, thus: ‘What did upset me a little bit
was that there was a little, maybe a football field that had been dug up… and
the [Public Works Department] vans were picking up dead people on the
streets, pulling in and just emptying the dead bodies into this hole. Now I’m
convinced that while we were watching… some of those dead bodies weren’t
dead. Whether it was movement of a dead body… there was movement
amongst one or two of them. And I believe they covered them with lime.’11
Overall, from all these causes up till surrender on 25 December 1941,
Selwyn Selwyn-Clarke (the British Director of Medical Services for Hong
Kong) estimated that 4,000 civilians had perished in the fighting.12
1942
Taking the upper and lower boundaries of the 1941 census, adding the
assumed population increase by December of that year, and subtracting those
who perished in the invasion, we can assume that Hong Kong had a civilian
population at the start of the year 1942 of between 1,660,725 and 1,690,725.
This first year of occupation began with a massacre of Chinese civilians
who had been close to the British establishment. This was never at the
scale of the Sook Ching political cleansing massacre of Chinese civilians in
Singapore (which took place from soon after their surrender on 15 February
1942 to 4 March 1942 and killed some 50,000 people) but at various places
across the Colony suspected British sympathisers were rounded up and
shot.13 Selwyn-Clarke again estimated: ‘About 1,200 Chinese civilians were
Civilian Fatalities in WWII
35
alleged to have been executed at Big Wave Bay under suspicion of having
aided the British defence’.14 Other organised executions took place in King’s
Park, and there are numerous accounts of individuals (looters, and those who
displeased the Japanese in a variety of ways) being summarily executed all
over the territory. Many Prisoners of War (and third nationals, free to move
around Hong Kong) also mentioned seeing bodies floating in the harbour,
and witnessing summary executions of Chinese civilians, adults and children,
outside the camps.
Aside from this, there were a huge number of attacks (especially in
the first few days after the Japanese victory) on Hong Kong’s women.
‘The actual number of women raped will always remain a question; but it
was large—10,000 would be an underestimation—and the methods were
appallingly brutal. At my hospital we treated rape victims ranging from the
early teens to the sixties.’15
Following these atrocities hundreds of thousands left of their own accord.
In the first two months of 1942 British and Canadian Prisoners of War held
on Kowloon-side recorded many accounts of long columns of civilians winding
over the hills into China, leaving many to die at the sides of the paths. For
many Chinese families the only hope of survival was to escape north, back to
their family roots.
On 7 January Tom Forsyth of the Winnipeg Grenadiers recorded: ‘Their
plight is pitiful. All on foot, women and little children and babes in arms,
climbing the steep rocky road over the mountains, their worldly goods in a
bundle on their backs, retracing the same road down which they had fled not
so long before, hoping for safety and protection from a brutal conqueror. What
possible hope would they ever have of reaching Chinese occupied territory?’
Major Kenneth Baird of the same regiment was moved by what he saw.
From Sham Shui Po he added: ‘I can see thousands of Chinese trekking over the
hills. I have been watching them from the balcony of our quarters. The nearest
point of the road they are on is about three-quarters of a mile away. Everyone is
loaded down with all they can carry. I often watch them through my binoculars
and so many are carrying babies. They carry their bundles on bamboo poles and
shuffle along in a half walk, half run gait that makes their load easier to carry.
I wonder where they are all going.’16 And: ‘For the past week we have seen
thousands of Chinese refugees going back to where they came from. It was said
that over 500,000 flocked into Hong Kong and Kowloon; with them leaving it
will mean that many less to feed, and perhaps better conditions. To see them in
36
Tony Banham
an endless chain wending their way slowly up through the hills makes one admire
their hardiness. They are slight in build and so thin, and yet they carry incredible
loads slung on the ends of a bamboo pole. They start sometime before daylight
and go in one long stream until afternoon, about 12,000 to 15,000 each day. We
can see the road for a distance of about two miles and it is one mass of people.’17
The observation that these were refugees who had just come to Hong
Kong and were now returning is interesting. It seems likely that the majority
of them were; new arrivals—who were often living in appalling conditions—
would have less to lose in leaving.18 But the numbers were so large that it is
probable Hong Kong’s poorer families were also—even at this early date—
trekking over the border. Many of them did not even survive till the border.
Benny Proulx, a fellow Canadian who had served with the HKVDC, observed:
‘Each dawn those who had died still lay beside the winding road.’19
While it is impossible to accurately calculate exactly how many civilians
left Hong Kong in total in 1942, historians have noted that: ‘a quarter of a
million were said to have left in the first month, that is by February 1942.’20
Those first few weeks were clearly the busiest. The scale was clear even to a
convalescing British soldier at the British Military Hospital (BMH) on the
other side of the harbour on Bowen Road: ‘At first we failed to realise that a
real exodus was going on before our eyes. There are two roads to the North
from Kowloon and the more direct Eastern one climbs up a long incline to the
pass leading to Shatin. This incline was clearly visible from the BMH and for
several weeks it was black with an endless stream of Chinese on their way to
“Canton more far” heading for their ancestral villages.’21
But Japanese records show that far more left than this. Unfortunately
only one ‘weekly work report’ of their military administration from January
to March 1942 has survived.22 It tabulates the ‘returnees’ to different parts
of China (listing towns and villages in Guangdong). The scale is numbing;
between 11 and 17 January 1942, 69,886 left Hong Kong. According to
Japanese sources, from 6 January to 19 February 1942, 554,000 people
departed in total, and then from 19 February 1942 to September 1943 the
Occupation Government removed another 419,000, most of them leaving
from October 1942.23 If we assume that 100,000 of the latter left before the
end of 1942 then—according to Japanese figures—approximately 654,000
had departed before 1943.
From the early days of the occupation the Japanese had instituted a
policy of reducing the population to around 500,000 in order to relieve the
Civilian Fatalities in WWII
37
difficulties of getting sufficient food into the territory. As the year drew on,
food supplies rapidly diminished and this led to both starvation and looting
by those who were starving. One witness noted: ‘We passed dead bodies on
the pavements, people that had died of starvation. Their bodies were nothing
but skin and bones. A lorry would drive by and two men would jump out,
they would hold the hand and legs of the [body] and throw it on to the truck
filled with collected bodies. There was once we passed one that had not yet
passed, he was picked up by the two men who pounded him on the concrete
pavement then threw him into the lorry. There were looters and the Japanese
showed no sympathy for those poor people, they would sic [sic] their dogs on
looters. There was one tied to a street lamp post close to where we were living
and we would have to pass by him. It was a cold winter and he was dressed in
very light clothing. There was nothing we could do to help him, we would be
punished had we tried. After three days without water or food he died and his
body was removed.’24
Earlier that year escaped Prisoner of War (POW) Professor Lindsay Ride
of the University of Hong Kong had established the British Army Aid Group
(BAAG) in China. Other escapees joined him. One was Doctor Robert Scriven
of the Indian Medical Services, and his medical work started (in Waichow) on
April 5. In the mornings he treated local people, but the stream of refugees
from Hong Kong was by then so large that he dedicated his afternoons to
them, averaging 200 patients per day.25
At that time the main stream of refugees coming out from Hong Kong
passed through Kukong (today Shaoguan, 韶關) but a number also came via
Kwangchowwan (Guangzhouwan, 廣州灣) and Macau, and so the BAAG
set up a branch office in Kweilin (Guilin, 桂林). Hong Kong Government
servants were treated as though their positions were abolished and each man
on establishing his identity was given six months’ pay up to 30 June 1942
plus the arrears of his pay for December 1941, together with either one or
three months’ pay in lieu of notice depending upon whether he was on the
temporary or permanent establishment. In addition to salary, officers were
given the rent and high cost of living allowances to which they were entitled.26
The students of Hong Kong University formed another category in need
of relief and it was decided that a special effort should be made to care for
them. Professor Gordon King, Dean of the Medical Faculty of Hong Kong
University (who had himself escaped from Hong Kong) was entrusted with
their care. He visited Kukong in April to see what assistance was needed, to
38
Tony Banham
arrange for their entry into Chinese colleges or universities, and to provide
them with funds to enable this. Through the assistance of the Chinese
authorities 280 were accepted by Chinese educational institutions, generally
provided with free board, lodging and tuition.27
On 24 October 1942 the Americans launched their first air raid on
Hong Kong. There would be nine more in 1943, a further nine in 1944, and
eleven in 1945. The 1945 raids on 21 January and 4 April—primarily in the
Wanchai area—would be particularly heavy. In total some 10,000 civilians
were killed by these attacks (though we can assume the majority of these were
included in Selwyn-Clarke’s annual totals below) and 160,000 flat dwellers
were made homeless.28
Overall, Selwyn-Clarke reported for the full year 1942 that there were
82,435 reported and documented deaths and 10,343 births. 29 From the
summary executions described above we can assume that no fewer than 2,000
should be added to the former number, giving 84,435 in total. However, there
was more to Selwyn-Clarke’s reported 10,343 deliveries for the year than met
the eye. ‘One time, after a long hard night of delivering babies, I looked at
the calendar thoughtfully. October 1942. A little over nine months since the
Japanese had overrun Hong Kong, and now this deluge of maternity cases…’30
So taking the end of 1941 population estimate, subtracting the Japanese
account of the number who left, and the calculation of those who died, and
then adding in those who were born during the year, we should expect a 1
January 1943 population of some 932,633 to 962,633.31
1943
According to BAAG, at the end of 1942 the Japanese authorities still
calculated the number of inhabitants to be around one million, but: ‘A census
of February 1943 gave a figure of 968,524’.32 This matches our upper estimate
surprisingly well.
But the number was still considerably above the number the Japanese
authorities were aiming for, so in March they announced that ‘derelicts’ would
be given free passage to China but would have to leave Hong Kong by April.33
It didn’t work; clearly those who thought that leaving offered the best
option had already left voluntarily. But by the middle of the year starvation was
rampant, and ‘people with bloated faces dragged themselves about on swollen
feet, and the corpses of some 300 famine victims were found on the pavements
Civilian Fatalities in WWII
39
each morning and hauled off in carts.’34 Now the Japanese army started removing
derelicts or ‘rice buckets’ and whether they liked it or not ‘they were put aboard
motorised junks and dropped off, at the rate of around 2,000 a week, on the
plague-ridden coast of Guangdong or on one of the barren and uninhabited
islands on the fringes of the colony, to fend for themselves.’35 BAAG reckoned:
‘During June, July, and August the Japanese forcibly repatriated one batch of
refugees each month. Each batch consisted of between 1,200 and 1,600 refugees
of all ages, who had been arrested in Hong Kong and sent away in wooden junks,
usually at about the middle of the month. In every case the refugees were driven
ashore at some deserted place on the coast line of the Taipang (Dapeng, 大鵬)
Peninsula and left to fend for themselves as best they could in an area of which
they knew nothing and in which they had no friends.’36 Others noted that: ‘Hordes
of Hong Kong’s common people were rounded up, packed aboard trains, taken
across to the border at Shumchun (Shenzhen, 深圳) on the mainland, and driven
inland like cattle. Other thousands were crowded into junks and driven ashore on
arrival at the China coast, to trek for hundreds of miles on foot to reach safety in
the interior. Many of these God-forsaken people fell into the hands of pirates and
bandits on the way.’37
There are also many stories of civilians being put in junks and either
sunk or simply dumped on uninhabited islands. For example, Selwyn SewlynClarke noted post-war: ‘But it was not simply starvation that reduced the
population by about a million. There was forced evacuation of the inhabitants,
sometimes by picking them up in the streets and taking them by lorry-loads
to junks in the harbour. These were towed out to sea and sunk or set on fire,
charred bodies floating ashore afterwards.’38
While no one could help those abandoned on deserted islands, BAAG
found it within their duty to aid those on the mainland:
There is another reason why I believe it was incumbent on us to
undertake this work and that is that these people were refugees from a
British Colony and no British organisation (especially when it was the
only medical organisation worth anything in the area) could stand by and
do nothing about it. The result is that now there are some thousands of
Chinese who realise that even though they were driven out of the Colony,
the British still honoured their obligation towards them if only in a small
degree. Perhaps this aspect of the work can best be understood if I quote
from a letter from Major Clague to P.C.M. Sedgwick, Esq., of the Refugee
40
Tony Banham
Relief Department, then in Kukong: ‘When we arrived we found there
was absolutely nothing whatsoever being done for Hong Kong Refugees.
Is this the British Government Policy? At that time there were wrecks of
people if the word people can be used to describe the bundles of skin and
bone we saw, lying in a state of advanced starvation. No one cared. No
one did anything for them. They were guests of China.’39
So the BAAG shouldered the major problem of looking after them.
‘Their plight was mainly due to malnutrition and starvation and our medical
unit initiated relief measures with such success that it stimulated the local
authorities to form a committee to take over the work.’40 But the fact was that
BAAG (and others who helped) were by now completely overwhelmed by the
scale of the refugee problem. Everywhere their agents went they came across
Hong Kong refugees. ‘The party arrived in Tamshui (Danshui, 淡水) on the
afternoon of the 22 June, having picked up one small refugee girl at a place
called Wing Wu (Yonghu, 永湖). This girl had apparently been abandoned
and is presumed to have been one of the large batch of refugees recently landed
on the shore of Bias Bay by the Japanese authorities.’41 And Ronnie Holmes
reported:
In Saihang we overtook 4 refugee women in the last stage of emaciation
and fatigue. They asked for matches, saying they had been walking for
more than 10 days and for 3 days had not even had hot water to drink.
They were not certain where they had been put ashore but it must have
been somewhere on the Taipang peninsula... I gave them $50, told them
the distance to Tamshui, and told them that they would be given congee
when they reached Tamshui. Although Tamshui is only 3 1/2 hours walk,
I am by no means certain that these 4 women would ever reach there’.42
The local inhabitants were also struggling to help:
Whilst in Tamshui we also met a Chairman Tsang, the Chairman of the
Tamshui Chamber of Commerce and Mr. Yip Tuen Pun, a prominent
member of the Chamber of Commerce… They claim they have so far
been able to do the following services for all destitute refugees entering
Tamshui from the South:
a) supply 2 bowls of congee per day to each man
Civilian Fatalities in WWII
41
b) transport all refugees to Waichow (Huizhou, 惠州) in wooden boats and
c) bury the dead.
Chairman Tsang on behalf of the Chamber of Commerce asked that
anything possible should be done to lift this burden from the shoulders of
the Tamshui community.43
But the numbers kept increasing:
The Japanese policy is apparently to collect destitute people in HK and,
when they have collected a number usually between 1000 and 2000, to
remove them from HK and put them ashore somewhere on the Po On
(Bao'an, 寶安) coast. It is extremely difficult to keep accurate figures or
dates but I would say with some hesitation that probably at least one
month has elapsed in the past between each exodus. These unfortunate
people are not necessarily put ashore on the Taipang peninsula, but if
they should be put ashore in this area the distress already existing there
makes it almost impossible at the moment for the refugees to be given the
assistance necessary to get them to any place where real help can be given.
The fact that they are usually in a half-starved condition before they even
leave HK adds considerably to the difficulty of handling the problem
when they reach Chinese territory.44
And then: ‘In 1943, famine in Eastern Kwangtung aggravated the
condition of the helpless refugees, and the BAAG applied for funds to carry
out a major relief programme.’45
It was a humanitarian disaster. But even this ruthless expulsion was still
not enough to relieve Hong Kong’s shortages of food and supplies. Despite
Selwyn-Clarke’s reported statistics for 1943 (40,117 deaths and 20,732 births):
‘In desperation the Japanese started another spurt of deportation. To get rid
of further ‘rice buckets’ they began seizing people in the streets like fowl and
herding them into detention centers until fleets of junks were ready to transport
them to the China coast. Families waited frantically at home for their missing
ones and pandemonium spread through Hong Kong like wildfire.’46
Report No. 3 by Major Ronnie Holmes, 24 July 1943:
On 16 July 43 four junk loads of refugees were driven ashore at a point
somewhere between Tung Ching (possibly Dong Chong, 東沖) and Yeung Mui
Tony Banham
42
Hang (Yangmeikeng, 楊梅坑) in the southern half of the Taipang Peninsula.
The numbers have been variously estimated at between 1,200 and 1,400.’47
Assuming that the total was 1,300, he estimated that: ‘300 will return to HK by
boat from Nam O (Nan'ao, 南澳), 100 have connections in Waiyeung (Huiyang,
惠陽) and Po On Districts and can be left to look after themselves, 150 will die
in any case before they can reach Tamshui, about 750 are helpless but fit enough
to be able to reach the Waichow refugee camp if given enough help.48
An unknown BAAG author added:
Furthermore, no matter whether they try to return to Hong Kong or try to
make their way into Free China, many die on the road. During my recent
journeys in that area I have seen at least 40 corpses of refugees lying by
the roadside. Local authorities in the Third Sector of the Po On District
have given me rough figures of the numbers buried at public expense and
although I am not certain of the accuracy of these figures I should estimate
that between 450 and 600 refugees have died of starvation by the roadside
in the third Sector during the last two and a half months. This figure
does not include those who have died on the road between Kwaichung
(Kuichong, 葵涌) and Tamshui and in Tamshui itself.49
If we continue to accept the Japanese figures, we can assume that 319,000
more Hong Kong residents left or were deported during 1943 (many of whom
clearly perished). From Selwyn-Clarke’s accounts, 40,117 deaths must be added
to this figure, balanced partly by 20,732 births. Thus the overall reduction in
population for the year would be 338,385. Applied to the range of numbers at
the end of 1942, this gives us total populations for the end of 1943 of:
932,633 – 338,385 = 594,248
962,633 – 338,385 = 624,248
1944
Probably because of the pressure that the Japanese were under by this time,
there are no known census figures for the start of 1944. Deaths and evictions
continued and:
Civilian Fatalities in WWII
43
In March 1944 recruitment posters went up inviting able-bodied young
men to come out of the colony and earn good money working in the gold
mines on Hainan Island, near Vietnam. Over the following months a
total of 7,000 Chinese applied to take part in the programme. They were
packed off to Hainan without ceremony and put to work on road building
sites and in iron mines (not gold ones), where 5,000 of them eventually
died from starvation, overwork and disease.50
It is no coincidence that there are fewer records for 1944 than the
preceding years. There were fewer people, and they had less energy. The city
had become a shell of its former self.
From January 1944 the Occupation Government resumed the mandatory
evacuation campaign, ordering the removal of a further 150,000 civilians from
the Colony. The turn of 1944–45 was recalled as the worst period for the mass
deportations. ‘Smart and shabby alike were picked up and corralled behind
rope barriers, ready to be consigned to the transit camps and the deportation
boats.’51 For the purpose of this study I will make the assumption that this
removal was carried out in full, included the Hainan number (in 1944), and
was otherwise evenly split over the two years.
Thus we are assuming that 75,000 more left the Colony this year. In
Hong Kong itself for 1944, Selwyn-Clarke reported 24,936 deaths and 13,687
births. This results in a total reduction of 86,249. Applying that to the
range of end of 1943 numbers above, for the end of 1944 we get Hong Kong
population estimates of:
594,248 – 86,249 = 507,999
624,248 – 86,249 = 537,999
(While starting with a different—and suspiciously round for a census—
number, BAAG came to a similar conclusion: ‘The census taken on 12 March
1944 showed a total of 750,000 people, but after the suspension of the public rice
rationing scheme on 15 April 1944 the high cost of rice led to a renewed exodus
from the Colony. No reliable estimate of the numbers that have left since that
time can be made, but a report received in September 1944 placed the population
unofficially between 600,000 and 700,000. It is believed, however, that the
actual population was somewhat less, possibly between 500,000 and 600,000.’)52
Tony Banham
44
1945
By the start of 1945 the situation in Hong Kong was appalling. Most probably
between 500,000 and 550,000 people remained, but there was very little food
and the Japanese were desperately trying to evict yet more of the population.
While in the past two years the number of births had been roughly half the
number of deaths, in 1945 the birth rate dropped to just over 15% of the
deaths; Selwyn-Clarke reported 23,098 deaths and just 3,712 births up until
liberation.
In 1945 the Rosary Hill Red Cross camp closed, and its inhabitants were
shipped to Macau. (Throughout the occupation, Macau had been relatively
accessible. Many of Hong Kong’s people had fled there, and as conditions
worsened many more followed.)
Cut off from supplies, like many locations under Japanese control, Hong
Kong had been left to wither on the vine. The American blockade and war
of attrition against the Japanese had been very successful, as illustrated by
the demographics. This once vibrant city, with the wherewithal to welcome
hundreds of thousands of refugees just a few years earlier, had almost lost the
ability to support life. When the arrival of warships at the end of August that
year finally heralded the end of war, the remaining few didn’t comment on
whether they were British, Chinese, or American. They simply said: ‘now we
can eat.’53
But there were few left to comment. Using the estimate of a further
75,000 deportations, and adjusting for Selwyn-Clarke’s figures, we can
calculate that the population dropped in 1945 by a further 94,386, giving the
final range:
507,999 – 94,386 = 413,613
537,999 – 94,386 = 443,613
Conclusion
So, based on the information presented above, let us consider again how Hong
Kong’s population fluctuated over the war years. Taking the lower 1941
census figure of 1,564,725, and adding 100,000 more refugees before the
Japanese invasion of December in which four thousand perished we get:
Civilian Fatalities in WWII
45
1941: Deaths 4,000: total remaining: 1,660,725
1942: Deaths 84,435, births 10,343, departed 654,000: total remaining:
932,633
1943: Deaths 40,117, births 20,732, departed 319,000: total remaining:
594,248
1944: Deaths 24,936, births 13,687, departed 75,000: total remaining:
507,999
1945: Deaths 23,098, births 3,712, departed 75,000: total remaining:
413,613
The final number (if we apply the upper 1941 census figure instead) is then
443,613 or, if we adjust based on the Japanese census of February 1943, 449,504,
(which is an extremely close match). Clearly, however, none of these reconcile
perfectly with the liberators’ estimates of 500,000 to 600,000. It is not clear how
these 1945 estimates were arrived at, or exactly when, therefore they may have
been exaggerated. If not, the reasons for the population being higher could be:
a) An underestimate of the New Territories’ population in 1941.
b) Further refugees (beyond those estimated) arriving in the nine
months between the 1941 census and the start of hostilities.
c) Japanese over-counting of deportees 1942/43.
d) The Japanese plan for deporting 150,000 in 1944/45 not being
completed.
e) A high number of returnees, as reported by BAAG.
It could also, of course, be caused by a combination of any or all of these
factors.
We have established that there were a total of 176,586 recorded civilian
deaths in Hong Kong during the fighting and occupation (which we must
assume is an underestimate as it is only 2,000 more than Selwyn-Clarke’s
officially reported figures). Next we need to estimate the number of deaths
among those who left Hong Kong, and to do that we must first calculate the
number of leavers. Ignoring Japanese figures for the moment, if we start with
the higher December 1941 population estimate of 1,694,725, subtract the
176,586 deaths, add the 48,474 births, and subtract the lower 1945 estimate
(500,000), we see that 1,066,613 people left. Doing the same for the lower
initial estimate and the higher final estimate, we get 936,613. If, on the other
hand, we simply use the Japanese figures for those who left then we have a
total of 1,123,000.
46
Tony Banham
We are told that 5,000 of the 7,000 young men shipped to Hainan did
not return (and thus presumably perished), which leaves 931,613, 1,061,613,
or 1,118,000 largely unaccounted for.
The fate of these people is primarily anecdotal (it seems that every Hong
Kong family I have ever asked has said that they lost members—either killed
or simply never seen again—during the wartime period); BAAG and others
confirm that many perished after arrival on the mainland. Although it is
impossible to calculate precise numbers, I believe a reasonable estimate would
be a model mortality rate of fifty-five per thousand per year.54 Over three years
and eight months this would give 153,056, 172,982, and 181,137 deaths.55
So the total number of fatalities could be calculated as:
Lower British
population estimate
176,586
+153,056
=329,642
Higher British
population estimate
176,586
+172,982
=349,568
Japanese figures
176,586
+181,137
=357,723
With so many uncertainties it is foolish to give such precise numbers,
but let us say that no fewer than 320,000 and no more than 360,000 of Hong
Kong’s pre-war civilian population, both long-term and refugees, perished
between 8 December 1941 and 1 September 1945.56
In retrospect it seems odd that Hong Kong, whose people suffered
so much during the Japanese invasion and occupation of 1941–45 has no
memorial to the Chinese civilians who lost their lives during that time. While
it’s true that the Botanical Gardens have a gate—originally commemorating
the Great War, and clearly (and emotively) showing damage sustained in the
Second—that bears the text: ‘In memory of the Chinese who died loyal to the
Allied cause in the wars of 1914–1918 and 1939–1945,’ it is hard to see this
as commensurate with the losses sustained. Singapore, in contrast, has a tall
and impressive memorial dominating the centre of town. It bears the text: ‘In
deep and lasting sorrow this memorial is dedicated in memory of those of our
civilians who were killed between February 15, 1942 and August 18, 1945,
when the Japanese armed forces occupied Singapore.’
While Singapore’s admirable memorial was constructed to remember the
50,000 or so citizens lost during the Second World War,57 Hong Kong, which
this paper demonstrates lost approximately six times as many civilians, has
built none. Admittedly the period under examination is now many years ago,
Civilian Fatalities in WWII
47
and those to blame for the deaths are themselves now dead. But it seems in this
analysis that Hong Kong’s victims have not so much been forgotten, as never
recognised in the first place. Now that in retrospect we can finally describe
the scale of the loss, perhaps this is the time for Hong Kong to commission an
appropriate memorial to all the civilian victims of this sad and cruel period.
Notes
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
G.B. Endacott, Hong Kong Eclipse (Hong Kong: Oxford University Press, 1978) p. 11.
Reported in the Hongkong Telegraph of 4 April 1941, as ‘revealed by the Deputy
Director of Air Raid Precautions, Mr B.H. Puckle, at a Press interview this
morning’. The Hong Kong Legislative Council noted on the 24th of that month:
‘This highly useful census work lay completely outside the proper duties of the
Corps and entailed a great deal of labour upon them.’ Note that the Endacott
reference above estimated 200,000 for the New Territories.
Hong Kong Eclipse, p. 142. Unfortunately although this range (and the higher and
lower figures by themselves) turns up repeatedly, I have not yet found the original
source of this estimation.
Hong Kong Eclipse, p. 11.
The 1931 census had calculated ‘other races’ as 28,322 in 1931. Unfortunately
the 1941 census did not make this distinction, so all have been included in the
civilian numbers as if they were local Chinese and must be considered as a minor
inaccuracy in all following calculations.
Hong Kong Eclipse, p. 11.
I have not yet found any documentation of arrivals in that period. The Hong Kong
Daily Press reported regularly on the number of refugees in the Colony, but only
those few accommodated in Government camps. For example, on 26 September
1941 they quoted a total of 11,759 spread between King’s Park (1,393), Ma Tau
Chung (2,166), North Point (1,571), Morrison Hill (552), Tai Hang (2,541),
Ngau Tau Kok (823), Kam Tin (2,314), and Fanling Children’s Camp (399). As
both the British and Japanese started to tighten up border controls in 1940, and
at least one source (Hong Kong Eclipse p. 142) claims that the population decreased
before December 1941, more research is needed here.
Post-war statement of Charles Mycock, Essential Service, dated 15 November
1945 and taken by Detective Hedwig of the New Zealand Police. Mycock was
Commandant of the Taikoo Braemar Dispersal Area for Refugees. The original is
held by grandchild Lee Hunter.
Fr T. Ryan, Jesuits under Fire in the Siege of Hong Kong (London: Burns, Oates &
Washbourne, 1944) p. 135
48
Tony Banham
10 Wenzell Brown, Hong Kong Aftermath (New York: Smith & Durrell, 1943) p. 24.
There are of course far more accounts of shootings by Japanese forces, though it
is an open secret that the Hong Kong Police summarily shot many looters and
suspected fifth columnists.
11 Tony Banham, Not the Slightest Chance (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University
Press, 2003) p. 84. Such emergency cemeteries certainly existed. The Police
War Diary, for example, states: ‘[The officer in charge at Aberdeen] supervised
the digging of cemeteries at Apleichau Refuse Dump and the hill side behind
Aberdeen Temple for burial of unclaimed bodies’. From Bethell’s comments it
appears he was at the Upper Station on Caine Road at the time.
12 Selwyn Selwyn-Clarke, Footprints: The Memoirs of Sir Selwyn Selwyn-Clarke (Hong
Kong: Sino American, 1975) p. 69: ‘In approximate figures four thousand civilians
had been killed, and three thousand severely wounded.’
13 The Japanese reckoned 5,000 Singaporean Chinese were killed, and the Singaporeans
70,000. There seems little doubt it was far closer to the latter number.
14 Footprints, page 69. Bones and bullets have turned up regularly in the Big Wave
Bay sands ever since.
15 Li Shu-Fan, Hong Kong Surgeon (London: Victor Gollancz, 1964) p. 111.
16 Kenneth G. Baird, Letters to Harvelyn (Toronto: Harper Collins, 2002) p. 45, 11
January 1942. On the 12th he adds: ‘Thousands more Chinese are going along the
road that disappears over the hill.’
17 Letters to Harvelyn, page 41.
18 See Hong Kong Eclipse, page 12, for a description.
19 Benjamin Proulx, Underground from Hong Kong (New York: Dutton, 1943) p. 160.
He estimated that 10,000 left per day.
20 Hong Kong Eclipse, page 142.
21 Bill Wiseman, Hong Kong: Recollections of a British POW (Canada: Veterans’
Publications, 2001) p. 27. The BMH on Bowen Road still exists at time of
writing (2019). While the distance would have been too great to see individuals, a
large mass of people would indeed have been visible.
22 https://www.jacar.archives.go.jp (reference code: C01000056300). My thanks to
Dr Chi Man Kwong for his assistance in this research.
23 From: Hong Kong under Military Administration, a Japanese book, Hong Kong
Oriental Economics Co 1944, created under the auspices of Information Dept.,
Office of Governor-General for Occupied Territory of Hong Kong.
24 Cecilia Burroughs (nee Yvanovich), as recounted to the author. This recollection
was from ‘late spring’ 1942.
25 Elizabeth Ride, B.A.A.G. Series Volume V. Printed and distributed by Special
Collections, The University of Hong Kong Libraries (no date), page 1. He also
treated wounded soldiers and guerillas.
Civilian Fatalities in WWII
49
26 BAAG Report On The Refugee Relief Department from March to December
1942. Via Elizabeth Ride.
27 Ibid.
28 Hong Kong Eclipse, page 299. Unexploded bombs from the Wanchai attack are
still being found today, with three one thousand pound bombs being found and
defused in the first half of 2018 alone.
29 Footprints, page 69. The remainder of the figures are from Selwyn-Clarke, Report
on Medical and Health Conditions in Hong Kong for the Period 1st January 1942 – 31
August 1945 (London: HMSO, 1946). As Selwyn-Clarke’s precision implies, the
burials were those officially recorded, and therefore certainly an underestimate as
many bodies were not formally dealt with.
30 Hong Kong Surgeon, page 121.
31 At the start of the year 1942: 1,560,725 to 1,590,725 as at March 1941, plus
100,000. Subtract 654,000 who left (according to my interpretation of Japanese
figures). Subtract 84,435 reported and estimated deaths. Add 10,343 reported
births. Note that a percentage of those who left would also have perished; this
reckoning will be added later.
32 Hong Kong Eclipse, page 142. BAAG reported earlier: ‘The census returns
of December 1942 showed a population of 1,012,707 in HONGKONG,
KOWLOON, the New Territories and surrounding islands. Included in the
figure were 1,001,441 Chinese, 4,002 Japanese and 7,264 of other nationalities.’
(A Summary of Conditions in Occupied Hong Kong, 1 March 1945, by Douglas
Clague. WO/208/7117).
33 Philip Snow, The Fall of Hong Kong: Britain, China and the Japanese Occupation (New
Haven and London: Yale, 2003) p. 154.
34 Ibid., p. 167.
35 Ibid., p. 167.
36 BAAG Volume VII, p. 55.
37 Hong Kong Surgeon, p. 160.
38 Footprints, p. 69. My thanks to Tim Ko for additional colour here.
39 BAAG Volume V, p. 33.
40 Ibid., p. 4.
41 BAAG Volume VII, p. 17.
42 Ibid., p. 24. He had earlier observed: ‘It will be remembered that when Mr. Lo
Hung Sui covered this road on his earlier expedition he found many refugees dead
or dying along the road. This time however we saw few traces of the passing of
refugees except a few new graves and one skeleton lying ominously across our path.’
43 Ibid., p. 19.
44 BAAG Volume VII, p. 26.
45 Ibid., p. 15.
50
Tony Banham
46 Hong Kong Surgeon, p. 161.
47 BAAG Volume VII, p. 41.
48 Ibid., p. 42. He continued: ‘On 20 July 43 I walked from Taipang City to
Tamshui via Kwaichung. On the road Wong Mo Hui/Kwaichung I passed about
12 corpses of refugees who had recently died and I found in Kwaichung itself
many refugees who were suffering acutely from starvation.’
49 BAAG Volume VII, p. 56.
50 The Fall of Hong Kong, p. 213.
51 Ibid. quoting WO 235/999.
52 WO/208/7117.
53 The Fall of Hong Kong, p. 259.
54 Crude Death Rates for China in this period do not appear to be available. The
earliest, from around 1960, are about 25 to 27 per thousand. And although
estimates of civilian deaths in China due to the war vary, the consensus seems to
be around 3% of the population (this is for a period longer than 1941–45, but I
think it fair to apply to the Hong Kong refugees as their experience was probably
more dangerous than average). So I have added an estimated 25 per thousand
per year for 1940s peacetime, plus 30 per thousand per year for war. Although
Holmes (above) estimated that more than 10% of the refugees he saw landed in
mid-43 would die almost immediately, it would be unsafe to apply this number
to the refugees as a whole.
55 Here I have applied the model mortality rate of 55 per 1,000 per year to the
estimated Hong Kong refugee population surviving in China each year. Thus
in 1942 it is simply the 654,000 who departed that year, in 1943 those who
survived from 1942 plus those who arrived in 1943, etc., though obviously this is
imperfect. For the lower estimates of those unaccounted for I simply reduced the
estimates of those departed by the same percentage.
56 Applying the same peacetime model mortality for the entire pre-war population
for the same period would have given some 152,322 expected natural deaths. In
other words, the war caused the unnaturally early deaths of more than 177,000.
57 The Singapore Chinese Chamber of Commerce and Industry gathered the remains
of the victims where they could, and initiated the creation of this memorial.
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