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15 Independent Observation Battery Royal Artillery, Lo Wu, New Territories
February 28 through May 23 1950
15 Independent Observation Battery RA is Formed
Returning to my story, on the Devonshire we heard the unit was to be stationed in the New Territories under canvas but little else. After our run ashore and one more night on ship we disembarked to begin our service in Hong Kong.
While my memory of arriving at Hong Kong was clear, I originally had no recollection of exactly how we moved from the dock to our new home at Lo Wu. In describing our trip I relied on others’ memories for my description of first mustering at nearby Whitfield Barracks and the formation of 15th Independent Observation Battery RA 1 However, a fellow member of 15 Battery who found this memoir and arrived on the Devonshire with me, informs that we went directly to Lo Wu via rail then trucks. The formation of our battery must then have been aboard the Devonshire, and it served one more night as our home.
Our battery was made up of the following troops: A, Observation, into which I went, along with the majority of 98 squad, C, Sound Ranging and X, Survey. Each troop was made up of about 40 personnel, surveyors, signalers and drivers. There was also an HQ troop. With officers and NCOs we probably numbered about 180. We were commanded by a Major JS Dacre.
Lo Wu Camp By Rail and Truck
Next day we marched the short distance from the Devonshire to the railway station in Kowloon, near the great Peninsula Hotel and waterfront. I enjoyed the railway station due to my life long love of all things railway. Many aspects of the station looked familiar as it should because the British had built and run it, as they had most others in China. The Kowloon Canton Railway (KCR) on which we were to travel originally ran to Canton, but the communists severed the line at the border, Lo Wu, our last stop.
Receiving the correction described above about how we got to Lo Wu, prompted a review of my records of that time. Finding a picture of us all at Fanling railway station was a pleasant surprise. Rather than insert it here, I have created a blog entry about as this seems a good way to illustrate the interactive nature of these web abased memoirs, and focus on an item of interest me, the railway station.
Our train was special, made up of American style carriages and pulled by a steam engine of a type familiar to me that was built in Britain. Heading north it took us under Lion Rock in a tunnel past the mountain Tai Mo Shan (3,144 ft) and through the countryside providing our first sights of paddy fields with Chinese peasants working in them. The trip continued alongside water in various bays and the expanse of Tolo harbor, past the small town of Tai Po and in the distance the mountains of mainland China and then to Fanling. A very neat little station in what appeared a well ordered community.
Here with our kit bags and gear we mustered and got onto lorries or trucks that left the made roads and took us along rough tracks further north and toward the frontier. At the end of one track were several corrugated iron Nissen huts and a series of tents arranged among terraced paddy fields, Lo Wu Camp. About a mile away was the border with China.
Lo Wu on the Shum Chun River was the crossing point from China by land. Controlled on our side by the Hong Kong Police, it was the entry point for many refugees from the mainland. To here the trains ran from inland China. Entry for those allowed into Hong Kong was over a bridge where once admitted refugees continued by train or walked with their bags and baggage along the tracks. This was a constant sight. Not all refugees arrived by land, many attempted to gain entry by sea. It was a chronic problem.
Located in an isolated position on open ground that had been terraced paddy fields, the camp was set below a range of hills. Previous units stationed in the New Territories had cut their regimental badges into these hills. On the other side of the broad valley some good distance away was another range of higher hills. Through this intensely cultivated valley full of paddy fields ran the Shum Chun River that eventually discharged to the west into Deep Bay and then the sea.
Here we were to spend nearly 3 months. Our first tasks were to settle in, and get the unit and our camp into a soldierly state, and as I recall I think we were the first unit to occupy it. First, we fetched and unpacking each and every item we were likely to require and stored it in either more tents or the two or three storage huts. Second, we dug monsoon trenches around all the tents and various holes for the ablutions and latrines. It was hard work in very humid conditions in concrete like soil. After our first introduction to digging holes in the Colony, we became expert with pick and spade. We once again carried out customary fatigues and guard duty. The guards were however different in that we were issued with and carried a clip of live ammunition. This long, hard and arduous labor after the “soft” voyage began to toughen us up, and acclimatize us to the conditions.
Lo Wu Camp – Officers and NCOs
At this stage we became aware of our Troop Officers and NCOs. The Troop was commanded by a Captain Tilburn, a pleasant and decent enough fellow, with a Lieutenant Laird. We did not see much of the CO, Major Dacre who was I think already serving in Hong Kong when we arrived. He did not live in camp and share its delights with us for he had a house inland somewhere with his wife and several horses. He seemed, however, reasonable enough notwithstanding having come from, I think, the Indian Army, not bothering us unduly with a strict regimental attitude. Here we had the benefit of being an Independent Battery and having no regimental hierarchy to satisfy.
The senior NCOs we found were intelligent and acted fairly toward us. The Troop SM was BSM Baglow “Baggy” a surveyor, and as we got to know him found he was something of a character. Our Surveyor Sergeants were Hale and Mason and “Nobby” Hall the Signals Sergeant. Sergeant Hale was the senior, most intellectual and somewhat distant, Mason, the other surveyor sergeant younger, an accomplished amateur artist and friendly while Nobby had seen long and hard service and liked his beer. They were Regular soldiers and had had much experience in survey units and under active service conditions. We got to know our sergeants well when working with them in close proximity out in the field on survey activities in relaxed conditions. Between us there was a mutual respect. On parade they could be as regimental as the occasion required.
Bombardier ‘S’ was still with us if in body and not as a surveyor. I cannot recall him ever being of use or assistance in that field. But given us to order about he was in his element. It was Sergeants Hale and Mason with whom we spent our time on survey matters. There was another Bombardier named Smith who was a happy enough fellow. I cannot remember other NCOs, but there must have been some. From time to time we also became aware of the other Troop officers and NCOs, but who they were I cannot now recall.
Conditions in camp to say the least were primitive. The approach was a dry, dusty and rough track that wound through the paddy fields for some distance. In the monsoon conditions the track quickly turned to mud and vehicles using it vehicles regularly bogged down. When stuck, if they could not be winched or hauled out by another truck, we were called out to retrieve them by setting to and with our shoulders, pushing them out of the deep mud and muck.
This awful track made the conditions in camp worse. Most serious of these was that there was no laid on water supply. All the drinking water was trucked in by tanker, as well as that for washing. Our situation became somewhat precarious when the tanker got stuck. Similarly our food supply was short when the ration truck got stuck – the food itself was inadequate and poor and we were often hungry. When the mail truck could not get through, mail from home was disrupted and delayed. Mail was most important to us. We became in those circumstances rather isolated.
With this lack of a proper water supply to the camp site and with only water delivered by tanker and needed primarily for drinking and cooking there was consequently a great shortage of it for washing and other necessities. Another crudity was that the latrines were open pits. In the heat and humidity these became exceedingly obnoxious infested with flies and the like. The Naafi and mess hall were huts.
The tents in which we lived and slept were sited on what been paddy fields. They were square in shape and held six. The sides could be rolled up. Coarse matting covered the bare ground. There was no electricity and we had no light after dark. We slept on our biscuits 2 on metal bed frames and under mosquito nets. We assembled the bed by placing three or four wooden slats length ways and putting the biscuits on top. This arrangement provided a home for more pesky insects, bed bugs, that lived between the biscuits and boards.
Lo Wu and all the New Territories were malarial areas and after sunset the mosquitoes became a persistent nuisance. Many other peculiar insects, flies and bugs, too many to count, plagued us. All in all it was a little rough.
Apart from our ‘boxes soldier’ – a kind of foot locker – and orange boxes which we scrounged to put at our bedsides as a makeshift, there was no furniture or other comforts in the tents. I noticed, as I had before in the early days at Oswestry, that those who had been in the Boy Scouts and done some camping adapted more readily to this life under canvas.
At first I didn’t mind it at all. It was always a pleasure to lie in bed and with the tent walls rolled up look at the stars. On hot humid nights it was pleasant enough to have a breeze through the tent. It was not so pleasant when in the middle of the night there was a tropical downpour and the walls had to be lowered. The worst part was finding a mosquito in the net and having to hunt it down for some peace before one could sleep.
The routine in camp was Reveille at 6 am, then a wash and shave either at the ablutions a long walk away or if the water was off there out of a mess tin outside the tent, paludrine parade, where to combat malaria under the sergeant’s eye one was given and then had to swallow a paludrine pill, a walk to the cookhouse of about a ¼ mile for breakfast at 7 am and then parade at 8 30. If in camp we finished around 4 pm and then we made up our beds putting our mosquito nets up. Dinner was between 5 and 6, and by 6pm long trousers had to be worn and jacket sleeves rolled down to prevent the mosquitoes biting. After that if not on guard or duty, there was no where else to go, or little to do other than a visit to the Naafi, and I noted I was generally in bed by 9 pm.
The Naafi as ever provided some refuge from our tents but it was always full and noisy. Here was the only radio from which the BBC could be heard, but it was mainly tuned to an American station, Radio Manilla. I do recall though standing outside in the dark and damp of an evening while on guard listening to an account of the 1950 Boat Race, that event striking me as incongruous in the circumstances. Our Naafi was home to the inevitable piano. It was also one of the few places in camp that had electric light.
One could get something to eat and a drink of beer, char, (tea) or real orangeade made by Watsons; a superb thirst quencher. Here we were introduced to what became part of our staple diet – the ‘egg Banjo’- or a fried egg on fried bread. San Miguel beer was sold (and now with an international repute), but I never acquired a taste for it finding it too sweet and perfumed. Many of the regulars did like it to excess and on pay nights, Fridays and Saturdays, the atmosphere was more like a saloon in a western film. Some regulars never even left camp preferring to spend their free time drinking whilst their money lasted. One ritual here and elsewhere was that the drinkers retained on the their tables all the empty bottles as the session progressed. By evenings end it was totally covered. I had never seen the like before.
Occasionally a mobile army film unit would brave the tracks to our location and provide some ‘entertainment’ with a film show in the mess hut. They would set up a projector and if the electricity supply allowed and attempt to show a film. They were all black and white, in appalling condition and with a sound track one could not hear. They really were not worth watching. But they were something to do of an evening, and as on ship the comic and ribald comments from the audience were the best of the entertainment.
These film shows were fairly regular, when the truck could get through, but the Major’s wife in her ‘welfare capacity’ on one occasion organized a ‘treat’ for us; a real live amateur concert party with some attractive girls, singers and the like. This was well done and well received, but it only happened the once in the whole of my service.
Keeping oneself clean was difficult. Water was as described, in very short supply. One had to often wash and shave in no more than a mess tin of cold water and when none was ‘on’ in the ablutions we often washed in water in a concrete channel that ran down from the hills above. It was rare for the showers in camp to have water and even then it was erratic. Whether the water there was hot or not I cannot recall but I doubt it. From time to time we were trucked to Fanling to have showers in a camp there or occasionally a mobile shower unit would visit.
When too we could go swimming it was an opportunity to get wet all over. And when we could get into Victoria, again if the water was on, the China Fleet Club offered hot baths. Even in Kowloon and on Hong Kong Island there was a chronic shortage of water that persisted through my entire service, and in fact the bulk of the supply came from mainland China.
Monsoon rains provided another opportunity for a shower. When it did rain one could strip off and attempt to wash and shower but it proved surprising how hard that was to achieve even in what seems to be torrential rain.
We, of course, wore very little when working during the day. Boots, shorts or denims and a hat were the customary attire. So we all acquired very deep tans. Here we were issued with our jungle hats and very comfortable they were too. It was possible in wearing them to adopt your own style, which given the army need for conformity was a welcome chance for individuality to show itself. We were issued too with monsoon capes which hung from the shoulders to ankle, like a poncho, and were a lot easier to wear and work in when it rained They also kept you reasonably dry, except you never stopped sweating profusely.
The period of the annual monsoon rains occurred not long after we had arrived. In anticipation of these rains, we had dug the monsoon trenches and drains. But having had no experience of monsoons, and given the concrete like nature of the soil we had not been overly enthusiastic in our digging and they were not very deep. Those great open gullies I had seen in Singapore and noted along the roads in Hong Kong were, of course, I later realized storm drains for the monsoon rains.
The monsoon started with fierce thunderstorms the like of which I had never seen before, and were quite fascinating in their fierceness and intensity; great flashes of fork and sheet lightning across the sky with enormous rolls of thunder through the valley and against the mountains. Then we experienced what force and how much rain they produced. As the rains came so did all the paddy fields fill with water and the peasants set to and planted the rice that as it grew transformed the valley.
Out here in the Territories nothing had changed for the Hakka people who still retained all the ways and traditions of the centuries old China. They lived in small walled villages, each with its head man, a duck pond with its water fowl and its trees, used water buffalo and the women did the bulk of the work in the fields. They all wore black “pajamas” and had huge black veiled straw hats on their heads. They ignored us.
Their traditions included the veneration of their ancestors. On many of the hills were small grotto like constructions and urns containing remains which we would come across when up there. What surprised us one evening were lines of fire extending up the hillsides and then fires lit on all the hills around lighting up the night sky and a clanging and a banging. We found these were processions of mourners with lighted torches and the event a celebration of the dead. For a time we were alarmed. It made a wonderful sight.
But in one tremendous storm we got flooded out. Off the hillside and through the terraces rushed the muddy water until several inches filled each tent. Squaddies were out in it hastily deepening the trenches and making ineffectual dams. The terraced site worked against us, the water cascaded down through one series of tents into those below. We were all wet, our kit was soaked with dirty water and everywhere was a sea of mud. None of us had any dry or clean kit. But the event raised morale considerably.
It was impossible with the rain and humidity to keep anything dry and our clothes were constantly damp with molds growing overnight. The sun shone brilliantly and hotly between these storms and things did dry out but the humidity remained.
For clean uniforms and for their washing there was in camp a ‘dhobi’ – a laundry run by a Chinese contractor, Mary Chang, who had the concession. Employing the the most primitive methods, there were, of course, no washing machines or dryers the Chinese nevertheless got good results. The water came out of the same concrete channel we used for washing, it was heated in drums over a fire and the clothes washed by beating them on a stone. Our ‘greens’ being returned to us well pressed and starched. I think we paid a small sum for extra attention to our uniforms prior to guard duties or special occasions.
Surveying, An Observation Post
We were soon busy with survey activities. Even so, and as ever, there were still guards to be done, holes to be dug, fatigues to be performed and periods of little useful activity along with what seemed a constant change of tent. The survey tasks were all interesting, and we then started putting our Larkhill taught skills to work.
One of the first duties we had was manning an Observation Post (OP) dug into the forward slope of Crest Hill a few hundred yards from the border from which we had an extensive view across the Shum Chun River, the border areas and into mainland China. Within the hill were stores and on the rearward side a covered area for cooking over a petrol stove, a thunder box (latrine) and a tent precariously perched on the steep slope through which a gale of wind blew, and in which we attempted to sleep.
A jeep track went part of the way and from its end was a rough track. For a 48 hour guard duty, we had to manpack up all our kit and arms, including live ammunition, water, food, bedding and supplies, a difficult and challenging struggle. One of our fatigues also involved this post, replenishing its stores a very hard toil. From the OP we had a good vantage point to see what was happening, and we kept a 24 hour watch on the actions of the communists on their side of the border with all activities and movements logged. The communists similarly looked at us. They had one post on what we called China Mountain and opposite on our side was one named Robins Nest.
The observation party consisted of an officer, sergeant, three surveyors and the batman/driver who acted as cook and spare hand. I found this quite exciting and I recall spending Easter 1950 on this duty. We were then the most forward soldiers of the British Army. I felt it real soldiering particularly when a party of us ventured out, carrying our arms, to a small village below where we bartered with the villagers for milk and eggs to replenish our provisions. Not all that long before I had been a civilian in suburban Surbiton!
We were also made aware of the communist presence when one morning as we were on parade an aircraft – from the remnants of the Nationalist forces - suddenly flew low overhead and let loose a fusillade of machine gun fire at the communist positions just across the border. It was all over before we could take in what was happening. But it livened up the start of that day. It made us realize too the war in China was not yet over.
Surveying Targets in China
Another task assigned to X Troop were extensive survey schemes to lay base lines and establish bases and survey points to locate targets in China. The survey for this was hard work as we climbed all the hills and mountains used for observations in the frontier area and further back in the heat, and on foot, while encumbered with all the survey gear including the heavy beacons.
We then calculated the coordinates for these potential targets. Knowing the positions of our own guns, and the positions of the targets, if Hong Kong was attacked, our guns could have immediately laid down accurate and effective fire. We had a great deal of trouble with this survey initially, but then found that the survey data we had originally been given on which to base our work was wrong. So that had to be corrected.
The most enjoyable work we had was that of calibration. Only small parties of surveyors were involved and we got away from the Troop and Battery with its duties and fatigues. The firing range was out to sea in the remote, attractive and scenic Clearwater Bay, set below High Junk Peak on the south easterly coast with Tung Lung Island to the south. We set the base up on several excursions to the hills surrounding the Bay. And like all the other hills in the New Territories and Hong Kong their tops were only accessible on foot, which meant hard scrambling whilst loaded up in the heat.
Once up there though I was often reminded of the cliffs and sea views I knew so well of Portland and of the Channel Isles where I had just previously had a holiday, for on the calibration shoots the shot falls into the sea. The first guns we calibrated were 5.5’s of the 58th Medium Regiment, and we then did, I think, 25 pounders of the 25th Field Regiment, and later the 4.2” mortars of 120 Mortar Battery.
Having established the observing posts and base, the actual calibration shoots were for us a relaxing duty, the firing being intermittent as each gun was laid and fired independently with great care as the laying was corrected after each firing. We then establishing by observation and calculation in our HQ where the shot had fallen. This was then checked against how the gun had been laid and the next shot and charge adjusted accordingly. Being in radio contact with the guns we knew when they were to fire and thus were ready to observe the fall of the shot. Occasionally a salvo was fired and the fall of this into the sea from the 5.5’s was a grand sight.
What made this duty so attractive, apart from the scenery, and the weather had to be good to get satisfactory results, was that while on it our small detachment of less than 20 involved were billeted with 58th Medium. This regiment occupied permanent brick built barracks known as ‘The Gun Club’, why I know not, in central Kowloon. We found it amusing that they complained about their accommodation. It was the height of luxury compared to ours at Lo Wu.
The food too they got was better prepared and served in larger portions than we were given. This was due in no small measure first, to the meager basic rations we were supplied with. And second, being a new unit it had not built up the funds that the Naafi gave out of its profits, which could be used by established units to purchase food locally to supplement that which the army provided. At Lo Wu one was often very hungry.
The barracks of the 58th were but a short walk from the Star Ferry across the harbor to Victoria. Once we had completed a day’s shoot we were normally free and thus often got across to the Naafi run Cheero Club or the Navy China Fleet Club. At the latter we could have a bath, hair cut and get a decent meal, or enjoy the ease of a comfortable chair in relaxed surroundings and that we did not have at Lo Wu.
There only was one pleasure and that was swimming. This we did when a recreational truck was laid on once or twice a week to take us the 12 miles or so to Castle Peak Bay. It was a pleasure to be able to get wet all over. But more so to those accustomed to the rigors of the English beach and sea this was quite heavenly. For one thing there were no chill winds blowing, the beach was a fine sandy shingle and the sea was warm!
For ten fellow gunners at this time there was a particular escape from camp, including Frank Beames from 98 Squad and who had the bed next to me in our tent, these lucky fellows – they were decided by drawing the names from a hat - went on a 5 day trip as guests of the Navy. Frank went aboard a frigate HMS Morecambe Bay whilst it patrolled the seas around looking for refugees and hoping to catch some pirates. He had a grand time. Whilst he was away I had his job as Troop clerk, it kept me off fatigues but I did not like clerking.
The greatest pleasure for us all was to get out of camp at weekends if not on duty. Often, but not regularly, trucks would be laid on to take us the 40 odd miles or so to Kowloon. But at least on one occasion we walked about a mile or more to a railway station at Sheung-Shui and took the train. This was another experience for it was crowded to capacity and more in both the passenger carriages and open wagons attached with refugees and all the possessions they had been able to bring with them.
Many of the peasants aboard had vegetables and produce to sell including pigs in baskets in the markets in Kowloon and Hong Kong. We traveled most comfortably on the steps than in the coaches, the trains did not travel fast, and on arrival both the passengers and possessions went out of the windows. More often than not we used the trucks even though returning at night in the back of a truck especially if it was raining was not the most comfortable means of travel. As the journey was about 2 hours, and we had to be back by 2359 hours, we usually left Kowloon before 10 pm.
Once at Kowloon we invariably made for Victoria, crossing on the Star Ferries. Europeans and the better kind of Chinese traveled 1st class on the top deck, the coolies, bags and baggage on the lower decks. The trams in Victoria were similarly segregated.
Approaching Victoria the first thing one saw from the water was the imposing Hong Kong & Shanghai Bank with its stone lions either side of the main entrance just beyond the ferry terminal. The smaller commercial buildings around it were overwhelmed by this symbol of British imperialism. To one side of it in an equally prominent location was another typical English institution, the cricket ground of the Hong Kong Cricket Club. To the right was the business and shopping area of Central District along Queens Road, above which Government House sat on the lower level of the Peak. To the left was Causeway Bay and the Chinese district of Wanchai.
Victoria was home to two servicemen clubs. The Cheero Club, a popular and overcrowded place in temporary buildings right in the center above the cricket ground run by Naafi, and the China Fleet Club in a large white permanent building out toward Wanchai and HMS Tamar the naval dockyard. This was long established and more like the Union Jack Clubs in the UK. While principally for the Navy we were always welcome. It was less crowded and had better facilities.
These facilities included the two most important to us, hot baths and decent food. An added attraction was sitting at a properly laid table with waiter service. Compared to the Cheero Club’s canteen, these were absolute luxuries. One could also get your hair cut, shop, make reservations for the cinema, be entertained of an evening – invariably housey/housey-tombola, get a drink or sit in an armchair, there were none in our camps, to relax, read and write.
Mature ‘motherly ladies’, probably form the WRVS helped at the Cheero Club and China Fleet Club helped if needed on welfare matters at home. I recall it was one of these ladies who arranged delivery of flowers to my sister Joan, when she was married. Incidentally, these turned out to be the only English ladies we ever had the opportunity to make contact with in the whole of our service in Hong Kong and our return 18 months later.
I made special reference in one of my first letters home, dated 15 April 1950, to a visit to the China Fleet Club and part is perhaps worth quoting:
[T]he three of us had the meal on a balcony overlooking the harbor, and waited on…it was a pleasant change to have a table cloth and choice of knives and forks. First we had a terrific tomato soup with fried bread, then sardines on toast with chips. After these tasters we had…pork, roasted spuds, carrots, green peas and apple sauce. This was delicious. For sweet we had some macaroni which tasted just like ice cream. To finish we had coffee. The whole for HK$ 3.20
That is about 4/- shillings, now UK 20p, or US 30 cents.
We explored both Victoria and Kowloon. It never made any difference whether it was a weekday, Saturday or Sunday they were always busy. We never got far from the main streets or the European areas as everywhere else was ‘out of bounds’ to us. In any event I never felt the urge to explore the Chinese districts of narrow ladder like streets and tall tenement buildings hung with flags and washing, or the overcrowded and squalid shanty towns. Everywhere day and night the streets thronged with busy people cooking, sleeping, chattering and selling fruits and vegetables, along with barbers, letter writers and mahjong players. All this was accompanied by incessant clamor of strange noises and peculiar aromas as well as unpleasant smells. The teeming people, the noise of it all, the discordant Chinese music, exotic and unpleasant smells pressed in and demanded your attention.
The Chinese paid little heed of us. In army fashion and slang they were to us all ‘chinks’. This was true of them generally in the country or in the town. Whether we were in uniform, on duty or in civilian attire they were indifferent and never imposed themselves nor importuned to the extent of the Arabs and Indians we came across on our outward voyage. There seemed few beggars as such but many had nothing but the street to make their home. With each other they conversed at the top of their voices in a hard piercing tone and what seemed an aggressive manner. It appeared to us that every one acted only for themselves in a forcible manner showing little compassion and courtesy.
In Victoria and Kowloon on Nathan Road were many shops and bazaars in the side streets. They were full of goods of every description and luxuries from all over the world that were not available in England. It really opened our eyes. And at what appeared to be bargain prices with every price negotiable, and we became adept at it. Our first purchases were civilian clothes for these we were allowed to wear off duty, and then we looked at watches and cameras.
If we happened to be in on a Sunday Ian Styles and I occasionally attended evensong at the Cathedral and the Church of England form of service being a reminder of things at home. While on this topic we had formal Church parades at times and visits from an army chaplain but religion never figured large in our lives. Though one of our fellow squaddies was a devout Plymouth Brethren who each night knelt at his bedside and said his prayers.
Chinese Tradesmen at Camp
A Chinese tailor in camp quickly make something to measure as the camp cobbler quickly made shoes. Having these made was simplicity itself; one pointed to an illustration in a magazine, he ran a pencil around your feet on a piece of cardboard and named a price, once that was settled the shoes were ready within a few days. I got a good hand made pair for HK$ 25 (about 30/-shillings or one US dollar.)
As we got the camp into order and became accustomed to our life under canvas the construction of corrugated iron Nissen huts to replace our tents commenced. This in turn meant we had once again to move the tents. From this it appeared our lot might improve. That was not to be for in typical army fashion as they were being completed we were told, toward the end of May, that the Battery was to move to Ping Shan, or Quarry Camp.
Guard Room at entrance to Lo Wu Camp, March 1950 The tents we occupied lie behind.
Lo Wu camp looking east. See how the camp site was a little above the level of the paddy fields that stretch to the distance across the valley. Across it runs the railway-the straight line-the winding Shum Chun River and Shung Shui lies toward the center. The border with China is just out of the picture to the left. The scenery is typical of the New Territories. The Guard Room is to the right, the tents the Battery occupied are either side of the track across the site, the officers tents up the valley to the left, and the cookhouse and NAAFI are toward the center in Nissen huts. The site is more compact than I recall.
Crest Hill New Territories This sat above Lo Wu Camp which is below and to the right. Right center in the gap is the Shum Chun River, the border crossing with mainland China just beyond. Through this gap and along the river ran a road and the Kowloon-Canton Railway. The tracks lead to the OP on this hill. This is typical scenery of the New Territories.
View into China from OP Easter 1950. The border ran along the Shum Chun River below.
Lo Wu, New Territories, Easter 1950 View from rear of OP back to Crest Hill. A jeep trail led to the track at the bottom, but from there all supplies and provisions had to be man packed up the rough path that can be seen cutting across the side of the hill. We clambered up these kinds of hills on survey duties, hard work.
Clearwater Bay, New Territories, May 1950 Setting up the calibration base, Sergeant Hale standing, Sergeant Mason observing, Ian Styles booking the observations
Clearwater Bay, New Territories, May 1950 Having finished a day’s survey we head back to the barracks of the 58th in Kowloon. To the left is Jock Robertson, the driver of the jeep, John Flann and to the right Sergeant Mason. This illustrates the small numbers involved in a survey party. The survey gear is in the jeep trailer. Ian Styles was probably the photographer.
Calibration, Clearwater Bay New Territories, May 1950 Simms Flash spotting Instrument set up to observe fall of shot into the bay below. The heavy steel carrying case is to the left. The jerrican was sat on to observe. What it contained I cannot remember.
Calibration, Clearwater Bay New Territories, May 1950 View from ‘Able’ OP looking south toward Tung Lung Island with Hong Kong Island in distance. In good weather and once one had clambered up the rough track by which it was reached it was a delightful spot. Here you see the typical lowering sky of the monsoon season.
John Flann, Clearwater Bay Calibration Base, May 1950. Sitting on a rock, Simms Flash Spotter to left and radio behind and in the customary working gear. It is very different attire to that I wore up on West Down Ranges at Larkhill in the preceding October!
We were later to find this Battery had a long history with its forerunner founded in 1757 as Smiths Company, initially serving in Newfoundland. ↩
Military slang for small, hard mattresses, 2 foot 6 inches square. Each man was issued three to use as a bed. ↩
