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This contribution to WW2 People’s War was received by the Action Desk at ´óÏó´«Ã½ Radio Norfolk. The story has been written and submitted to the website by Rosalie Davis Gibb (Volunteer Story Gatherer) with the full permission and on behalf of John Barton.

In 1915, aged 20, my father left home to work in Hong Kong, soon married a Portuguese lady and had 12 children.

8.00am, 8th December 1941. I was 12½, waiting for the school bus, when air raid sirens went. We gathered in the garden and could see Japanese bombers strafing the streets and dropping bombs. No-one knew what was happening. A doctor took us in his car to the Peninsula Hotel where they were taking refugees. They only had room for Mum and the six youngest children. All we had were the clothes we stood in.

Chinese looters were everywhere. We waited at the hotel for 3 of my brothers. They never showed up. We were very distressed. So much had happened in one day. That night we slept in the great hall on chairs.

Truckloads of Japanese soldiers drove past the hotel. We were in the middle of an almighty battle. We hoisted a white flag. Unfortunately some idiot took a pot shot at a Japanese soldier from one of the windows. We were all crowded up against a wall with a machine gun mounted on a tripod in front of us. The Japs wanted the culprit. They told us we’d all die in ten minutes’ time. We stood there for three hours with constant threats of being shot in ten minutes. The culprit finally gave himself up and he was taken away.

The mainland of Kowloon surrendered two days after the war started.

Conditions in the hotel deteriorated daily. We had two awful daily meals of stewed liver and dumplings. On Christmas morning we all cheered when the Japs announced Hong Kong had surrendered. By then we were afraid not to.

Allied nationals were rounded up. My mother feared the worst so registered herself and her children as Portuguese nationals. We were transported to Homatin in Kowloon. A friend of mum’s took us in. Whenever the Japanese came to search the house Mum would hide the girls and entertain the Japs with her piano playing to distract them.

Mum contracted double pneumonia and was close to death. I had to venture out to buy food, stepping over dead bodies laid out in the street. Thankfully Mum pulled through.

We heard Dad and the other children, except Bernard, were in a civilian internment camp at Stanley Peninsula. Bernard was in the Military Camp at Shamshuipo, so all of us were alive.

In February or March 1942 Dad got word to us to contact the Red Cross and try and join him at Stanley. We eventually travelled to Stanley on an open lorry in April. It was very cold. I wore a tea cosy on my head for warmth.

My mother mistook the Japanese secretary as her pre-war dentist’s receptionist. Mum’s sincere greeting eased the tension somewhat. The family reunion was euphoric. That night I slept on a heavily carved camphor wood chest packed with goodies we took with us. Next morning my body was embossed with pictures of dragons!

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