Tony Banham | |
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Born | Morley, Norfolk, England | 24 July 1959
Nationality | British |
Known for | Hong Kong War Diary |
Tony Banham is founder of the Hong Kong War Diary project, which studies and documents the 1941 defence of Hong Kong, the defenders, their families, and the fates of all until liberation. His published books cover topics including the Hong Kong experience during the Second World War. [1] Mr. Banham is also very active in the "human side" of historical research relating to the era and often speaks at various symposia on the subject and carries on an active dialogue with survivors of the conflict and their families. He also maintains a close association with various diplomatic services, government agencies, and other official parties associated with providing care and services to those involved in the conflict. He serves, at the request on the Government of the Hong Kong SAR, on a special government panel which reviews and grants the payment of pensions to veterans ( or their survivors ) who served Hong Kong during the period. He is also Honorary Editor of the Journal of The Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong, and principal of Reyner Banham Consulting. [2]
Hong Kong War Diary began as a simple attempt to locate and centralise documentation relating to Hong Kong's wartime garrison, but soon evolved into the core of a community of interest around this group of people. What started off as purely a centre of information exchange, grew into a historical network that helps today's descendants of the defenders place their ancestors' experiences in context, offers a service to other researchers, and reunites families split by war. His website has more than 10,000 regular readers and he is generally acknowledged as the authority on Hong Kong's POWs. [3] The central ethos of the project has been to catalyze the open exchange of all information from disparate sources for the benefit of the maximum number of people. [4]
Banham's core interest is in the impact of war on society at both the micro and macro level. This interest runs the gamut from studying the civilian casualties in the London blitz to writing about the concept of the island of Tinian (where Banham has conducted on-site research) being, as the location where the final assembly of "Little Boy" and "Fat Man" took place, the geographical segue between the 'old war' (of tanks and marines storming beaches) to the 'new war' which has dominated civilization since Hiroshima. Hong Kong, while perhaps not the central theatre of the conflict, offered an opportunity to study a small population in the context of the critical path to victory that dominated the core of the Pacific War.[ citation needed ]
Banham received his PhD in history from the Australian Defence Force Academy (ADFA), Canberra. The book Reduced to a Symbolical Scale is closely based on his thesis.[ citation needed ]
Book | Publisher | Year |
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"Potato" Jone's Diary | Battlefields Review | 2001 |
Life Moves On, Time Moves Forward | Battlefields Review | 2001 |
Not The Slightest Chance | Hong Kong University Press | 2003 |
Serving Hong Kong – The Hong Kong Volunteers (One chapter) | Hong Kong Museum of Coastal Defence | 2004 |
A Small Story in a Big War | Journal of the Pacific War Research Group | 2004 |
WWII Ordnance in Hong Kong | Journal of the Pacific War Research Group | 2004 |
Where Old War Met New | Journal of the Pacific War Research Group | 2004 |
In Search of The Lisbon Maru | Journal of the Pacific War Research Group | 2005 |
A Short History of 3 Coy, Hong Kong Volunteer Defence Corps | Royal Asiatic Society | 2005 |
The Sinking of the Lisbon Maru | Hong Kong University Press | 2006 |
We Shall Suffer There | Hong Kong University Press | 2009 |
Ship of Death | Discovery Channel Magazine | 2009 |
A Short History of the Hong Kong Dockyard Defence Corps | Royal Asiatic Society | 2011 |
Hong Kong Dictionary of National Biography (three sections) | Hong Kong University Press | 2011 |
A Short History of the Hong Kong Chinese Regiment | Royal Asiatic Society | 2014 |
A Historiography of C Force | Canadian Military History Vol 24 Iss 2 | 2015 |
Reduced to a Symbolical Scale | Hong Kong University Press | 2017 |
A Short History of Bungalow A, St Stephen's College | Royal Asiatic Society | 2017 |
The Big For | Amazon | 2019 |
Hong Kong's Civilian Fatalities of the Second World War | Royal Asiatic Society | 2019 |
The Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, commonly known as the Royal Asiatic Society, was established, according to its royal charter of 11 August 1824, to further "the investigation of subjects connected with and for the encouragement of science, literature and the arts in relation to Asia." From its incorporation the society has been a forum, through lectures, its journal, and other publications, for scholarship relating to Asian culture and society of the highest level. It is the United Kingdom's senior learned society in the field of Asian studies. Fellows of the society are elected regularly and include highly accomplished and notable scholars of Asian studies; they use the post-nominal letters FRAS.
The Battle of Hong Kong, also known as the Defence of Hong Kong and the Fall of Hong Kong, was one of the first battles of the Pacific War in World War II. On the same morning as the attack on Pearl Harbor, forces of the Empire of Japan attacked the British Crown colony of Hong Kong around the same time that Japan declared war on Great Britain. The Hong Kong garrison consisted of British, Indian and Canadian units, also the Auxiliary Defence Units and Hong Kong Volunteer Defence Corps (HKVDC).
Lisbon Maru (りすぼん丸) was a Japanese cargo liner built at Yokohama in 1920 for a Japanese shipping line. During World War II, the ship was turned into an armed troopship. On her final voyage, Lisbon Maru was being used to transport prisoners of war between Hong Kong and Japan when it was torpedoed on 1 October 1942, sinking with a loss of over 800 British lives.
Sir John Francis Davis, 1st Baronet was a British diplomat and sinologist who served as second Governor of Hong Kong from 1844 to 1848. Davis was the first President of Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong.
The Imperial Japanese occupation of Hong Kong began when the governor of Hong Kong, Sir Mark Young, surrendered the British Crown colony of Hong Kong to the Empire of Japan on 25 December 1941. His surrender occurred after 18 days of fierce fighting against the Japanese forces that invaded the territory. The occupation lasted for three years and eight months until Japan surrendered at the end of the Second World War. The length of the period later became a metonym of the occupation.
Sir James Haldane Stewart Lockhart, was a British colonial official in Hong Kong and China for more than 40 years. He also served as Commissioner of British Weihaiwei from 1902 to 1921. Additionally, he was a Sinologist who made pioneering translations.
South Asians are part of the Hong Kong society. As of the 2021 by-census, there were at least 101,969 persons of South Asian descent in Hong Kong. Many trace their roots in Hong Kong as far back as when the Indian subcontinent was still under British colonial rule and as a legacy of the British Empire, their nationality issues remain largely unsettled. However, recently an increasing number of them have acquired Chinese nationality.
Old Bailey Street is located in Central, Hong Kong. The name is derived from the Old Bailey, the Central Criminal Court in central London, United Kingdom.
Sai Wan War Cemetery is a military cemetery located in Chai Wan, Hong Kong which was built in 1946. The cemetery was created to commemorate soldiers of Hong Kong Garrison who perished during the Second World War. The cemetery also contains 12 World War I burials. A total of 1,528 soldiers, mainly from the Commonwealth, are commemorated here. Most of the remaining burials are located at the Stanley Military Cemetery.
Stanley Internment Camp was a civilian internment camp in Hong Kong during the Second World War. Located in Stanley, on the southern end of Hong Kong Island, it was used by the Japanese imperial forces to hold non-Chinese enemy nationals after their victory in the Battle of Hong Kong in December 1941. About 2,800 men, women, and children were held at the non-segregated camp for 44 months from early January 1942 to August 1945 when Japanese forces surrendered. The camp area consisted of St Stephen's College and the grounds of Stanley Prison, excluding the prison itself.
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James William Hayes was a Hong Kong historian and civil servant.
Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong Branch is an organisation to encourage interest in Asia broadly, with an emphasis on Hong Kong. The society was founded in 1847 and folded 1859. It was revived on December 28, 1959. Its parent association is the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland.
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Patrick Hugh Hase is a historian specialized in the history of the New Territories, Hong Kong. He is a retired civil servant of British Hong Kong, living there from 1972 to present.
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Deric Daniel Waters or Dan Waters was a British educator, scholar of building science and heritage conservationist. He was the founding principal of the Morrison Hill Technical Institute in Hong Kong from 1969 to 1972, Assistant Director, Education Department of Hong Kong from 1974 to 1980. Waters retired in 1980 and obtained his MPhil from Loughborough University in 1982 and PhD in 1985. He was a Fellow of the Hong Kong Institute of Directors, Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Building, Fellow of the Royal Society for Public Health and an Associate Member of the British Institute of Management.
Cedric Wallis was a British military officer who served as commander of the Mainland Brigade and East Brigade during the Battle of Hong Kong.
Anita Wilson was the first archivist/librarian for the Government of Tuvalu, as well as archivist for the Government of Hong Kong and the British royal family.