Lieutenant Commander Gandy RN was happy to loan his spare uniform and only cap to his VIP guest Chan Chak who wore it with pride for the duration of the escape even though it lacked the broad gold stripe on the sleeve of his true rank of Vice Admiral CN.
After much consultation Chan Chak marked the route on a chart with a red pen explaining that he had made prior arrangements with guerrillas on the mainland to assist them.[6]
With Admiral Chan up on the bridge, cap at a jaunty angle the flotilla was set to proceeded at 21.40 with just three torpedoes
between them. The engines were started and tuned up, the noise was ear shattering and nerves were jangling. The Chinese
called the MTB's Wind Thunder Boats with good reason. With the officers atop the bridge/Con Tower, Coxswain and chief engineers at the controls in the wheelhouse, and 2nd engineers in the engine room the 2nd MTB Flotilla eased out, and working up to 22 knots proceeded on its final voyage with some well offshore through the East Lamma Channel and south of Po Toi.[5] Lt Ashby on 07 could
see his house on fire up on the hill at Stanley as he sped past being fired upon.[21] The sea was as calm as a millpond and the wind warm, under a bright moon in it's first quarter. Shortly after they encountered a Japanese
warship on the horizon searching the sky with searchlights and fired off four rounds, but all the boats managed to slip past. At 01.30 they arrived at the crecent shaped island of Tung Ping Chau now pitch dark after the moon had set nearly an hour previously.[70] Cmdr Gandy reported " Under Admiral Chan Chak's 'instructions' the flotilla anchored off PingChau Island , where Mr F.W.K. went ashore under cover of manned Lewis guns and brought off the head man to confer with the Admiral. The Admiral thus received information that the small harbour of NanAo was free of Japanese and that the Chinese guerrillas would meet him there and escort the party through the Japanese lines to the Chinese Army"[15] MTB 07's 'Fair Log' records "All boats tied up on '10' E of PingChau, where party was sent ashore to contact local guerrillas.[5]
26th December 1941
Mike Kendall, a Canadian and C/O of the Special
Operations Executive (Z Force) along with the other two agents and Lt-Cmdr Henry Hsu went ashore in two skiff's under cover of the MTB's manned Lewis guns.[15] The locals fled
into the hills at the sound of the Flotilla arriving. Henry assured them they were
friendly and they brought the headman back to liaise with the Admiral. The MTB's made their way across the strait with a couple of locals acting as pilots to the small village of NanAo on the Dapeng Peninsula in the province of Guangdong on the mainland. A ninety plus year old nanAo resident told me in 2009 "Here the locals on hearing the boats approaching send the woman, children, and the old up into the hills while the able bodied set up guns to bear on the boats fearing it was the Japanese." Henry Hsu and Yeung Chuan calmed the locals down explaining that Admiral Chan chak was coming ashore.
C-410 also encountered the Japanese cruiser which fixed her in it's searchlight for a full ten minutes before switching it off and letting them proceed. On arrival at NanAo Monty was not sure which bay the Admiral's party were to disembark and then ran aground as he succumbed to exhaustion at the helm. Maj Goring recorded " It was then, that he told us, that he committed the gravest crime of his Naval career. He had fallen asleep ! He awoke with a start to find his boat aground-where he did not know."[17] Ten minutes later they heard the roar of engines, fearing it was the Japanese they were surprised to hear good old English lower deck cussing when the engines cut .[49]
The 'Fair Log' of MTB 07 records "Ships proceeded to NanAo where all ammunition, guns, loose gear etc,was loaded onto Sampans and taken ashore. L.Gs, & ammo, handed over to guerrillas temporarily, Bren guns, ammo, provisions, etc retained". [5] Even the fold down bunk beds were removed and taken ashore as McEwan and Talan found when they returned to Nanao attempting to retrieve the Lewis Guns and ammunition in January.[11]
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The party now numbered sixty eight men along with Collingwood's dog Bruce, with Kendall taking charge of the whole party. Mike as he liked to be called had earned the respect of the flotilla crews to a man over the previous five days. It was here that the guerrilla's led by Leung Wingyuen, a notorious people trafficker & smuggler, [7] met the Chinese Admiral and everyone was relieved. Leung Wingyuen told
Chan that he would escort them to Waichow following the age old smugglers route to meet up with the Chinese
Army, and provide all expenses on the road. Leung Wingyuen had also contributed 3 boxes
of Chinese currency for the Admiral's cause.[6] We immediately realised the power,
influence, and respect the Admiral had. He was the President of the
Southern Kuomintang party in Southern China. We then
started to bring ashore 
everything that was of value to our cause and to the
guerrilla's. S-Lt Legge had the job of negotiating with the locals ashore as he spoke the language fluently. The flotilla had to be scuttled immediately with Collingwood protesting as the value of each boat was £25.000 but the Admiral insisted. The boats were then backed off out a couple of hundred meters. "Then came the rottenest part: having to sink our boats, the boats we had lived in for the last two years or so".[18] The 1st Officer of MTB 09 had ripped the boats bronze crest off but decided it was too heavy, and while in the process of abandoning it Kennedy decided to take up the challenge. He bribed a burly rating with cigarettes to lug it all the way across China.[9] The ships crest of MTB 08 was also removed by Sub-Lt Bush in Aberdeen, they are the only original artefacts remaining of the 2nd MTB Flotilla apart from the MTB 07 Fair Log. Two members were reprimanded for being drunk while scuttling, Coxswain Dyer who had been on 10 for the past three years and Cox-Walker. A bottle of gin had been left out in the forecastle on 10 when the escape party were picked up. Time was something we did not have, as daylight was
approaching. We had to use axes on the wooden hulls, and open the sea cocks to
let the water in. The Chinese villagers piled rocks on board. The weight of the
engines eventually took the remnants of the 2nd MTB Flotilla down along with
C-410. There was only two fathoms of water, which meant that the top of the bridge and 12 feet of mast were visible above water.
With heavy hearts we eventually landed ashore, and were ready to proceed on foot
at 05.30 after working all night. An hour later the sun rose, and the full
implications of what lay ahead dawned on us all.
The contents of this website led to a considerable number of escapee families contacting me and now each other, and remains the principle source of contact and private information for the spinoff projects that have followed. The personal accounts enabled me to record the complete and true account of this remarkable episode of Sino-British war time co-operation. The information compiled here has directly resulted in a museum exhibition in Hong Kong, a re-enactment of the escape in Hong Kong and China, a book just published, and a movie drama and also a documentary in the making.
Some accounts published quote statemants made years, sometimes tens of years after the events, where the facts have been blurred in the mists of time.
Thank you all for your contributions, may our forefathers be remembered.
Hong Kong Museum of Coastal Defence
