Argyle Street Camp

Argyle Street Camp was a Japanese World War II prisoner-of-war camp in Kowloon, Hong Kong, which primarily held officer prisoners. Built by the Hong Kong government as a refugee camp before the war as North Point POW Camp, it began life as a POW camp soon after Kowlon and the New Territories were abandoned to the Japanese.

In January 1942 it was emptied, with the POWs moving to Shamshuipo, North Point, and Ma Tau Chung Camps. However, after a number of escapes by POW officers and Other Ranks from Shamshuipo, Argyle Street was re-opened in mid-1942 as an officers' camp. In 1944 the officers were moved instead to Camp 'N' at Shamshuipo, and the Indian POWs from Ma Tau Chung Camp took up residence.

After World War II

After the Japanese surrender, Argyle Street Camp became a centre for displaced people returning to Hong Kong. Later still, it was a camp for refugees reaching Hong Kong from other parts of South East Asia. The camp started accommodating Vietnamese refugees in June 1979, with a planned capacity of 20,000.[1]

Today there are no memorials of any kind on the site of the camp, which is just to the south of St Teresa's Hospital.

See also

• Japanese occupation of Hong Kong
• List of Japanese-run internment camps during World War II
• Second Sino-Japanese War
• Argyle Street, Hong Kong
• Stanley Internment Camp

References

1. "500 move to Tuen Mun" (PDF). South China Morning Post. Hong Kong. 5 June 1979.

Further reading

• Roland, Charles G. (2001). Long Night's Journey Into Day: Prisoners of War in Hong Kong and Japan, 1941-1945. Wilfrid Laurier University Press. ISBN 0-88920-362-8.
• Banham, Tony (2009). We Shall Suffer There: Hong Kong's Defenders Imprisoned, 1942-1945. Hong Kong University Press. ISBN 978-962-209-960-9.