Wartime Canadian soldier’s watch find on Hong Kong hillside is reward for enthusiasts out to keep alive memories of lives lost
Dave Willott searches Hong Kong battle sites with a metal detector for second world war relics, and unearthing watch of a young private killed in desperate last days of defence against Japanese invaders inspires him to keep on looking
It was on a humid spring morning above the daily hubbub of Hong Kong Island when time rolled back more than seven decades to give a momentary glimpse into the desperate dying minutes of 21-year-old Private Ray Jackson.
Dave Willott was battling through dense undergrowth with his metal detector on Stone Hill in Stanley – scene of a heroic but futile last stand against the Japanese by Canadian soldiers in 1941 – when Jackson’s wristwatch winked up at him from the weather-baked mud.
He came from a farm in Canada and ended up dying on a humid hillside in Hong Kong ... Those soldiers must have wondered what they were fighting for
The watch casing with its simple inscription “Pte Ray D. Jackson B68205” has been sent to the grateful family of the young man who left his home on a farm in Ontario 76 years ago to die a terrifying death on a shell-scarred hillside during the Battle of Hong Kong.
For Willott and his team of five fellow metal detecting enthusiasts who scour Hong Kong’s second world war battle sites for historic relics, the discovery was the best possible reward for their work to keep alive the memories of the lives lost in the war years.
“I’d been up to Stone Hill a dozen times before but these places are big and hard to search,” says Willott, 51, recalling his March find. “There is dense foliage and sometimes you find yourself crawling through undergrowth.”
He says he had been up the hill a couple of times the previous week, and for some reason had a feeling he was going to find something special.
