Kowloon Walled City - Southern Gate Ruins and Yamen, Hong Kong, SAR China

Built in 1847 by the Qing Government to oppose the British occupation of Hong Kong island in 1841, the original walls contained 6 watchtowers, 4 gates and occupied a total of 6.5 acres. The garrison contained the offices of the Commodore of the Dapeng Bridage and the Kowloon Assistant Military Inspectorate (Yamen).

When the British took over the environs of the fort in 1899, the Qing officials and troops quietly withdrew, leaving the status of this walled area in limbo. The fort was never officially handed over to the British when the New Territories were ceded. Deprived of the rule of law and administration, its status unclear, it became a no man's land, a semi-lawless squatter slum.

The fort's stone walls were demolished by the Japanese during their occupation of HK during WW2 for the extension of the nearby Kai Tak Airfield. In the post-war years, new buildings were built over the ruins of the old fort, illegal constructions building up higher and higher without government supervision, reaching 10 to 14 stories and housing over 33,000 people in a ring around the original Yamen building in the center of the highrises. Illegal factories, tax evaders, gangsters and unlicensed medical clinics sprung up inside with roads and alleys no more than 1-2metres wide. Electricity and water supply was illegally tapped and the high tension cables and water pipes ran haphazardly all over the place.

Many attempts to evict and demolish the Walled City by British administered HK were blocked by the Chinese government because I believe, technically its status was still as a Chinese administered "garrison fort", until in 1987 when the Chinese government very astutely relented, letting the British handle what must have been very troublesome evictions, relocations and expensive demolitions before the whole of HK reverted to Chinese rule in 1997. Demolition started in 1993 and was completed in April of 1994 and during the demolition works, the original foundations of the fort's south and eastern gates were found almost intact, including their original stone plagues bearing the words "South Gate" and "Kowloon Walled City". Amazingly, the original wooden Yamen building from 1847 survived the long one and a half century in the heart of it all, and has since been restored together with two of the original cannons cast in 1802 which once guarded the fort's walls.