Hong Kong Cemetery

The former Colonial Cemetery in Happy Valley, Hong Kong is the resting place for many who travelled to the Far East in the 19th. Century. The British Colony was a thriving trading centre and home to merchants, servicemen and colonial civil servants. Members of the Royal Navy and merchant seamen all spent time on what was once termed ‘this barren rock’.

From 1985 to 1995 whilst I was working in Hong Kong I spent my weekends in the cemetery transcribing and indexing the memorial inscriptions. During the typhoon season when the weather precluded outdoor activities I found other sources of information: burial registers; obituaries; government gazettes to supplement my index. My Hong Kong Cemetery Burial Index now contains over 12,000 entries for souls from the UK, Australia, USA, Europe etc. etc. etc.

Gone - but certainly not forgotten. The full story of my project plus some of the stories behind the graves can be found at http://hongkongcemetery.blogspot.com/