[Royal Engineers] Douglas Ferguson
Description:
Born:
29 July 1916, Hamilton, Scotland
Death:
Unknown
Pre-war:
Douglas was son of Alexander and Sarah Ferguson of Ferniegair, Hamilton, Scotland. He joined the Royal Engineers on 28 November 1936 and was sent to Chatham, spending twelve weeks on initial training, followed by field work including learning to build pontoon bridges. After that he was sent to Kitchener Barracks, the Engineer’s trade school, for machine shop training. Next he attended the Searchlight Battalion in Blackdown to learn about searchlights and the generators that powered them. He was then posted to Hong Kong, sailing from Southampton on 22 October 1938 on HMT Dunera, and arriving in December. His life prior to the invasion was spent mostly in workshops, plus chores such as guard duty and battening everything down for typhoons. Off-duty there were beaches for swimming, then cinemas and bars in the evening.
Wartime:
When the Japanese attacked, Ferguson was manning a searchlight on Cape D’Aguila together with other British and Chinese Sappers. About a week later his squad watched a company of Canadians marching out of a gun emplacement and then heard a loud bang as the gun blew up, rendering it useless to the Japanese. The sappers’ N.C.O. phoned for orders and was told to ‘get the hell out of there as fast as you can’ as the Japanese were on the Island and would soon cut off the peninsula. Ferguson packed a small bag with a towel, soap, razor, toothbrush and left all other possessions behind. They headed over the hills, arriving at the Repulse Bay Hotel. Ferguson told of ‘waiting around not knowing what to do next’, when the first Japanese soldier appeared. They were about to fire when a man came out of the hotel shouting: ‘don’t shoot, there are women in the hotel!’ A Middlesex officer told the men that the women had been given the chance to leave weeks ago and so now they had to live with the consequences. The British soldiers were there to fight so ‘that ended that little argument.’
The Japanese had a sniper in the hotel garage below them. Peter Grounds, a close friend of Ferguson, kept popping up and shooting over the balustrade they were sheltering behind. Ferguson told him to stop, but he did it again; he was pulling him down but it was too late; his best friend Peter had been shot in the head. After several days isolated at the hotel, a senior officer came to organize their withdrawal back to Stanley. They walked in their stockinged feet overnight and spent next day (24 December 1941) in barracks watching shells bursting around them. The following day all the troops moved down the hill into trenches facing the Japanese, but on the morning of 26 December 1941, they surrendered.
As a POW, Ferguson quickly ‘grew tired of the Japs’ hospitality’. Together with Sapper Glyn Howarth, he decided to break out. Apparently the camp’s cobbler asked the Japanese for pliers to use fixing boots. These included wire cutters, and Ferguson borrowed them to cut the fence wires. Once they were through he sent Howarth on while he stayed and retied the wires to cover their traces.
When the two escapees were met by BAAG, Ferguson was very ill with beriberi. Dr Raymond Lee, a Chinese national who had trained at University of British Columbia, Vancouver, cured him with injections of vitamin B1. After being with BAAG for a week, it was decided that Howarth would be sent to India, but Major Clague asked Ferguson to stay. Ferguson was then given a battlefield promotion to CQMSMI (Company Quartermaster Sergeant-Major Instructor) and was in Waichow from September 1942 until the end of February 1943 when he was sent to Kweilin for a break. He returned in May 1943 and stayed until September 1943. By then he had serious issues with his teeth, and he was sent to India to have them pulled and dentures made. This trip was made by truck, train, another truck and finally an RAF supply plane which took him to Calcutta. Three weeks later he went by train to New Delhi where he was posted to the Combined Services Detailed Interrogation Corps, stationed in the Red Fort in Old Delhi. He was put in charge of the Motor Transport Section, doing repairs and training men to drive. There Major Clague visited and: ‘very kindly took me out in the town for dinner’. Clague asked him if he would consider going back into China, but by then Ferguson wanted to go home, having been five and a half years away. Clague understood. He took a train to Bombay and sailed on 26 March 1944 on HMT Lancashire, arriving in Liverpool five weeks later. He was given leave and ordered to report to 502 Field Company in Kirkby-Lonsdale as an instructor in an intensive training course, training recruits for D Day. There he met a local girl, Margaret Standing, who helped out in one of the pubs, and they married on 23 December 1944. He was demobbed on 12 December 1945 - having served nine years and 126 days.
Post-war:
Once the war ended they moved to Hamilton, Scotland, where Ferguson got a job with Phillips. In 1952, by which time they had four children. he decided he wanted to move the family to Canada (his older brother had moved to Canada pre-war and by then was living in Ajax, Ontario). Ferguson managed to secure a job transfer to a Phillips facility in Montreal, Quebec. He left Plymouth aboard the Arosa Kulm bound for Montreal on 23 September 1952, but when the ship arrived there he boarded a train for Ajax instead, and found employment with Dowty. His wife and children immediately booked passage to Canada, arriving in Ajax on Christmas Eve 1952. A fifth child, Heather, was born there in 1955. They were very proud to have a Canadian child and always introduced her as: ‘this is our Canadian’. Later he worked at Sta-Rite Pumps as a foreman. In 1974 he got a job managing warehouses at McIntyre-Porcupine Mines in Northern Alberta. He retired on 29 July 1981.
Ferguson was very involved with the building of the Royal Canadian Legion - Ajax branch. He started the Ajax Legion Pipe Band in the late 50s/early 60s and they wore the Ferguson tartan to honour him. Ferguson loved to play his pipes, once playing for HM Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, during a visit to Toronto in the late 1950s.
Awards:
MM
Born:
29 July 1916, Hamilton, Scotland
Death:
Unknown
Pre-war:
Douglas was son of Alexander and Sarah Ferguson of Ferniegair, Hamilton, Scotland. He joined the Royal Engineers on 28 November 1936 and was sent to Chatham, spending twelve weeks on initial training, followed by field work including learning to build pontoon bridges. After that he was sent to Kitchener Barracks, the Engineer’s trade school, for machine shop training. Next he attended the Searchlight Battalion in Blackdown to learn about searchlights and the generators that powered them. He was then posted to Hong Kong, sailing from Southampton on 22 October 1938 on HMT Dunera, and arriving in December. His life prior to the invasion was spent mostly in workshops, plus chores such as guard duty and battening everything down for typhoons. Off-duty there were beaches for swimming, then cinemas and bars in the evening.
Wartime:
When the Japanese attacked, Ferguson was manning a searchlight on Cape D’Aguila together with other British and Chinese Sappers. About a week later his squad watched a company of Canadians marching out of a gun emplacement and then heard a loud bang as the gun blew up, rendering it useless to the Japanese. The sappers’ N.C.O. phoned for orders and was told to ‘get the hell out of there as fast as you can’ as the Japanese were on the Island and would soon cut off the peninsula. Ferguson packed a small bag with a towel, soap, razor, toothbrush and left all other possessions behind. They headed over the hills, arriving at the Repulse Bay Hotel. Ferguson told of ‘waiting around not knowing what to do next’, when the first Japanese soldier appeared. They were about to fire when a man came out of the hotel shouting: ‘don’t shoot, there are women in the hotel!’ A Middlesex officer told the men that the women had been given the chance to leave weeks ago and so now they had to live with the consequences. The British soldiers were there to fight so ‘that ended that little argument.’
The Japanese had a sniper in the hotel garage below them. Peter Grounds, a close friend of Ferguson, kept popping up and shooting over the balustrade they were sheltering behind. Ferguson told him to stop, but he did it again; he was pulling him down but it was too late; his best friend Peter had been shot in the head. After several days isolated at the hotel, a senior officer came to organize their withdrawal back to Stanley. They walked in their stockinged feet overnight and spent next day (24 December 1941) in barracks watching shells bursting around them. The following day all the troops moved down the hill into trenches facing the Japanese, but on the morning of 26 December 1941, they surrendered.
As a POW, Ferguson quickly ‘grew tired of the Japs’ hospitality’. Together with Sapper Glyn Howarth, he decided to break out. Apparently the camp’s cobbler asked the Japanese for pliers to use fixing boots. These included wire cutters, and Ferguson borrowed them to cut the fence wires. Once they were through he sent Howarth on while he stayed and retied the wires to cover their traces.
When the two escapees were met by BAAG, Ferguson was very ill with beriberi. Dr Raymond Lee, a Chinese national who had trained at University of British Columbia, Vancouver, cured him with injections of vitamin B1. After being with BAAG for a week, it was decided that Howarth would be sent to India, but Major Clague asked Ferguson to stay. Ferguson was then given a battlefield promotion to CQMSMI (Company Quartermaster Sergeant-Major Instructor) and was in Waichow from September 1942 until the end of February 1943 when he was sent to Kweilin for a break. He returned in May 1943 and stayed until September 1943. By then he had serious issues with his teeth, and he was sent to India to have them pulled and dentures made. This trip was made by truck, train, another truck and finally an RAF supply plane which took him to Calcutta. Three weeks later he went by train to New Delhi where he was posted to the Combined Services Detailed Interrogation Corps, stationed in the Red Fort in Old Delhi. He was put in charge of the Motor Transport Section, doing repairs and training men to drive. There Major Clague visited and: ‘very kindly took me out in the town for dinner’. Clague asked him if he would consider going back into China, but by then Ferguson wanted to go home, having been five and a half years away. Clague understood. He took a train to Bombay and sailed on 26 March 1944 on HMT Lancashire, arriving in Liverpool five weeks later. He was given leave and ordered to report to 502 Field Company in Kirkby-Lonsdale as an instructor in an intensive training course, training recruits for D Day. There he met a local girl, Margaret Standing, who helped out in one of the pubs, and they married on 23 December 1944. He was demobbed on 12 December 1945 - having served nine years and 126 days.
Post-war:
Once the war ended they moved to Hamilton, Scotland, where Ferguson got a job with Phillips. In 1952, by which time they had four children. he decided he wanted to move the family to Canada (his older brother had moved to Canada pre-war and by then was living in Ajax, Ontario). Ferguson managed to secure a job transfer to a Phillips facility in Montreal, Quebec. He left Plymouth aboard the Arosa Kulm bound for Montreal on 23 September 1952, but when the ship arrived there he boarded a train for Ajax instead, and found employment with Dowty. His wife and children immediately booked passage to Canada, arriving in Ajax on Christmas Eve 1952. A fifth child, Heather, was born there in 1955. They were very proud to have a Canadian child and always introduced her as: ‘this is our Canadian’. Later he worked at Sta-Rite Pumps as a foreman. In 1974 he got a job managing warehouses at McIntyre-Porcupine Mines in Northern Alberta. He retired on 29 July 1981.
Ferguson was very involved with the building of the Royal Canadian Legion - Ajax branch. He started the Ajax Legion Pipe Band in the late 50s/early 60s and they wore the Ferguson tartan to honour him. Ferguson loved to play his pipes, once playing for HM Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, during a visit to Toronto in the late 1950s.
Awards:
MM
Sources: Photo: Tony Banham
