{"id":2199,"date":"2016-04-19T14:59:29","date_gmt":"2016-04-19T21:59:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/?page_id=2199"},"modified":"2026-01-30T16:03:28","modified_gmt":"2026-01-31T00:03:28","slug":"henry-fung","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/veteran-stories\/army\/henry-fung\/","title":{"rendered":"Henry Fung"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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Henry Fung of Vancouver was only 19 years old when he became the first, and the\u00a0youngest, of several Chinese-Canadians to be parachuted\u00a0behind Japanese lines in Malay during the waning months of the Second World War.<\/p>

\"Henry

Henry Fung takes a cigarette break in India, where he did some of his commando training.<\/p><\/div>

As a member of Britain’s secretive Special Operations Executive (SOE), Force 136, Fung was put through punishing,\u00a0commando-style and jungle survival training. He eventually specialized as an interpreter. That was to be\u00a0his role the day that Fung and a small team of men was selected\u00a0to be dropped into Japanese-occupied Malay (now known as Malaysia).<\/p>

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Henry Fung<\/p><\/div>

On\u00a0June 22, 1945, Fung found himself floating to earth near\u00a0Kuala Lumpur, today the capital\u00a0city of Malaysia. In his pocket were four gold coins stamped 1918 with King George on\u00a0the front, and St. George the dragon slayer on the back. The coins were given to him in case of an\u00a0emergency. Knowing Fung would have no outside support, the coins could be used for bribes\u00a0to help him hide or escape.<\/p>

Once Fung’s\u00a0team got their bearings, they set off to blow up a railroad bridge and railroad tracks, and bring\u00a0down telephone lines. They also made contact with the guerrillas of the Malayan Peoples’ Anti-Japanese Army (MPAJA).<\/p>

Fung discovered many of the guerrillas were very young men just\u00a0like him, and he developed a sense of camaraderie\u00a0with them. He proudly sported their cap badge on his beret.<\/p>

\"Badge:

Badge: Malay Anti-Japanese Peoples Army<\/p><\/div>

When the\u00a0Japanese formally surrendered in mid-August, 1945, it took some time before word reached Japanese units posted in remote locations. This often put\u00a0Force 136\u00a0men into a difficult position where they had to persuade or force the surrender of army units they met in the field.<\/p>

Fung’s\u00a0team took over control of\u00a0the Japanese garrison in the city of Kajang. Not surprisingly,\u00a0after the surrender, chaos ensued and\u00a0retribution was frequently\u00a0meted out by residents on\u00a0anyone who was Japanese or who was\u00a0viewed to have been\u00a0a Japanese collaborator during the occupation. Force 136 members had struggle\u00a0to maintain order until British troops arrived.<\/p>

\"Henry

Henry Fung Force 136<\/p><\/div>

Although he escaped any injuries, Fung was not left untouched by his journey in the jungle. He returned to Britain suffering from jaundice and malaria. By 1946, he was back home in Canada sporting a small dragon tattoo on his arm.<\/p>

As for those four gold coins Fung had in his pocket when he parachuted into Malay? He never needed them, so he brought them back to Canada. He gave one to a friend. And gifted the other three to his daughters. They, in turn, turned the coins into medallions that they wore around their necks.<\/p>

\"One

One of four gold coins that Henry Fung carried with him into the Malaysia jungle.<\/p><\/div>

Unfortunately, Henry Fung died of a massive heart attack on June 18, 1982 — a mere four days before the anniversary of his first parachute jump. He was only 56 years old.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Henry Fung of Vancouver was only 19 years old when he became the first, and the\u00a0youngest, of several Chinese-Canadians to be parachuted\u00a0behind Japanese lines in Malay during the waning months of the Second World War. As a member of Britain’s secretive Special Operations Executive (SOE), Force 136, Fung was put through punishing,\u00a0commando-style and jungle survival […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2203,"parent":594,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"template-nosidebar.php","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-2199","page","type-page","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","post-preview"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2199","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2199"}],"version-history":[{"count":18,"href":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2199\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6013,"href":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2199\/revisions\/6013"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/594"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2203"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2199"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}