{"id":2407,"date":"2016-08-06T11:34:54","date_gmt":"2016-08-06T18:34:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/?page_id=2407"},"modified":"2026-01-29T16:44:35","modified_gmt":"2026-01-30T00:44:35","slug":"young-ming-james-wong","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/veteran-stories\/army\/young-ming-james-wong\/","title":{"rendered":"Young Ming (James) Wong"},"content":{"rendered":"

Young Ming (James) Wong was born on August 7, 1920. He was one of a family of 10 children whose\u00a0father\u00a0ran a grocery store in Vancouver. At a time when many young men dropped out of school early to earn a wage, Wong stayed in school and graduated from Grade 12.<\/p>\n

He\u00a0was\u00a0smaller than average and rather slight, but what he lacked in physical prowess Wong\u00a0made up for with his\u00a0intelligence. He\u00a0loved to read and was considered bright\u00a0and articulate.\u00a0Prior to joining the war effort, Wong\u00a0worked his way up to be a bookkeeper for the US Army Engineers in Prince Rupert, British Columbia.<\/p>\n

The Canadian Army recruiter who first interviewed Wong was quite impressed\u00a0by\u00a0the lad as\u00a0evidenced by the comments made in Wong’s service\u00a0file.<\/p>\n

“Has very high learning ability. In view of his civilian experience as a warehouseman and bookkeeper, he seems suitable for service… He possess leadership ability and was foreman of a Chinese crew in civilian life. His manner is co-operative, alert and self confident. Ought to adjust well and become a valuable soldier. Suitable for enriched training during basic.”<\/em><\/p>\n

\"Wong<\/p>\n

Wong was sent off for basic training in the fall of 1944. In February\u00a01945, he\u00a0was withdrawn from basic training and assigned “special duties” — this\u00a0was code for recruitment to\u00a0Force 136. He became one of almost 150 Chinese Canadians who were slated to\u00a0be trained for secretive, dangerous missions in the jungles of Southeast Asia.<\/p>\n

Force 136 came under British Intelligence –Special Operations Executive. Not part of the “regular armed forces” these men would be assigned\u00a0operations behind Japanese lines in Southeast Asia. Force 136 men were trained in guerrilla warfare and jungle survival techniques. Each man was to specialize in a particular skill\u00a0(demolition, wireless, interpretation) that would make him useful in a small, mobile, self-sufficient team. The plan was to parachute these small teams into Japanese occupied territory. There they would survive on their own skills;\u00a0find\u00a0and train local resistance fighters; and then assist with sabotage and espionage of the enemy.<\/p>\n

\"Young

Young Ming (James) Wong of Force 136. Circa 1944 Vancouver.<\/p><\/div>\n

The young Chinese Canadian men were told they had a 50-50 chance of survival. And if captured, they would likely be tortured and executed by the Japanese. Consequently, anyone going on an ops mission was given\u00a0a cyanide capsule to keep in their pocket and instructed to bite on the capsule\u00a0if captured.<\/p>\n

Wong\u00a0was sent to India for his commando training. He was joined there by his cousin Donald Sung. We do not know if Wong\u00a0was sent on any assignments before the war in the Pacific ended\u00a0as\u00a0he seldom shared his memories with his\u00a0family.<\/p>\n

We do know that many\u00a0isolated Japanese units did not surrender until weeks later. However, once the atomic bombs were dropped, most of the\u00a0young men of Force 136 were quickly informed that there services were no longer needed by the British and plans were made to send them\u00a0home.<\/p>\n

It was a long boat ride back to England where the famous photo below was taken. After a short stay in the UK,\u00a0the young men hopped onto another ship bound\u00a0for\u00a0Halifax. Once in that port, Wong and\u00a0most of the\u00a0Force 136 members\u00a0boarded\u00a0a train back to the West Coast of Canada.<\/p>\n

\"Force

Force 136 men in England awaiting repatriation to Canada. Young Ming James Wong is back row, second from left. His cousin, Donald Sung, is front row middle. (Library and Archives Canada)<\/p><\/div>\n

Wong\u00a0returned to Vancouver\u00a0and eventually married and had three children.<\/p>\n

His\u00a0most successful business venture after the war was a restaurant he started in Kerrisdale, a tony neighbourhood on the West side of\u00a0Vancouver. The Miramar Chinese Restaurant<\/em> was one of the first, high-end Chinese restaurants in that part of the city.\u00a0It is still there today, in it\u2019s original form, although it has now been renamed\u00a0The Golden Ocean<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Wong passed away peacefully on July 7, 2016 in Coquitlam. He was just shy of his 96th birthday.<\/p>\n

\"Young

Young Ming (James) Wong in India<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Young

Young Ming (James) Wong in India with a bicycle<\/p><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Young Ming (James) Wong was born on August 7, 1920. He was one of a family of 10 children whose\u00a0father\u00a0ran a grocery store in Vancouver. At a time when many young men dropped out of school early to earn a wage, Wong stayed in school and graduated from Grade 12. He\u00a0was\u00a0smaller than average and rather […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2508,"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-2407","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\/2407","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=2407"}],"version-history":[{"count":19,"href":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2407\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2507,"href":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2407\/revisions\/2507"}],"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\/2508"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ccmms.ca\/staging\/9619\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2407"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}