Pengerang Battery

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Background

Pengerang Battery is located on a headland in Southeast Johor and is oriented towards the Straights of Johor, facing Pulau Tekong and Changi in Singapore. The history of the battery begins in the late 1920s. Japanese business owners, regarded today as informers, were present in the Pengerang area. In the small town of Pengerang itself, about 2km east of the battery location, there were two Japanese sundry shops: Matsumoto Sundry Shop and Yashida Sundry Shop. The British grew suspicious of these Japanese activities, in particular the Japanese company Consolidated Nippon Sangyo Gomu K.K. Rumor spread that the company, which operated in the nearby Pengerang Estate, were observing activities at the Singapore Naval Base from the estate and that they had erected a fort and were hiding machine guns and ammunition. These rumors compelled two military officers to request a visit to the estate on the 20th of June 1929. Further suspicion was aroused when the company purchased over an estate in Tanjung Pengelih where the Pengerang Battery was later built. The company applied to build a jetty at Tanjung Pengelih, which the Naval Office of Singapore felt was too close to Pulau Tekong Besar. It also appears that during this time a 2 ft gauge railway was built leading to the jetty possibly to transport material from the mines and plantations. In an effort to protect the Singaporean Naval Base, which was being constructed, from attack and remove Japanese threats the British government sought to take over the Japanese owned Pengerang Estate. The land, amounting to 1,102 acres, was taken over and cordoned off as a military reserve in 1936, in the process displacing seventy Malay families and ten Chinese families.

Construction (1924-1940)

Construction of the Singapore Naval Base began with the allocation of 11,000,000 pounds in 1923 for the project. Progress was extremely slow, and was only sped up in 1931 when the Japanese invaded Manchuria. The base was completed in 1939. The Pengerang Battery was built for the purposes of defending the Naval Base during an attack. Surveys on Tanjung Pengelih as a place to build defenses began in the planning phases of the Naval Base, which produced a map (refer to fig.2). In 1924 Major-General J.Frazer recommended placing guns in Pengerang, leading to the siting of a pair of 9.2 inch guns and a pair of 6 inch guns being proposed by the Committee of Imperial Defence. However, in 1927 they decided to transfer the armament to Pulau Tekong Besar instead.

In 1935 General William Dobbie was nominated as the GOC (General Officer Commanding) of Malaya, and he advocated for the siting of 6 inch guns at Pengerang in a defensive battery, which was approved on July 30th, 1936. The War Office allocated 60,000 pounds for the construction of the Battery, covering the costs of “one two-gun 6-inch 15 degrees battery, complete with range finding instruments, stores and loud-speakers installation, and with 1,500 rounds of ammunition, one defense electric light, with power supply to battery, defense electric lights, and accommodation for additional R.A (2 officers, 40 other ranks) and R.E (9 other ranks). (Haji Isa, 1989)” Funding for an observation post and electric lights was approved later in 1937, and the anticipated date of completion was December 1938. Laborers, mostly Chinese and amounting to between 50-100, were brought in from Pulau Tekong to work on the battery. Winches were used to bring the 6-inch gun to the summit of Bukit Pengerang. Pill boxes, machine gun positions, staff quarters, operation room, kitchen, observation posts, search light positions, generator room and wells were also constructed during this time. The expected date of completion was extended to July 1940. However, construction was halted when General Lionel Bond was appointed the new G.O.C. According to records, only 23,000 pounds out of the 60,000 pound budget was actually used.

Wartime (1941-1945)

Keith Simmons was selected as the major-general of the headquarters of the Singapore Fortress, which included Pengerang Battery. The Gordon Highlanders were instructed to defend Pengerang in November 1941. Expecting heavy battle, the British made the necessary preparations, including laying mines and evacuating the local population. While the British expected the Japanese to attack by sea, instead the troops advanced to Singapore through Johor Bahru, forcing the British to blow up the causeway. An eyewitness account of the Pengerang Battery during the Japanese invasion from Ivan Simpson’s memoirs describes the pillboxes in the area as overgrown and obscure. At the time of the Fall of Singapore the Pengerang Battery was occupied by the 1st Mysore Infantry I.S.F. Due to the nature of the Japanese invasion, the battery had only minimal involvement in the defense of Singapore. 3 days before the Fall of Singapore, the demolition of all Changi defences and withdrawal of all troops from the Pengerang area to Singapore was ordered. By 1943, the Japanese were occupying Pengerang Battery. The battery was seen to be of little military use, so instead the Japanese utilized the area in other ways. Bauxite ore was mined at Teluk Rumania and the Japanese worked with locals to catch fish to supply to Singapore. During the Japanese occupation a number of structures were built: three bungalows, an administrative office (on top of the hill), a wooden watch tower facing the sea and a smoke kiln. Furthermore, in 1945 it was reported that there was a power plant, marine camp, oil dump, rice stores, office, parade ground and a Japanese hostel at the battery.

Post War (1945-present)

The Pengerang battery was looted for its weapons and stores of food after the Japanese surrender. The British attempted to sell the battery, which was valued at $337,400 in 1948, to the government of Johor but the offer was declined. In later years, the pair of six-inch guns located at the summit of Pengerang Hill were cut into manageable pieces and sold as scrap in Singapore. Locals used the battery as a source of wood, cable, wire and iron to sell or reuse for their own projects (for example the roof tiles of the Japanese-built administrative block at the summit of Pengerang Hill were repurposed as the roof of the Ar-Raudhah mosque in Pengerang). Photographs from an aerial survey of the coast of Johor in 1957 shows the Pengerang Battery site to be abandoned, however a number of buildings are visible as well as an airstrip along the coast. A 1962 map of Pengerang makes no mention of the battery however it does confirm the existence of an airstrip in the vicinity, which may have been built because of the Malayan Emergency. According to Raz Talhar, a number of British troops were positioned in Pengerang to search for communists, and later during the Konfrontasi insurgents from Indonesia entered Malaysia through the beaches around Pengerang.

Pengerang Battery is the last remaining fortification of Singapore which has not been demolished or otherwise developed/restored, however today the Royal Malaysian Naval Academy stands in the vicinity of the battery.

Pengerang Battery

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