Patrick Corrigan (businessman)
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Patrick Corrigan AM |
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| Born |
9 September 1932 Hankou, China |
| Citizenship | Australian (since 1960) |
| Occupation | Businessman |
| Known for | Philanthropy, art collections |
Patrick Corrigan, AM (born 9 September 1932), is an Australian businessman, art collector, jazz enthusiast and philanthropist.
Corrigan was born at Hangkow (now Hankou, part of the city of Wuhan), central China, to British parents Leonard and Amelie (née Wolnizer) Corrigan. Leonard Corrigan worked for the shipping conglomerate Jardine Matheson, one of the original Hong Kong trading houses or Hongs.
In 1935 the Corrigan family moved to Tientsin (now Tianjin), northern China. On 30 July 1937, Tientsin fell to Japan during the Second Sino-Japanese War, but was not occupied entirely as the Japanese continued to respect foreign concessions until 1941, when the United States entered the Second World War. Following rumours of Japan's imminent entrance into the War, the local British authorities encouraged evacuation of its citizens and the Corrigan family decided to seek refuge in Australia.
Corrigan and his mother were granted a travel permit and left mainland China ahead of his father aboard the SS Fausang, which was captured in the Battle of Hong Kong on 8 December 1941, the same day as the attack on Pearl Harbor. Corrigan and his mother subsequently spent four years in the Stanley Internment Camp during the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong. Corrigan has reflected on his life at this time:
the movie ‘Empire of the Sun' almost duplicates my life in the camp. I was the same age as the boy … and we did things that you see in 'Empire of the Sun' … we used to go under the barbed wire and steal vegetables from the Japanese vegetable garden and come back … it's just amazing, it's like watching yourself when you watch that movie.
After the Japanese surrender in 1945, they were liberated by Australian Navy minesweeper personnel. Corrigan's father had also been interred in a POW camp on mainland China, near Beijing, and was liberated after the surrender.
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