Noonday Gun, Artillery piece in Causeway Bay, Hong Kong.

The Noonday Gun is a Hotchkiss three-pounder naval gun with a long blue barrel, mounted on a silver-white breech mechanism atop a square blue pedestal ringed in gold. It stands on a low stone masonry platform at the edge of the Causeway Bay Typhoon Shelter, enclosed by blue posts linked with a gold-colored chain. A Jardines guard in a dark green jacket and tie attends the firing.

Jardine Matheson's private militia at East Point fired salutes for arriving tai-pans until a senior British naval officer, new to Hong Kong, objected in the 1860s; as a penalty the firm had to fire a gun every noon. Japanese forces dismantled the gun in 1941 and it was lost. In 1947 the Royal Navy supplied a six-pounder, and in 1961 a Hotchkiss three-pounder used at the Battle of Jutland replaced it after noise complaints.

The name "Noonday Gun" comes from the daily noon shot, and the ritual begins with the guard ringing a bell eight times, a practice dating from the East Point offices and warehouses when it marked the end of the morning shift. On New Year's Eve a midnight shot is fired and "Auld Lang Syne" is played, a custom brought to Hong Kong from Edinburgh Castle, with pipers performing each year. Since 1989 a HK$48,000 donation to the Community Chest lets anyone pull the lanyard, raising over HK$5 million for charity.

The gun sits on an enclosed plot on the Causeway Bay Typhoon Shelter waterfront, reached by a tunnel under Gloucester Road from the basement car park of The Excelsior hotel on Gloucester Road. The guard rings the bell eight times before firing, so arrive a little before noon to see the full ritual.

Each noon a uniformed guard rings a bell before firing the cannon in a carefully choreographed ritual. This daily duty has been performed by the Jardine Matheson company, which has maintained this tradition through generations.