De Fontaine had come to North Borneo from the Singapore police force. In May 1885, he organized what was called the Puroh Expedition, tasked with finding a Murut chief named Kandurong, known as both a cattle thief and a headhunter. De Fontaine assembled a party that included G.L. Davies, the Resident of the West Coast; Dr. Fraser; R.M. Little, a Resident Assistant; and J.E.G. Wheatley, along with a detachment of police. They arrived at Kawang village on 10 May. The expedition needed to push into the mountainous Crocker Range, but they were short of baggage carriers. The Dusun people who normally served as porters were unavailable, so the British turned to the Bajau headmen of Kawang and demanded 30 men to carry loads into the mountains.

The Bajau headmen resisted. "The carrying of heavy loads is hard for them," they told the British, a refusal that was as much about dignity as physical burden. The British Resident threatened to fine the village if the headmen did not comply. Tensions sharpened when a porter from a neighboring district discovered a stolen water buffalo in the Bajau village, forcing the headmen to surrender the animal to British authorities. On 12 May, the situation worsened further as more porters were demanded from Papar. The Kawang inhabitants felt cornered -- their autonomy overridden, their village threatened with punishment, their livestock seized. The colonial authorities, waiting under the shade of a tree with their Indian constabulary and policemen, did not recognize how close the situation was to breaking.

Two Bajau men approached the group carrying guns and began what appeared to be casual conversation. Then, without warning, one of them shot Dr. Fraser at point-blank range. Seven more Bajau fighters charged from concealment with spears, killing three Indian constables and wounding eight policemen in a burst of chaotic violence. R.M. Little drew his revolver and shot three attackers. One of the Indian constables seized a Bajau gun and killed another three, wounding two more. Facing unexpected resistance and mounting losses, the surviving Bajau retreated across open ground and vanished into the jungle. De Fontaine, severely wounded by a spear, was carried from the scene. He died on 17 May 1885 and was buried the following day in the European cemetery at Sandakan. In all, five members of the constabulary died in what became known as the Kawang Incident.

The tree where the ambush occurred became known as the Government Tree, a local landmark that served as an informal memorial for years. When the tree eventually fell, the Resident of the time proposed erecting a permanent marker: a small stone pillar, fenced in, to stand as a perpetual memorial. The monument that stands today is an approximately 2.5-metre obelisk on a simple stepped square base, bearing an inscription that contains a slight error in the spelling of Dr. Fraser's name. The North Borneo Chartered Company built it to honor its fallen officers, but the story the obelisk tells is incomplete. It memorializes the British dead without fully accounting for why the Bajau fought back -- the accumulated pressure of colonial demands, the threat of fines, the seizure of livestock, the erosion of village authority. The memorial stands at the intersection of colonial duty and local resistance, marking a moment when both sides paid in blood for the frictions of empire.