HISTORY
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However, these disturbances, with their associated outbreaks of violence have not impeded the continued development for long and appear to have done little to weaken public confidence in the future prosperity of Hong Kong.
Founding Hong Kong as a British Colony 1841-2
Although archaeological finds have shown habitation since primitive times, Hong Kong's rise as a centre of commerce and industry dates only from its founding as a British colony in 1842. By the end of the 18th century, the British dominated the foreign trade at Canton but found conditions unsatisfactory, mainly because of the conflicting viewpoints of two quite dissimilar civilisations.
The Chinese regarded themselves as the only civilised people and treated all others as barbarians. Foreigners trading at Canton were subject to humiliating personal restrictions. Confined to the factory area, they were allowed to reside only for the trading season, during which they had to leave their families at Macau. They were forbidden to enter the city and to learn the Chinese language. Shipping dues were arbitrarily varied and generally much bickering resulted between British and Chinese. Yet there was mutual trust and the spoken word alone was sufficient for even the largest transactions.
Trade had been in China's favour, and silver flowed in until the growth of the opium trade from 1800 onwards reversed this trend. The outflow of silver became more marked after 1834, when the East India Company lost its monopoly of the China trade and the foreign free traders. The company, hoping to get rich quickly, joined the lucrative opium trade, which the Chinese had made illegal in 1799.
This led to the appointment of Lin Tse-hsu in March 1839 as special Commis- sioner in Canton, with orders to stamp out the opium trade. A week later he surround- ed the foreign factories with troops, stopped food supplies and refused to allow
anyone to leave until all stocks of opium had been surrendered and dealers and ships' masters had signed a bond not to import opium on pain of execution. Captain Charles Elliot, RN, the British Government's representative as Superintendent of Trade, was shut up with the rest and authorised the surrender of 20,283 chests of opium after a siege of six weeks.
But he would not allow normal trade to resume until he had reported fully to the British Government and received instructions. The British community retired to Macau and, when warned by the Portuguese Governor that he could not be respon- sible for their safety, took refuge on board ship in Hong Kong harbour in the summer of 1839.
Lord Palmerston, the Foreign Secretary, decided that the time had come for a settlement of Sino-British commercial relations. Arguing that, in surrendering the opium, the British in Canton had been forced to ransom their lives-though in fact their lives had never been in danger-he demanded either a commercial treaty which would put trade relations on a satisfactory footing, or the cession of a small island where the British could live free from threats under their own flag.