N? CONFIDENTIAL.
GOVERNMENT HOUSE.
HONGKONG.
25th August, 1914.
71
Enclosure 1.
sir,
I have the honour to transmit for your information
the enclosed copy of a letter from the General Officer Commanding asking me to approach His Majesty's Minister at Peking on the subject of the institution of a censorship of postal matter and telegrams at Canton.
2.
The facts are that on the British and French Settlements on the Shamien, Canton, there are a British, & French and a German Post Office and a branch of the Chinese Post and
Telegraphs Office.
The German Post Office is situated on the British Settlement but has been little used since the outbreak of war. A small amount of local postal matter is being forwarded by the German Post Office, Canton, to the General Post Office, Hongkong, and is subject to censorship. The bulk of the mails from the German Post Office, Canton, for foreign countries is in all pro- bability being sent in closed mails to Shanghai through the inter -mediary of the Chinese Post Office which is under agreement to carry such mails; and foreign transit mails destined for the German Post Office, Canton, also reach Canton in Chinese closed mails from Shanghai. A small amount of correspondence from Germans is being received à découvert in the General Post Office, Hongkong, franked with Chinese stamps.
Local letters between Hongkong and Canton are liable to censorship here.
THE RIGHT HONOURABLE
&c.
LEWIS HARCOURT, M.P.,
&c.
ו.