Enclosure No. 1.
26
Memorandum of British Section claims on
Chinese Section on account of Suspension of Through Traffic and Demurrage of Rolling Stock.
Brief history of the Claim from the year 1923 and each subsequent year to 1928 inclusive with summary showing the amount of claims each year.
1923
sufferer
1. The year 1923 saw continuous political unrest in the Province of Kwong Tung and consequent periodical disturbances continued throughout the year. Naturally the Chinese Section was by far the greater of the two, but as the working of both Sections is so interdependent, the misfortunes of either reflect on the other, with the result that the receipts from through traffic for the year compared most unfavourably with those of previous years instead of showing a steady improvement.
2,
Trouble commenced on the Chinese Section with the departure from Canton of General Chan Kwing Ming on the 15th January. His troops in a panic made a rush for Shek Lung. About 3,000 were got away by rail when all arrangements were upset by retreating troops stopping trains and forcing the drivers to take them where they willed. Chinese Section engines were left standing wherever they happened to be when coal and water gave out. From this time onwards there was spasmodic and intermittent running of trains until 27th October when all through traffic ceased. There was no express service from the 16th April to the end of the
year.
Conditions gradually went from bad to worse. Chinese Section locomotives were run, or kept in steam,
night