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SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST-HONGKONG TELEGRAPH, CENTENARY SUPPLEMENT
HISTORY OF THE COLONY'S OLD BUSINESS
Notable Part In The Island's Prosperity
Bound up with the history of Hongkong is the history of the old "hongs" or business firms, some of which prospered and produced veritable merchant ¦ princes, while others were unable to weather the vicissitudes of early commercial competition, and failed.
Whatever the fate of these old mercantile enterprises, they played a great part in bringing prosperity to the Cclony; their principals did much for the betterment of the social life of the community, and several were cham- pions of reform, so that their influence for good is felt even to-day.
In a brief notice of some older business firms, much of the romance of their foundation must necessarily be omitted, and i must be left to some special scribe (as was the case with Jardine, Matheson and Company) to write their full history. It is not possible to do more in the present article than note the origin and subsequent progress of certain companies whose foundation dates back to the early years of Hongkong, or beyond, or wheĉ s advent brought some important change in local conditions.
Jardine. Matheson and Company have the oldest history of any existing firm in the Colony, their origin going back to 1732. when the business was started by Mr J. H. Cox. Their old books show a change in 1787 to the firm name of Cox and Beale: to Beale.
Reid and Company in 1793; and to Magniac and Company in 1817.
In 1832 the name as we have it to-day came into being, when Dr William Jardine and Mr James Matheson took control of the business.
Foochow and Japan. The original R. J. Gilman went home in 1855, but con- tinued his partnership in the firm.
In 1862 the partners were R. J. Gil- man. A. R. Hudson, R. J. Ashton, W. H. Vacher (later to become one of the promoters of the Shanghai Banking Corporation. Ltd.), Hongkong and and W. H. Green, and comprehensive merchant business was a large and carried on by the firm.
The connection of Gilman and Com- pany with the corporation of Lloyd's in London dates from the early 'Afties. during which period they have acted as agents for the corporation in Hong- kong and Foochow.
Fes
The former Hongkong Bank building, at Queen's Road, demolished to make room for the present structure.
Part of the old fountain opposite
the City Hall is seen on the right.
soon
A substantial building was erected, and as the business grew, ex- tensions were made, until the premises extended from Des Voeux Road to Queen's Road. The erection of Ex- change Building within comparatively
firm the
op- recent times gave the
been "Temises
expansion has Before 1905 brandnd...want of space opened in Shanghai and Japady been
THE HONGKONG HOTEL
The earlier China trade was done from headquarters at Macao. where Mr Hollingworth Magniac had been in charge; and when Dr Jardine, who had been a surgeon of the Honourable East India Company, combined with Having its roots in the old China Mr Matheson (afterwards Sir James
trade, the wver the operation a number
Arm extended its Matheson. Bart, they took concern and in due course made it one
merchant ventures
of different the of the best-known in Far East, ing tides of fortune, has been gh vary- Their interests, apart from imports by connected with the commercial fortunity of occupying their present and exports, extended to shipping. of the Colony up to the present day. mainly for the
purpose of carrying In 1917 it was converted into a private their own goods, and insurance. One limited liability company. of the Arm's subsidiaries was the Can- ion Insurance Office,
as far back as 1804.
Jardine and Matheson faced keen
started
a
competition, as did other merchants of East the time. on the part of the India
retained Company, which monopoly that gave them an advantage; but this monopoly came to an end in 1834, and that advantage went with it
Jardine. Matheson and Company transferred to Hongkong from Macao in 1842, the year after Britain took possession of the island. Their estab- ishment at East Point became famous; inrincipals oecame leading men.
Flustered.
Ai
www.
UNION INSURANCE
The Union Insurance Society of Can- ton is another old concern which has
later met with
already passed its centenary. In 1835. Dent and Company (which some years disaster) decided to found a second insurance business at Canton, where only one then existed. and where
cargoes were increasing with the extinction of the East India Company's monopoly. The original subscribers are believed to have been Dent and Co., Jardine. Matheson and Co. Turner and Co., and Russell and Co., the first three British and
y sand
13
A
N..
The
where
Hongkong
Hotel
Company, which later developed into Hongkong
T
teresting history, as it was formed at a¦ and Shanghai Hotels. Ltd, has an in-
time when hotel enterprise opened a wide field here. The
original com-
pany was formed in January. 1867, and July that year. The newly-built hotel premises.
in commenced operations
the corner of Pedder Street, were open- which then occupied a seafront site on ed in February, 1868; and soon it be came the principal hostelry of the Colony, and one of the leading con- cerns of its kind in the Far East.
Dairy Farm Company deserves men- tion in any historical survey of Hong- kong.
Prior to its advent, the milk supply had been insufficiently controlled, and was not entirely above suspicion. It was Dr (afterwards Sir) Patrick Man- son who instigated the formation of an up-to-date dairy, and in 1886 the Dairy Farm Company came into existence. with Dr Manson as one of its first directors. One of the local enterprises which it absorbed was the Hongkong Ice Company, which had been founded as far back as 1880, after the last of the old "ce houses" were becoming a
mere memory.
LINSTEAD AND DAVIS
JANUARY 25, 1941.
FIRMS
A Arm of chartered accountants, Messrs Linstead and Davis, have as sociations which go back to the early days of Hongkong, one of the founders. Mr T. G. Linstead, having arrived in the Colony in the fifties, originally working with the old concern of Lind- say and Company, pioneers who later passed out of existence. About the same time, Mr H. W. Davis had come out to Canton, and later entered busi- ness in Hongkong with Mr Granville Sharp, as bill and bullion brokers. Messrs Linstead and Davis in due course became associated in partner- came into existence, not all of them Thomas Sutherland, as Chairman.
The Union Church photographed in
the 'nineties, standing in a wooded area now completely built over.
ship, and founded the firm that bears prospering. their names to-day. Both were pro- minent in local activities of their time
מן
Reiss, Bradley and Company (former- ly Reiss, Massey) can trace their con- nection with the Colony to Reiss and Company, who opened a branch al Canton 1846, being a Manchester concern founded in 1818. The Hong- kong office was opened in 1864. In 1923 it was reorganised as Holyoak, Massey and Company but later the old name of Reiss was restored.
OLD PRINTING FIRM Among old-established local busi- nesses, Noronha and Company, who are the Government Printers, deserve men- tion, their beginning going back to 1844. Mr Delfino Noronha, in 1847, was already well established in Wellington Street, and in the fifties when the Government Gazette came into existence, the firm obtained the con- tract for its printing, which they still hold to-day.
It is their proud boast, also, that they have printed the Hongkong Jockey Club's race programmes ever since the Club was founded in the early years of the Colony.
SUGAR REFINING
The business of the Taikoo Sugar Refinery (controlled by Messrs Butter- fleld and Swire) dates back to carly Hongkong, and recalls interesting local
When Des Voeux Road became an inland street, the Hotel's sea frontage was lost, but an extension was later built towards Queen's Road, and when the older portion of the premises were
years agomed by fire some fifteen history. partly reconstruktivant building was site of the old hotel the original greater part of Gloucester Buthe
DAIRY ENTERPRISE
If for no other reason than the part it has played in bringing healthful food conditions to the Colony, and the sue-
cess of its efforts to found a dairy on
European lines in a tropical island the
There was an old sugar refinery at East Point in the sixties, known as the Indo-Chinese Sugar Company,
the
which ordine, Matheson and Company took Refim 978 to form the China Sugar ed
proper They later extend- premises which had nourchasing Hongkong Mint (a short-he former prise of the local authorities). Ole enterprises of the same nature th
the
It was in the early 'eighties that the Taikoo Sugar Refinery was established, and it has maintained its position ever
since.
P. AND O. COMPANY
In
es-
1865 the Colony's Arst dockyard. tablished at Aberdeen in 1857 by Mr Douglas Lapraik and Captain John Lamont, was taken over, and in 1866 the Hongkong and Whampoa Dock Company, Ltd, was duly registered. Among earliest shipping firms with It amalgamated in 1870 with the Union services to the Far East were the Dock Company, which had been started Peninsular and Oriental Steam Naviga-at Hunghom in 1864; and in 1877 the tion Company, who came to Hongkong Whampoa property was sold to the in the early forties. They obtained a Chinese Government. lease of land from the Government in the
The property of Cosmopolitan Dock Company. 1844, and opened offices in Queen's founded at Shamshuipo early in 1880, Road. Old records show them as was purchased later that same year, occupying premises At the Jubilec and thus all the Kowloon dockyards
Street-Des Voeux Road corner in 1852. were merged in a single enterprise.
THE EXTENSION OF PEDDER ST.