مي
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Municipal Commissioners; Lieutenant-Colonel Pennefather, Inspector General of Police; Mr. W. Evans, Protector of Chinese; Dr. Middleton, Health Officer of the Municipality; to enquire and report on your suggestions, and the measures desirable to be adopted with a view to checking the spread of venereal disease.
2. This Committee made its report on the 8th July. I enclose a copy thereof. 3. To enable the report to be fully understood by those not conversant with the locality, I have had prepared a map of Singapore indicating approximately the locality of the brothels, both public and private, enumerated in the list laid before the Com- mission by the Inspector-General of Police. The map indicates also the various can- tonments or barracks, and (approximately) the number of troops stationed in each.
4. It must be understood that the statistics given by the Inspector General very likely do not comprise all the prostitution in the city-possibly almost as much as one- half of it may have escaped his lists, which are presumably more accurate in regard to Europeans and Japanese than to other races.
5. The Protector of Chinese, whose department used to register brothels, puts down the number at about 350, and the prostitutes at 3,600. Dr. Mugliston's evidence puts the Chinese at 3,000 and others at 350, who used regularly to undergo examination before the law was altered.
The Inspector-General locates 308 Chinese brothels, whose inmates are returned by their owners at 1,751. He also locates 121 other brothels, containing 335 women of other races.
Assuming the whole of the European and Japanese and a small proportion of the Chinese prostitutes to be due to the vices of Europeans and visitors to the port, there will remain almost five-sixths of the vice of the city attributable to Asiatics, nearly all of it to the Chinese race.
6. It must, therefore, be borne in mind that venereal disease in Singapore is prin- cipally a question affecting the Chinese population; the European population, including Her Majesty's Forces, is not nearly as deeply interested as the Chinese people.
Unfortunately there are no statistics concerning the prevalence of venereal disease in the Chinese general population except the hospital statistics quoted to the Com- mittee, but we have accurate observations concerning all prisoners who come into gaol, and the figures given in the gaol reports quoted in paragraph 17 of the letter of the Straits Associationt are appalling, as they show that nearly half of the convicts recently admitted bear signs of having suffered from venereal disease before entering prison.
SINGAPORE,
Total Number of Prisoners admitted
Of whom were
in Gaol.
Chinese.
Others,
Bearing marks of Venereal Disease.
1892
4,510
not specified
680
1893
3,446
609
1894
2,979
597
1895
3,028
2,699
1896
3,497
2.993
329 514
1,692
1,732
1897
3,893
3,284
607
1,735
53
7. From China extremely few women of the working class emigrate a small num- ber of women come as wives of the richer Chinese. The children of married Chinese long settled in the Colony (locally termed Babas) are usually united in marriage with other Babas. Practically the only wife that an immigrant Chinese (unless he is rich) can expect locally is a woman from a brothel or from one of the two institutions for taking care of Chinese girls.
8. In Penang, which is an older settlement, the proportion of Babas to immigrants is greater. In the Federated Malay States Babas are very scarce, and the proportion of persons marrying immoral women must be greater.
For a long time to come we must continue to expect a large proportion of the Chinese children, even of those born in wedlock, will be the issue of women who have at one time lived an immoral life, and from the evidence laid before the Committee, I am almost forced to add, have suffered from venereal disease.
9. On the physical effect of such a state of things on the innocent rising genera- tion I need not descant; the death-rate in Singapore, as will be seen by the figures noted below, far exceeds the birth-rate, and among the Chinese it is only constant in- migration which prevents a decrease of population.
DEATHS PER MILLE.
European.
Eurasian.
Chinese.
Malay.
Indian.
Other RaceK,
1894
12:54
20-21
33.38
31.33
28.25
37.23
1895
15.85
28.88
46.75
45-03
32-20
63.28
1896
17.15
40-08
55.69
43.35
34-65
54:53
1897
15.16
24-08
41.96
39.31
32-09
51.54
BIRTHS.
European.
Burasian.
Chinese.
Malay.
Indian.
Other Races.
16-48
1894
15.95
33-07
12:32
31.33
15-92
26.60
1895
14.68
35.85
12-09
32-43
27.00
1896
11.98
34.86
12.19
27.70
15.86
32.57
1897
15.48
28.28
12.73
29-02
-14.69
24.11
how
I wish that I could, without making this despatch too long, adequately express very deplorable I feel the present position of Singapore to be in respect of this scourge and in respect of the prospect of its spreading in future.
10. With reference to the question whether brothels have increased in number since 1888 (the year of the repeal of the Contagious Diseases Acts) and 1894 (the year of the abolition of the local inspection of brothels), the statistics noted below have been supplied by the Protector of Chinese.
Total Number of Prisoners admitted
in Gaol,
PENANG.
Of whom were
Chinese.
Others
Bearing marks
of Venerea!
Disease.
1895
1896 1897
:::
3,244
3,263 4,064
481
824
861
The statistics indicate also how terribly the proportion of diseased persons has aug- mented of late years, even after making due allowance for frequent re-admissions.
• Not reproduced.
† No. 19.
1888 1894 1898
:::
1888
1894
1898
110
BROTHELS.
Registered or Publio.
Unregistered or Private.
0 | All private houses were
prosecuted.
243 251 279
8}
150
PROSTITUTES.
Registered or Publio.
2,169
2,000
1,671.
Unregistered or Private.
0 100 600
Estimated.
• Furnished by keepers of brothels.
L
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
Reference :-
ודח
C.O. 882
6
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO
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