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12084
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17683.82
19669
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Copy admiralty
SIB,
No.
The RIGHT HON. THE EARL OF KIMBERLEY to GOVERNOR SIR J. POPE
HENNESSY, K.C.M.G.
Downing Street, 26 July
1881.
I HAVE now the honour to communicate to you the conclusions which I have formed upon the report of the Commission* appointed by you to enquire into the working of the Contagious Diseases Ordinances in Hong Kong. This decision has been delayed from various causes, partly from the bulk of the papers, partly in order to obtain the opinion of gentlemen who have had experience of the subject in this country, and partly owing to the necessity of further communication with yourself in the hope of obtaining from you some practical suggestions for dealing with so-called brothel slavery. I also waited to receive the special report of the Colonial Surgeon upon the condition of the brothels in 1874, which reached me in your Despatch of the 17th of September last. Since that date you have informed me, in your Despatch of, the 13th November, that the Contagious Diseases Ordinances of 1857 and 1867 have undoubtedly intensified brothel slavery; and in my reply of the 31st December I requested you to furnish me with particulars in explanation of that statement.
In the first place I request you to convey to the three Commissioners an expression of the thanks of Her Majesty's Government for their services and for the time and labour which they devoted without remuneration to investigating this intricate and unpleasant subject.
The report of the Commission is a minute and copious document, and throws light upon certain abuses which have arisen in connexion with the administration of the Ordinances in question, and which you, as I am glad to acknowledge, have shown every readiness as far as possible to remove.
I regret, however, that I find myself unable to accept the conclusions of the report with that full and entire confidence which I should have been glad to bestow upon a document compiled with so much labour,
The report is that of a majority, and one of the Commissioners dissents in very important points from his two colleagues. At the same time, these two latter gentlemen appear to me not to have sufficiently appreciated one of the chief objects aimed at in these Ordinances, and I feel considerable difficulty in determining what amount of reliance I can safely place upon their recommendations, owing to the omission from the printed evidence of material documents which deserved equal publicity with the other official records, and to the want of recognition in the report (in particulars to which I will presently allude) of evidence which is adverse to the views which they recommend for my adoption.
Their fourth conclusion is at variance with the opinions of the only European medical men whom they examined, and of the medical authorities of Her Majesty's military and naval forces. No medical or other officer of either branch of Her Majesty's services was called before the Commission, but Dr. Wells and Dr. Grant were asked in writing to express their opinion as to the effect of the Ordinance upon the amount and character of venereal disease, with an intimation that the evidence had left a most unfavourable impression on the minds of the two Commissioners (Mr. Keswick was then absent from the Colony). Both of these gentlemen take a different view from the Commissioners, and a further element of doubt has been introduced by the receipt from the Governor of the Straits Settlements of a despatch (copy|| enclosed), from which it appears that a law following the lines of the Hong Kong Ordinance, and affecting, as in Hong Kong, a large Chinese population, is in the Straits Settlements considered to have had eminently
satisfactory results.
The terms of the Commission indicate that the primary object of the investigation was the revision of the method employed in prosecuting unlicensed brothels; in other words, the administration of the law baving been called in question, the machinery was to be overhauled and a better system introduced. The enquiry, however, developed into a general investigation of the circumstances affecting prostitution in China and in Hong Kong, into the origin of these Ordinances, their effect in regard to kidnapping and ill treatment of the women by their keepers, their sanitary results, and other cognate
‡ No. 57.
* Published in H. L. No. 67, and in H. C. No. 118 of 1880.
§ Not printed.
Q 4190. 13-7/81. G. 179.
A
† No. 43. See No. 38.
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