CO129-326 - Foreign Office - 1904 — Page 114

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29 JAM 1001

Document is the Property of His Britannic Majesty's Government.

Printed for the use of the Foreign Office. January 1904.

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112

PRESS | MAX 04

CONFIDENTIAL.

'No. 1.

Sir E. Satow to the Marquess of Lansdowne.--(Received January 16, 1904.)

(No. 21. Treaty.) My Lord,

Peking, November 25, 1903.

I HAVE the honour to acknowledge receipt of your Lordship's despatch No. 9, Treaty, of the 3rd July, transmitting copies of correspondence on the subject of the protection to be afforded to Anglo-Chinese British subjects by His Majesty's Consular officers in China. Your Lordship inquires whether, after consideration of all the circumstances of the case, I would advocate any modification of the present system as regards the protection of the category of persons referred to by Sir Henry Blake, and how far any changes which I may be disposed to recommend will necessitate a previous understanding being arrived at with the Chinese Government.

The delay in replying to your Lordship's despatch has been caused by the necessity of obtaining from the principal ports affected by this question Returns of the number of Anglo-Chinese British subjects of different categories.

The Returns which I had asked for from His Majesty's Consuls-General at Shanghae and Canton, and His Majesty's Consuls at Swatow, Amoy, Foochow, Ningpo, and Chefoo have now reached me.

The numbers are as follows:—

Shanghae Canton

Swatow

Amoy

Fouchow

Ningpo Chefoo

::::::

22

2

33

Total

3

5

1

116

I append the Returns as they were furnished to me. It will be observed that the Return from Shanghae is double. The earlier one did not furnish the particulars I desired, and I asked to have it made out in the same form as that from Amoy. The result is an increase of two in number, registered at Shanghae since the date of the first Return, and the omission of the name of Chan Shan, No. 20 in the first list.

Of these 116 persons only eight are reported as wearing European dress. The Return from Swatow states that the thirty-three registered there "for the most part wear Chinese dress, with a terai hat, brown leather boots, and a foreign-made umbrella." No mention is made among these of persons who have discarded Chinese dress, and with it the quene.

It is evident, therefore, that Sir Rutherford Alcock's Circular of the 7th October, 1868, requiring Anglo-Chinese British subjects to assume a distinctive dress, so as to be readily distinguished from subjects of the Emperor of China, has remained a dead letter. I consequently beg to recommend that I should be authorized to revoke it.

Analysis of the Shanghae lists shows that out of the twenty-two persons registered six were apparently born in a British Colony of parents not British subjects. As to o 15 in the first list, it is stated that no particulars of his parents can be obtained, but the second list gives both parents as British. Probably the earlier account is correct. This "registered British subject" is actually an opium farmer at Foochow. No. 17 in the list is the adopted son of a man who was a registered British subject, and on this fact of adoption rests his title to British nationality. He has been registered as a British subject since 1881, and is an Expectant Taotai.' His child, born in Shanghae, was registered as a British subject in 1900. The parentage of Nos. 5 and 7 appears from the first Return to be doubtful, but in the second is stated to be British.

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The Amoy Return shows that out of forty-seven actually on the register twenty claim to be born of parents both of whom were British subjects, whilst sixteen were born in a British Colony of fathers of whose nationality there is no evidence. One

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