[This Document is the Property of His Britannic Majesty's Government.]
CHINA RAILWAYS.
CONFIDENTIAL.
[29895]
No. 1.
355
[August 9.]
SECTION 1.
(No. 256.) Sir,
Sir J. Jordan to Sir Edward Grey.-(Received August 9.)
[Via Siberia.]
Peking, July 15, 1909. IN my despatch No. 571 of the 21st December last, I had occasion to remark on the contrast between the steady progress and apparent absence of friction in the work of the northern section of the Tien-tsin-Pukow Railway, and the unsatisfactory condition of things in the southern section. The advantages enjoyed by the northern section consisted largely in the harmouions relations existing between the Chinese managing director, Li Te-shun, and the German staff. Mr. Li, who speaks excellent German, and has a German wife, made no pretence to special engineering knowledge, and was content to allow the German engineer-in-chief a large staff of German employés and a free hand in technical administration, while his colleague in the south, who has had some training as an engineer, has emphasised the subordinate position of Mr. Tuckey, and has prevented the employment of an adequate number of British engineers.
In the present temper of the Chinese people, however, success in obtaining, foreign assistance by no means makes up to an official for failure to secure the. confidence of his fellow-countrymen. Li Te-shun has just been dismissed from office as the result of a series of accusations made against him by the Tien-tsin gentry. The charges and Mr. Li's reply to them have occupied many columns recently in the Tien-tsin native press, but beyond the fact that Li has been dismissed, nothing appears to be yet known as to how far the charges have been investigated and substantiated.
The most important accusation is in connection with the site chosen for the main station at Tien-tsin, Li being accused of conniving with other persons to make money out of the purchase of the land required. The land in question was originally in the possession of a syndicate known as the Tien-tsin Land Improvement Company, whose title to it arose out of a concession made by the Tien-tsin Provisional Government of 1900-1902. A German, Mr. von Hanneken, was the chief shareholder in this company, and his name is freely mentioned in the case against Li Te-shun, but one or two of the leading British merchants were also interested. Last year the property of the Tien-tsin Land Improvement Company was transferred to a Chinese syndicate with the object of being sold to the railway administration. It is alleged that Li Te-shun was in this syndicate, and the allegation is not unlikely to be true. Indeed, His Majesty's consul- general at Tien-tsin reports that it is rumoured that many of the highest Tien-tsin officials were concerned in the syndicate.
The gravest part of this charge, however, in the eyes of the accusors appears to be in their belief that the site selected will prove advantageous to the foreign settlements at the expense of the interests of the native city.
The other charges against Li were that he surrounded himself with a crowd of unnecessary German employés, that he allowed his relatives and friends to make illicit profits out of contracts, that the line was being faultily constructed, the embankments having insufficient width of foundation; and, in short, that his mismanagement endangered the whole interests of the railway.
In connection with the station site, the Tien-tsin gentry have unfortunately raised the question of the demand that has been made by the Germans in conjunction with ourselves for railway station facilities for the foreign settlements, and they insist, not only that the main station shall be in the north of the city instead of in the site at present selected, but that the project of a branch station in or near the German concession shall be definitely abandoned. In my despatch No. 485 of the 27th October, 1908, I reported the arrangement reached after protracted negotiations between the British and the German interests for a scheme for railway station facilities which could be jointly pressed upon the Chinese authorities, and it may be
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