CO129-406 - Public Offices - 1913 — Page 136

135

The engineer was one Macartney.

Crew, about 50 Chinese.

Our quarters are on the upper or boat deck, away from all

the Chinese.

I would mention that there is some sort of a search

made by the Authorities of all passengers and their lug-

gage when going on board these river steamers leaving

Hongkong, but in my opinion it is little more than a

Rarely is anyone found with arms or ammunition

farce.

on them, whilst it is a well known fact that quantities

of arms etc. are being smuggled from Hongkong into

Chinese territory.

12

Leaving Hongkong as usual at 7 p.m. of April 2nd

we had a quantity of general cargo on board, and about

500 Chinese passengers; one European missionary lady,

Miss Dunk, having a cabin on the upper deck with us. As

Chief Officer I have charge during the second half of

the run; accordingly, when clear of the Hongkong ship-

ping, I turned in at once.

At about 10 p.m. I was awakened from sleep by hear- ing a disturbance amongst the Chinese passengers on the

deck below me,

"

but paia little attention tu it at first,

a6

However,

as troubles frequently occur among the Chinese

themselves, but are rarely anything serious.

finding the row continuing, and thinking I heard a

revolver shot, I came on deck in my pyjamas to find

out the cause of the trouble, and was immediately

held up by two or more Chinese with revolvers in each

hand levelled at me, and was told in good English to

put my hands up. This, under the circumstances, I

thought it advisable to do, and I was then backed

into the Captain's room, finding Captain Holmes and the

engineer already there held up in the same way: the

lady passenger being brought in at the sume time as

myself.

For some four hours we were so kept. The hands of

us three men were tied, and we were the whole time

looking into the business ends of revolvers.

The lady passenger, a good Cantonese scholur,

informed us later that many of the pirates advocated

shooting us for fear of our recognising them on some

future occasion, and I wn quite of the opinion that

the same lady's arguments had considerable weight

with