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Chinese, except as regards the use of Opium, are exceedingly temperate in their habits and we cannot account for the immense distilleries which have been discovered here."
19 Captain Sir Edward Belcher, Narrative of a Voyage Round the World, performed in Her Majesty's Ship Sulphur, During the Years 1836-1842. Including details of the Naval Operations in China, From Dec. 1840, to Nov. 1841 (London 1843, Dawsons of Pall Mall reprint, 1970, Vol.II, p.152.
Wyndham Baker, p.156. Commenting, he had added, "The British common soldier in fact is a strange compound, for they are very kind to their prisoners when once the excitement ceases."
21 Beeching, p.136.
22
24 Beeching, p.152. Another British placard recorded by Chu warned that there was to be no more commandeering of goods without payment: ibid. However, despite good intentions, according to another Chinese diary, this time from Shanghai in 1842, rape and looting did occur there, and impressment of civilians for forced labour for such heavy work as shifting gun emplacements and gunpowder [ibid., p.149]. Wyndham Baker, when landing his guns before Chin Kiang Foo, refers to "about 100 helpless natives to assist in carrying the shot boxes." Baker, in Blackwood's 1964, pp.161-2.
Beeching, p.139.
The British Foreign Secretary, Lord Aberdeen, had agreed, minuting: “The worst proposal I have seen from Mr. Pottinger....It ought not to pass unnoticed": Beeching, pp.139-140. But Pottinger deserves credit for preserving the famed Porcelain Pagoda at Nanking from British soldiers and sailors who, armed with chisels and hatchets, were intent on obtaining souvenirs by stripping tiles from the tower. "Sir Henry Pottinger was very indignant at this gratuitous vandalism; a guard was stationed to keep off intruders, and no one was thenceforth allowed to visit the tower without a permit from the Admiral or Commander-in-Chief." Parkes wrote, "Such an act as this is shameful and a disgrace to the British name." From Stanley Lane-Poole, Sir Harry Parkes in China (London, Methuen & Co., 1901), p.32. Alas, the Porcelain Pagoda was destroyed by the Taipings not long after, in 1856.
25 Edgar Holt, The Opium Wars in China (London, G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1964), p.139.
227
Chinese, except as regards the use of Opium, are exceedingly temperate in their habits and we cannot account for the immense distilleries which have been dis- covered here."
19 Captain Sir Edward Belcher, Narrative of a Voyage Round the World, performed in Her Majesty's Ship Sulphur, During the Years 1836-1842. Including details of the Naval Operations in China, From Dec. 1840, to Nov. 1841 (London 1843, Dawsons of Pall Mall reprint, 1970, Vol.II, p.152.
Wyndham Baker, p.156. Commenting, he had added, "The British common soldier in fact is a strange compound, for they are very kind to their prisoners when once the excitement ceases."
21 Beeching, p.136.
22
24
Beeching, p.152. Another British placard recorded by Chu warned that there was to be no more commandeering of goods without payment: ibid. However, despite good intentions, according to another Chinese diary, this time from Shang- hai in 1842, rape and looting did occur there, and impressment of civilians for forced labour for such heavy work as shifting gun emplacements and gunpow- der [ibid., p.149]. Wyndham Baker, when landing his guns before Chin Kiang Foo, refers to "about 100 helpless natives to assist in carrying the shot boxes." Baker, in Blackwood's 1964, pp.161-2.
Beeching, p. 139.
The British Foreign Secretary, Lord Aberdeen, had agreed, minuting: “The worst proposal I have seen from Mr. Pottinger....It ought not to pass unnoticed": Beeching, pp.139-140. But Pottinger deserves credit for preserving the famed Porcelain Pagoda at Nanking from British soldiers and sailors who, armed with chisels and hatchets, were intent on obtaining souvenirs by stripping tiles from the tower. "Sir Henry Pottinger was very indignant at this gratuitous vandalism; a guard was stationed to keep off intruders, and no one was thenceforth allowed Young Harry
to visit the tower without a permit from the Admiral or 10rth allowed
Parkes wrote, "Such an act as this is shameful and a disgrace to the British name." From Stanley Lane-Poole, Sir Harry Parkes in China (London, Methuen & Co., 1901), p.32. Alas, the Porcelain Pagoda was destroyed by the Taipings not long after, in 1856.
25 Edgar Holt, The Opium Wars in China (London, G.P, Putnam's Sons, 1964), p. 139.
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