[ { "id": 204351, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1961", "page_number": 119, "title": "RAS-1961", "content_text": "Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong Branch\n\nRASHKB and author\n\nVol. 1 (1961)\n\nISSN 1991-7295\n\n115\n\nCHINESE BURIAL CUSTOMS IN HONG KONG *\n\nB. D. WILSON, M.A.\n\nBefore 1949, burial customs in China were largely geared to the traditions of a predominantly agricultural country. Except in the New Territories, however, Hong Kong was not in a position to follow the same rural traditions of burial procedure and therefore was forced to evolve a pattern more or less of its own. The postwar change of Government in China has led to even further changes in local burial customs.\n\nFor non-Christian Chinese in Hong Kong the focus of burial practices is the veneration of family ancestors. In its extreme form this can be taken to mean the belief that if surviving relatives and descendants pay sufficient respect to their dead, the dead in their turn will exercise a benevolent influence over the lives and prosperity of their family.\n\nThe deceased is considered to be in a better position to watch over his earthly descendants if buried close to his native place, where it is also, of course, easier for his family to pay their respects to him. This has led to the practice of conveying the deceased back to the place in China whence he came and interring him in a traditional burial ground. It is well known that, no matter where they die, the bodies of overseas Chinese have, where possible, usually been conveyed back to their homes for burial; when they could afford to do so, relatives have followed this same principle where death occurred in Hong Kong. Coffins and remains of Chinese who died in various parts of the world, e.g. Borneo, the Philippines, Indonesia, the U.S.A., have been shipped to China via Hong Kong which in prewar and immediately postwar days enjoyed a certain pre-eminence as a transit centre for the onward movement of human remains.\n\nThe trans-shipment was not always immediate. Circumstances often imposed some delay. To meet the difficulties of holding the coffin temporarily, the Tung Wah Group of Hospitals in prewar days set up in Hong Kong a coffin repository in Sandy Bay where remains could be stored on payment of a monthly fee. This repository served its original purpose well till 1949 when difficulties arose in the way of transferring bodies into China. At present, there is virtually no movement of coffins into China, with the result that the repository has gradually accumulated\n\n* The writer wishes to make it clear that, in putting forward this article, he has simply recorded information which has come to his notice incidentally in connection with other duties. He is neither an anthropologist nor a trained research worker, but simply an amateur with an interest.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1961.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/vd6724704", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 204358, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1961", "page_number": 126, "title": "RAS-1961", "content_text": "Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong Branch\n\nRASHKB and author\n\n122\n\nVol. 1 (1961)\n\nISSN 1991-7295\n\ntouch the dead is to run the risk of becoming infected by an aura of ill-luck (sz yan fung) whereby all the misfortunes of the deceased will be transmitted.\n\nAmongst fishermen fear of the dead and of ill-luck is particularly pronounced. At Tai O on the north-western end of Lantau, fisherfolk on their death bed may be taken from their boats to die in a special house maintained for the purpose near the cemetery.\n\nDuring funeral processions in both the urban areas and the New Territories it is the practice to scatter different types of paper, representing money, along the route to the burial ground, particularly at cross-roads where traditionally malevolent spirits tend to congregate. It is hoped that in the confusion caused by the evil spirits grabbing the money the spirit of the deceased will be able to pass unscathed. The remainder of the paper money thrown out at points other than cross-roads is for the use of the spirit of the deceased in making his way back to his home three days after death (saam ch'iu ooi wan). In many homes, a corner in a hall or passage may be reserved for a tablet and memorial, to house the spirit on its return to the home. This return of the spirit may at first sight be difficult to reconcile with the belief that the spirit descends into hell. The answer is that according to Chinese belief each dead person has a number of spirits. The descent of one of these spirits into hell is often assisted at the burial by the scattering and burning of specially printed hell bank notes (meng t'ung chí paî), together with paper effigies of clothes, suit-cases, motor cars, steam ships, aeroplanes, etc., often of most elaborate and detailed construction.\n\nThe impact of crowded living conditions, economy and improved public health have had their gradual effect in changing the pattern of Hong Kong burial custom. Except for paupers, by far the greater proportion of Chinese dead from the urban areas (numbering some 10,000) are now buried in the public cemetery at Wo Hop Shek, near Fan Ling in the New Territories. Coffins may be conveyed by rail from Kowloon daily as a service included within the burial fees that are $5 or $15 according to size of coffin. Only some 20% of the coffins are carried to the cemetery by private hearses at the expense of the relatives. Of the balance brought by rail, not more than half are attended by relatives. It is obviously not possible in a public cemetery to site graves in accordance with individual interpretations of good fung shui. The fact that each coffin is simply allotted the next vacant space in the burial terrace is readily accepted, although it must be admitted that the majority of terraces are well up the hillside with a commanding view of distance and water. Similarly, when the routine six months' notice of intention to exhume remains from the coffin sections is given, it is unusual for relatives", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1961.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/vd6724704", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 204441, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1962", "page_number": 73, "title": "RAS-1962", "content_text": "62\n\nHEROLD J. WIENS\n\nthe Miao, love vows between boy and girl are made through the exchange of girdle sashes.\"\n\nAmong the Miao, stilt houses with beds on the wooden or bamboo floor is the rule. Among the Yao a one-room house is usual, with a fireplace on the ground in the center of the room. Family members sleep around the fireplace. Sometimes the Yao have separate kitchen sectors for cooking purposes. Other aspects of the material culture of the Yao include browbands for carrying loads on the back, distinctive hairdos, and cross-bows which are also used by the Miao. The Miao material culture includes bronze drums, notched record sticks, and musical lutes made of multiple bamboo tubes. Neither Miao nor Yao possessed a written language of their own. Their religion is mostly animistic superstitions.10\n\nThe T'ai differ completely from the Miao and Yao in their exclusive love for well-watered valley bottom sites for paddy rice culture. For this they use yellow oxen or buffalo as draft animals, although such livestock has been more significant to them as a measure of wealth than for labour power. Vegetables, beans, tropical fruits, pigs, chickens and ducks all form part of their farm scene which is not much different from that of the Han Chinese. Their houses are akin to that of the Miao in being built on wooden or bamboo stilts, generally near a stream, and the T'ai also use crossbows. Tattooing of the skin is an ethnic trait of early times.\n\nAs with the Miao and Yao, free love before marriage accorded with social custom, especially during spring fertility rites, and, like the Miao, the T'ai lovers exchange girdles as love symbols. A bride stays with her own parents until the birth of the first child, when she goes to live with her husband. Little is known of the T'ai religious system before the introduction of Buddhism, but probably some form of animism associated with \"nats\" spirits attached to objects of nature or particular localities was common. Belief in and practice of sorcery are parts of T'ai superstition. Their dead are placed in coffins, but the coffins often are staked down with ropes on the surface of the ground rather than being buried underground.11 The writer has seen this form of burial along the Burma Road as late as 1940.\n\n10 Eberhard, Kultur und Siedlung, 51-52.\n\n11 Ibid, 53.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1962.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/9s166f47f", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 204538, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1963", "page_number": 19, "title": "RAS-1963", "content_text": "14\n\nLINDSAY RIDE\n\npredominantly Protestant, or to the Indians and Chinese who were not Christians. The Portuguese officials for a long time could not be persuaded to sell land to the Protestants for use as a recognized cemetery, and so, as on the islands up the river, the bereaved foreigners in Macao had to bury their dead on the hillsides beyond the city walls. In 1821 however, on the occasion of the death of Mary Morrison, wife of Dr. Robert Morrison, the Portuguese authorities at last agreed to let the East India Company have some land for burial purposes. The Morrisons had lost their first born, James, ten years before and he had been buried on Mesenburg Hill. During her last illness, Mary Morrison had expressed the wish to be buried with her first born, but the Chinese were reluctant to open an old grave. Strong representations were made by the Select Committee to the Portuguese and although they could not let her be buried in their cemetery, the pleadings plus the popularity of Dr. Morrison won the day, and a plot of land near one of the Company's official residences, now the Museum, was sold to the East India Company for use as a burial ground. Later, the East India Company allowed it to be used by all foreigners, and then a number of people sought permission for the remains of those formerly buried on hillsides to be moved into the newly established cemetery: that is why, if one looks carefully at the memorials, it will be found that a number of them have dates of death earlier than 1821, when the cemetery was opened. The earliest death recorded was of George W. Biddle of Philadelphia, U.S.A., he died in 1811, so that the date over the gate referred to earlier is neither that of the opening of the cemetery nor of the first death recorded there. It is probably that of the year in which the new charter came into force under which the East India Company operated in China at the time of the opening of the Cemetery.\n\nThe name \"Old Cemetery\" came into use after 1858 when the Portuguese authorities decided that no more burials were to take place within the city limits. This decision necessitated the closing of the cemetery and the opening of another, The New Protestant Cemetery, outside the city walls. A property named Carneiro's Gardens was bought at a public auction in 1858 by Osmund Cleverly (Cleverly Street in Hong Kong was named after him), acting on behalf of the Protestant community in Macao, and a Board of Trustees was set up to administer the property as a", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1963.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/4m90m091v", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 204540, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1963", "page_number": 21, "title": "RAS-1963", "content_text": "16\n\nLINDSAY RIDE\n\nAs we leave the church level to visit the terraces below, it is worth noticing that the corner of the balustrade behind the chapel is adorned with an old piece of Chinese porcelain in the form of a large peach. It is about a foot in diameter and carries on top, another small, almost parasitic one, about two inches in diameter; both have a delightful bluish-grey underglaze. These peaches, Chinese emblems of longevity, are most fitting and reassuring adornments to the approach of a Christian burial ground.\n\nThe three most widely known personalities, and the most frequently visited memorials, in the cemetery are undoubtedly those of Dr. Robert Morrison, D.D., Captain Lord Henry John Spencer Churchill, R.N., the brother of Sir Winston's great-grandfather, and George Chinnery; but these people are so well known that they need neither introduction nor lengthy consideration. Chinnery will be mentioned again in connection with his portraits and we shall have to be content therefore with just one or two observations on the artist himself when we come to his memorial. The Memorials. The Upper Terrace contains forty memorials; thirty-eight of them are to be found on either side of a small central avenue, and the other two are at its far end; they are of Chinnery and Drinker. All these memorials mark the resting places of those most recently buried in the cemetery, from 1850 to 1859, as well as one relatively very recent one who unaccountably gained entrance in 1889, thirty years after the cemetery was closed!\n\nOn the left, as we move along the central avenue from the entrance, the memorials nearly all stand back under palms and shrubs near the retaining wall below the chapel. They include American naval and merchant personnel, an Armenian and a few British. The majority of the Upper Terrace memorials however are on the right, their backs to the Lower Terrace. They include more American seafarers both naval and merchant, missionaries both British and American, a member of Perry's historic mission to Japan, and Joseph Adams, the grandson of the second President and the nephew of the sixth President, of the United States of America.\n\nNames associated with early Hong Kong, for example Duddell of Duddell Street, will be found in this row, as will also that of a famous Danish family of sea captains; in fact Captain Ipland has two memorials", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1963.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/4m90m091v", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205367, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1967", "page_number": 129, "title": "RAS-1967", "content_text": "122\n\nREV. MR. KRONE\n\nobtains a livelihood. One of my teachers acknowledged to me, that he had written one of these themes for another person, and had received in payment a pair of new shoes.\n\nLet us now take a glance at the Inhabitants of the district. Their present number I have been unable to learn, but from what I have seen, it must be very considerable. The densest population is in the plains. To any but an eye-witness, the great number of large towns and villages which are scattered over so small a space, would appear almost incredible.\n\nThe inhabitants are mostly agricultural, but there is also a considerable trade carried on with Tun-kung, Shek-lung, Hong-kong, and Canton. Many junks may be seen entering and issuing from the harbours, and numerous fishing-boats frequent the coast.\n\nWherever it is possible, the ground is converted into paddy-fields. The agricultural produce consists chiefly of rice, ground-nuts, yams, sweet potatoes, and the different kinds of garden vegetables. In the more mountainous parts of the interior of the district, large quantities of different fruits are grown, which serve not only for their own consumption, but also supply the markets of Canton and Hongkong. The principal kinds are pine-apples, pears, oranges, plums, mangoes, with the li-chee, the long-an, and the song-hin or Chinese goose-berry. Pine-apples are extensively cultivated, especially in the neighbourhood of Pukak. Whole mountains are covered with these plants, which thus give a picturesque appearance to an otherwise barren country. They are very cheap, sometimes costing only six to eight cash each.\n\nTea is also cultivated in several places, and is generally called \"Shan-cha\"✡, mountain tea. It has rather a strong astringent taste, but is much liked by the natives, and particularly by those who are of advanced age, who consider that it promotes digestion and cools the system. Many drink only this indigenous tea.\n\nBut few cattle are reared in the district. Horses are seldom seen, and those which are kept belong either to the military establishments or to private gentlemen, by whom they are often lent to geomancers to enable them to travel over the mountains to choose lucky spots for burial places, or for the erection of some building. Oxen are scarce compared with the number of buffaloes, which are preferred for tilling the ground. Often, on passing", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1967.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/0c488p70g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205629, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1968", "page_number": 171, "title": "RAS-1968", "content_text": "166 \n\nNOTES AND QUERIES \n\ntions and answers produced an interesting picture of life among the soldiers at the Fort in the few years before they withdrew from it after Lantau and other parts of the present New Territories were leased to the Hong Kong Government in 1898. Put together they amount to this: \n\nI was 24 sui when the British came to take over Lantau. Tung Chung Fort had a permanent garrison of Chinese troops before then. I can't remember exactly how many troops there were or what the rank or title of the officer-in-charge was, but they were none of them local people. Their families lived at Tung Chung too, in several rows of brick houses outside the Fort and some inside the walls also. There was a house nearby in which soldiers or their family members were put when sick, with a burial ground behind. The garrison's provisions were brought in by ship, though they bought fish and vegetables locally at Tung Chung. There were military boats at Ma Wan Chung [where the main stream empties into the sea], about 7 or 8 of them of different kinds, but they were not under the command of the Tung Chung officer and came and went between such places as Canton [the provincial capital], Nam Tau [the district city], Shum Chun etc. \n\nThe soldiers at the Fort had a big parade each year on the 1st day of the seventh moon. It was held on the level ground beside the Hau Wong temple (1) near the beach. Inspecting officers came from Nam Tau, Shum Chun and Canton, I think. There was much drumming and noise on that day, and the troops paraded with all their weapons. The soldiers had uniforms of all sorts, and many kinds of weapons too, but there was no uniformity of clothing or equipment. \n\nThe soldiers were generally well-behaved and gave no trouble to us local people, though they did not have much to do as they didn't cultivate any fields, inside or outside the Fort. They did not ask for money, but kept watch. There was a guard station at Ma Wan Chung, though there were rarely soldiers in it. There were lots of robbers and pirates in this area when I was young. They came from", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1968.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833948d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205946, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1970", "page_number": 26, "title": "RAS-1970", "content_text": "MORE ON THE YUNG-LO TA-TIEN\n\n21\n\nserved in the Legation Guard in Peking in 1900. The Chester Beatty Library (Dublin) has three volumes not otherwise accounted for (chüan 803/4, 805/6, and 10,110/1). The Wason Collection of Cornell University has chüan 13,853, and the National Central Library, Taipei, has chüan 7527, which Yang Chia-lo failed to reproduce. The number at present count then is 809 chüan out of the original total of 22,877 chüan (not counting the table of contents which has been separately published).\n\nWhat subjects are covered in the volumes that have been saved? Practically everything that concerned the Chinese around the year 1400, but in fragmentary fashion. Thought, morals, poetry of several kinds, frontier people (the Hsiung-nu and Hu, for example), geography, surnames, government, law, the spirits, biography, divination, architecture (gates, bridges, halls, storehouses, walls, offices), villages, capital cities, history, burial customs, astronomy, botany, grain, military matters, Buddhism, Taoism, travels, bronzes, food and drink, caves, dreams, scholars, drama, sacrifices, clothing, mathematics, images, carpentry, post stations, shamans, literary collections. Dr. Walter Swingle, writing on the YLTT in the Report of the Library of Congress (1922-23), asserted: \"It combined all existing Chinese books that were available to Yung-lo, excepting novels and possibly some plays.\" Fortunately, his remark was found to be in error when the Library of Congress acquired (1935) from the collection of Dr. H. A. Giles, professor of Chinese at Cambridge University, a copy of a \"short historical novel, Ch'ieh-fên-lu and a hsü-lu, purporting to describe the experiences of Sung Hui-tsung, made captive by the Chin in 1127.\" (The son of Dr. Giles, Lancelot, was in the British Legation during the siege in 1900, and doubtless picked it up then.) The first notice of the famous play P'i-pa chi (The Lute Song) also appears in a volume of the YLTT. Professor Pelliot has characterized as one of the most important volumes saved the sections from a great Yuan dynasty encyclopaedia (Ching-shih ta-tien, published 1331), including a part on courier stations (jamči), now in the Toyo Bunko. Among other interesting works saved, generally fragmentary, are geographical. Francis D. M. Dow of Australian National University has recently drawn attention to certain gazetteers preserved: one of the prefecture of Soochow, published in 1379, for example; and years ago (1929) the Metropolitan", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1970.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ww72j0241", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206329, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1971", "page_number": 146, "title": "RAS-1971", "content_text": "140\n\nH. J. LETHBRIDGE\n\n44 Sir Robert Ho Tung was never a member of the District Watch Committee although he was at one time chairman of the Tung Wah Hospital Committee. Sir Robert's brothers—Ho Fook and Ho Kom Tong—and other relatives became members of the Committee.\n\n45 Sir Chau Tsun-nin, who served on the Committee, was the son of Chau Siu-ki, a prominent financier and member of the Committee until his death. Chau Siu-ki (1863-1925) was killed in the collapse of a house during an abnormally heavy rainstorm.\n\n46 I think one may conclude that by the time the Committee met the Registrar General most of the problems to be discussed had been thrashed over previously, most likely at the Chinese General Chamber of Commerce or at the Chinese Club, both located in Connaught Road. There was also a Compradores' Club.\n\n47 For an account of Ho Kai's involvement in Chinese politics see Harold Z. Schiffrin, \"The Enigma of Sun Yat-sen\", in M. C. Wright, ed., op. cit., pp. 246 ff.\n\n48 The Hong Kong Chinese General Chamber of Commerce was in close touch with the Canton Chamber of Commerce and members flitted between one and the other. Many members of the District Watch Committee had offices and businesses in Canton and invested heavily in Kwangtung enterprises. Many bought land.\n\n49 Ho Kai, however, believed in the 'Open Door' policy in China, which he thought would be beneficial to both China, Hong Kong and the West. See the letter sent to Lord Charles Beresford in Beresford's book, The Break-up of China, London, Harper and Brothers, 1899, pp. 216-233.\n\n50 This is made clear, I feel, by a perusal of the commissions of enquiry into the workings of the Po Leung Kuk and the Tung Wah Hospital. In both cases Ho Kai worked in concert with Lockhart to protect the interests of the Chinese community. Ho Kai was no yes-man. On the other hand, he did use his inside knowledge of government activities to line his own pockets. Endacott states that Ho Kai and his cronies were suspected of spreading rumours about British intentions in the New Territories before the takeover in order to reduce land prices. Endacott, op. cit., p. 263. See also Despatches and other papers relating to the Extension of the Colony of Hong Kong, Sessional Papers, No. 32 of 1899, p. 20.\n\n51 For example, Ho Fook, Chau Siu-ki and Wei Yuk all died in office.\n\n52 This board was set up to oversee the working of the managing committee and to see that continuity in policy was maintained.\n\n53 See note 52. An important function of the Advisory Board was to see that money was spent wisely.\n\n54 The Committee controlled fee-paying cemeteries at Aberdeen and Tsun Wan. Burial was reserved for Chinese who had been permanently resident in the Colony.\n\n55 This Committee, like the others listed above, was under the chairmanship of the Secretary for Chinese Affairs. Chinese temples were controlled, in accordance with Ordinance No. 7 of 1928, by this Committee.\n\n56 The Chinese Recreation Ground was an open space situated off Hollywood Road. Funds derived from the rents of stalls in both Hollywood Road and the Yaumati Public Square in Kowloon.\n\n57 Before 1941 there were 9 Chinese Public Dispensaries controlled and maintained by a committee under the chairmanship of the Secretary for Chinese Affairs. They were originally established to help combat plague.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1971.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/z029vt43g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207147, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1974", "page_number": 218, "title": "RAS-1974", "content_text": "212\n\nNOTES AND QUERIES\n\nsurvey. Sir E. Belcher, accordingly, landed on Monday, January 25, 1841, at the foot of Taipingshan, and on the hill, now occupied by the Chinese Recreation ground, Captain Belcher and his officers, considering themselves the bona fide first British possessors, drank Her Majesty's health with three cheers, the spot being thenceforth known as Possession Point. The Point remained an open space and came under the management of the Chinese Recreation Ground Committee created in 1890.\n\nIn 1887 there was a rearrangement of streets to the south of the Recreation Ground. With the change there was a renaming. The western terminus of Hollywood Road was shifted from the present Possession Street to what was known as Gap Street, so that Hollywood Road emptied into Queen's Road on the south side of the Recreation Ground rather than on its east side.\n\nOn the south side of old Gap Street across from the Chinese Recreation Ground the original St. Stephen's Anglican Church opened in 1866. Here also the Baxter Memorial School was built in 1872 in memory of Miss Sophia Harriet Baxter. She had come to Hong Kong in 1860 and until her death five years later established schools for Chinese, Eurasians and orphans. St. Matthew's Anglican Church now occupies a part of the original site granted to the Church in 1864.\n\nThe neighbourhood could have been regarded as a good missionary area for it was dominated by establishments devoted to pleasure. Nearby was a theatre, and the present Possession Street was lined with brothels in the nineteenth century. It was also, however, near a more sobering district.\n\nThe hillside between Possession Point and West Point was used as a Chinese burial ground. The I-tsz Temple, built to house commemorative tablets for Chinese residents who died without a family to remember them, and, temporarily, for those whose families were in their home villages in China, was behind Possession Point on Tai Ping Shan Street. It adjoined the burial ground and thus, in accordance with Chinese practice, was in a convenient location to be used as a depository for those who were about to die. Publicity regarding conditions at the temple started a movement to provide better medical services for the Chinese community. This resulted in the formation of Tung Wah Hospital. It was opened officially in 1872 across the street from the I-tsz Temple, occupying land that was a part of the old burial ground.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1974.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207162, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1974", "page_number": 233, "title": "RAS-1974", "content_text": "NOTES AND QUERIES \n\n227 \n\nyears excellent education for girls. On a visit to Europe in 1874, the Vicar Apostolic of Hong Kong took the occasion to invite the Christian Brothers to come to Hong Kong and assume responsibility for St. Saviour's School. They are a teaching Order founded by Jean Baptiste de la Salle (1651-1719). His statue made by Mr. Auguste Vannini, a former Hong Kong resident, stands in front of La Salle College.\n\nThe first contingent of Brothers arrived in June, 1875. In 1876 they reorganised St. Saviour's into a school for the education of Portuguese only and renamed it St. Joseph's College. A property was bought at the north-west corner of Caine Road and Aberdeen Street. With more space it was possible to open a class for Chinese in 1878. The capable administration of the school by the Brothers brought increased enrolment and resultant overcrowding. When the Church in 1881 bought 'Glenealy', the property where the Cathedral is now located, the Brothers moved into the house on the site and classes were held in temporary matsheds and out-buildings, while a new school building was being built. In September, 1882, the new school was opened on Robinson Road. St. Joseph's by gradual transition beginning at the close of the first World War moved to its present location on Kennedy Road. Initially, it occupied the premises there of the Club Germania,\n\nIn 1917, St. Joseph's College opened a branch school on Chatham Road in Kowloon. The boys in the upper forms were sent to finish their education at the main school on Hong Kong Island. This was not an altogether satisfactory arrangement. Father Aimar, Principal of the College, and Father Spada, parish priest of Holy Rosary Church, Chatham Road, anticipated the growth of Kowloon. In 1924 they looked over the peninsula for suitable sites for the future needs of the Church. Brother Aimar bought ten acres from Government for $120,000 in a sparsely settled area. A nearby site was also acquired upon which was built St. Theresa's Church in 1932.\n\nAt the time, the wisdom of buying these sites was questioned by those who considered them both too extensive and too remote from the centre of population in Kowloon. A description of the area was published in an early issue of The Lasallite:\n\nThe north-eastern portion of the estate must have been used at some time as a burial-ground, as well over a thousand graves had to be removed by the care of the Tung Wah Hospital", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1974.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207305, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1975", "page_number": 73, "title": "RAS-1975", "content_text": "THE GREAT PLAGUE OF HONG KONG\n\n65\n\nconsiderable sum of money. However, compliance with this regulation was seldom observed. House to house visits continued to detect afflicted premises but this also proved difficult. Usually, bodies were thrown out at night by the other occupants of infected houses so as to avoid detection and the subsequent disinfection of the premises. In 1900, for example, 412 dead bodies were dumped in the harbour,\n\nWhen the disinfection of houses was undertaken it was the usual practice for the occupants to be issued with new clothes. Their own clothes, bedding, curtains and carpets were sent to a steam disinfecting station. The premises were then thoroughly cleaned by spraying the walls with a solution of perchloride of mercury; alternatively, rooms were fumigated with free chlorine obtained by the addition of diluted sulphuric acid to chlorinated lime. Finally, the floors and furniture were scrubbed with Jeyes fluid and the walls were lime-washed. During these operations the occupants were given temporary accommodation on Chinese marriage boats anchored off Stonecutters Island.\n\nOther measures taken included the burial of the dead in a plague cemetery at Kennedy Town and the regular disinfecting of all public latrines with chlorinated lime.\n\nIn Search of an Answer\n\nThe suddenness of the attack of plague in 1894 and its continued virulence for the next two decades must have caused great dismay among the community in general, particularly as it also seemed impossible for modern science to eradicate the basic cause of the disease.\n\nWhen Sir William Robinson reported to the Marquess of Ripon in 1894 on the course of events he wrote:\n\n\"It is, I think, very probable that the want of sufficient water and the filthy habits of life amongst the 210,000 Chinese who reside here have rendered Hong Kong liable to the invasion and development of the germ of the bubonic plague. Chinese are of the opinion that the plague emanates from the ground and is favoured by a long continuance of dry weather when the earth becomes porous and numerous fissures appear on the surface facilitating the escape of whatever causes the disease.\"*\n\n* Ibid, p. 5.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207853, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1976", "page_number": 241, "title": "RAS-1976", "content_text": "226\n\nMAURICE FREEDMAN\n\nman with a parent to rebury and with the resources to back up his ambition will look far and wide in his search for a good site, not necessarily confining himself to the neighbourhood of his village. The poor cannot indulge themselves so; but they are unlikely in any case to reach the stage of looking for reburial sites, and the bones of their dead probably remain for ever in the urns where they were deposited after the first burial. There is no dearth of evidence that urns lie neglected for many years, at the end of their career spilling their contents on the ground. For the humble, geomantic burial plays a small role. Among the proud and the aspiring the hunt for the Dragon, a never-ending search for promotion and security, leads people in a competitive race over the hills, Fung shui in this context represents the right of individuals to outstrip their neighbours. (I have not gone into the details of burial. See B.D. Wilson, 'Chinese Burial Customs in Hong Kong', Journal of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, vol. I, 1961, pp. 115-123).\n\n60. Success which flows from fung shui raises a moral problem, for it is not a reward for merit. If the geomancer has done his job correctly Breaths will concentrate automatically, whether the descendants are good men or bad. Geomancy explains why some people succeed and others fail, even when they have the same advantages and appear to have the same chances, but, at least at first sight, it seems to obscure the role in success which may be played by moral worth. The problem is in fact raised in some of the fung shui stories current in the New Territories. They show that in reality the evil cannot expect to prosper by fung shui, however much they appear to benefit in the short run. The universe is a moral entity; principles of right laid up in Heaven are not to be denied by the workings of Earth. I heard one story in two different versions; here is a summary of its main points to illustrate the role of morality in fung shui. A poor duck-breeder one day observed a geomancer at work. The geomancer stuck a bamboo pole in the muddy duck-pond and left it there for the night. During the night it flowered. The duck-breeder stole it and replaced it with another bamboo pole to the surprise next morning of the geomancer who had expected to find it flowering. He tried again but once more was foiled by the wily duck-breeder, and so he was forced to abandon what he thought to have proved a magnificent fung shui. The duck-breeder, having stolen the knowledge of the site, ordered", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1976.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/hq382988q", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208161, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1977", "page_number": 200, "title": "RAS-1977", "content_text": "184\n\nNOTES AND QUERIES\n\n\"The burial ground is situated near Chai Wan Kok, Tsun Wan. Some time ago, about ten years after the Territory was leased to Great Britain, some natives of Tsun Wan village applied to the H.K. Govt. for a piece of land near the grave to erect some houses, but the proposed area affected the Fung Shui of the said grave. The village Elders of the various branches of the Tang family assembled, and a joint petition was submitted to the District Officer in the names of the descendants. Thanks to this Official the proposed sale was withdrawn. It was afterwards put on record that the site of the grave was to be preserved for ever. Subsequently new roads were constructed by the P.W.D. and the line of one proposed road was across the grave site. The Elders of the Tang family, fearing that this might affect the \"force of the movement of the green dragon,” again assembled and petitioned H.E. the Governor, praying that the line be moved to the foreshore of the site. This was done. In the 6th moon of the 12th year of the Chinese Republic, (1923) a villager of Tsun Wan dug earth on the right side of the ancestral grave, that is, in Chai Wan Kok village, thereby affecting the \"force of the movement of the coming dragon.\" Another petition was sent to the District Officer, who inspected the grave personally. After that earth cutting was prohibited, and the ancestral grave preserved.\"\n\nWe then proceeded to Kam Tin itself where, in front of the Kam Tin Rural Committee Office, we were greeted by an impressive body of lineage elders, treated to a dim sum (*) repast and shown a number of interesting relics handed down through the centuries. These included a painting with imperial calligraphy stated to date from Sung times, and a number of other paintings.*\n\nOur next stop was at Au Tau cross roads to see grave No. 5, that of TANG Wai-kap, the husband of the Sung refugee princess referred to in the Notes.\n\nFrom Au Tau cross roads we went on to the Pok Oi Hospital near Yuen Long and walked into an area of low hills, across a stream, where we inspected grave No. 2. This is located in what is obviously considered to be a very favourable fung shui area because the adjoining ground is thickly covered with graves.\n\nAfter returning to Pok Oi Hospital, we went by bus to Wang Chau behind Yuen Long where we walked through the village and across the fields to the foothills of an adjacent hill area. We went first to grave No. 1 and from there along a winding path to grave No. 4 which is located some 500 yards to the south. Both graves are in excellent positions, and like No. 3 have granite pillars with lion\n\n* These have been reproduced at pp. 112-115 of the Inauguration Publication of the Tang Clansmen Association (Inc. 1965), in Chinese, of which there is a copy in the Chinese Library, University of Hong Kong.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1977.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/np198x23n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208727, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1979", "page_number": 184, "title": "RAS-1979", "content_text": "CHINESE RELIGION REDISCUSSED\n\n157\n\nwould not be a recommendation; besides, he does not 'worship' other people's ancestors: he prays for their salvation. The author has overlooked a very important dimension of the cult for the dead, which shows that anthropology and sociology cannot explain all the aspects of phenomena such as these. I refer to the historical dimension. That Buddhist priests and nuns perform services for the deceased is historically conditioned. Ever since the T'ang dynasty, Pure Land Buddhism has had a strong impact on the Chinese population. Scared to be assigned to one of the dreadful courts of hell (or purgatory), devotees wished to be reborn in Amita's paradise (Sukhavati) and in imitation of rituals attributed to Monk Mulien, as expressed in a very popular legend, would ask the Buddhist priests to perform these rituals. Since the Chinese concepts of the after-life drastically changed after contact with Buddhism, and since the Pure Land school enjoyed such a universal popularity, it was only natural that the monks belonging to that school became the specialists in funeral rites. In other words, the custom of Buddhist personnel to perform funeral and memorial rites for the dead in China is not a result of their \"leaving home\" as the author claims.\n\nTo end chapter 3, the author establishes a series of temple types which cuts across the three religions and is based on different criteria, especially particularism vs. universalism. Here again there are great difficulties. The series for one thing is too symmetrical and looks therefore almost like an a priori and artificial construction. To be more specific, however, I feel that in the set of three primary types (group a) the Confucian temples are missing. In the set of derived types (or group b) I do not see the essential difference between the ancestral temples (group a) and the pseudo-ancestral temples. The differentiation between the monastery (group a) and the so-called bone temple (group b) again is arbitrary: bone temples are frequently attached to Buddhist monasteries; and are, in my opinion, just an alternative funeral ground. Families often have their private burial spots or graveyards. After cremation was introduced to China, storage of urns in pagodas became a fashionable way to substitute for graves, but that does not make those 'bone temples' a distinct type of temple. Finally the medium-shrines are also missing, although many of them are real temples, although privately owned.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1979.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2801w5938", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208752, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1979", "page_number": 209, "title": "RAS-1979", "content_text": "182\n\nJULIAN F. PAS\n\nBoth the Buddhists and Taoists are publishing books and monthly magazines to make their religion accessible to serious lay people; examples are the Journal of Buddhist Culture,11 imitated by its counterpart Journal of Taoist Culture.12 Besides these two, there are a great number of other monthlies.13\n\n(d) Folk Religion\n\nI believe that Chinese folk religion is the heart of religious life in Taiwan (and China). Although it has greatly borrowed from all the other systems, it has to be regarded as a distinct system in its own right, already in existence before the rise of the historical traditions of Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism. In the course of the centuries, it has absorbed a great deal of their teachings and has thus been enriched considerably, but it still cannot simply be identified with any of the three. This does not mean that it is a well-organized and homogeneous system. To postulate a well-rounded and logically constructed system for the folk religion does not agree with the real facts. If one were to ask what the religious beliefs and practices of the Chinese people are, the answer would have to start with the folk religion, making exceptions for the relatively few who are purely and exclusively Buddhist or Taoist (also excepting those who have no religious beliefs any longer).\n\nWhat the majority of the people believe in and practice circles around two areas of major concern: the family (clan) and the local community. These two social organizations determine their religious practices and also, to a greater or lesser degree, control their religious beliefs.\n\n(i) Family: the family lineage is characterized by the cult of the ancestors and some select deities.14 The practice of ordinary ancestral worship at the home shrine is rather stereotyped: depending on the degree of religious fervor of individuals, rituals are performed with lesser or greater regularity and abundance of offerings. But a minimum practice in all families, even in the cities, is the devotions performed at the home shrine two times a month: on the first and fifteenth day of the lunar month. Daily offerings of incense are also often performed, but not in all homes.\n\nThe extraordinary ancestral cult consists of rituals of passage, especially those observed at funerals, and these are often focused on geomancy and second burial. These customs are still very seriously maintained by a large section of the population.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1979.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2801w5938", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209079, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1980", "page_number": 241, "title": "RAS-1980", "content_text": "A SHORT GLOSSARY OF GEOMANTIC TERMS\n\nCAROLE MORGAN\n\nChinese geomancy (fengshui) like many other esoteric sciences has developed a technical vocabulary both to facilitate the transmission of concepts from master to pupil and, one suspects, to set the learned fengshui xianzheng apart from the rest of the population.\n\nAlthough Western scholars have studied the visual manifestations as well as the social implications of fengshui, its technical vocabulary, with the possible exception of J. Edkins' stab at a few definitions in the late 18th century, has largely been ignored. It is the author's hope that the definitions outlined in the following pages will help to fill some of the gaps in our knowledge of geomancy.\n\nThe vocabulary as well as the explanations to be found in this article have all been gleaned from fengshui manuals dating from the early 18th century to the present day, and refer mainly to yinzhai or the siting of tombs. But just as different schools of geomancy use different compasses or luobans, they do not always interpret the same term in the same way, which implies that the definitions given below, though generally accepted by most schools, are not the only possible ones for any given term.\n\nThe first series of terms concerns the general topography of a site.\n\nxue refers to the burial site as a whole and includes all topographical features such as mountains, their height, the slope of the ground, the supply of water, etc.\n\nbiantou is another term for mountain ridges, it being understood that the mountains in question may be no higher than hills or even knolls. Geomancers are particularly interested in the spot where mountains rise from the plain (see tai).\n\nlong is, as one manual points out, one of the hardest fengshui\n\n1 J. Edkins in J. Doolittle's Vocabulary and Handbook (1873). The definitions provided by S. Feuchtwang in his An Anthropological Analysis of Chinese Geomancy (1974) are, for the most part, not very reliable.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1980.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/kh04md207", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210429, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1985", "page_number": 36, "title": "RAS-1985", "content_text": "17\n\nNOTES FOR A VISIT TO THE GOVERNMENT CEMETERY AT HAPPY VALLEY\n\nCARL T. SMITH\n\nThe writer of an article entitled “Lest We Forget” published in the South China Morning Post 6 June 1913 describes the Colonial Cemetery as \"an extremely beautiful spot, for all around is to be seen the rugged grandeur of nature's own handiwork; the free elemental play of stream and sky and mountain a truly wonderful background, and a magnificent object lesson of the infinitude and vastness of things\". The description might be viewed as a western counterpart of Chinese feng shui. Whether the site of the cemetery and its graves really conform to proper feng shui principles must be left to a qualified geomancer.\n\nA Chinese view of the proper aspect of a cemetery was expressed by Mr. Lau Chu-pak, a leader of the Chinese community, in a discussion concerning cemeteries at a meeting of the Sanitary Board in 1909. He quoted Confucius as saying that burial places should not resemble pleasure gardens, rather they should be in harmony with those who weep and mourn. (Weekly Press 17 April 1909)\n\nThe first Protestant burial ground\n\nThe Colonial Cemetery, now called the Government Cemetery in Happy Valley, was opened in 1845. Previously Europeans were buried at a Protestant and a Roman Catholic Cemetery which adjoined each other in Wanchai. They were located on the slope of the hill above Queen's Road East extending upward to the vicinity of the present Kennedy Road, in the general area of the present Sun, Moon, Star and St. Francis Streets.\n\nThe earliest date of burial on the forty-eight monuments removed from the old Protestant Cemetery to the Colonial\n\n* 15th March, 1984", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1985.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/gt54s866x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210430, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1985", "page_number": 37, "title": "RAS-1985", "content_text": "18\n\nCARL T. SMITH\n\nCemetery in 1889 is June 1841 and the latest date is January 1845.\n\nAfter the new cemetery was opened, the old was allowed to fall into neglect. An article in the China Mail of 23 November 1865 calls public attention to the desecration of the abandoned cemetery. \"Part of it”, the writer says, “has been cut away for building lots, where now stand some tenantless houses, and day after day headstones are stolen by the Chinese to be refaced and sold to some newly-made mourners”.\n\nThe remaining stones were removed in 1889 and the ground was sold for development. Upon a part of it Hong Kong's first electric power plant was built.\n\nThe new cemetery at Happy Valley\n\nA large tract of land on the hill on the west side of Happy Valley was designated in 1845 as cemeteries for Protestants and Roman Catholics. St. Michael Cemetery, administered by the Roman Catholic Church, lies to the north of the Colonial Cemetery.\n\nIn the same year that the cemetery was opened a mortuary chapel was built. The cemetery was placed under the charge of the Colonial Chaplain, who kept a register of burials. Maintenance costs were borne by the Government as a part of the Ecclesiastical Establishment. The first burial record book begins in 1853 with grave number 807. By the end of the century the cemetery was placed under the jurisdiction of the newly created Sanitary Board.\n\nThere were complaints about the state of the cemetery in 1865. An article in the China Mail (23 November 1865) stated that it was nearly full. At the time there had been some 3,100 burials. The writer expressed the hope that \"Happy Valley will ever be sacred to the dead, and that we never again behold in Hong Kong a graveyard desecrated and as filled as was that to the south of Queen's Road East by St. Francis Hospital\". He made some suggestions \"so that the Happy Valley Cemetery be", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1985.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/gt54s866x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210432, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1985", "page_number": 39, "title": "RAS-1985", "content_text": "20 \n\nCARL T. SMITH \n\nspecial section of the cemetery somewhat isolated had been set aside for the burial of Japanese. The Japanese had no cemetery of their own. When their numbers began to increase after the turn of the century, the practices associated with their graves created annoyance among expatriates who thought such customs were not appropriate in what they considered to be a cemetery set apart for the burial of Christians. \n\nAs the years passed some of the wealthy Chinese increasingly desired a proper place for the burial of their dead. There were cemeteries for the Chinese, but wealthy members of the community did not regard the conditions of burial in such as suitable to meet their needs. In 1901 the Cemeteries Committee of the Sanitary Board moved to set apart a piece of hillside between the Aberdeen Channel and Deep Water Bay for wealthy Chinese (China Mail, 12 July 1901). For some reason this site did not meet the needs of the group for whom it was intended, for in 1909 a correspondent to the Daily Press claimed that \"The question of proper cemeteries for Chinese has not been approached courageously at all. The authorities for some reason or other seem afraid of it. When the better class of Chinese recently sought a burial ground for their dead, they learned that the Government did not approve of the site suggested at Pokfulam, but no reason was given. Surely the better class of Chinese, whom the Government wish to settle here, have some claims for consideration and respect.” (Weekly Press, 17 April 1909) Their cause was presented to the Sanitary Board by one of its Chinese members, Mr. Lau Chu-pak. In his view, \"the better class of Chinese who had made Hong Kong their permanent home had not a decent cemetery in which to bury their dead, and the Chinese had no control on what were called Chinese Cemeteries. These cemeteries were simply tracts of barren land set apart by the Government for the burial of the Chinese dead of any class. The Government reserved the right of resuming the land and ordering the remains to be exhumed and buried anywhere else the Government might from time to time be pleased to direct”. (Weekly Press, 17 April 1909) \n\nIn February 1909 an application was made to the Sanitary Board by a wealthy Chinese to use some land near Inland Lot", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1985.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/gt54s866x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210434, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1985", "page_number": 41, "title": "RAS-1985", "content_text": "22 \n\nCARL T. SMITH \n\nChinese Cemeteries\". The senior Chinese representative on the Board, Mr. Lau Chu-pak, was quick to detect any signs of racial discrimination. He asked if bodies from cemeteries other than Chinese could be re-buried in the cemetery. \n\nThe Board sent a letter to the Colonial Secretary in April requesting that Government should allot a piece of ground for burial of Buddhists. This could be done immediately, so it was proposed by the Governor in Council that a new ordinance be drafted to set aside the major part of the Colonial Cemetery for the burial of Christians only. In transmitting this decision to the Sanitary Board, the Colonial Secretary reminded the Board that the proclamation to the Chinese in 1841 by Captain Elliott had guaranteed the free practice of religion to all nations and creeds, and as the Buddhists — meaning the Japanese — had no place other than the Colonial Cemetery to bury their dead, he suggested that the Board suspend, for the time being, the enforcement of the bye-law regarding joss sticks and crackers. \n\nThe two Chinese representatives of the Board expressed their dissatisfaction with recent proposals by some members of the Board which they considered would make the cemetery exclusively European and Christian. Mr. Lau Chu-pak reminded the meeting that the cemetery was open to every resident of the Colony, irrespective of nationality and religion, though, he admitted it was probably originally intended for persons of the Protestant faith as there had been special cemeteries provided for Chinese, Muslims and Roman Catholics — he did not mention the Jews and Parsees, which had their own cemeteries also. He looked back in history, saying that, “In the early days, when there was a Colonial Chaplain, what was more natural than that he should describe the cemetery at which he officiated as the Colonial Cemetery, meaning thereby the cemetery of the Colonial Church”, and he also acknowledged that the official Government Gazette had been referring to it as the Protestant Cemetery. In spite of the use of those names, Mr. Lau contended that the cemetery was a public one, as it was public property and maintained at public cost. He acknowledged that the general Chinese community did not use the cemetery. The Chinese who did, he said, were largely British born, British naturalized,", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1985.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/gt54s866x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210436, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1985", "page_number": 43, "title": "RAS-1985", "content_text": "24\n\nCARL T. SMITH\n\nprofessing the Christian religion could be buried and that such sections be consecrated. An area in an isolated part of the cemetery would be designated for the burial of non-Christians. The Ordinance set apart certain Crown Land to be used as a burial ground for persons professing the Christian religion and had its first reading in Legislative Council in November 1909.\n\nThere was some ambiguity between the title and the memorandum which accompanied the proposed bill. One spoke of the Colonial Cemetery, the other of the Protestant Cemetery. The original draft of the bill also excluded the burial of Roman Catholics. The Attorney General explained that they had been excluded because \"The Church of Rome had been in possession for years of a portion of the English Cemetery.\" A separate piece of ground under the administration of the Catholic Church was immediately to the north of the Colonial Cemetery.\n\nAs an explanation for the introduction of the Bill, the Governor told the Council, “I think everybody is aware of the fact that there has been a good deal of discussion at the Sanitary Board and elsewhere on the subject of Chinese interment in the Colonial Cemetery. The Colonial Cemetery, so far as I can ascertain from a study of the archives, has always been open to any person irrespective of race or creed. It has now been desired that there should be a certain portion set aside for Christian interment. The Bishop presented to me a joint request from the representatives of the Church of England and various denominations of the Colony that a portion of the Colonial Cemetery should be dedicated for Christian burial”. A member of the Council asked if Christians other than Protestants would be excluded, such as Nestorian and Armenian Christians. The Governor replied that this was an ecclesiastical problem which should be left to the ecclesiastical authorities. At a subsequent meeting of the Legislative Council the Governor stated that he had been approached privately regarding the situation of Roman Catholic who were Freemasons and who were not allowed to be buried in the Roman Catholic Cemetery. He consulted the Anglican Bishop who assured him there would be no difficulties regarding their burial in the proposed consecrated section of the cemetery. A question was asked if in the separation of sections", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1985.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/gt54s866x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210437, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1985", "page_number": 44, "title": "RAS-1985", "content_text": "25\n\nthere were Christians buried in the portion designated for non-Christians, as, in the opinion of the questioner, “It is rather rough on the relatives to be buried in the non-Christian burial ground\". His Excellency, The Governor, replied, \"They won't be any worse off than they were before\". (Hong Kong Hansard 1909, p. 79, 85-86, 142, 168)\n\nThe questioner reminded the Governor that he had said relatives, not bodies. With the introduction of the Ordinance the Hong Kong Telegraph again spoke out: \"Here in Hong Kong there are a few persons who while still in the prime of life are prepared to work themselves into a miniature passion about the conditions under which they may finally return to that whence they came. Not only so, but they are determined to carry out their class prejudices beyond the tomb. Is it possible that there will be choice selections of land, and Ordinances, similar to that known as the Peak Reservation Ordinance, in heaven? Are the Chinese and Japanese to be relegated to the slums of paradise, while the \"hupper suckles\" [upper circles] loll and lounge on the grassy swards of the golden river, secure against intrusion by the vulgar rabble!\"\n\nThe editor noted that Mr. Hewett in objecting to a distinction being made between residents of seven years' and of twenty years' residence had said, “We are all equal\". Indeed, wrote the editor, \"That is exactly what we have been contending, but we have a suspicion that Mr. Hewett really meant we are all equal where we are Europeans and that his remark did not apply to people of the Asiatic race. But he struck the root of the matter when he declared that all mortals are equal in the grave, for it is incredible to believe that all this pushing for precedence and squabbling for place will follow us to the next world\". (Hong Kong Telegraph, 10 November 1909)\n\nA dedication ceremony was held at the cemetery on 30 March 1910 by the Anglican Bishop assisted by clergy of other denominations. In his remarks before the act of consecration the Bishop set forth the reason for the ceremony. “A portion of this most beautiful cemetery has been for upwards of sixty years the burial place of the bodies of brave men and noble women and innocer!", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1985.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/gt54s866x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211066, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1987", "page_number": 127, "title": "RAS-1987", "content_text": "102\n\nof this has yet been found although contemporary maps indicated at La Loma a \"Burial place of infidels.” Infidels comprised non-Catholics and included European Protestants, Chinese, and Indians. Incidentally, still living in Cainta, only a few miles away are the descendants of the Indian troops of the expedition who decided to stay after deserting or being left behind after their boat capsized, but their distinctive looks are, however, slowly disappearing. Sadly, after being governed by the East India Company for eighteen months, Manila had to be returned to the Spanish by the Treaty of Paris in 1763. Speculation still exists amongst Filipino scholars about what the Philippines might have been if the British had remained in control — a British colony in the Far East, rich in natural resources, fifty years before the acquisition of Singapore and Malaya and eighty years before Hong Kong.\n\nTrade continued to prosper after the resumption of Spanish Authority, and, until 1821 the Philippines continued to be run from Mexico. Treaty ports and trading posts were established in several places including Sual in Pangasinan, on Luzon Island, in Iloilo on Panay and on Cebu and Protestant cemeteries were established in each town, where beforehand the burial of Protestants in consecrated ground was prohibited, (as was the importation of Protestant Bibles).\n\nWith the expansion of trade, a burial place for the four hundred to five hundred aliens from Europe and North America living in Manila, was becoming an urgent necessity.\n\nIn 1827 the first British Consul General was appointed and it was his successor, John William Perry Farren (sometimes referred to as Fearon) who in 1860 attempted to establish a Protestant Cemetery for the mostly but not exclusively British residents. Sadly, Farren became one of the cemetery's first residents within weeks of its establishment.\n\nOn May 27th, 1862, the Spanish Government by a \"Superior Decreto\" granted permission to construct the Cemetery, and on March 11th, 1864 a lease was signed between Farren and Don Jose Bonifacio Roxas, the Owner of Hacienda de San Pedro, of a parcel of land of 31,656 \"varas cuadradas\" (22,467.85 sq metres or", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1987.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/rx919b522", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212578, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1991", "page_number": 132, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "112\n\n20\n\nA one-inch diameter, ancient bronze-coin, costing $60, with a 1/4-inch square hole in the centre (a pearl or jade object is sometimes used instead), had been placed in the mouth of the corpse. This practice can be traced back to Liangzhu culture in ancient China 3,900 to 4,900 years ago. The purpose of this talisman is to deter evil, to prevent body spirits escaping before purification and to safeguard the corpse against rapid decay.\n\nIt was expected that the dead person's spirit would come to the funeral parlour. There were two bowls of peanut oil with a wick made from dried seaweed in the farewell room, 'to lead her on her way'. A packet of cooked rice and a pair of chopsticks lay on the floor to placate fierce dogs which she would meet three weeks after death on the road to heaven. Possessions she treasured, such as special clothes, a cassette of Chinese songs and her handbag with knickknacks, including magnifying glass, cigarettes, lipstick, compact and a piece of jade, were placed in the coffin. Coffin jade, which has been reclaimed after many years of burial, is valued for 'protective' properties. For practical reasons keys and a notebook, which contained telephone numbers, were not placed in the casket. Nor were spectacles. Cremation would splinter them and they could injure the corpse although there seems to be a contradiction here with the magnifying glass.\n\nAlso at the back of the hall, on the left of the altar, was a stove around which relatives and close friends, including children, folded 'gold' and 'silver ingots' out of tin-foil. These imitation bars, together with pieces of paper resembling bank notes (a tale has it that a little boy once found one and went to the bank to try to cash it), were burned continuously until midnight. Money is needed by the dead, among other purposes, to bribe officials to obtain good positions in the after-world. Five Buddhist nuns with shaved heads and colourful robes chanted prayers. One had a series of initiation, incense stick burn marks on her scalp.22\n\n21\n\nChinese children take part in funerals, and, with the extended family, it is important they 'farewell the dead'. This appears in no way traumatic. With English funerals children tend not to participate. Certainly with the author's generation (pre-World War II) death was a taboo subject for the young.\n\nA Chinese saying has it:", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212884, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1992", "page_number": 193, "title": "RAS-1992", "content_text": "178\n\nNOTES\n\n1\n\nSaid by one of the Tangs of Ha Pa. The father had won a Jockey Club lottery ticket\n\nMrs Wong Chau Yuk-bing, 10 July 1991\n\nI once became concerned with a grave on a hill above Tsuen Wan. There had been a mistake and confusion when exhuming illegal graves and removing the remains to an authorized cemetery. My subsequent enquiry showed that this slope contained a number of graves of Chans of Sam Tung Uk, repaired in 1919, and another old grave belonging to their cousins from Kwan Mun Hau, a recent reburial of another of their graves whose old site had been required for development; the earth grave with stone tablet dated 1954 belonging to another local lineage recently taken up and remains placed in an urn (whose removal caused all the trouble); and a Tsang grave dated 1909 but removed at some time previously. The enquiry showed that the hill was a favoured burial site, that it was mostly monopolized by the Chans of Sam Tung Uk; that they had received objections from Kwan Mun Hau to a new grave and had not used it but found another site.\n\n4\n\nThe exercise was prompted by what I personally felt was the misguided notion that all the owners of old graves could, and should, one fine day be asked to exhume them.\n\n4 This was still felt to be the case, even though some leading members of the clan were Christians, with forebears who had also been members of the local protestant Chuen Yuen Church, established in Tsuen Wan about 1905.\n\n+\n\nAddressed to DOTW but sent to NTA HQ. See Secretary for the NT's NT L/M No.(172) in E/948/78 to TM&DO TW dated 11 December 1980, enclosing Chinese letter dated November 1980.\n\n+ Chinese letter from Mr. Wong Kit-hung, Village Representative of Shui Pin Village, Yuen Long, dated 14 January 1980.\n\n\"Wong Cho-yip and 22 other villagers of this place are the owners of the grave of Ancestor Shui-tai at Tsing Lung Tau. Ancestor Shui-tai was buried there in the tenth month of the first year of Tung Chih [1862], so that the grave has a history of 120 years. The villagers have recently learned that the government will resume the land there for development. They fear that great damage will be done to the fung-shui [of the clan] if the grave is destroyed. We entreat you to remedy the situation quickly [by cancelling the notice] or by compensating for this loss, so that they may choose a lucky day for the removal of their ancestral grave (and another auspicious burial ground for).\n\nM\n\nChopped DOTW Inward. Serial No. 1861 of 17 August 1963. The District Commissioner gave an account of a ceremonial visit following damage to a grave. See Annual Departmental Report, District Commissioner, New Territories, 1955-56.\n\n4\n\nADR, DCNT 1955-56, para. 87.\n\nMr Wong Kwai-chi, Land Inspector, Class 1. He and I had been colleagues and friends since we first served together in the District Office South, twenty years before.\n\n|| DOTW file TW6/WL/71, Chinese letter dated 4 May 1971.\n\n1:\n\nSee JHKBRAS, Vol. 17 (1977), p.189 for background.\n\nFile TW130/983/77, for China Light and Power Company's electricity supply sub-station on NE Lantau.\n\n14\n\nThis was partly their own fault, as owing to a particularly intense intra-lineage feud, all through the late 1970s and most of the 1980s they could not agree on removal terms,", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1992.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qf85tx75x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213783, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1996", "page_number": 135, "title": "RAS-1996", "content_text": "106\n\nThe genealogy of the Chengs of the Nam Wai traced their origin to a Song dynasty settlement in several places of Xingning, with farming and orchard land of several Chinese acres and population of more than one thousand. As the result of disorder during the Yuan they lost all names and burial places of ancestors save what was called their zheng shizu immediate Beginning Ancestor, ancestor Shao Ji(7) Lang. This name, while not indicated as a duming, also fits into the pattern of ordination names. The beginning ancestor's eldest son Shao Jiu(19), who was said to be of the Yuan dynasty, had only one son Shi Jiu (19). The latter moved to Changle County in the Taiding period (1324-1327) when he had no relatives around at the native place of Xingning. His son Liu Shi San (63) bore a son during the Hongwu years, Liu Shi Jiu (69). Liu Shi Jiu had a son called Sheng who lived during the Tianshun years (1457-1464), to whom the genealogy attributed magical powers,” but does not indicate any ordination name. One part of the genealogy listed the next eight generations, showing separately the two descendants of each of his two sons, while limiting itself to the descendants of the elder son in the last four generations. Another listed the descendants of the second son, who is an ancestor of the Chengs of Nam Wai. The first ancestor to have an ordination name in the genealogy is Fa You in the seventh generation, an ancestor of the Chengs of Nam Wai. His father lived in early Ming during the Hongwu years (1368-1398). But it was among the descendants of the first son that we find many with ordination names, a large proportion of the ancestors named for the 12nd to 14th generations.\" The only other ancestor of the Chengs of Nam Wai to have an ordination name was Fa Jing of the 16th generation who moved to the Xin'an county in the early years of Kangxi (1662-1722) at a very young age \"His ordination, it therefore appears, probably took place in Xin'an county,\n\nSimilarly, in a fragment of the genealogy of the Lis of Wu Kau Tan after the name of the 14th generation ancestor Ming Fang and his zi and hao names there are eight words which can be punctuated as \"[alternative name] Fa Nian, and fang ming Li Mou Shi Lang”. While the term Shi Lang is the same as a title of an official it seemed to be originally Mou Shi(4)Lang. The caption of the plate says this is the first ancestor of the Lis to move to the Hong Kong region, probably in early Qing. The Chens of Luk Keng and elsewhere of the New Territories had some ancestors with ordination names since the 1st generation in early Ming until the 10th generation in early Qing. One\n\nPage 135\n\nPage 136", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1996.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/3n209j641", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214708, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1999", "page_number": 123, "title": "RAS-1999", "content_text": "87\n\ninstruments.\n\nTwo native Cantonese speakers remarked at the ceremony that they each understood only about 10 per cent of what the priests were chanting. Thus, it was not always easy to follow exactly what was going on. This helps keep the priestly profession a closed shop. Priests are paid not only for performing ceremonies but also for knowing how to perform them.\n\nNote (see Plate 1) the five tun fu pots used to guard and protect each direction of the Chinese compass (including centre), with one talisman in each. These were later lined up in front of the matshed. After 'heaven and earth were made ready' messages to the respective gods were written on each strip of split bamboo (each about 75 centimetres long and four centimetres wide) after each strip, and the brush, had been purified by prayer and incense. The red paper horse at the front of the matshed acted as an emissary for letters, pleas and charms dispatched to heaven (Stevens: 1997, 121). The horse was constantly being blown over in the wind and one wondered, unless it could be anchored down in a secure way (which it never was), whether its magical powers would be affected. Anyway, few seemed concerned. During much of the ceremony ordinary villagers came in ones and twos and burnt joss sticks in front of Tai Wong Ye and his four henchmen.\n\nThe ceremony in the matshed lasted about one hour. After this was over we were bussed to an expanse of open ground not far from Lin Fa Tei (Lotus Ground), a 10-minute drive away. From here, we could see where the new railway tunnel's northern portal will be situated. A further ceremony took place not far from this spot, again officiated over by the same Taoist priests and attended by the same village elders, committee representatives, and government officials (see Plates 4 and 5). There was more chanting, more joss sticks and paper offerings were burned, and medium-sized roast pigs (brought from the ceremony inside the matshed) were presented up to the gods. Rice wine was again sprinkled on the ground for purification.\n\nIt was pointed out by a villager, who had lived in Britain for over 30 years and spoke fair English, that over 1000 village graves and burial urns had been moved to make way for the new tunnel. A small river had been filled in. In spite of the landscape having been considerably", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1999.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/s178b887x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215514, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2001", "page_number": 291, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "241\n\nA REVIEW OF DEVELOPMENT OF CEMETERIES IN HONG KONG: 1841-1950\n\nKO TIM-KEUNG\n\nHong Kong had been claimed for the British Crown even before the First Opium War (1839-42) was formally brought to an end. A naval party under Sir Gordon Bremer landed on the island on 26th January 1841. A form of government was organized and a chief magistrate and a harbour-master appointed, and in June the first land sale took place to create the impression of permanency. The port was declared a free port, and merchants, both foreign and Chinese, were encouraged to settle and trade there. However, little significant building followed, the main deterrent being the island's insalubrity and a high death rate from 'Hong Kong Fever.' Hong Kong, quite unexpectedly, became the last resting place of many of these early settlers and troops.\n\nThe Burial Ground in Wan Chai\n\nThe first years in Hong Kong had a distressing aspect for the British, particularly its army, because of disease. The setting up of the first barrack areas along the north coast of the island led to severe epidemics of fever among the troops. 183 of them had died in 1841. Consequently, a burial ground for the dead was urgently needed. A notice was proclaimed in August 1841:\n\nA piece of land to the eastward of Cantonment Hill having been allocated by Government as the ground for the burial of the dead of Europeans and others, Notice is hereby given that persons burying their dead in any other unauthorised place will be treated as trespassers.\n\nJno. F. Mylius, Land Officer, Hong Kong 30th August 1841.\n\nA 19th-century publication also records: \"Deaths now [1841] became frequent occurrences also among the European community; hospitals had to be hastily constructed, and the first cemetery (near the present St. Francis' Chapel, above Queen's Road East) began to fill...\"", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215515, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2001", "page_number": 292, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "242\n\nSeveral months later on 2nd April 1842, another piece of land adjacent to the burial ground was allotted for internment of Roman Catholics.7 It was recorded that during the leveling work, because of heavy rain, a landslide obstructed Queen's Road. A letter from the Inspector of the Land Office, dated 20 June 1842, required the building of a retaining wall and the immediate clearing of the road. Burials started as soon as the site formation was over. On the same compound, two brick houses were also built, one at the bottom used as a seminary and the second at the top of the hill as the residence of Father Luke Poon8 who had just arrived from Macao to assist the work in the seminary.9\n\n10\n\nEpidemics of fever, which visited Hong Kong each summer in its early years of development, retarded its development and gave it an evil reputation for insalubrity. 1841 and 1842 had been bad summers, but 1843 was even worse. In 1843 the annual death rate among European troops in Hong Kong was 22 percent and among Indian troops even higher. One regiment alone, at West Point, lost a hundred men between June and the middle of August.11 The Royal Army Medical Corps history records 'Hong Kong proved a costly acquisition, as in spite of good barracks and hospital as the men continued to fall sick and die.”12 Almost all contemporary public, private and regimental records had similar entries in regard to the terrible cost in lives, particularly among the troops, in the early development of Hong Kong.13 The popular Illustrated London News had the following account in 1845:\n\nIts diseases are endemic fever, diarrhoea and dysentery...The British Commander, General D'Aguilar, has declared, that to retain Hong Kong will require the loss of a whole regiment every three years... The grave yard was soon filled and another was required form14 the Surveyor-General, who found it difficult to point out a proper spot.\n\nThe burial ground in Wan Chai had only been in use for a short period's15 as space was running out. It became necessary for a new burial site and the Wong Nai Chung Valley,16 soon to be named as Happy Valley, quickly provided the answer,\n\n17\n\nYet the last graves and monuments in Wan Chai were not removed until 1889. By then it had become surrounded by a dense population of Chinese of the poorer classes, it is difficult to keep it in a condition of decency and cleanliness.18 The ground was sold for development.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215516, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2001", "page_number": 293, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "243\n\nUpon a part of it Hong Kong's first electric power plant was built. In fact, what had happened to this burial ground was the cause of some anger long before it was finally cleared:\n\nBut we sincerely hope that the Happy Valley may ever be sacred to the dead, and that we may never again behold in Hongkong a grave-yard desecrated and defiled as was that to the South of the Queen's Road East, by St Francis Hospital. Part of it has been cut away to form the building lots, where now stand some tenantless houses; and day after day the head stones are stolen by the Chinese, to be re-faced and sold to some newly-made mourner.\n\nThe Colonial Cemetery20\n\n19\n\nAlthough Wan Chai had been described in various accounts and records as the site of the first burial ground in Hong Kong, a British naval surgeon who arrived in Hong Kong in April 1841 had recorded two burials in Happy Valley in his personal journal two months after his initial arrival:\n\n[18th June 1841] Poor old Brodie was buried in the afternoon in the new cemetery in 'Happy Valley,' Hong Kong. He was much respected by both Navy and Army and large numbers followed him to his grave.\n\n[19th June 1841] Another friend of mine, Wilson, Adjutant of 18th Regiment, has just died of remittent fever soon arriving from Canton, on board Futty Salaam transport. Many men of the 18th Regiment have also died; many of the wounded from tetanus. Many a gallant fellow who escaped in the field has succumbed to disease.\n\n[20th June 1841] Poor Wilson was buried in 'Happy Valley' near Commander Brodie.21\n\nHowever, as the tombstone of Brodie was among those removed from the 'old Colonial Cemetery' to the new Colonial Cemetery in 1889,22 Brodie's initial burial site is not entirely clear as yet.\n\n?\n\nEitel also mentioned the 'new' cemetery in Happy Valley. He wrote: 'A mortuary chapel was erected, in 1845, in the new cemetery", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215519, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2001", "page_number": 296, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "246\n\ncould be traced in regard to this burial ground, though the noted Scottish botanist and traveller Robert Fortune, who visited Hong Kong between 1843 and 1846, recorded:\n\nBefore leaving China [1846], I had occasion to visit this spot of ground (the old barrack area in West Point), the grave of many a brave soldier. A fine road31 leading round the island…passed through the place where they had been buried. Many of their coffins were exposed to vulgar gaze, and the bones of the poor fellows lay scattered about on the public highway no one could find fault with the road having been made there, but if it was necessary to uncover the coffins, common decency required that they should be buried again…38\n\nOther Early Cemeteries\n\nHong Kong's initial progress as an entrepôt was slow, nevertheless, by the 1850s, Hong Kong's position as a trading centre had gradually been consolidated. Before the emergence of a recognizable Chinese merchant class in the later half of the 19th century, foreign merchants, the bulk of whom were British, dominated the local political and economic scene. Nevertheless, some of the most prominent and best remembered foreign traders came neither from Europe nor North America, but from the Indian subcontinent and the Middle East. These included the Parsees, the Indians and the Jews.\n\n39\n\n40\n\nA Parsee (or Zoroastrian) cemetery in Happy Valley was granted as early as 1852, and the first grave was erected there in 1858. The Jewish Cemetery, located south-east of Wong Nai Chung Village and near some paddy fields, was first laid out in 1855 when the first of the Jewish merchants from Guangzhou settled in Hong Kong. The lease for land for a cemetery was granted in 1857, the year of the first burial.42 As the community was not large, the number of burials was small. By the end of the 19th century, burials were limited to about sixty. The cemetery was described as 'neglected' in an 1890's tourist guide.44\n\nThe Muslim cemetery in Happy Valley had been deeded to the community in 1870, and a mosque with rooms for burial preparations was added. Prior to this, a Mohammedan cemetery, located at roughly the present site of St. Stephen's Girls College along Park Road, can be found in an 1863 map.46\n\nHowever, no further information on this", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215520, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2001", "page_number": 297, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "247\n\ncemetery could be traced. The cemetery was probably created for the early Muslim military community. It was in the 1880s that a Hindu Cemetery was founded in Happy Valley, with the earliest graves dated to 1888.47\n\nThere had also been a small French Mission Cemetery erected in Pokfulam near the Bethanie, a retreat for retired or sick French Fathers (Mission Étrangères), in the later part of the 19th century; however, further details regarding the erection of this cemetery are not known yet.48\n\nChinese Cemeteries in the 19th Century\n\nA great influx of Chinese immigrants occurred soon after the British arrived in Hong Kong, though the growth was uneven. By the 1850s, in the wake of massive upheavals as the Tai Ping forces swept through wide areas of southern and central China, the Chinese population of Hong Kong grew rapidly. From 1853-1855, the numbers rose from 39,017 to 72,607.49\n\nBetween the 1860s and the 1880s, the population steadily increased and Hong Kong was subjected to serious overcrowding. In 1865, the population totalled 125,504 and in 1881 the number was 160,404. During this period, public health emerged as one of the main problems.\n\nBefore 1856, burial grounds for the Chinese had not been properly regulated. Not unexpectedly, Chinese burials were not permitted in the Colonial Cemetery in the early days,51 they were not even allowed to enter the cemetery at least until 1885.52 A direct result of the increase of population and the corresponding increase in mortality among the Chinese was the studding of all hillsides and slopes on the island with graves, which caused ‘certain Nuisances which the Laws hitherto in force have failed effectually to prevent.’53\n\n54\n\nOne such popular Chinese burial ground was located on the west of the Tai Ping Shan district, along a certain Fan Mo or Cemetery Street,5 upon which the Tung Wah Hospital was later to be built.\n\nThe surveyor general had the following entry in his report in 1856, probably referring to the burial ground at Fan Mo Street:", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215521, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2001", "page_number": 298, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "248\n\nThe Chinese Burial Ground having become offensive in consequence of the corpses being so close to the surface it was found necessary to spread a quantity of quick lime over the whole area at a cost of £20.16s this was provided for by Requisition 5 of 1856.\n\nIn was in the same year that an ordinance was passed to regulate Chinese Burials, and to prevent certain Nuisances, within the Colony of Hongkong. This Ordinance 12 of 1856 became the first step taken by the government to regulate Chinese burials by the establishment of special Chinese cemeteries. In addition to regulating the burial grounds, due to the 'nuisances' described above, the ordinance also stated that 'a Grave of less than Five Feet in depth from the ordinary surface of the ground to the uppermost side of the Corpse or Coffin therein deposed, shall for every such Offence forfeit and pay a sum not exceeding Fifty Dollars, nor less than Five Dollars.'\n\n58.\n\nHowever, it was only fifteen years later in 1871 that the first designated Chinese burial ground was created, which was located in Kowloon. The plot of land was ‘situated about one Quarter of a mile to the North-east of the Village of Yau-ma-Tee.' It became the only lawful place for the Chinese inhabitants of British Kowloon to inter their dead until the establishment of another cemetery in 1885. But no designated Chinese burial ground on the island has so far been traced prior to this announcement. The first Chinese cemetery on the island was selected and appointed in 1882, at Mount Davis ‘measuring on the North thereof 40 feet, on the South thereof 40 feet, on the East thereof 60 feet, and on the West thereof 60 feet.”59\n\nIn 1882, the first two cemeteries for Chinese Christians were authorized. The first one was located ‘on the Eastern slope of the Shaukiwan Hills, on a contour line about 300 feet above the level of the sea, marked by four boundary stones and measuring on the North thereof 200 feet, on the South thereof 200 feet, on the East thereof 400 feet, and on the West thereof 400 feet.\" The second one was on the west side of the island, ‘on the Western slope of the Hills below the Pokfulam Road, marked by five boundary stones, and bounded on the North by Mount Davis on the South by Crown Land, on the East by the Pokfulam Road, and on the West by the Sea (Sandy Bay) high water mark, and containing about 43 acres.\n\n61", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215523, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2001", "page_number": 300, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "250 \n\nburial ground. Inland Lot 899, on the east by the Pokfulam Road, and West by Cliff facing the Sea, measuring on the North, 4,800 feet, South-West, 3,500 feet, West, 5,100 feet.\n\n69\n\nCAROLINE HILL. Situated on the South side of the Caroline Hill Road and to the South of Caroline Hill, bordered on the North by a Public Road, 400 feet, South, 612 feet, East, 1,275 feet, West, 1,100 feet.\n\nIn the 1890s, a Eurasian cemetery, generally known as Ho Tung Cemetery before the Second World War and later renamed 'Chiu Yuen Cemetery,' was erected in Mount Davis, with the first grave dated to December 1892.70\n\nThe Plague Cemeteries and Trenches\n\nThe first outbreak of bubonic plague in Hong Kong occurred in May 1894. In less than a month, more than two thousand persons had died. On 6 June, Father Piazzoli, the pro-vicar, wrote:\n\nThe plague is spreading rapidly with 100 dead each day, though only a section of the Chinese city is infected. The tragedy is terrible. There are streets completely empty: it is estimated that about 40 thousand Chinese have left the island. The harbour too is deserted, the large ships sail at large; the trade is dead and the most horrible misery is growing...\"\n\nFrom 1896 on, the plague became almost an annual recurrence. Over the period 1894-1901, about 8,600 people succumbed to the disease.72 Two plague cemeteries were designated at Kennedy Town and Cheung Sha Wan in 1901.74 In addition, a section of ‘Kau Pui Loong Cemetery' (see below) was also referred to as 'Plague Trench'75 (疫症); which was also the case of 'Kai Lung Wan East Cemetery' (also see below).76\n\nIndian / Hindu Cemeteries in Kowloon\n\nIn 1900, a Hindu Cemetery was authorized in Kowloon, this might have been the result of the plague, as many Indian troops were among the victims of this epidemic disease. This Hindu Cemetery was described as:\n\nPage 300\n\nPage 301", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215524, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2001", "page_number": 301, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "251\n\nSituated on the South slope of Danger Flag Hill, Kowloon, on Military Reserve Land, midway between the Military and Association Rifle Rangers and about thirty yards to the North of the line joining the butts. The Cemetery measures fifty-feet square and its limits have been defined by wooden pickets.77\n\nThere was another Indian cemetery at Tai Shek Ku78 recorded in a government notice, which was ordered to be closed in 1927;79 however, the origin of this cemetery is not known.\n\nCemeteries in the Early 20th Century\n\nThe first two decades of the 20th century was a period of steady economic and administrative development in Hong Kong, in spite of the influx of Chinese as a result of unsettled condition following the 1911 Revolution in China. A long list of cemeteries was added during this period.\n\nIn 1903, the 'Sai Yu Shek Cemetery'80 (晒魚石墳場) was appointed 'to the North of Kowloon City and West of Nga Tsin, as a sufficient and proper place for a burial ground for Chinese living in the vicinity of Kowloon City.'81 In addition, there was also a Sai Yu Shek (Christian) Cemetery.82\n\nIn the same year (1903), it was also announced that the 'Po Kong Po Cemetery' (), 'situated to the North-east of Kowloon City and West of the Village of Sha Ti Un'83 () was to be closed. Again, no information examined has revealed the origin of this cemetery, although the cemetery is mentioned in a privately published memoir regarding the burial of a woman in 1896.84 As this burial predated the lease of the New Territories in 1898 and the fact that the cemetery was adjacent to several villages in the Kowloon City area, Po Kong Po Cemetery might have been an extension of some villagers' burial ground,85\n\nA year later, another Chinese Christian Cemetery was authorized ‘on the hillside about 200 feet to the North of Kowloon Walled City, measuring, on the North 208'9,' on the East 208'9' and on the West 208'9,' and defined by boundary stones.' This cemetery still exists today as the oldest surviving cemetery on the Kowloon Peninsula.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215525, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2001", "page_number": 302, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "252\n\nhas not only survived, but was actually extended in 1947,87 despite the vigorous developments that Kowloon would have to experience in the 20th century.88 This cemetery was renamed as New Kowloon Cemetery No.1’ in 1925.89\n\nIn 1904, ‘Sham Shui Po Cemetery’ was also appointed ‘at Shum Shui Po in the New Territory, the Eastern boundary thereof being about 270 feet West of the Tai Po Road and the Southern boundary being about 520 feet North of the old boundary of Kowloon and containing 4.75 acres or thereabouts.’90 The cemetery was close to the old Sham Shui Po Village and other settlements in the area. Similar to Po Kong Po Cemetery, the cemetery might have been an extension of an early villagers' burial ground. In some later government notices, the names of ‘Kowloon Tong Cemetery’ and ‘Christian Chinese Cemetery, Kowloon Tong, known as New Kowloon Inland Lot No.16’92 also appeared. Further clarification is needed in regard to the location of these two cemeteries, though in a 1924 map,93 three cemeteries can be found in the present Tai Hang Tung area, which may be related to the two cemeteries. Kowloon Tong Cemetery was closed in 1921, but removal of all graves and urns were not ordered until 1949;95 while the removal of all graves and urns in the Chinese Christian Cemetery, Kowloon Tong, was ordered in 1950.96\n\n93\n\n94\n\nIn January 1907, two cemeteries were authorized, one on the island:\n\nA plot of land at Kai Lung Wan (A) having an area of about 12 acres and the following boundaries:- North: Farm Lots 14 and 15 and the Jubilee” and Pokfulam Roads; South: the present Kai Lung Wan Cemetery; East: the Pokfulam Road; West: Farm Lot 15.100\n\nThe other was described as:\n\nA plot of land at Tseung Loong Tin11 (✯✯), situated at Cha Kwo Ling in the New Territories, having a total area of about 1 acre.\n\n102\n\n•\n\nLater in the year, ‘Kai Lung Wan East Cemetery,104 which was “situated on the East side of the Pokfulam Road at No. 10 Bridge, and containing about 53.50 acres’ was also appointed.\n\n.* 105\n\nIn 1908, Cheung Chau Cemetery which was situated on the", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215526, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2001", "page_number": 303, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "253\n\n'106\n\nWestern side of Cheung Chau Island and about half a mile to the South-West of the village of Cheung Chau and containing about 5.19 acres, was authorized. This was the first cemetery designated on an outlying island and was later extended in 1921.107\n\n108\n\nIn 1912, two Chinese cemeteries were authorized. The first one was situated at 'New Kowloon Survey District 1 Lot Nos. 582 and 583,' very close to Sai Yu Shek Cemetery. The cemetery appeared in a 1924 map109 and was marked as 'Fukienese Cemetery.' In another 1940 HKGG Notification, the cemetery was also referred to as 'Fukienese Cemetery.' The second cemetery appointed, a Christian cemetery, was 'to be known as the Tsun Wan Christian Cemetery situate and being near Tsun Wan in Demarcation District No. 453 in the New Territories in the Colony of Hongkong, containing an area of 10,000 square feet,'111\n\nIn the following year, a site 'to be known as the Hau Pui Loong Cemetery situate and being near Hau Pui Loong in Kowloon in the Colony of Hongkong containing an area of about 19 acres' was appointed.112\n\nThe Chinese Permanent Cemetery in Aberdeen\n\nAlthough a number of Chinese cemeteries were authorized and appointed since the 1870s, these cemeteries were not intended for the upper and wealthier classes. By the early 20th century, the absence of what were considered proper and decent sites for these Chinese who wished to settle in Hong Kong was apparent. In 1901, the Cemeteries Committee of the Sanitary Board moved to set apart a piece of hillside between the Aberdeen Channel and Deep Water Bay for wealthy Chinese as a burial ground.113 However, for some reason, eventually this site was not appointed. Eight years later, the issue was presented again to the Sanitary Board by Lau Chu-pak, a member of the Board and one of the most prominent members of the Chinese community in the Colony,114 Lau said:\n\nThe better class of Chinese who had made Hong Kong their permanent home had not a decent cemetery in which to bury their dead, and the Chinese had no control on what were called Chinese Cemeteries. These cemeteries were simply tracts of barren land set apart by the", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215527, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2001", "page_number": 304, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "254\n\nGovernment for the burial of the Chinese dead of any class. The Government reserved the right to resuming the land and ordering the remains to be exhumed and buried anywhere else the Government might from time to time be pleased to direct. 115\n\nA solution was finally arrived at in 1913 when a plot of land was selected in Aberdeen as the location of a Chinese permanent cemetery:\n\nHis Excellency Sir Francis Henry May had been graciously pleased to set apart a certain piece or parcel of ground situate at Aberdeen in the said Colony of Hongkong and registered in the Land Office as Aberdeen Inland Lot No. 78 for the purpose of a Permanent Cemetery for Chinese permanently resident in the said Colony..... 116\n\nThe cemetery was under the control of a Board of Management made up of recognized leaders of the Chinese community. It was stated that the Board should have absolute power in the management of the cemetery and in the control and disposal of the funds, subscriptions, donations, fees, charges, income, fines and all moneys collected or received in respect of or in connection with the cemetery. The erection of this permanent cemetery was an important step and an encouragement for the upper class Chinese residing in Hong Kong to recognize the place as their home.\n\nThe Problem of the Japanese Burials\n\nThe early 20th century saw a gradual increase in the Japanese population in Hong Kong. The population rose from 484 in 1901 to 958 in 1911. A decision to erect a Japanese chapel and crematorium was made by the government which required the removal of graves on a plot of Crown Land, to the North-East of I.L. [Inland Lot] 1021 in the Soo-kun-poo Valley. Although this crematorium was intended for the Japanese, the Japanese had no cemetery of their own. The earliest Japanese burials were found intermingled with Christians in the Colonial Cemetery before a special section of the cemetery was set aside for the burial of Japanese. When their numbers began to increase after the turn of the 20th century, the Buddhist practices associated with their graves and burning joss sticks in particular had created annoyance among the western communities in Hong Kong, who thought such customs were not appropriate in what they considered to be a\n\n121", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215532, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2001", "page_number": 309, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "259\n\n2. Hong Kong No.2A, piece of Botanical and Forestry Department ground at the junction of Kennedy Road and Garden Road 163\n\n3. Hong Kong No.2B, piece of Botanical and Forestry Department ground at junction of Upper Albert Road and Albany Road, 164\n\n4. Old Government Civil Hospital Site 165 (2,631), open space behind the Old Government Civil Hospital. 166\n\n5. Queen Mary Hospital Site (101), piece of ground on the east side of Pokfulam Road near the Maison de Nazareth. 167\n\n6. Aberdeen Site (98), on the north side of Island Road, 100 yards from the Aberdeen Industrial School, 169\n\n7. Island Road, 170 Shaukiwan Site (363), slopes on side of Island Road near its junction with Shaukiwan Road. 171\n\nFigures in bracket show the number of grave exhumations for reburial between April 1948 and March 1949. 172 The remains in these emergency cemeteries were reburied in the New Kowloon Cemetery No.8 (Diamond Hill Urn Cemetery).\n\nEarly Post-War Cemeteries\n\nThe first cemetery authorized after the Second World War in 1947 was a military cemetery for the burial of the servicemen who had died in the war. It was initially known as the 'Sai Wan Military Cemetery,' 173 which contained about 5.71 acres, situated East of Chai Wan Cemetery 174 and the extension thereof and to the North of the road serving Sai Wan and Cape Collinson in the Colony of Hong Kong.' 175\n\nThis was followed by a 'Prisons Cemetery' in the same year, which was 'being an enclosure of about 5,000 square feet lying 250 yards to the South of St. Stephen's College Preparatory School Building at Stanley,' 176\n\nIt was recorded that as early as 1940, the government had already intended to transfer the government cemeteries for Chinese from the urban area to new sites in the New Territories. However, due to the...", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215533, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2001", "page_number": 310, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "260\n\nJapanese invasion, steps could not be taken until after the war.\n\n177\n\n178\n\nIn July 1949 the first of such cemeteries, the Sandy Ridge (Urn) Cemetery near Lo Wu was approved, and burials commenced on 9th April 1950. In the financial year of 1950-51, the number of reburials (including temporary storage awaiting cremation) at Sandy Ridge (Urn) Cemetery was as high as 65,558.\n\n180\n\n181\n\nSE\n\nThis was followed by the commissioning of the most important post-war cemetery, the Wo Hop Shek Cemetery, which was authorized on 27th February 1950. Burials in this cemetery commenced on 1 December in the same year. The cemetery was served by a branch of the Kowloon-Canton Railway, and coffins could be transported to the cemetery by railway hearse. In the financial year of 1951-52, 16,054 coffins were transported to the cemetery by the railway hearse.\n\n182\n\nAppendix 1\n\nName of Cemetery\n\n \n Name of Cemetery\n Location\n Year\n Remarks\n \n \n Protestant Burial Ground\n Wan Chai\n 1841\n Closed 1845, last graves removed 1889\n \n \n Catholic Burial Ground\n Wan Chai\n 1842\n \n \n \n *Colonial/Hong Kong Cemetery\n Happy Valley\n 1845\n \n \n \n *Stanley Cemetery\n Stanley\n \n Earliest graves: 1843. Closed c. 1870, re-opened during the war. Renamed Stanley Military Cemetery after WWII.\n \n \n West Point Burial Ground\n \n \n \n \n \n St. Michael Catholic Cemetery\n Happy Valley\n 1848\n \n \n \n *Parsee/Zoroastrian Cemetery\n Happy Valley\n 1852\n \n \n \n *Jewish Cemetery\n Mid-Levels\n 1857\n Appeared in a 1863 map. Details not known.\n \n \n Muslim/Mohammedan Cemetery\n Happy Valley\n \n Appeared by 1850s. Details not known.\n \n \n *Muslim/Mohammedan Cemetery\n Po Yan Street (Cemetery Street)\n 1870\n \n \n \n Chinese Burial Ground\n Yau Ma Tei\n 1871\n \n \n \n Chinese Cemetery\n Mount Davis\n 1882\n \n \n \n Chinese Christian Cemetery\n Chai Wan\n 1882\n \n \n\n183\n\n184", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215539, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2001", "page_number": 316, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "266\n\nNovember 1889.\n\n18 Ibid.\n\n19 The China Mail, 23rd November 1865.\n\n20 Although the Colonial Cemetery was referred to as 'the Protestant Cemetery' in most 19th century government notifications (starting from HKGG Notification 120 of 15th November 1856) and maps, the ordinance to set apart certain section of the cemetery to be used as a burial ground for persons professing the Christian religion only had its first reading in the Legislative Council in November 1909. See Smith (1985), NOTES FOR A VISIT TO THE GOVERNMENT CEMETERY AT HAPPY VALLEY, The Journal of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, Vol.25, pp. 17-26. The earliest Chinese name of the cemetery that could be traced is, see HKGG Notification 92 of 6th October 1859. In some 19th century tourist guides, the cemetery was simply called 'the Anglican cemetery,' e.g., A HAND-BOOK TO HONGKONG BEING A POPULAR GUIDE TO THE VARIOUS PLACES OF INTEREST IN THE COLONY, FOR THE USE OF TOURISTS (1893), Hong Kong: Kelly & Walsh, p. 94. The cemetery was renamed 'Hong Kong Cemetery' in the 1970s.\n\n21 Levien, Michael (ed) (1982), NAVEL SURGEON: The Voyages of Dr. Edward H. Cree, Royal Navy, as Related in His Private Journals, 1837-1856, New York: E.P. Dutton, p. 89. Dr. Cree had also made a water-colour sketch of the funeral of Brodie which is shown on p. 90 in the same book. Both the graves of Brodie and Wilson are still lying in the Hong Kong Cemetery.\n\n22 This burial ground in Wan Chai had been referred to as 'the old Colonial Cemetery, see HKGG Notification 447 of 2nd November 1889. A list of the tombstones removed from the burial ground in Wan Chai to the Colonial Cemetery can be found in the same notification.\n\n23 Eitel,\nP. 246.\n\n24 See Blue Book, 1845, p. 40, or HISTORICAL AND STATISTICAL ABSTRACT OF THE COLONY OF HONG KONG 1841 - 1930 (1932), Hong Kong: Government Printer, p. 4. However, one source suggests the cemetery was opened on 1 February 1844, see Hayes (1970), COACH TOUR OF EASTERN HONG KONG ISLAND 19TH OCTOBER, 1969, The Journal of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, Vol.10, p. 190.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215543, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2001", "page_number": 320, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "270\n\nrecords. It is almost certain that this cemetery was the same as 'Ma Tau Wai Cemetery,' though reference in regard to this change in name has not been found. Ma Tau Wai Cemetery, located around the present site of the Hong Kong Eye Hospital, was a large cemetery which can be revealed by the fact that between 1911 and 1912, the number of interments was mounting to 1,155 and 2,036 respectively, see Administrative Report 1912, p. L28. Removal of all graves in Ma Tau Wai Cemetery was ordered in 1925, see HKGG Notice 352 of 19th June 1925. The location and boundary of this cemetery is shown in a 1920 map, CO1047/455, as kept in the PRO at Kew.\n\n64 This plot of land was later cancelled and replaced by a similar site in the same area in 1889, see HKGG Notification 76 of 23 February 1889. A year later, this cemetery was closed, see HKGG Notification 168 of 26 April 1890. The cemetery was later referred to as Chai Wan Cemetery in 1911, and the burial area was extended, see HKGG Notification 42 of 24th February 1911. Another plot of land, also in the same area, was appointed as a Chinese cemetery in the same year, see HKGG Notification 307 of 19th July 1890. A section of Chai Wan Cemetery was reserved for the use by the Tung Wah Hospital, known as 'Chai Wan Extension, Tung Wah Hospital' which was authorized some time after. However, details on this development are not known yet, but obviously it occupied a huge area, for in 1939 alone, there were 2,274 interments (many dead were probably refugees arriving in Hong Kong after the fall of Guangzhou in 1938), see Annual Report of the Chairman Urban Council Hong Kong for the year 1939, p. M(1)17. All graves and urns in the Extension section and the urns in the whole cemetery (including the Christian section) were ordered to be removed in 1948, see HKGG Notice 1072 of 19th November 1948.\n\n65 Bodies buried in this cemetery between 1929 and 1941 were exhumed by the government and the remains reburied in New Kowloon Cemetery No.8 (Diamond Hill Urn Cemetery), see HKGG 719 of 1947.\n\n66 Removal of all the graves in the Stanley Cemetery, together with the Christian Chinese Cemetery, Stanley, mentioned below, was ordered in 1933, see HKGG Notices 494 and 500 of 21 July 1933. A 'New Stanley Cemetery' was erected shortly after, also see below.\n\n67 HKGG Notification 211 of 2nd May 1891.\n\n68 The Chinese cemetery at Mount Davis was extended in 1900, see HKGG Notification 6 of 13th January 1900. The cemetery was closed in December 1906,", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215544, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2001", "page_number": 321, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "271\n\nth see HKGG Notification 691 of 17 August 1906. A certain number of graves in the cemetery were ordered to be removed in 1914, see HKGG Notices 449 of 13 November 1914. Another removal of graves was ordered in 1930 for 'the proper laying out of such area in connection with the Aberdeen Waterwork Scheme,' see HKGG Notice 539 of 29th August 1930. Removal of all graves and urns in this cemetery was finally ordered in 1949, see HKGG Notice 936 of 30th September 1949.\n\n7\n\n69 This cemetery was later referred to as in Chinese, see HKGG Notice 580 of 26th November 1920. In 1948, all graves and urns, other than those in 'Section D,' were ordered to be removed, see HKGG Notice 1071 of 19th November 1948.\n\n70 Information supplied by the Rev. Carl T. Smith. Other references in regard to the erection of this cemetery have not been found yet.\n\n71 Ticozzi, pp. 102-103.\n\n72 Pryor, E.G. (1975). The Great Plague of Hong Kong (1894), The Journal of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, Vol.15, p. 64.\n\n73 Apart from this plague cemetery, a 1907 War Office map kept at the PRO at Kew (WO78/5332) also shows a 'Plague burial ground (1894)' at Sandy Bay, at about the site of the present Duke of Kent Children's Hospital. In 1948, the removal of all bodies and remains of bodies in 'Kennedy Town Cemetery' was ordered, it is not certain if this cemetery was the same plague cemetery, see HKGG Notice 700 of 30th July 1948.\n\nst\n\n74 HKGG Notification 473 of 31 August 1901. On the eastern edge of St. Raphael's Catholic Cemetery in Cheung Sha Wan, there is a large charitable grave dating back to 1894, the year of the Great Plague, erected by the Tung Wah Hospital. This grave may be associated with the plague cemetery,\n\n75 HKGG Notice 164 of 26th March 1926.\n\n76 HKGG Notice 555 of 8th October 1926.\n\n77 HKGG Notification 466 of 15th September 1900.\n\n78 Tai Shek Ku was generally referred to an area to the north-east of the old Ho", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215549, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2001", "page_number": 326, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "276\n\n125 As late as the 1990, there was still a new burial.\n\n126 HKGG Notice 311 of 14th August 1914. According to a 1951 stone inscription at the Chiu Chow section of the Wo Hop Shek Cemetery, a section of this cemetery was reserved for the Chiu Chow dead in 1933. All graves of the 'Government or General section' of urn cemetery in the same cemetery were ordered to be removed in 1947, see HKGG Notice 743 of 19th September 1947.\n\n127 For instance, HKGG Notice 421 of 20th October 1922 and Notice 321 of 20th July 1923.\n\n128 HKGG Notice 797 of 14th October 1938. Removal of all urns in Shum Wan Cemetery was ordered in 1949, see HKGG Notice 936 of 30th September 1949.\n\n129 HKGG Notice 420 of 12th September 1919. The location of this cemetery is not mentioned in the notification and the site is not known at the moment.\n\n130 HKGG Notice 18 of 21 January 1921. The cemetery was to be split into three separate ones in 1930, see below.\n\n131 HKGG Notice 678 of 5th December 1924.\n\n132 HKGG Notice 439 of 3rd August 1928. A section of this cemetery still exists within the St. Joseph's Home for the Aged. As the whole piece of land has just been sold to a developer in February 2002, the cemetery may be cleared soon. See a local Chinese newspaper, The Economic Journal, 13 March 2002, p. 6. Information provided by the Rev. Carl T. Smith.\n\n134 HKGG Notice 400 of 27th June 1930.\n\n135 Fo Pang was the old name for the area around the present Wah Yan College site.\n\n136 A 1920 map, CO1047/455, as kept in the PRO at Kew, shows a European Cemetery near Tai Shek Ku, approximately the present Kowloon Hospital site, but not in the Fo Pang area. Further clarification is needed in regard to the relation between these two cemeteries. Kowloon Cemetery No. I was closed in 1933, see HKGG Notice 799 of 15th December 1933.\n\n137 Removal of all graves and urns in this cemetery was ordered in 1948, see HKGG", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215602, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2001", "page_number": 379, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "329\n\nDEATHSPACE IN HONG KONG, GUANGZHOU AND SEOUL: A REVIEW OF RECENT RESEARCH,\n\n1995-2001\n\nELIZABETH K. TEATHER\n\nAbstract\n\nThis paper introduces and summarises nine published papers on deathspace (urban cemeteries and columbaria) in Hong Kong, in Guangzhou, and in Seoul. It includes a paper on fengshui co-written with C. S. Chow. One paper examines the non-material worlds of Hong Kong's cemeteries, and identifies these as the worlds of the spirits, of fengshui, and of ritual time. Another focuses on grave furnishings, taking several graves as examples, including a symbolic grave (i.e. not containing remains). Case studies of four very different Hong Kong cemeteries are the topic of another paper. The architectural response to the need for buildings to contain ashes (cremains) is featured in a paper on Hong Kong's columbaria. This paper also summarises the shift from coffin burial to cremation in Hong Kong from the 1960s. A further paper examines the heritage significance of Hong Kong's urban cemeteries, interpreting this in terms of their being places of tribute, as well as being material forms of the historical and contemporary social fabric. An historical perspective is provided through a paper that traces how deceased Chinese sojourners were brought back from overseas to their ancestral places around the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Agendas shaping contemporary deathspace in Guangzhou are identified in another paper. Finally, in South Korea, the influence of traditional grave shapes on contemporary designs for graves to store ashes is noted, as well as the urgency of an official campaign to persuade citizens to consider cremation rather than coffin burial.\n\nKeywords: Hong Kong, Guangzhou, Seoul, deathspace, cemeteries, columbaria, cremation, feng shui.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215603, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2001", "page_number": 380, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "330\n\nIntroduction\n\nThe purpose of this short paper is to introduce the research that I have carried out since 1995 on deathspaces, first of all in Hong Kong and later in Guangzhou and Seoul. My interest in this topic arose from a visit that I made to Wo Hop Shek Cemetery at Chung Yeung, 1995. I had just arrived in Hong Kong to join my husband, David, for what was meant to be a year's leave of absence from my position as a geographer at the University of New England in New South Wales, Australia. I needed to find a nice, tidy topic of research that I could undertake in a few months of field work while in Hong Kong.\n\nWe were taken aback by the festival mood at Wo Hop Shek. It was a sunny day. There were endless streams of cheerful family groups going up and down the steep road. Stalls selling flowers, food and sunhats, or marketing tombstones and urns, were staffed by smiling men and women. There was a strong but low key police presence. Clouds of pungent incense floated around the columbarium, and ash fluttered down, settling on our shoulders. Late in the afternoon, flames crackled somewhere out of sight up in the hills and a fire engine raced up the road. No-one seemed to mind our presence or even notice us except to offer an occasional courteous nod.\n\nI realised that this was a unique manifestation of time-space and one I wanted to know a lot more about. Fortunately, my time in Hong Kong has not been limited to that first year! When you begin researching issues relating to death in Chinese culture, you go right to the heart of beliefs and customs. I feel fortunate that I chose such an intriguing and fundamentally important topic.\n\nIn the research I eventually undertook, I concentrated on Hong Kong's municipal cemeteries, provided by public and private organisations, and not on rural graves and graveyards. This made sense because of my background as a geographer teaching on a degree programme in Urban and Regional Planning. There are sensitive and important issues involved in planning for the provision of space for the dead. As a geographer rather than an anthropologist, I have been more interested in broad spatial issues than in the practices associated with funerals and burial. However, this does not mean that I see place as a passive object. Indeed, place is dynamic: it is a context for the activities", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 } ]