[ { "id": 206557, "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-1972", "page_number": 105, "title": "RAS-1972", "content_text": "REVIEW OF HOUSING CONDITIONS IN HONG KONG\n\n99\n\nby the reduction of available accommodation, that privies for common use were contrary to Chinese social habits and that no compensation was offered to property owners.7 The unofficial (appointed) members of the Legislative Council were most vociferous in their objections to the proposed measures and were successful in obtaining numerous amendments which made the Ordinance of very limited use. However, the restriction over the amount of internal living space was retained but only after heated debate and the use of the official majority vote.\n\nTwo years elapsed before the government again attempted to introduce new provisions in the form of a Building Ordinance. The matter of rear yards was included in the Bill but this was once more forced out by the unofficial Legislative Council members and had to be included in the Crown Lands Resumption Ordinance. A clause was proposed whereby mezzanine floors could only be constructed if provision were made for a vertical clearance of 9 ft. above and below. This was modified at the insistence of the unofficial members so that it would apply only in cases where the mezzanine extended over more than two-thirds of a room; otherwise a clearance of 6 ft. was permitted. Another clause relating to the provision of sufficient windows was eliminated whilst the installation of privies was made optional.\n\nStiff resistance continued from property owners against further proposals put forward by the government to help improve the sanitary condition of the Colony which daily became the cause of greater concern. Nevertheless, the administration did achieve a number of major improvements recommended by Chadwick in 1882. Between 1883 and 1900, for example, over HK$2 million was spent on improving water supplies through the completion of a reservoir at Tytam; another HK$1 million was allocated for the reprovisioning of the sewerage system and the redraining of 9,957 houses; a further HK$660,000 was used for the construction of new markets, animal depots, slaughterhouses, latrines, laundries and other miscellaneous works.\n\n7Letter of 18th July 1901 to the Hon. J. Chamberlain, Principal Secretary of State for the Colonies from J. H. Stewart Lockhart, Colonial Secretary, Enclosure No. 2: Measures to Give Effect to Mr. Chadwick's Recommendations of 1882 Legislation, Blue Book Reports on Sanitation and Housing 1900-1907, Hong Kong, 1907.\n\nPage 105\n\nPage 106", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1972.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/gm80qf99h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206560, "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-1972", "page_number": 108, "title": "RAS-1972", "content_text": "102\n\nE. G. PRYOR\n\nthe Commission reported that \"there are many insanitary properties in the Colony, and dwellings which, in their present condition, are unfit for human habitation.\" The Commission came to the conclusion that it was unnecessary for the government to undertake widespread resumption but that it would be sufficient for various improvements to be carried out at the owners' expense. The principal improvements which were recommended were the provision of open spaces at the rear of premises and the prohibition of cubicles under certain conditions.\n\nIn the compilation of the Commission's report, the views of Dr. Ayres, the one-time Colonial Surgeon, were sought. He very observantly commented that:\n\nMany laws have been made in the 20 years previous to 1894 to remedy the insanitary state of the Colony, but most have remained dead letters owing to the difficulties of enforcing them and the prejudices of the Chinese especially and other sections of the community. The labours of Hercules in cleansing the Augean stables were a trifle compared with that the Government has to contend with in the near future in cleansing the City of Victoria and other inhabited portions of the Colony.14\n\nThe recommendations of the Commission were by and large incorporated in the Insanitary Properties Ordinance of 1899, the provisions of which, however, the then Director of Public Works regarded as a compromise designed to meet objections by the unofficial members of the Legislative Council and the propertied interests which they represented.15\n\nChadwick Returns and New Reforms\n\nDespite all the steps taken by the colonial government to come to grips with the problems created by the disorderly growth of the city, deep feelings of discontent were expressed by certain sections of the community against the inadequacy of the administration's efforts. In particular, the Hong Kong Chamber of Commerce in 1901 went so far as to gather 1000 signatures for a petition to the Principal Secretary of State for the Colonies to set up a commission to investigate, report and make recommendations on the sanitary\n\n13 Ibid., p. 12.\n\n14 Ibid., Appendix 14, p. 52.\n\n15 Letter of 18th July 1901 to the Hon. J. Chamberlain, op. cit., p. 48.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1972.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/gm80qf99h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210166, "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-1984", "page_number": 137, "title": "RAS-1984", "content_text": "116\n\nJAMES HAYES\n\nThis did not mean, however, that local villagers were not averse to minor piracy and smuggling, and generally to taking advantage of opportunities for gain. There are too many accounts of villainy from the surrounding waters for us to rule out the occasional initiative. In this connection, the remarks of a Chinese brigade general ordered by his superiors to cooperate with two young British naval officers against pirates thought to belong to villages in the present day Yuen Long area of the New Territories, has to my ears the ring of truth to it:\n\n\"Having seen these eighteen villages we have, becomingly and properly, together admonished the people thereof, and I think that they will be compliant and obey our orders. But this is merely an affair of vagabonds who rob with violence and make forays, who are not in the same category with confirmed rebels and pirates.”37\n\nThe English officer in charge commented:\n\n\"It must clearly be borne in mind that piracy in China differs from piracy elsewhere in this respect that there the pirates live on the land and only put to sea occasionally to carry on their depredations... Nor is this state of things confined in this vicinity to the neighbourhood of Deep Bay. Piratical villages exist along the whole coast wherever the native traffic is sufficient to render such an occupation remunerative.\"38\n\n+39\n\nWriting specifically of Hong Kong itself on 11th April 1846 to the Secretary of State for the Colonies in his annual despatch on the state of the Colony, Sir John Davis observed that “A principal obstacle to the Chinese commerce of the place is the system of piracy which infests the approaches from the east and west. In another despatch dated 26 February 1848, Davis commented on the subject as follows: \"The former prevalence of piracy has been checked (as appears best proved by the increase of native trade) through the active exertions of Captain Loring of HM's ship 'Scout', by whom nearly 300 pirates were captured in the last year, and delivered over to the Chinese government.\n\n1540\n\nWhether the Hong Kong villagers joined in such behaviour", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1984.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/5h73wh572", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211035, "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": 96, "title": "RAS-1987", "content_text": "71\n\n1901 (see below).\n\n36\n\nBrewin, who was promoted to Registrar General in 1901, had also served briefly, from 1897 to 1901, as Inspector of Schools in succession to E.J. Eitel. His endorsement was, therefore, particularly valuable. He had been appointed, together with his successor as Inspector of Schools, E.A. Irving, and the Chinese member of the Legislative Council, Ho Kai, to the 1901-1902 Education Committee, the report of which contains blatant calls for the separate educational treatment of the different races and a clear recommendation, compatible with the extremes of colonialistic paternalism, that, as far as Chinese education was concerned, the Government should concentrate its efforts and finances on the education, in English, of the few who could be regarded as potential leaders. Interestingly, the Secretary of State for the Colonies at this time, Joseph Chamberlain, totally rejected this recommendation (Chamberlain to Sir Henry Blake, Governor of Hong Kong, 12th September, 1902, in CO129/311, p. 481).\n\n\"For certain individuals, this explanation is something of a euphemism since the “medical and sanitary precautions\" involved burning down their homes.\n\nThe Plague first broke out in Hong Kong in the Spring of 1894. The death rate for the first five or six months was over 2,500, and, though, it was the Chinese population which was most affected, the Europeans were not untouched. Lady Robinson, the wife of the Governor of Hong Kong, was, for example, a victim. Dr. E.J. Eitel, the Inspector of Schools, provided details of the rumours circulating among the less educated Chinese, and their effects, in a memorandum to the Colonial Secretary on 22nd May 1894. Eitel wrote to report and explain \"the panic which has suddenly decimated the attendance in the local Chinese Schools\" and noted that the rumours began to spread in districts affected by the Plague on Sunday, 20th May and reached other districts the next day. The principal rumours were (a) that \"the Government intended to select a few young Children from each School to subject them to a surgical incision of the liver in order to obtain bile, this being the only known remedy for curing the plague”; and, (b) that \"every School would be visited by officers who would examine every child and send to the \"Hygeia\" anyone having the least boil or pimple on its body\". Eitel speculated about the origin of the panic, attributing it to \"the malicious distortion of the native medical fraternity\" and concluded: “I do not think anything very effectual can be done to remove the suggestions of native malice to native ignorance and suspiciousness. Distrust of the Government is still rampant among the lower classes of Chinese. Education will remove it in time. (Memorandum No. 38 of 22nd May, 1894, by Dr. E.J. Eitel, Inspector of Schools; in CO129/263, p. 190-193). 39 In Arnold Wright (ed.), Twentieth Century Impressions of Hongkong, Shanghai, and the Other Treaty Ports of China: Their History, People, Commerce, Industries, and Resources (London: Lloyd's Greater Britain Publishing Company, Ltd., 1908), p. 182, for example, Mok Tso Chun, “a native of the Heungshan district\" and formerly one of the directors of the Tung Wah Hospital, is described as the Chief Compradore of Butterfield and Swire. In the Anglo-Chinese Commercial Directory of circa 1915 (Chief Editor, Jan George Chance), a Mok Jao Chuen, clearly the same person as Mok Tso Chun, appears as Compradore for Butterfield and Swire, while a Choi Kung Po and a Mok Kon Sang appear as Assistant Compradores. Mok Man Cheung acted as witness to the will of Mok Tso [or Jao] Chun and the will, itself, makes it clear that Mok Kon Sang was Mok Tso Chun's eldest son. It was certainly not unusual for Compradores at this time to find positions for younger relatives.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1987.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/rx919b522", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213092, "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-1993", "page_number": 160, "title": "RAS-1993", "content_text": "141\n\nwith some happier notes.\n\nJuly 23rd\n\nBy this time we had broken down the opposition and matters began to run smoothly\n\nAnd after a long gap, the final entry,\n\nSeptember 3rd\n\nI left for Japan about this time spending all September in Colony In Japan the guest of the Japanese Government and made a national hero Valuable presents numerous and suite of rooms in the Imperial Hotel\n\nThis red-carpet treatment must have been recommended by Kitasato in appreciation of the help given him by Lowson in making the discovery that earned him international fame\n\nHaving read the diary, I learnt more about the situation as it developed from day to day but it came as a surprise to me that so much had gone on behind the scenes arising from clashes of personalities The three important people whose responsibility in the fight against the Epidemic was no less onerous than that of Ayres or Lowson were called: fools, cowards and nonentities. They were the Governor, who was in overall charge as head of the administration, the Colonial Secretary, who was the Governor's principal assistant, and the Chairman of the Permanent Committee of the Sanitary Board which was set up to recommend on legislation Were the accusations justified? We do not know, but it would be interesting to find out something about these three.\n\nSir William Robinson was Governor of Hong Kong from December 1891 to January 1898. His governorship covered a most difficult period in the history of Hong Kong, during which 'misfortunes after misfortunes assailed the colony in swift succession', to quote from Sayers. The year 1894 was a particularly bad one for Robinson and Hong Kong. His wife died but not from plague. Two very severe typhoons struck Hong Kong in September and October, causing much devastation and many casualties. Above all, there was the Epidemic with its effect on the economy and other aspects of life in the Territory. Robinson reported to the Secretary of State for the Colonies that 'Without exaggeration, I may assert that so far as trade and commerce are concerned the plague has assumed the", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1993.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833t302", "rank": 0 } ]