[ { "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": 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": 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": 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": 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": 215518, "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": 295, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "245\n\nVictoria is increasing rapidly in size, and the Happy Valley will soon be within the municipal boundaries. The time must come when the existing Cemeteries will be closed, and the dead taken elsewhere for burial. The Protestant Cemetery is now nearly full, and every little corner is being made use of...29\n\nA soldier also wrote home about the cemetery:\n\n[Happy Valley] is crammed with the graves of Europeans who have succumbed to the diseases of the unhealthiest country in the world. The graves of the soldiers are numbered. And when the last one was buried on his grave was 5373, showing that that number had died since the city was garrisoned by the British...30\n\nDespite what had been written in the mid 19th century, new burials were and still are carried out in the cemetery till this day - almost one and a half century later.\n\nEarly Burial Grounds in Stanley and West Point\n\nThe cemetery in Stanley,31 renamed Stanley Military Cemetery after the Second World War, was another burial ground erected in the early days of British rule. The area was the site of early military barracks. Although burials can be traced back to 1843, no mention of the cemetery has been found in any of the examined records, nor is it depicted on Lieutenant T.B. Collinson's map and sketch prepared in 1846. One source suggests that the cemetery was opened on 21st July 1843.33 It may be possible that servicemen and families were buried in that area, but the cemetery was not designated until later.34 The use of this cemetery was apparently discontinued after 1870, but it was re-opened during the Japanese occupation period for the burial of civilian internees. After the war, many of the servicemen who died in the battle were re-buried in the cemetery. No new burials have taken place there since the war.\n\nSimilarly, West Point, another barrack area3 in the early days, was also the site of a burial ground in the early 1840s. It is recorded that the Pro-Prefect Father Navarro forwarded on 26th February 1843 a petition for another burial site at West Point for the troops, which was granted on 3rd March the same year.36 However, no further information", "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 } ]