[ { "id": 206934, "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": 5, "title": "RAS-1974", "content_text": "CONTENTS\n\nPage\n\nPRESIDENT'S Report for 1974 · 1\n\nHON. TREASURER'S REPORT FOR 1974 · 8\n\nTHE LIBRARY, 1974 · 10\n\nTRANSACTIONS OF THE BRANCH: · 12\n\nThe Paper Chase-Archives and the Public Records Office of Hong Kong (A lecture given on 7th January, 1974) - A. I. DIAMOND · 28\n\nAdventurers in Hong Kong: the Marquis de Morès and David de Mayréna (A lecture given on 29th March, 1974) - HENRY JAMES LETHBRIDGE · 58\n\nDogs and Horses in Ancient China (A lecture given on 27th May, 1974) CAROLE MORGAN · -\n\nARTICLES: · -\n\nThe Craft of God Carving in Singapore- KEITH G. STEVENS · -\n\n\"Oh for the Joys of England\": Lt. Orlando Bridgeman's Letters from China and Hong Kong, 1842-1843– ROBIN MCLACHLAN · -\n\nFather Ernesto Gherzi, S. J., 1886-1973—G. J. BELL · 68\n\nNotes on the Sources of De Mailla, Histoire Générale de la Chine-Richard Gregg Irwin, with Introduction by L. Carrington Goodrich · 76\n\nThe Monuments of Vientiane and Luang Prabang (Report of the RAS Tour to Laos, 23-24 January, 1974)— MICHAEL SMITHIES · 85\n\nThe Hong Kong Region: its place in Traditional Chinese Historiography and Principal Events since the Establishment of Hsin-an County in 1573....-JAMES HAYES · 108\n\nREPRINTED ARTICLES · 136\n\nPlace Names of Hong Kong and the New Territories (1958) K. M. A. BARNETT · 160\n\nLegends and Stories of the New Territories: Kam T'in (1935-38) (continued) SUNG HOK-PANG · -\n\nNOTES AND QUERIES · 188\n\nThe European Grave on Shek Kwu Chau, Hong Kong JEAN MOORE · -\n\n\"Fung Shui\" Woodlands-L. C. SHEN · 190\n\nUnusual Trees in Hong Kong: the Cassia Bark Tree- L. C. SHEN · 191\n\nTraditional Farming Techniques and their Survival in Hong Kong-P. L. SIAK · 196\n\nProgramme Notes for Visits to Places of Interest in Hong Kong and Kowloon, 1974: Kennedy Town, Old Wanchai, Old Western District, the Diocesan Boy's School and La Salle College, and Ceramic Factory and Sam Tung Uk, N.T. JAMES HAYES, CARL SMITH, HELGA WERLE et. al. · -\n\nBOOK REVIEWS · 235\n\nLIST OF MEMBERS · 245", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1974.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207011, "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": 82, "title": "RAS-1974", "content_text": "\"OH FOR THE JOYS OF ENGLAND\"\n\nLT. ORLANDO BRIDGEMAN'S LETTERS FROM CHINA AND HONG KONG, 1842 - 1843\n\nROBIN MCLACHLAN*\n\nLieutenant Orlando Bridgeman was a minor participant in British activities in China in the early 1840's. Mention of this quite unimportant subaltern is not likely to be found in any of the dozens of histories and memoirs narrating the First Anglo-Chinese War and the early years of Hong Kong. However, Orlando Bridgeman has left us his own personal record of his sojourn in the Far East in the form of several entertaining, if somewhat illegible, letters preserved in the archives of the Nottingham County Record Office.1** His correspondence home provides the rare opportunity of seeing what life could be like in the Far East for a very homesick and bored young British officer on his first overseas service. The impression that Bridgeman gives of life in China and Hong Kong is quite different from the more romantic and adventurous picture provided by more experienced and hardier souls. For Bridgeman, his time there was little more than an adventure in misery.\n\nLimited biographical information on Orlando Bridgeman can be gleaned from Hart's Annual Army Lists and Burke's Peerage.2 His full name was Orlando Jack Charles Bridgeman; he was born in 1823, the younger son of Captain Orlando Henry Bridgeman (1794-1827) and his wife, Selina. Both parents were the children of British aristocracy; his father was the third son (of four) of Baron Bradford and his mother was the daughter of the Earl of Kilmorey. The careers of the four sons of Baron Bradford comply with the popular stereotype of careers followed by the sons of eighteenth and nineteenth century British nobility. The eldest son, of course, succeeded to the family title; for the second, third and fourth sons there were careers in the navy, army and church respectively. Following their schooling at Harrow, both Orlando Jack Charles Bridgeman and his brother, Francis Orlando Henry, followed their\n\n* Mr. McLachlan is a member of the Department of Far Eastern History at the Australian National University.\n\n**The notes to this article will be found at the end.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1974.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207013, "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": 84, "title": "RAS-1974", "content_text": "78\n\nROBIN MCLACHLAN\n\nIt may not have been Orlando's intention to alarm the gentler members of his family, but the receipt of such accounts must have been the occasion for much apprehension for his safety and well-being. In October, he wrote from the island of Chusan where, he told his sister, there was the danger of being kidnapped by the \"dreadfully treacherous\" Chinese.\n\nYesterday, Shadwell had a most narrow escape of being kidnapped. Since the peace we have been perhaps rather incautious in walking too far into the country, and almost unarmed, but now we have had a warning. Shadwell was walking in the country with Cap. Wellsley and after about getting five miles they returned, when within three quarters of a mile of the city they were suddenly attacked by about ten men from behind. Shadwell was pinioned and gagged and Wellsley after breaking one man's head with his stick, saw there was no chance against so many and having also broken his stick, took to his heels and alarmed the guard, but he had to run a mile.5\n\nIn the meantime, Shadwell was trussed up by his Chinese captors, who were already dragging him off when the guard arrived on the scene and rescued him from an unpleasant fate.\n\nBut such danger and excitement were rare during Orlando's stay in China; more common were his complaints of boredom and homesickness. Within weeks of arriving in China, he confessed a longing for home with the lament:\n\nOh for the joys of England again, all those joys, alas so long vanished, and with so small a chance of seeing them again for a long time, ... I would rather break stones by the roadside in England than undergo what I have done since I have been in the East.6\n\nBy Christmas, he was not only homesick for England, and an English Christmas (\"There is no place like England for it.\"), but quite bored with life in China.\n\nMonotony generally makes time fly very quickly, but I do not ever remember anything so tedious as the time has been since my embarkation.7\n\n5 The two persons mentioned in the letter were brother officers of the 98th.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1974.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207015, "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": 86, "title": "RAS-1974", "content_text": "80 \n\nROBIN MCLACHLAN \n\nin this horrid place. I am therefore leading a most regular life. I get up at 6 a.m. and walk for two hours before breakfast. I remain in my room all day during the heat of the sun and walk again in the evening, and go to bed early. I live on fish, fruit and curry and drink but little wine. But I smoke a great deal; in fact it is necessary in India. I cannot get on without it. The whole fleet expect to sail in a few days. They go back to India. This place, which is now a perfect bear garden, will once more be quiet. There is only one spot on the whole island that has a tree on it. It is called Happy Valley, and is certainly a pretty spot. The rest of the island is one barren rock and perfectly devoid of all vegetation, although there are springs innumerable. ... Now I have told you everything about this delightful spot. It is inferior to Sierra Leone from the fact of its being less healthy, less amusing and less near England.\n\n10 \n\nAn important social activity for the infant colony was the rounds of dinner parties held by the senior military and colonial officers. Bridgeman seems to have regarded these events as at least tolerable social functions, but was very critical of the more rowdy partying that went on in the officers' barracks. While writing to his sister, he commented on one such party going on in the next room. This was a farewell party by the Madras Artillery for one of their officers, Captain Balfour. Bridgeman considered it a very noisy party with far too much drinking and feared that it would go on far into the night. \n\nMen of this sort never sit down to a large party without drinking to such an excess that they lose their senses and are put to bed more like beasts than Christians. God forgive me, but I hate them all. Give me women's society! Without it we are beasts.\n\n11 \n\nAnother form of entertainment that attracted Bridgeman's critical comment was the amateur theatre established in Hong Kong in late 1842. The actors were largely drawn from among the soldiers and sailors stationed at Hong Kong. \n\nI regret to say it was a complete failure. The first and only performance was about a week ago. The pieces they chose were stupid and not one of them knew their parts. However, the house was filled; for in a stupid place like this everybody caught willingly at anything in the way of amusement. The house is now being...", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1974.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207017, "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": 88, "title": "RAS-1974", "content_text": "82\n\nROBIN MCLACHLAN\n\nthen a junior officer in Orlando's regiment but later to become the British Minister at Peking and Sir Thomas, was to teach Orlando to play the flute.17 But as Wade was busy with his Chinese language studies the flute lessons had to be postponed indefinitely. About the same time the music lessons were being considered, Orlando met Elijah Coleman Bridgman.18 This Bridgman was the first American missionary in China, arriving in Canton in 1829, and is probably best remembered for his part in the founding and editing of the Chinese Repository. Although the American spelt his name without an \"e\", Orlando still considered it a rare event to meet someone of the same name who was not a relation. It is unlikely though that he would have been anxious to claim a relationship with a man he described in his letter as a \"beast\".\n\nWhen writing of his commander in the war, General Hugh Gough, and the naval commander, Admiral William Parker, Bridgeman was equally caustic in his remarks. Writing in October from Chusan, where the British force had collected before proceeding on to Hong Kong, he commented:\n\nThe whole force is collected here now, with the exception of the Genl. and Admiral who are delaying as long as they can because they are each putting £30 a day into their pocket and as soon as they get to Hong Kong they will cease to receive this.19\n\nUnfortunately, there are very few comments, either favourable or unfavourable, on the Chinese people and their way of life. In his first letter home from China, he complained that he didn't get to see anything of Nanking and the Chinese people he had seen were only the \"lowest of the low.\"20 Later he confessed that what \"pity\" he had for the Chinese, on account of their heavy losses in battle (\"The slaughter was frightful ... .”), was lost \"since they proved so dreadfully treacherous\" with their kidnapping on Chusan.21\n\nDuring his time at Hong Kong, Bridgeman continued this lack of interest in things Chinese and only occasionally commented on Chinese customs and ways. For example, his interest in Chinese tea led him to describe to his sister the Chinese tea stands that dotted the colony and how, according to his observations, no Chinese could pass one without having several tiny cupfuls of tea.22 But such sketches of Chinese life in the colony are rare in his letters; the Chinese inhabitants of Hong Kong seemed scarcely to exist for Bridgeman.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1974.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207019, "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": 90, "title": "RAS-1974", "content_text": "84\n\nROBIN MCLACHLAN\n\nNOTES\n\n1 Nottingham County Record Office, Bristowe Papers - DDBB 113, items 31-39. The dates and places of writing of the seven letters relevant to this paper are: No. 33, Hong Kong, February 12, 1843; No. 34, H.M.S. Melville on the Yangtze off Nanking, August 16(?), 1842; No. 35, Chusan, October 11, 1842; No. 36, Hong Kong, November 25, 1842; No. 37, Hong Kong, December 18, 1842; No. 38, Hong Kong, May 6, 1843; and No. 39, Hong Kong, October 29, 1843. (Further footnote reference will be by item number, i.e. 33-39).\n\n2 H. G. Hart, The New Annual Army Lists for 1842 to 1847 (London: John Murray, 1842-1847), p. 250 (98th Regiment) and p. 137 (11th Hussars); and, Sir Bernard Burke, A Genealogical and Heraldic Dictionary of the Peerage and Baronetage of the British Empire (London: Hurst & Blacket, 1857), p. 110 (Bradford).\n\nThe original Orlando Bridgeman lived in the seventeenth century and among other accomplishments was the Lord Keeper of the Great Seal. See the Concise Dictionary of National Biography, I (to 1900), p. 143.\n\n4 No. 34.\n\n5 No. 35.\n\n6 No. 34.\n\n7 No. 37.\n\n8 No. 35.\n\n9 No. 36.\n\n10 No. 36.\n\n11 No. 37.\n\n12 No. 37.\n\n13 No. 37, Postscript on inside of envelope, dated December 28, 1842.\n\n14 No. 33.\n\n15 No. 38.\n\n16 No. 37.\n\n17 No. 39.\n\n18 No. 39.\n\n19 No. 35.\n\n20 No. 34.\n\n21 No. 35.\n\n22 No. 38.\n\n23 No. 39.\n\n24 Hart, 1846, p. 137. Bridgeman now rated the distinction of a footnote detailing his experiences in war. It read \"Lt. Bridgeman served in the 98th with the Expedition to the North of China in 1842, and was present at the attack and capture of Chin Kiang Foo, and at the landing before Nankin.\"\n\n25 Ibid., 1847 and 1848, p. 137.\n\n26 Burke, 1914, p. 286 (Bradford). I have not been able to locate a newspaper obituary for Bridgeman. As he spent his last years in Shrewsbury (11 Berwick Road to be exact) there may be an obituary in the press of that district.\n\nPage 90\n\nPage 91", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1974.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077", "rank": 0 } ]