[ { "id": 204997, "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-1965", "page_number": 105, "title": "RAS-1965", "content_text": "96\n\nCOLINA LUPTON\n\nhalves, one of which today is really not of great relevance. The watershed provided by the war, and the change in Hong Kong's fortunes as a result of the establishment of a strong and Communist Government in China, the independence of most other former colonial territories in Asia and the incipient industrialization of all of them put post-1949 Hong Kong into a totally different category from the quiet backwater which it occupied before.\n\nSo much has changed that the early history of the Colony sheds little light on its development today, and it remains only of academic significance, particularly in connection with the expansion of Western interests in China. An account of Hong Kong's growth in the last fifteen years, however, does go some way towards explaining what is a unique political and economic phenomenon and one which is too much overlooked by the outside world. It is the chapters which deal with the post-war years and look to the future which are the most thought-provoking in the book, for they discuss questions and problems to which there are many answers and varying solutions. These speculations are more stimulating than the carefully documented facts about, for example, the evolution of Hong Kong's Sanitary Board; and the summing up of how today's Government actually functions has more relevance than the picturesque disputes between early officials.\n\nThe success of the present Administration — “government by discussion\", Mr. Endacott calls it — is certainly peculiar and deserves examination. In this most uncolonial age, Hong Kong's Colonial Government has grown and prospered. Of the Legislative Council, Executive Council and Urban Council, only the last named has any elected members, and the number of electors is minute compared to the population (and, it may be added, a very small percentage of those entitled to vote actually do so). Mr. Endacott adduces a good deal of evidence that public opinion, while having little constitutional voice, is very carefully ascertained and considered before a new policy is embarked upon, and given the lack of unrest here, it must be conceded that Government seldom if ever inflicts a truly unpopular policy on the people. The press, and the various sections of the populace which have an articulate voice are given considerable attention, and the members of the Urban Council are apt to bring well into the\n\nPage 105\n\nPage 106", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1965.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/s752cj653", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205712, "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-1969", "page_number": 18, "title": "RAS-1969", "content_text": "12\n\nT. C. CHENG\n\nuneventful one, and he was noted for his co-operative attitude towards Government policies. This at least had the merit of demonstrating that no hazard was likely to result from having a Chinese representative permanently on the Legislative Council. When his six-year term was up in 1890, he asked not to be re-appointed, and a very prominent \"local boy\", Dr. Ho Kai (later Sir Kai Ho Kai) succeeded him.\n\nDr. Ho Kai, born in Hong Kong in 1859, was the fourth son of the Rev. Ho Tsun-shin (alias Ho Fuk-tong) of the London Missionary Society. Having studied Chinese for several years, he was admitted to Class 4 of the Central School in 1870 at the age of 12. He was an extremely clever and hardworking boy for, according to the school record, he was already in Class 1, the top form, in September 1871. He completed his studies at the Central School the following year, and proceeded to Palmer House School, Margate, England. From there he entered St. Thomas' Medical and Surgical College and received the degrees of Bachelor of Medicine and Master of Surgery from the University of Aberdeen in 1879. In the same year, he was admitted as a member of the Royal College of Surgeons of England by examination. He then turned to the study of law and was admitted to Lincoln's Inn in May 1879. He was Senior Equity Scholar, Lincoln's Inn, in 1881 in which year he passed the finals with flying colours and also married a charming English girl, Alice, the eldest daughter of the late John Walkden of Blackheath. On his return to Hong Kong in 1882 with his newly-wedded wife, he first practised medicine but was unsuccessful, because the Chinese at that time were not prepared to avail themselves of western medical treatment unless it was offered free. He then turned to the Bar and since 1882 had practised as a barrister in Hong Kong.\n\nUntil his death in 1914, Dr. Ho Kai rendered his services freely and ungrudgingly to the Hong Kong community. For many years he was a valuable member of many important committees, including the Standing Law Committee, the Public Works Committee, the Examination Board, the Medical Board, the Sanitary Board, the Po Leung Kuk Committee, the Tung Wah Hospital Advisory Committee, the District Watch Force Committee, the Architects' Advisory Board and the Advisory Committee of the Hong Kong Technical Institute. For 26 years he was a Justice of the Peace and for 25 years he represented the Chinese community on the", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1969.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/9g553n20d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205715, "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-1969", "page_number": 21, "title": "RAS-1969", "content_text": "CHINESE UNOFFICIAL MEMBERS OF COUNCILS\n\n15\n\nincluding a big reclamation project.14 The name of the company contained the names of the partners, \"Kai\" from Ho Kai and \"Tak\" from Au Tak. Hence the name of our airport may be taken as a name in commemoration of both Ho Kai and Au Tak.\n\nAlthough very westernized himself, Dr. Ho Kai always entertained a very sympathetic understanding of the Chinese masses. In May 1887 when the Government introduced the Public Health Bill, Dr. Ho Kai, to the surprise of his European friends, opposed it strongly as a member of the Sanitary Board. He accused the Bill of making the \"mistake of treating Chinese as if they were Europeans\" and argued that to improve standards indiscriminately would mean cutting down the available building space, and forcing rentals to go up,15 thereby causing great hardship to the poorer Chinese. Because of his opposition the Bill had to be amended substantially. This is only one example of why Ho Kai was so much respected by the Chinese community as its leader and forthright spokesman.\n\nIn addition to his interest in Hong Kong affairs, Ho Kai, like many educated Chinese of his time, was very much concerned with the modernization and reformation movements that were going on in China. On 8th February 1887, the China Mail carried a reprint of an article by Marquis Tseng Chi-tze, Chinese Minister to Great Britain and Russia, entitled \"China, the Sleep and the Awakening\". On 16th February 1887, Ho Kai published, under the pen-name \"Sinensis\", a long article in the China Mail refuting many points raised by Marquis Tseng. In subsequent years he wrote quite a number of articles, voicing his ideas on political and economic reforms in China, and refuting the views of such Chinese personages as Viceroy Chang Chi-tung and Kang Yu-wei, the reformer who aroused the ire of the formidable Empress Dowager. In 1897 he was offered a post in China by his brother-in-law, Wu Ting-fang.16 However, he went to Shanghai to have a look at things for himself and he decided to return to Hong Kong.\n\nIn 1895, when Dr. Sun Yat-sen, one of his students in the Hong Kong College of Medicine and founder of the Chinese Republic, started the Hsing Chung Hui, a revolutionary organization, in Hong Kong, he had the assistance and support of Dr. Ho Kai. Indeed Dr. Ho took an active part in planning some of the early abortive attempts in Canton to overthrow the Manchu Government.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1969.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/9g553n20d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205718, "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-1969", "page_number": 24, "title": "RAS-1969", "content_text": "18\n\nT. C. CHENG\n\nwatchmen being paid for with subscriptions from the Chinese community.* In 1893 a District Watch Force Committee was formed with the Registrar General (Protector of Chinese) as Chairman, and from that time onwards up to 1941 many prominent Chinese leaders served on that Committee. Indeed, for many years, it was more or less a tradition for prominent Chinese who wished to render public service to the Colony to begin their public career with this Committee and then, in the case of those who had a knowledge of English, to proceed to the Sanitary Board (which was replaced by the Urban Council in 1935) and thence to the Legislative Council.\n\nFor some years Wei Yuk was more or less an unofficial liaison officer between Hong Kong and the Manchu Government, and the latter was indebted to him in no small degree for the assistance he rendered in bringing to justice Chinese criminals who had fled from Chinese territory to Hong Kong. He was so respected by the Chinese in South China that, following the successful revolution in 1911, when Admiral Li Tsun, Commander of the Chinese Imperial Naval Detachments of Kwangtung and Kwangsi Provinces, declared his surrender to the revolutionary forces directed by Dr. Sun Yat-sen's deputy, Hu Han-min from Hong Kong, Mr. Wei Yuk was asked to act as the guarantor of good faith on both sides!\n\nIn 1894, a fierce bubonic plague broke out in Hong Kong which accounted for over 2,000 deaths mainly in the oldest Chinese section of Hong Kong, viz., Tai Ping Shan (the present Po Hing Fong). In 1896 and subsequent years the plague recurred to a greater or less degree every spring. As there was little scientific knowledge of the plague and as there was no western treatment for this, Government decided to take drastic measures including the cleansing and disinfecting of infected areas, compulsory removal of the sick and house-to-house visitation carried out generally by the military. As it was very un-Chinese to allow sick parents or relatives to be removed from their homes to die in strange hospital rooms, and as the Chinese looked upon house visitation as interference and intrusion upon their privacy and personal liberty, they adopted an attitude of passive resistance and often hid away the dead and the sick. Wei Yuk was able to do\n\nSee chapter 4, \"District Watchmen\" of Regulation of Chinese Ordinance, No. 13 of 1888.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1969.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/9g553n20d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205719, "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-1969", "page_number": 25, "title": "RAS-1969", "content_text": "CHINESE UNOFFICIAL MEMBERS OF COUNCILS\n\n19\n\nan outstanding job in these difficult times in enlightening the Chinese masses and in explaining to them the purpose of the Government measures. For these invaluable services he was later presented with a gold medal and a letter of thanks from the general public of Hong Kong.\n\nWei Yuk was also a far-sighted person, for it was he who first seriously pursued the idea of constructing a railway from Kowloon to Canton and thence to Peking. He spent large sums in furtherance of the scheme which failed, however, owing to the obstacles placed in its way by officials in China.21\n\nWei Yuk served on many Government and public committees. While not being noted for long speeches, he was always clear and precise in expressing his views and advice. He retired from public service in 1917 at the age of 68. For his invaluable services to the Colony, he was awarded the C.M.G. in 1908 and knighted in 1919. He died in 1922.\n\nWhen Sir Kai Ho Kai retired in February 1914, his place in the Legislative Council was filled by Lau Chu-pak, who was born in Hong Kong in 1866. He was a brilliant scholar at the Central School and in 1885 was the first boy to be awarded the Stewart Scholarship.22 After leaving the Central School, he was for a time chief clerk at the Hong Kong Observatory. Later he became a tea merchant and amassed a fortune. He was a generous benefactor of education and helped financially many poor children to complete their schooling. With Ho Fook, he was co-founder, in 1900, of the Chinese Merchants Bureau which was renamed in 1913 the Chinese Chamber of Commerce. Before he was appointed to the Legislative Council, he was for many years an active member of the District Watch Force Committee, the Sanitary Board, the Board of Education and the Council of the University of Hong Kong. He was Chairman of the Po Leung Kuk in 1903, a founder-director of the Kwong Wah Hospital in 1907 and Chairman of Tung Wah Hospital in 1909/1910. In January 1909 when a powerful committee was nominated, with the Governor Sir Frederick Lugard as Chairman, to raise funds to start the University of Hong Kong, Lau, Dr. Ho Kai and Wei Yuk were all members of the Committee.\n\nLau Chu-pak's concern in education was demonstrated in 1916 when he suggested, in a Legislative Council meeting, that the", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1969.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/9g553n20d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205723, "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-1969", "page_number": 29, "title": "RAS-1969", "content_text": "CHINESE UNOFFICIAL MEMBERS OF COUNCILS\n\n23\n\nmerchants in this Colony. In all necessary measures to that end, I know that I can rely upon the whole-hearted support of this Council\". At the same meeting, the Senior Unofficial member, Sir Henry Pollock, paid the following tribute to Sir Shouson Chow and Robert Kotewall; \"During the last seven months, in particular, we have felt indebted not only to Sir Shouson Chow but also to his Chinese colleague on the Council. We, Sir, behind the scenes, can appreciate perhaps more fully than the general public the work of the Chinese members of this Council during the period I have referred to”. \n\nOn 9th July 1926, Sir Shouson Chow was also appointed the first Chinese member of the Executive Council, following the death of Sir Paul Chater who had served on that Council since 1896.26 Although the appointment was made on personal grounds, it was evident that political considerations also came in, viz., to pacify anti-British sentiment in China and to further encourage the loyalty of local Chinese towards Hong Kong. \n\nSir Shouson Chow served on both Councils until 1930, when he resigned from the Legislative Council. He continued, however, to be a member of the Executive Council until he retired in 1936. He died many years after the war, in 1959, \n\nWhen Lau Chu-pak retired from the Legislative Council in 1922, he was succeeded by Ng Hon-tsz who was born in 1877 and was compradore to Shewan, Tomes, Ltd. He was a director of the Tung Wah Hospital in 1907 and was a founder of the Tsan Yuk Hospital. He was at various times a member of the District Watch Force Committee, the Sanitary Board and the Council of the University of Hong Kong. He served in the Legislative Council for only two years and died in 1923 while in office. After his death, Sir Henry Pollock remarked at the Legislative Council meeting held on 10th May 1923 that Mr. Ng had always been a \"wise, sound and faithful councillor”. \n\nMr. Robert Kotewall, who succeeded Ng Hon-tsz as a member of the Legislative Council in 1923, was born in Hong Kong in 1880. Educated at the Central School as well as the Diocesan Boys' School, he was a noted English as well as Chinese scholar and was a very good speaker. After a distinguished career in the Hong Kong Government until 1916, he turned to business and", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1969.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/9g553n20d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205724, "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-1969", "page_number": 30, "title": "RAS-1969", "content_text": "24 \n\nT. C. CHENG \n\nfounded a company named after himself. He was also General Manager of Chinese Estate, Ltd., and adviser to the Hong Kong and Yaumati Ferry Company. He was Honorary Adviser to the Chinese Government as well as the Kwangtung Provincial Government. In 1924, he turned down a Chinese offer to be ambassador to England. He was a member of the Legislative Council for 13 years, from 1923 to 1936, and a member of the Executive Council for 5 years from 1936 to 1941. He was created a knight bachelor in 1938.\n\nThe big strike of 1925 was followed by a boycott of British goods and shipping in China until 10 October 1926, resulting in a serious economic depression in Hong Kong. Mainly through the persuasiveness of Robert Kotewall a special loan of £1,600,000 with an interest rate of 5½%, was arranged from the British Government to assist the merchants of the Colony until normal trading was resumed. Because of this, the Chinese gave him the nickname of \"Silver Tongue\". Sir Robert Kotewall died after the war in 1949,27\n\nIn 1929, the Legislative Council was enlarged through the initiative of the Governor, Sir Cecil Clementi, who was a noted Chinese scholar. The number of officials was increased from eight to ten, including the Governor, and the number of unofficials was increased from six to eight. Of the two additional unofficial members, one was to be a Chinese and the other a Portuguese. Thus the number of Chinese unofficials was increased from two to three and the Portuguese community was represented for the first time on the Council by Mr. Jose Pedro Braga.\n\nIn addition to Sir Shouson Chow and Robert Kotewall, Dr. Tso Seen-wan became the third Chinese member of the Legislative Council in 1929. Dr. Tso, born in 1868, studied law in England. In 1896 he started his practice as a solicitor in Hong Kong together with a partner named Hodgson. In 1902, he, Dr. Ho Kai and some other Chinese leaders were responsible for the founding of St. Stephen's Boys College. He served on the Sanitary Board in 1918 and was appointed a J.P. the same year. As early as 1916, he was awarded the honorary degree of LL.D. by the University of Hong Kong, and in 1928 and 1935 was awarded the O.B.E. and C.B.E. respectively. He served on the Legislative Council from 1929 to 1937 when he resigned.\n\nPage 30\n\nPage 31", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1969.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/9g553n20d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205725, "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-1969", "page_number": 31, "title": "RAS-1969", "content_text": "CHINESE UNOFFICIAL MEMBERS OF COUNCILS\n\n25\n\nDr. Tso was noted as a very frank, honest and outspoken person. On 26th August 1936 when Mr. (later Sir) M. K. Lo proposed a motion in the Legislative Council that the censorship of the Chinese press should be abrogated, he opposed it by saying that, although he appreciated the principle of the freedom of the press within certain limits, he must ask that local conditions and the interest of the Colony, and in particular of the Chinese community, should be taken into consideration as of first importance. He argued that as there was so much unrest and uncertainty in the political atmosphere in the Far East as a result of Japanese aggression in China, it was very easy and quite natural for the Chinese papers to over-step their bounds by giving expressions to their feelings on matters Chinese. Such expressions, if undesirable and unchecked, might create misunderstandings outside and stir up trouble inside the Colony. He advocated that prevention was better than cure; for, if bad feeling or bad blood were stirred among the masses, especially among the less intelligent sections of the Chinese community, it would be most difficult to restrain or pacify. He felt therefore that Government should continue to censor the Chinese press, although the better controlled English press needed little, if any, censorship. Although Lo's motion was also opposed by other members and was lost, Dr. Tso's frank remarks led to fierce criticisms and even hostility against him by the Chinese press and the Chinese public. This was probably the cause of his resignation in 1937.\n\nIn 1931, when Sir Shouson Chow left the Legislative Council, he was succeeded by Mr. Chau Tsun-nin, now Sir Tsun-nin Chau. Sir Tsun-nin, born in 1893, is the seventh son of the late Chau Siu-ki who was acting Legislative Councillor in the years 1921, 1923 and 1924. Having received his early education at St. Stephen's Boys College, he completed his university studies at Oxford. He was then admitted to Middle Temple and became a barrister. In 1914 he returned to Hong Kong and, after practising as a barrister for a few months, turned to business. He was appointed a J.P. in 1923 and a member of the Sanitary Board in 1929. He was a member of the Legislative Council from 1931 to 1939, and was awarded the C.B.E. in 1938. After the war he was appointed to the Executive Council and was created a knight bachelor in 1956. He retired in 1959.\n\nWhen Robert Kotewall retired from the Legislative Council", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1969.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/9g553n20d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205726, "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-1969", "page_number": 32, "title": "RAS-1969", "content_text": "26\n\nT. C. CHENG\n\nin 1936 he was succeeded by Mr. (later Sir) Man-kam Lo. Sir Man-kam, born in 1893, was the eldest son of the late Lo Cheung-shiu, J.P., who was Chairman of the Tung Wah Hospital in 1915. He was also the son-in-law of the late Sir Robert Hotung. Sir Man-kam went to England to study law in his youth and later founded the solicitors' firm, Messrs. Lo & Lo, his partner then being his younger brother, M. W. Lo. He was appointed a J.P. in 1921 and served on the District Watch Force Committee, the Sanitary Board and many other Boards and Committees. He was Chairman of the Tung Wah Hospital in 1929 and was a member of the Legislative Council from 1936 to 1941. After the war he was appointed to the Executive Council and was knighted in 1948. Sir Man-kam was not only a brilliant lawyer but also a very conscientious and outspoken member of the Legislative and the Executive Councils in his time. His views and advice were always highly esteemed by the Government. He died suddenly in 1959.\n\nIn his book Via Ports, a recent Governor of Hong Kong, Sir Alexander Grantham, had this to say about Sir Man-kam: “Out-standing amongst them (i.e., Executive Council Members) was Sir Man-kam Lo, whose death in 1959 was a great loss to the Colony. He had a first class brain, great moral courage and a capacity for digging down into details without getting lost in them. I can picture him at a meeting of the Council when some difficult or controversial subject was under discussion. Another member would be expounding his views. From the glint in 'M.K.'s' eyes and the way his lips were moving, I knew he had something forceful to say. I could hardly wait for the previous speaker to finish and to hear 'M.K.' Then again, when a complex but dull matter was being dealt with by the circulation of papers, on which members would write their opinions, I would look to see what 'M.K.' had written and, as often as not, save myself the tedium of reading all the other minutes. He was invariably right to the point”\n\n28\n\nWhen Dr. Tso Seen-wan resigned from the Legislative Council in 1937, he was succeeded by Dr. Li Shu-fan who, born in 1887, received his early medical training at the Hong Kong College of Medicine and later at Edinburgh University. In 1964 he published his autobiography, entitled Hong Kong Surgeon and it is recommended that any one wishing to know more about the late", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1969.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/9g553n20d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205744, "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-1969", "page_number": 50, "title": "RAS-1969", "content_text": "44\n\nR. G. GROVES\n\nthat one could not bear to think of them.\"55 These apprehensions represent the core of arguments which were developed and embellished as the campaign to mount the resistance movement continued. They reached their highest point in a petition sent to the San On Magistrate some two weeks later. This alleged that, in an effort to control cholera, the Hong Kong Sanitary Board murdered Chinese who were ill by poisoning them with arsenic and then burned their houses down. The inflammatory potentialities of these charges — which appear to have been widely believed — are obvious. They were used frequently by leaders of the resistance in subsequent weeks.\n\nAs requested, leaders of the various districts within the Yuen Long marketing area assembled the next day at Yuen Long market. Pat Heung, Shap Pat Heung, and Kam Tin were each represented by four people. Ping Shan sent six representatives, Ha Tsuen three, and Tun Mun (Castle Peak), one. Of the twenty-two people who attended the meeting, thirteen were members of one or another of the three Tang lineages. Once again, a decision was taken in favour of resistance, although not without disagreement. Two days later, on 31st March, leaders from throughout the area convened again at Yuen Long. The previous decision to resist was reaffirmed and letters were sent to leaders within the Sheung U Division, asking them to attend a general meeting at Yuen Long the next day.56\n\nOn 1st April leaders from the northern part of the Sheung U Division made their way to Yuen Long. In addition to the Yuen Long leaders, representatives of the following Sheung U lineages were present: Liu (Sheung Shui), Pang (Mandarin: P’eng, Fan Leng), Tang (Tai Po Tau), and Man (San Tin). The ensuing meeting was characterised by long and heated debate. It ended with a decision to offer resistance on an inter-divisional basis. Whatever the others did, the Tangs were clearly determined that the occupation would be opposed. While the Yuen Long meeting was in progress a copy of a placard issued by the Yuk-on Hin (\"wish for peace\" library) of Ping Shan reached the Governor in Hong Kong. Its message was direct and to the point:\n\nWe hate the English barbarians, who are about to enter our boundaries and take our land, and will cause us endless evil. Day and night we fear the approaching", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1969.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/9g553n20d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206315, "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": 132, "title": "RAS-1971", "content_text": "126\n\nH. J. LETHBRIDGE\n\nof the District Watch Committee stemmed not only from this subjective ranking of committees and from the great 'face' given by government to the Committee: the Committee acquired its influence principally because its members were appointed in the first instance to serve for five years and in nearly every case this period was renewed. Some members served for over twenty years37. Thus the committeemen of the District Watch were able to build up particular relationships for a very long period of time with important government officials and members of the community, Chinese and European. As a consequence, they began to be seen as elder statesmen as ‘elders' if you like above the fray, beyond criticism. They exemplified civic virtue, public spirit and successful climbing. They stood out sharply from the mass; they were listened to with respect; they became known to many people by name; they were seen at public functions and on public occasions. In sociological language, they were both instrumental and ritualistic leaders. The colonial government honoured them in numerous ways, by, for example, printing their names in the Hong Kong Civil Service List; and their standing was emphasised by the tradition that developed of the full Committee meeting twice a year, though often more than that38, at Government House, with the Governor himself presiding in the chair. Nomination to the Committee meant, it is clear to see, a complete validation of a person's status and public respectability.\n\nFrom 1880, when the first Chinese was nominated to the Legislative Council, to 1941, sixteen substantive appointments were made to the two Councils: nearly every such person had been active on the Committee. As T. C. Cheng confirms: for many years it was more or less a tradition for prominent Chinese who wished to render public service to the Colony, to begin their public career with the Committee, and then, in the case of those who had a knowledge of English, to proceed to the Sanitary Board (which was replaced by the Urban Council in 1935) and thence to the Legislative Council. Nomination to the Committee thus made possible translation to even more prestigious positions and, in a few cases, to the acquisition of a Knighthood.\n\nThe Committee was able to develop into the chief consultative body because, among other factors, the population of Hong Kong", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1971.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/z029vt43g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206319, "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": 136, "title": "RAS-1971", "content_text": "130\n\nH. J. LETHBRIDGE\n\nPermanent Board of Direction was established by ordinance in 189352, the Tung Wah Hospital Advisory Board came into being in 189633, the Chinese Permanent Cemetery Committee in 1913 and the Chinese Temples Committees in 1928. Two other Chinese committees should be mentioned: the Chinese Recreation Ground Committee, established in 1890, contained the Registrar General and the Chinese unofficial members of the two Councils; and the Chinese Public Dispensaries Committee, formed in 1909, consisted of the Registrar General as chairman, the Chinese members of the two Councils and the Sanitary Board, the three chairmen of the annual committee of the Tung Wah Hospital and a number of other leading Chinese. In 1941, the official Chinese committees, inclusive of the District Watch, were eleven in number. Together their members represented a Hong Kong Chinese élite, in which such values as wealth, prestige and power, to use William Skinner's expressive term, ‘agglutinated’.\n\nNomination to the District Watch Committee was a great achievement, but nomination to the other ten committees and boards was also regarded as an honour and an additional notification of a person's standing within the community. But Chinese appointed to these ten committees and boards exercised either a more specialised or more purely honorific role, primarily because these committees did not hold a constant or uninterrupted dialogue with the Registrar General/Secretary for Chinese Affairs. They met infrequently, sometimes only once or twice a year; and although they gave advice on occasions, the giving of advice was not their primary function. Much of the work of these committees centred on the allocation of charitable funds, the management of property and the supervision of accounts. The District Watch Committee represented the real locus of power: at its meetings the members formulated a Chinese point of view on government policies and general issues. The Committee acted as a permanently installed barometer for the government, giving it a clear indication of the state of mind of the Chinese bourgeoisie. It marked out for government how the élite felt on certain questions39.\n\nThe same people were to be found represented on all the eleven committees and boards (although in slightly different combinations in each case) so that it is a little unreal to distinguish", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1971.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/z029vt43g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206556, "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": 104, "title": "RAS-1972", "content_text": "98\n\nE. G. PRYOR\n\nment should carry out improvements to existing properties financed from an improvement fund set up by contributions from the license fees on gambling houses; and that for buildings not capable of improvement the Government should acquire, demolish, rebuild and sell the properties concerned.\n\nChadwick's report was a landmark in the history of Hong Kong, and as with Dr. Ayres in 1873 he drew attention to the serious consequences that would arise if nothing were done to alleviate the bad sanitary condition of the Colony. On this point Chadwick reported that:\n\nIt is stated that, hitherto, Hong Kong has escaped the epidemics which have afflicted other places in the neighbourhood. The settlement is but 40 years old and the subsoil beneath the city may not yet be sufficiently saturated with filth to make it a hot bed for disease and a breeding ground of filth poison. It is somewhat premature to assume that this happy immunity will always continue for the process of saturation is slowly but surely going on and if unchecked cannot fail to bring forth abundant fruit, in the form of misery and disease.\n\nAnother twelve years elapsed before Chadwick's warning took the form he predicted.\n\nPrelude to Disaster 1882-1894\n\nChadwick's report prompted the government into action and, as a first step towards meeting the problem, a Sanitary Board was set up in 1883 under a draft Order and Health Amendment Ordinance which gave the Board wide powers to deal with insanitary houses, the inspection of premises, compulsory disinfection and the removal of persons who were a source of disease. However, strong opposition from property owners caused these provisions to be withdrawn although the Board remained in existence.\n\nFurther attempts were made in 1887 to introduce a Public Health Ordinance which, among other things, provided for the reservation of open spaces at the rear of buildings, the provision of privies and the fixing of a minimum standard of 300 cu. ft. of internal living space per adult. Great opposition against these proposals was voiced in the local press on the basis that the poorer classes would suffer\n\n8 Ibid., p. 22.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1972.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/gm80qf99h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206559, "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": 107, "title": "RAS-1972", "content_text": "# REVIEW OF HOUSING CONDITIONS IN HONG KONG\n\n101\n\npopulated areas which were used for portable purposes should be closed, that all private lanes and streets should be brought under government control and that back-to-back houses should be demolished as soon as possible.\n\nUnder such desperate circumstances, the government was obliged to take strong action and in the same year as the plague struck it passed, on an emergency basis, the Tai Ping Shan Resumption Ordinance. Under this statute the inhabitants from 8.5 acres of land in the worst affected area were evicted, their properties were resumed and demolished, and the area was laid out anew. The various works were completed by 1899 at a total cost of over HK$944,000. Two smaller schemes in the same locality were carried out in 1902 and 1903 at a cost of some HK$271,000; the total area involved in these schemes was about 0.7 acre.\n\nOther measures were introduced in 1894 in the Closed Houses and Insanitary Dwellings Ordinance under which the height of buildings was limited to between 25 ft. and 76 ft. depending on the length and width of the street. The Ordinance also gave powers of inspection to the Sanitary Board to ascertain breaches of the law against overcrowding, the standard of measurement being 30 sq. ft. of floor area and 400 cu. ft. of air space per occupant. Despite the apparent necessity for such measures the unofficial members of Legislative Council pressed for less restrictive clauses.\n\nIn 1895 there was a respite from the plague with only 44 reported cases, but in the following year over 1,200 persons were afflicted. Thereafter, the plague became an annual visitation, mainly in the torrid summer months, and persisted until 1907. Altogether, there were some 13,000 victims between 1894 and 1906 giving an average of over 1,000 a year.\n\nThe continued concern of the government over the insanitary condition of the Colony led to the appointment of a commission to look further into the matter and a report12 was duly submitted in 1898, the year in which the New Territories were leased from China. After a comprehensive survey of 3,095 houses in two health districts,\n\n11 Minute by the Principal Medical Officer on the Report of the Public Health and Building Ordinance Commission, Appendix A. p. 5 in the Blue Book Reports on Sanitation and Housing 1900-1907, Hong Kong, 1907.\n\n12 Report of the Commission to Inquire into the Existence of Insanitary Properties in the Colony, Hong Kong, 1898.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1972.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/gm80qf99h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206562, "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": 110, "title": "RAS-1972", "content_text": "104\n\nE. G. PRYOR\n\nSection 151 of the new Ordinance restricted the depth of domestic buildings to not more than 40 ft; greater depths could be permitted, however, if every storey were provided with windows to ensure that the whole storey was adequately lit. Another provision prohibited rooms in existing domestic buildings which had neither a window nor skylight. Cubicles were limited to no more than two per room and each cubicle had to have a minimum floor area of 64 sq. ft. and a minimum depth or width of 7 ft. In rooms with no adequate natural lighting and ventilation, cubicles were prohibited.\n\nSection 179 of the Ordinance when first mooted required every domestic building to be provided with open space at the rear equivalent to not less than half the roofed-over area of the building; however, due to opposition from property owners, this provision was made to apply only to buildings erected on land leased after 1903. For buildings erected on land obtained before that date, the amount of open space to be provided was not less than one-third the roofed-over area.\n\nIn the case of building heights, opposition from vested interests also resulted in differential controls being applied so that on land obtained after 1903 the height of buildings was limited to a dimension not greater than the width of the street whereas for land that was leased before 1903 the maximum height was set at one-and-a-half times the street width. A maximum height of 76 ft. and a maximum of four storeys also applied in addition to the above limitations. These provisions remained in effect until 1935.\n\nIt was not long before the new regulations came under attack, and in 1906 a commission was appointed to look into the effectiveness of the Ordinance and also the existence of corruption in its application. The Commission was very sceptical over the value of many of the new regulations and, in particular, criticised the prohibition of cubicles as this was frequently the only means by which Chinese families could obtain accommodation at a rental they could afford.18 The Commission also found that corruption amongst all grades of the officers of the Sanitary Board was prevalent which, in turn, reduced or nullified the effectiveness of the regulations.\n\n18 Report of the Commission Appointed by his Excellency the Governor to Enquire into and Report on the Administration of the Sanitary and Building Regulations Enacted by the Public Health and Buildings Ordinance 1903 and the Existence of Corruption among the Officials Charged with the Administration of the Aforesaid Regulations, Hong Kong, 1907, p. 10.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1972.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/gm80qf99h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207307, "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": 75, "title": "RAS-1975", "content_text": "THE GREAT PLAGUE OF HONG KONG\n\n67\n\ndisease to man remained a mystery and the two Japanese researchers could only conclude that the bacillus was drawn from the air by breathing.\n\nFurther investigations soon established a positive relationship between the incidence of plague first among rats and subsequently among man. On this account, Simpson reported in 1902 that “no success is likely to accrue from the adoption of any measure limited to dealing with plague in human beings and which does not take cognizance of the fact that plague in rats and mice also disseminates the infection. It does not serve any very useful purpose to remove the sick and cleanse everything in the infected houses and above the ground if the infection is being carried by plague-stricken rats from house to house or district to district by the subterranean movements of rats, whether this be effected by rat burrows or by sewers and drains. Both rat and human plague possess infective powers and each can spread the disease not only to its own species but also to the other”.*\n\nSimpson could offer no explanation as to the medium of infection although he did make a number of observations as to the conditions which appeared to favour the spread of the disease. In particular, he drew attention to the extremely crowded and insanitary conditions under which the majority of the Chinese population lived, the virtually unrestricted migration of thousands of people from infected areas in China to Hong Kong, and the fact that the colony served as a great emporium with hongs and godowns filled with stores and infested with rats.\n\nSimpson saw the solution to the problem by way of the strict enforcement of various preventive measures. Besides the already well-established procedures for the disinfection of houses, public latrines, and the like, he recommended in 1902 the appointment of medical men in every health district to register cases and find out causes of the disease. He also urged the strict control over the disposal of dead bodies in the street and harbour, and, to this end, suggested the enforcement of collective fines on all households in any street where a dead body was discovered. He further saw the necessity for the bacteriological examination of rats as part of an\n\n* First Memorandum from W. J. Simpson, M.D., to James Stewart Lockhart, Sanitary Board Office, 20th January 1902, p. 1 in Blue Book Reports on Bubonic Plague 1894-1907.\n\nPage 75\n\nPage 76", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207308, "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": 76, "title": "RAS-1975", "content_text": "68\n\nE. G. PRYOR\n\nintelligence service to pin-point danger spots and proposed the distribution of 100,000 hand bills publicising the causes and symptoms of plague, the destruction of rats and the addresses of places where sickness could be reported. Another recommendation was the establishment of a plague department with wide powers for the discovery, prevention and cure of plague including inoculation with a highly potent horse antiserum prepared at the Haffkine Institute in India.\n\nA final recommendation made by Simpson was a general improvement of sanitary conditions and stricter control over the design of tenement blocks which he described as follows:\n\n\"The rooms, as a rule, are far too deep, the object of this depth being to subdivide each room into a number of cubicles for the accommodation of families or lodgers. Though there may be windows at each end of the room, the great depth materially obstructs the light to take an example from the better class of buildings, many of the houses that are being erected are eighty feet deep without lateral windows and contain long, narrow rooms of fifty-five feet in depth, by twelve or thirteen feet in width, lighted in front by a window and also in the rear by another window which looks into a backyard of twelve feet. . . .”*\n\nFrom the recommendations made by Simpson arose the Public Health and Buildings Ordinance of 1903 which set new standards for the design and occupancy of buildings and which remained in force until 1935.\n\nBy 1904 a considerable amount of deductive evidence had accumulated to link the occurrence of plague to the fleas carried by rats. Dr. J. M. Howie of Changpoo, for example, was of the opinion that the main cause of plague was inoculation through the bite of fleas, lice and mosquitos. Dr. H. Dobson of Yung Kong also noted that the cases he had observed appeared to have been caused by \"the bites of insects (fleas), contamination of open wounds on legs or elsewhere (or) through food containing the germ.\" William Hunter, the Government Bacteriologist of Hong Kong also noted\n\n* Second Memorandum from W. J. Simpson to James Stewart Lockhart Sanitary Board Office, 20th March 1902, p. 15 in Blue Book Reports on Bubonic Plague 1894-1907.\n\n+ W. J. Simpson, Report on the Causes and Continuance of Plague in Hong Kong and Suggestions as to Remedial Measures, London, 1903, p. 31.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207336, "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": 104, "title": "RAS-1975", "content_text": "96\n\nH. J. LETHBRIDGE\n\nand China Gas Company, the Hong Kong Electric Company, the Hong Kong Distillery Company, all needed skilled European labour.\n\nThe Hong Kong and Whampoa Dock Company employed European foremen, clerks, book-keepers, shipwrights, engineers, boiler-makers, storekeepers, and superintendents. 'Where the eastern seas', J.S. Thomson enthuses, 'bubble up hot to the flame of an equatorial sun, Chinese workmen, with Scotch overseers, turn out six thousand ton steel ships and do battleship repairing worthy of Woolwich or Devonport.' The skilled British mechanic experienced a degree of upward social mobility in Hong Kong: the skilled worker became an overseer, with all the compensations of improved status and salary.\n\n13\n\nApart from any non-qualified engineers, mechanics and artisans, there were a number of Europeans employed in other low status occupations. We should mention lighthouse keepers, employed by the Harbour Master's Department (later Marine Department), tide-waiters in the Chinese Maritime Customs, whose duty it was to board ships and junks at the various treaty ports, some of whom were domiciled in Hong Kong. They were, like the skippers and engineers of the vessels owned by the Hong Kong, Canton, and Macau Steamboat Company, mostly retired A.B.s from the Royal Navy and non-commissioned officers who had served their time. Lastly, there was a sprinkling of European tailors, hairdressers, milliners, confectioners, bakers, booksellers, printers, photographers, owners of sporting-goods shops, livery stable keepers, and gunsmiths. Most bars and tap-rooms employed Europeans as managers and barmen, though many were not of British nationality. As Macmillan concludes:\n\nThe bulk of the foreign population is employed in commerce, but the police, revenue, and sanitary staffs, schools, public works, docks, etc., give employment to a large number of overseers and supervisors, mostly engaged direct from home or from military and naval men whose service with the garrison is completed.1 Macmillan, however, forgot to mention the important beachcomber element in the overseer force.\n\n14\n\nEuropean outcastes were mainly prostitutes, nearly all of whom were of working class origin. Many of these women were professionals from the red light districts of San Francisco, Honolulu, Sydney, and Melbourne, who, for one reason or another (usually", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207893, "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": 281, "title": "RAS-1976", "content_text": "266\n\nNOTES AND QUERIES\n\ncommunity. They resisted being sent to the temporary plague hospitals set up under the direction of European doctors. They feared that the bodies of dead relatives and friends would not be treated according to Chinese custom. The mood of the Chinese population became so hostile, almost breaking into open rebellion, that the Government finally permitted the Directors of Tung Wah Hospital to open a plague hospital in a recently built and as yet unoccupied pig and sheep depot in Kennedy Town. The attempt to force western medical treatment upon a Chinese population already aroused by the natural fear of the plague, further alienated the general population from any suggestion that western methods should be introduced into Tung Wah. The President of the Directors in that year was in the unenviable position of being also a member of the Sanitary Board whose duties it was to initiate and enforce measures to control the plague. His position with a foot in two camps provoked an attack upon his business premises while he was chairing a meeting at Tung Wah called to consider the protests of the Chinese community against the measures of the Government. Upon receiving the news of the attack, he hurriedly left the meeting, but his chair was no more outside the gates of the hospital than the hostile crowd which had gathered began stoning the chair bearers and rushed the chair turning it upside down with the unfortunate Chairman inside. He managed to crawl out and rush back within the safety of the Tung Wah gates. An Indian constable blew his whistle and a group of watchmen of the Hospital rushed out and the crowd dispersed. The incident reflects the strong feeling surging in the Chinese community against the measures taken by the Government in the plague crisis.\n\nThe Governor was not only recipient of hostility from the Chinese community but was also strongly criticised in the English press for the slowness with which Government undertook plague measures and for making concessions to the feelings of the Chinese regarding the treatment and care of plague victims. He may have been stung by these criticisms, for after the passing of the plague he took a very strong stand in demands made on Tung Wah to change its former policy of exclusive employment of doctors trained in traditional Chinese medicine.\n\nIn 1895 a Commission was appointed to inquire into whether the Hospital should be closed, or, if continued, what changes should be made. There was no question in official minds that it could", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1976.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/hq382988q", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209283, "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-1981", "page_number": 186, "title": "RAS-1981", "content_text": "172\n\nNG LUN NGAI-HA\n\nThe person in Hong Kong who had the most direct influence on Sun's thought was Ho Kai, a founder and also a teacher of the Hong Kong Medical College, teaching medical jurisprudence and physiology.1 Ho was the son of a missionary of Cantonese origin who later settled in Hong Kong and became a businessman. Ho himself received his early education at the Central School and then left in 1872 to continue his secondary and then university education in Britain. He returned in 1882 as a qualified medical doctor and barrister. As a prominent civic leader, he served as the Chinese representative in various Government councils and boards, including the Legislative Council and the Sanitary Board. He was a great promoter of Western medicine and education for the Chinese in Hong Kong. In addition to the Alice Memorial Hospital and the Hong Kong Medical College, he was also a founder of the University of Hong Kong and patron of a number of Anglo-Chinese schools. In the Sino-French war of 1884-1885, when China failed to protect Annam, the Chinese seamen and coolies in Hong Kong reacted patriotically in boycott against French ships. Ho began to be concerned with the fate of China and the need for her modernization. From 1887 onwards, Ho began to contribute articles to the local English language newspapers, expressing his views on affairs in China. Most of his reformist essays were translated into Chinese or rewritten by Hu Li-huan and published both in Hong Kong and in China.2 Hu also received part of his education at the Central School both as a student and then as a student-teacher between 1862 and 1872. Unlike Ho, whose education was mainly in English, Hu had received very solid education in classical Chinese, and later won great fame as a gifted prose writer, scholar and poet. He was also a comprador and a very successful businessman.\n\nBecause of Ho's and Hu's prominence in Hong Kong, their essays must have caught the attention of many intellectuals. Ho's first essay was a long critical review of Tseng Chi-tse's article, \"China, the Sleep and the Awakening\". The review was published in the China Mail on February 12, 1887, three days after Tseng's article appeared in the same paper. Ho argued that the real cause of China's troubles lay not so much in her military weakness as in her \"loose morality and evil habits, both social and political\". He strongly emphasized complete and sweeping reforms in China's administration. More specifically, Ho demanded a new basis for recruiting officials as the existing civil examinations involved no knowledge of modern science or arts and were worthless as a test of real ability and talent. He also considered", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1981.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ff36bt18m", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209397, "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-1982", "page_number": 54, "title": "RAS-1982", "content_text": "32\n\n3.\n\nJ. H. HAAN\n\nmembers who were not elected but appointed. Even when colonial cities obtained a Municipal Council in one form or another as Hong Kong did in 1883 with the Sanitary Board, the later Urban Council, and Singapore in 1856, while it was still under the Bengal Presidency the main government rested in the hands of the Governor and the other appointed Councils. Furthermore, in these cities, if legislative measures had to be taken, approval of one foreign authority was necessary—the one in the metropolitan country.\n\nThis was in sharp contrast to the administrative system which prevailed in the Settlement. There municipal government consisted of a Municipal Council which was elected from among the foreign ratepayers in accordance with a written constitution termed the Land Regulations. If important byelaws had to be made these had to be approved by both the Council and the general body of foreign ratepayers assembled in Public Meeting as well as by a majority of the foreign consuls and ministers at Peking. This whole procedure was rather unwieldy when it was necessary to answer the new problems which were posed when the population of the Settlement increased (from 15 foreigners in 1844 to 38,940 foreigners and 1,120,860 Chinese in 1935), and when industrialisation gained pace from the 1920s.*\n\nAs regards the administration of justice, Shanghai equally held a special position. All foreigners belonging to countries having a treaty with China enjoyed extraterritorial rights, that is, in law cases they were tried by their own consuls according to the laws of their own country. This did not obtain in other colonies; there, strangers were prosecuted under the laws of the colony.\n\nAs for the Chinese in the Settlement they were tried by a so-called Mixed Court, in which a Chinese judge and a foreign assessor sat together on the bench.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1982.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mk61z420p", "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": 210431, "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": 38, "title": "RAS-1985", "content_text": "19\n\nmade an ornament and not a disfigurement”. He thought it not proper that the Colonial Chaplain had been turning his ponies loose to graze in the cemetery, though he had no complaint about the grounds-keeper, Mr. Donaldson, who kept things in order, reduced \"over luxuriant foliage”, and in bare places planted trees and shrubs. He suggested that for a trifling cost the bare blank walls along the road could be made more ornamental. The south end of the cemetery, however, was unenclosed and, as far as he knew, unconsecrated. He suggested this portion, \"rising in a rapid slope, could be greatly improved if it were grassed and flowering shrubs planted”. Even at the date covetous eyes were cast towards the proceeds from the races. \"Could not the Race Committee spare a few dollars that flew so plentifully into its coffers, for the purpose of improving the appearance of the site of their annual sports. We have more than once suggested that the centre of the race course should be laid out and planted, but we should rather see the cemetery beautified and cared for\".\n\nColonial Cemetery Ordinances the problem of Japanese and Chinese burials\n\nThe Public Health and Buildings Ordinance (No. 1 of 1903) included an article setting aside separate sections of the cemetery for special groups: naval and military commissioned officer, civil servants, residents of more than twenty-one years standing, residents of more than seven years standing, children and destitutes.\n\nSeveral conditions remained that created dissatisfaction in sections of the community. One was the burning of joss sticks and the firing of crackers at graves of non-Christians. The other was the absence of what were considered proper sites for the burial of wealthy Chinese with resulting periodic requests for burial of such in the Colonial Cemetery. These issues came before the Sanitary Board in 1908-1909, and resulted in the Christian Cemetery Ordinance of 1909.\n\nThe joss stick and cracker problem was principally related to Japanese burials. The first Japanese burials were on terraces where their graves were intermingled with Christians. Later a", "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": 210433, "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": 40, "title": "RAS-1985", "content_text": "21\n\n1415 as a place for private burial. The Board appointed a committee to investigate (Weekly Press, 20 February 1909). It reported back to the Board in April with the opinion that it was not advisable for land to be disposed of for isolated detached cemeteries. By way of concession it recommended that, “If, however, any Chinese of affluent circumstances wishes to have space reserved as a private graveyard, remission might be given for an area to be so reserved, and railed off, whether in an existing Chinese cemetery or on land adjoining such a cemetery at a rate of $2 per square foot, same as grave spaces in Class D of Chinese Cemeteries.” (Weekly Press, 3 April 1909).\n\nBut this arrangement did not fully satisfy those who wanted better accommodations for their dead. A satisfactory solution was finally arrived at in 1913 when land was set apart at Aberdeen (Aberdeen Inland Lot No. 78) for a permanent cemetery for Chinese permanently resident in the Colony. The cemetery was under the control of a Board of Management made up of recognised leaders of the Chinese community. Those who had resided in the Colony for eight years, and had subscribed $100 (later increased to $500) were entitled to graves; however, no more than four grave spaces were to be allotted for one coffin. Part of the problem of a satisfactory cemetery arrangement for wealthy Chinese was their wish to have a traditional horseshoe-shaped grave, a form which could use a great deal of space. The more area a grave included, the more important the person, and the greater the public statement of the wealth and position of the family.\n\nIn February 1909 the Sanitary Board considered an application from the son of a deceased Chief Interpreter of the Supreme Court for permission to exhume the body of his father that he might be reburied in a larger site in the same cemetery along with two sons, and two of his wives, who were to be exhumed from the cemetery for Chinese at Mount Caroline.\n\nThis request added fuel to the fire which was burning over the presence of Japanese Buddhist graves among those of Christians. One of the European members of the Board protested “against allowing our cemetery to be used for re-interment of bodies from", "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": 210435, "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": 42, "title": "RAS-1985", "content_text": "23\n\nChristians or Eurasians. He expressed the opinion that such groups had given up their heritage; he himself was an ardent Confucian and promoted the building of the Confucian Hall in Sookunpoo. He sarcastically added that “as people had already been admitted into the European paradise on earth, he thought it was scarcely fair to debar them from using the passage to the European paradise in heaven”. (The Weekly Press, 17 April 1909)\n\nThe Hong Kong Telegraph took up the cause; Lau Chu-pak was one of its owners. Following the April meeting of the Sanitary Board in which Mr. Lau had expressed the opinions given above, it ran an editorial entitled “More Class Legislation in Hongkong”. The editorial linked the cemetery question with what the paper regarded as a growing movement towards the enactment of class legislation. \"The fact of the matter is that this sort of petty municipal legislation is all of a piece with the policy of the Government in reserving special lands for the bon ton of the Colony. First, they decreed that in life the Chinese should not live in the vicinity of the Peak, and now in death the Chinese are not deemed fitting occupants of lairs in the public cemetery.” The editor asked for consideration for the Chinese who were seeking a better deal for their dead: “Fancy the outcry there would be among the elite if the remains of the deceased predecessors were subjected to removal at the whim and caprice of some insignificant official in a Government Department. That in itself should constitute a plea for the Chinese that they have a right of interment in the Colonial Cemetery.\" Indeed, “the Colonial or Protestant, or whatever fancy name anybody might wish to call it, the public cemetery of Hong Kong is maintained out of the rates and taxes provided by the residents in the Colony. It is no more a private institution than the public gardens. No sect or body has a right to say that it has any particular claim on the domain; as far as we can make out, all have an equal right to interment”.\n\nThe Christian Cemetery Ordinance of 1909\n\nThe Government decided to draft legislation which would create separate sections in the cemetery where only those", "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": 210701, "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-1986", "page_number": 52, "title": "RAS-1986", "content_text": "35\n\nhis profession but no-one would ever know what he was going to do next. Francis did not try again though he remained in the public mind as a possible candidate. The Daily Press in an editorial in 1892 said that he would prove a valuable acquisition to the Council with his long and intimate knowledge of the colony and his legal attainments but the Government would probably think it desirable to have a merchant. Also (according to G.B. Endacott, Government and People in Hong Kong 1841-1962) Governor William Robinson regarded Francis as one of his principal opponents. However he maintained his interest in the reform of the Legislative Council and the introduction of representative government. In 1889 in a lecture on Crown Colonies he expressed a hope for an elected Council, and he was a leading member of the Hong Kong Association founded in 1893 for improving and popularising the Government. That was followed in 1894 by a petition to the Home Government for constitutional reform.\n\nFrancis did in fact achieve elective office, but on the Sanitary Board. That was set up in 1883 to supervise and control the practical sanitation of the colony (which left much to be desired). As its work involved interference with the private affairs of residents it was unpopular with property owners and with the Chinese generally. It could however only make proposals. Their implementation was a matter for the Government. Originally it consisted solely of official members but subsequently provision was made for nominated unofficial members, and two members elected by ratepayers on the special and common jury lists. The first election was held in June 1888 and there were four candidates including Francis who received 55 votes. The other candidates received 71, 43 and 18 votes respectively. The Daily Press hailed the occasion saying the day would be ranked as a day of note by the future historian of Hong Kong; for the first time the ratepayers of the Colony had been given a voice in the management of their own affairs. Prior to the election it referred to his legal knowledge, skill in debate and long and intimate knowledge of social conditions of all sections of the population and said that his presence on the Board should ensure some check on its servants. Granville Sharp in proposing him called him capable, conscientious and unselfish. He promised to be a watchdog for the public. He remained a", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1986.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210702, "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-1986", "page_number": 53, "title": "RAS-1986", "content_text": "36\n\nWALTER GREENWOOD\n\nmember, being re-elected in 1891 and 1894, until his resignation in 1895. It was a substantial commitment, involving fortnightly meetings and reading papers in-between meetings. Considerations of space allow reference only to certain events in 1894 and 1895 for which Francis is best known. Suffice it to say that he appeared to try to dominate the proceedings of the Board but at the same time had an ambivalent attitude to it because he considered that it did not have sufficient powers and independence to make it an effective body. For example, in March 1894 he seconded a proposal that it be reconstructed on a popular basis but also argued that that was premature until its powers had been enlarged. Prior to the election in June 1891 the Daily Press said that he had rendered good service and that his keen and ever-ready criticism, sometimes perhaps degenerating into captiousness, had exercised a wholesome influence both on the Board and its officers. The China Mail in its obituary said that he was not an unqualified success and his performance as a member of the Board might have deprived him of support for a place on the Legislative Council.\n\nIn May 1894 plague struck Hong Kong, and a Permanent Committee of the Sanitary Board, comprising three members with Francis as Chairman, was set up to cope with the emergency. It met daily at his chambers at 4 p.m. Its actions were not universally popular. It was in conflict with the Government on occasion, and at one stage was said to be daggers drawn with the Governor. The business community complained that its activities had an adverse effect on commerce, and its relations with the Chinese community were not assisted by wild rumours such as that pregnant women were cut open and children's eyes were gouged out to make medicines for the treatment of the plague. There were recriminations as to whose fault had led to the outbreak and whether the right steps were taken to combat it. Francis bluntly laid the blame on gross mismanagement by the Public Works Department. Whatever the rights and wrongs of particular matters, there were many tributes to his work. The Governor in a dispatch to the Secretary of State, Lord Ripon, in June said that the Permanent Committee acted with extraordinary energy and efficiency and that the Government was indebted to him and others. The acting Attorney General paid tribute to his great assistance, at enormous sacrifice of time, and his wonderful and rapid grasp of any subject and great", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1986.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210703, "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-1986", "page_number": 54, "title": "RAS-1986", "content_text": "37\n\nlegal ability and acumen in drafting regulations for dealing with the plague and its effects. A thoughtful touch by Francis was to offer coffee and cigars to the men of the Shropshire Light Infantry who helped with plague relief. The Hong Kong Telegraph in its obituary said that he directed and controlled everything and allowed his practice to suffer in the public interest. However, in September when the emergency was over, the Daily Press attacked the Sanitary Board, saying that its springtime of promise had drifted into a moribund condition of age, and the Permanent Committee saying that it was as absolute as practically to remove all control from the executive and demonstrated the difference between representative government and amateur despotism. In October, the Colonial Surgeon, giving evidence before a Retrenchment Committee that had been set up, alleged that the Board had done very little worth doing during the last six years. So far as the unofficial members of the Board were concerned, matters continued to deteriorate, and the last straw was the proposal early in 1895 to appoint another official member, the Medical Officer of Health, to it. Francis went so far as to say that he would be a Government spy. He and two other members threatened to resign. A Chinese member, Ho Kai, expressed the hope that they would not do so because that would be playing into the hands of enemies who wished to get rid of them. Francis and another member did resign and wrote to the newspapers to explain their reasons to the ratepayers. Their resignations were followed by others. At the next meeting of the Board, the Chairman said that they had all, especially Francis, who had devoted several months of his time absolutely to the work of coping with the epidemic, rendered valuable services to the colony, and it was resolved that the thanks of the Board be conveyed to them for the assistance they had rendered during their membership, especially to Francis for his untiring zeal and energy in coping with the plague epidemic in 1894. By this time, the Governor favoured the abolition of the Board. Despite that, he held a plebiscite in 1896 to ascertain whether the community wanted an official or unofficial majority on the Board. Francis took part in the plebiscite, and by 331 votes to 31 votes, the community indicated that it wanted an unofficial majority. However, the new Colonial Secretary, Joseph Chamberlain, was not prepared to countenance that or to agree to the abolition of the Board, and it was reconstituted. Elections continued to be held.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1986.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210705, "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-1986", "page_number": 56, "title": "RAS-1986", "content_text": "39\n\none else. The general expectation was that May and Francis would be treated in the same way. However, whereas May was awarded the C.M.G., Francis was merely offered an inkstand. The discrepancy was made all the more apparent by the fact that inkstands were also awarded to a number of junior officials.\n\nOn 22 May 1895 the Governor wrote to Francis \"By the direction of the Marquess of Ripon I have great pleasure in forwarding to you the accompanying handsome inkstand. You will find engraved on it the following inscription: 'Presented by the Hong Kong Government with the approval of Her Majesty's Government to J.J. Francis Esq., Q.C., Chairman of the Permanent Committee of the Sanitary Board, in recognition of services rendered during the epidemic of bubonic plague at Hong Kong in 1894'. For those services you have already been thanked by me, and also by the Secretary of State for the Colonies. In again expressing my appreciation of the work which you then performed so willingly and so ably it only remains for me now to ask you to accept this inkstand from the Government of Hong Kong as a slight recognition of your disinterested and valuable labours during the epidemic of 1894\". Francis replied in a letter dated 27th May which he made public. After reviewing the work of the Permanent Committee and his part in it he said that the Public Committee felt that a medal or piece of plate, however valuable, was no sufficient acknowledgement for his services and in the circumstances it was impossible for him to accept the inkstand. He was perfectly satisfied with the thanks of the community and the Governor and Secretary of State and would have sufficient memorial of the plague year in the gold medal to be presented by his fellow citizens and in the state of his fee book. He would have been highly gratified if he had been honoured in the same way as May but the gift of an inkstand was so ludicrously inadequate to the services he had rendered that he could only conclude that the Secretary of State was under a false impression as to their nature. It was usual in England, or at least always had been, to award the honours of the campaign to the leader. He had done his work freely and voluntarily and without a thought, at the time, of anything beyond serving the colony but he now had a duty to speak out in justice to the Public Committee.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1986.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210712, "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-1986", "page_number": 63, "title": "RAS-1986", "content_text": "46\n\nHENRY THOMAS JACKMAN (1874-1928), ENGINEER, PUBLIC WORKS DEPARTMENT, HONG KONG\n\nSTEPHEN SELBY*\n\nH. T. Jackman came to Hong Kong in July 1903 to take up the post of executive engineer in the Public Works Department. Born in England on 4 June 1874, Jackman attended the Crystal Palace Engineering School in London from 1890 to 1893. He left the engineering school to take up three years' practical work on drainage and waterworks engineering with the firm of McLandsborough and Preston, where he was pupil and then assistant engineer. During that period, he was in charge of a new sewage works in Ripon. Following his indenture, he was appointed in 1897 as Assistant District Engineer for Sheffield, where he was responsible for electric tramways, drainage and highways works.\n\nThe early 1900's in Hong Kong were years of severe water shortage and sanitation problems. The total population of the territory stood at just over 300,000, about 94% of whom were Chinese. The first few years of the decade showed a particularly high death-rate from plague, although 1902 showed a slight drop. Severe damage was regularly caused by typhoons, particularly in 1900 and 1906: flash floods and strong winds brought down many of the poorly-constructed buildings in the “Chinese Quarter\" of the city, frequently killing or injuring the occupants. Shipping and small sampans on which whole families lived suffered huge losses.\n\nA report had been undertaken in 1882 by Osbert Chadwick on the sanitary condition in the Colony. The report resulted in the establishment of the Sanitary Board in 1883 amid some controversy over how far some of the report's more draconian recommendations should be implemented. The report was elaborated upon by Chadwick over the period from 1883 to 1903, and further recommendations were developed that works on sewerage, water supply and drainage should be put in hand forthwith.\n\n*Stephen Selby is an Administrative Officer in the Hong Kong Government and a member of the Society.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1986.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210716, "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-1986", "page_number": 67, "title": "RAS-1986", "content_text": "50\n\nSTEPHEN SELBY\n\nPlanning maps for that time show extensive plans for dwelling houses along the alignment of Prince Edward Road out to East Kowloon and the reclamation works undertaken by Ho Kai and Yau Tak (the Kai Tak residential development at Kowloon Bay) were under planning. The plans even show the proposed alignment of a branch railway to Ngau Tau Kok which is very close to the present-day MTR alignment.\n\nJackman was promoted to Assistant Director of Public Works on 1 June 1921 at a salary of £1,000; he had acted in the post for much of the previous year. His responsibilities included overseeing the planning of the Kowloon urban layouts and their implementation, including negotiation over resumption of private building and agricultural lots and arbitrations over difficult cases. In the mid-twenties, the Kai Tak residential development plan failed and the Government took back the partly-reclaimed area in order to form a commercial aerodrome using material dredged from the Harbour. The aerodrome came into use in 1928, although the flying club occupied a corner (as it does now) from about 1925.\n\nIn 1922, Jackman acted Director of Public Works during the sickness of the substantive incumbent, and from 15 May to 29 August of the following year, he again acted during his superior's leave. As DPW, Jackman also served as vice-president of the Sanitary Board and member of both the Legislative and Executive Councils. He was member of the Court and Council of the University of Hong Kong. The period of the mid-1920's was an unsettled one in Hong Kong, reflecting political events in China. A number of seamen's strikes and general labourers' strikes took place causing much uncertainty in the commercial sector and the Government.\n\nH. T. Jackman acted DPW for most of 1927, but at that time was already suffering from ill health. He was seriously ill at the end of the year, and at the St. George's Ball on 7 January 1928 he was invited to the official supper party, but only his wife could attend. On medical advice, he retired at the age of 54 (one year early) on 3 July 1928. He and his wife were given a farewell reception by the Acting Governor, W. T. Southorn, at Government House. The", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1986.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210717, "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-1986", "page_number": 68, "title": "RAS-1986", "content_text": "51\n\nA couple were presented by colleagues with a silver rose bowl and a coffee set.\n\nIntending to recuperate in England, Jackman and his wife left Hong Kong on July 21, 1928, aboard the s.s. Rawalpindi. However, he contracted pneumonia soon after the ship sailed from Bombay and died at sea on August 4. His wife probably did not return to Hong Kong (although her name and address appear in directories for the Peak up until 1929).\n\nSOURCES\n\nHong Kong Blue Book, 1903-1928\n\nChina Mail, August 10, 1928\n\nSouth China Morning Post, August 11, 1928\n\nHong Kong Daily Press, 1 January 1928\n\nHong Kong Telegraph, 28 October 1910\n\nRev. Carl Smith's card index\n\nTwentieth Century Impressions of Hong Kong, Shanghai, etc. (Lloyd's Publishing House, 1908)\n\nDirectory & Chronicle of China, Japan, etc., 1914-1930\n\nWho's Who in the Far East (pub. China Mail), 1906-07\n\nHenry Thomas Jackman, born 4 June 1874, Civil Service Record:\n\nDate | Events | Absences | Salary\n\n20.10.1902 | Appointed to Colonial Service (CSO4408 of 1903) | | \n\n1903 | Executive Engineer, PWD | | HK$3,000 p.a.\n\n1904 | | | \n\n1905 | | | \n\n | Appointed 5 June 1903 Took up duty 15 July 1903. Acting Sanitary Surveyor | 3 Apr.-23 Nov. | £480.0.0\n\n | | | £480.0.0", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1986.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210719, "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-1986", "page_number": 70, "title": "RAS-1986", "content_text": "Date\n\nEvents\n\n1916\n\nAdditional duties\n\n9 May to 30 Sept.\n\n1917\n\n1918\n\nAbsences Salary\n\n£630.0.0\n\n£60.0.0\n\n53\n\n(duty)\n\n$360\n\n(conv. allce)\n\n£630.0.0 $360 (c.a.)\n\n2 months £630.0.0\n\nand\n\n$1,020\n\n29 days\n\n(rental allowance).\n\n1919\n\nIn charge of maintenance of roads 1 Jan. 1919- 31 Dec. 1919\n\n£630.0.0 $180 (c.a.)\n\n1920\n\n1921\n\nIn charge of maintenance of roads until 15 Mar. 1920 Acted 2nd Asst. DPW from 14 Apr. 1920-31 Dec. 1920\n\nADPW (Kln & NT), 1 Jun.\n\n£850.0.0 £120.0.0 (b.p.) $360 (c.a.) $1,356 (rent)\n\nHalf-pay\n\n£1,000.0.0\n\nleave\n\n$360 (c.a.)\n\nfrom\n\n15 Aug.\n\nActing DPW (adm. con.) Half-pay\n\n1922\n\nfrom 27 Nov.\n\n1923\n\nto 16 Dec.\n\nActed DPW from 15 May to 29 Aug. Exco, LegCo and Vice-President of the Sanitary Board.\n\n£1,030.0.0\n\nleave to\n\n$360 (c.a.)\n\n16 Jan.\n\n£1,060.0.0 $360 (c.a.)\n\nHowever, to follow the exact instructions given and to format the text in a more structured and readable way using Markdown (though the final output is requested in HTML, the initial processing can be understood better in Markdown), here is the reformatted text:\n\n# Date | Events\n## 1916 | Additional duties 9 May to 30 Sept.\n## 1917 |\n## 1918 |\n## Absences | Salary\n£630.0.0 | £60.0.0\n53 | (duty)\n$360 | (conv. allce)\n£630.0.0 $360 (c.a.) |\n2 months £630.0.0 and $1,020\n29 days | (rental allowance).\n## 1919 | In charge of maintenance of roads 1 Jan. 1919- 31 Dec. 1919\n£630.0.0 $180 (c.a.) |\n## 1920 |\n## 1921 | In charge of maintenance of roads until 15 Mar. 1920 Acted 2nd Asst. DPW from 14 Apr. 1920-31 Dec. 1920\nADPW (Kln & NT), 1 Jun.\n£850.0.0 £120.0.0 (b.p.) $360 (c.a.) $1,356 (rent)\nHalf-pay | £1,000.0.0 leave $360 (c.a.) from 15 Aug. Acting DPW (adm. con.) Half-pay\n## 1922 | from 27 Nov.\n## 1923 | to 16 Dec. Acted DPW from 15 May to 29 Aug. Exco, LegCo and Vice-President of the Sanitary Board.\n£1,030.0.0 | leave to $360 (c.a.)\n16 Jan. | £1,060.0.0 $360 (c.a.)\n\nAnd the HTML output as per the instructions:\n\nDate | Events\n\n1916 | Additional duties 9 May to 30 Sept.\n\n1917 |\n\n1918 |\n\nAbsences | Salary\n\n£630.0.0 | £60.0.0\n\n53 | (duty)\n\n$360 | (conv. allce)\n\n£630.0.0 $360 (c.a.) |\n\n2 months £630.0.0 and $1,020\n\n29 days | (rental allowance).\n\n1919 | In charge of maintenance of roads 1 Jan. 1919- 31 Dec. 1919\n\n£630.0.0 $180 (c.a.) |\n\n1920 |\n\n1921 | In charge of maintenance of roads until 15 Mar. 1920 Acted 2nd Asst. DPW from 14 Apr. 1920-31 Dec. 1920\n\nADPW (Kln & NT), 1 Jun.\n\n£850.0.0 £120.0.0 (b.p.) $360 (c.a.) $1,356 (rent)\n\nHalf-pay | £1,000.0.0 leave $360 (c.a.) from 15 Aug. Acting DPW (adm. con.) Half-pay\n\n1922 | from 27 Nov.\n\n1923 | to 16 Dec. Acted DPW from 15 May to 29 Aug. Exco, LegCo and Vice-President of the Sanitary Board.\n\n£1,030.0.0 | leave to $360 (c.a.)\n\n16 Jan. | £1,060.0.0 $360 (c.a.)\n\nUpon closer inspection, it appears the text is best represented as a table. Here is the corrected HTML representation:\n\n \n Date\n Events\n \n \n 1916\n Additional duties 9 May to 30 Sept.\n \n \n 1917\n \n \n \n 1918\n \n \n \n Absences\n Salary\n \n \n £630.0.0\n £60.0.0\n \n \n 53 (duty)\n $360 (conv. allce)\n \n \n £630.0.0 $360 (c.a.)\n \n \n \n 2 months £630.0.0 and $1,020\n 29 days (rental allowance).\n \n \n 1919\n In charge of maintenance of roads 1 Jan. 1919- 31 Dec. 1919 £630.0.0 $180 (c.a.)\n \n \n 1920\n \n \n \n 1921\n In charge of maintenance of roads until 15 Mar. 1920 Acted 2nd Asst. DPW from 14 Apr. 1920-31 Dec. 1920\nADPW (Kln & NT), 1 Jun.\n£850.0.0 £120.0.0 (b.p.) $360 (c.a.) $1,356 (rent)\n \n \n Half-pay\n £1,000.0.0 leave $360 (c.a.) from 15 Aug. Acting DPW (adm. con.) Half-pay\n \n \n 1922\n from 27 Nov.\n \n \n 1923\n to 16 Dec. Acted DPW from 15 May to 29 Aug. Exco, LegCo and Vice-President of the Sanitary Board.\n£1,030.0.0 leave to $360 (c.a.)\n16 Jan. £1,060.0.0 $360 (c.a.)\n \n\nHowever, to strictly follow the given output format which requires the use of `` for paragraphs, the initial HTML representation is more appropriate. The table representation, while more structured, does not adhere to the specified output format. Thus, the initial HTML output is maintained.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1986.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211357, "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-1988", "page_number": 73, "title": "RAS-1988", "content_text": "49\n\nany age may be employed any length of time at any kind of work, however fatiguing or unhealthy\".' The only provisions relating to conditions of labour were in the Offensive Trades regulations under the jurisdiction of the Sanitary Board, but they only referred to cleanliness and sanitation in places of work. The only provision affecting employment was the prohibition of children under the age of ten from being employed in rag-picking or cleaning hair or feathers. There was no regulation of hours of labour. Some women and children worked twelve hours a day, Sundays included. Such an eighty-four hour week was in sharp contrast to agitation in Britain for a forty hour working week.\n\nMr. Bowley felt the time had arrived for Hong Kong to face these problems, though he admitted local opinion and conditions were not ready for the application of all the laws prevailing in Britain in this area. But as a first step he advocated that factories be licensed by the Sanitary Department and there be some regulations regarding hours and conditions of work, with women inspectors appointed to see the regulations were observed. The total prohibition of child labour was closely connected with the provision of schools if compulsory education was to be instituted. In England education had been compulsory for fifty years and free for eighteen years.\n\nBefore 1914 the Education Department in Hong Kong had no control over any school except Government schools and Grant schools. In that year registration of schools was made compulsory and certain elementary regulations were laid down regarding sanitation and the enforcement of discipline.\n\nA discussion of Mr. Bowley's proposals followed. On the subject of carrying loads to the Peak, a member stated that this was \"a disgusting sight.\" Mr. Schoffield saw it differently. He maintained that \"carrying loads up the Peak is about the healthiest exercise to which a child could be put in Hong Kong\".\n\nA member asked him, “If you were a little child would you like to carry heavy loads instead of going to school and enjoying yourselves as other children do? Would you like to see your mother carrying loads up the Peak?\"", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1988.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ft84gb83q", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211358, "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-1988", "page_number": 74, "title": "RAS-1988", "content_text": "50\n\nBut Mr. Scholfield stuck to his opinion. \"I would not give a single thought to it. The only thing I would think of was the ten cents I would receive at the end of the day.\"\n\nWhen the resolutions proposed by Mr. Bowley were put to the meeting, only Mr. Scholfield voted against him. He told the meeting that if the suggestions were to be implemented it would mean money **and would depend on the maintenance of the opium revenue**. If that was stopped, what would they do?\" Up to that date Hong Kong had depended upon the income from the opium trade to finance itself, now there was heavy pressure from the Home Government to abolish the traffic in opium.\n\nThe editor of the Daily Press commended the small group of Hong Kong expatriates who were concerned about social problems, though his views were expressed in the colonial attitudes of the day.\n\nFar removed from the centres of civilization and surrounded by people alien to us in manners, customs and ideas, there is a natural tendency to lose that sense of communal responsibility which is steadily developing in the land from which we spring. It is well, therefore, that we have in our midst some whose interests are not limited by sport or commerce to remind us of the thoughts and aspirations of our more progressive fellow countrymen at Home.\n\nProposals of the Sanitary Board 1919\n\nMr. Bowley was a member of the Sanitary Board and used his position to try to get passed some regulations on child labour. He used a back door approach by proposing that the regulations be based on sanitary grounds. As the name of the Board suggests such concerns came within its province.\n\nOn the 19 March 1919 Mr. Bowley had posed the following question, **Does the Medical Officer of Health consider it desirable in the interests of public health of the Colony that the ages, hours and conditions of employment of women and children in factories, workshops and work-places in the Colony should be regulated and controlled?** The Medical", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1988.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ft84gb83q", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211359, "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-1988", "page_number": 75, "title": "RAS-1988", "content_text": "51\n\nOfficer, Dr. Hickling, replied that the matter needed a full investigation, and for a beginning certain broad lines might be laid down. She suggested as such (1) the conditions which would constitute overcrowding in work places, (2) the ages at which children be admitted to factories, and (3) regulation of the hours children worked.\n\nAt a meeting of the Sanitary Board on 2 April 1919 Mr. Bowley said that though previous to the meeting he had submitted his intention to place before the Board resolutions concerning overcrowding in factories and child labour, he thought it would be better if the Board first appointed a sub-committee to investigate conditions and thresh the problem out before definite suggestions were placed before the full Board.\n\nMr. Bowley was the natural Chairman for the committee as he had shown special interest in the problem and was acquainted with the corresponding legislation on the subject in England, America and the British Colonies, and as the Chinese section of the community would be chiefly affected by such regulations, Mr. Chan Kai-ming and Mr. S. W. Tso were appointed along with the Sanitary Department's Medical Officer, Dr. A. D. Hickling. As the regulations would be dealing with the working conditions of women and children, it was appropriate that Dr. Hickling, a woman, be on the committee.\n\n―\n\n―\n\nAt a meeting on 27 May, the sub-committee submitted its recommendations. An amendment was proposed to Section 16 of the Public Health and Building Ordinance of 1903 that children under the age of fourteen be prohibited from working in any factory for more than ten hours a day exclusive of meal times and that children under thirteen not be employed in any occupation likely to be injurious to their “life, limb or health, regard being had to his or her physical condition”. The committee also proposed an addition to Bylaw sub-section 13 of Section 16, that factories be regarded as overcrowded and therefore a danger to health if there was less than 250 cubic feet for every person employed, or during overtime after six p.m., 400 cubic feet per person.\n\nThe Sanitary Board had the power to require factories to provide adequate ventilation, cleanliness and latrine accommodation. There was no statutory definition of what constituted overcrowding hence the resolution included such a definition.\n\nPage 75\n\nPage 76\n\n52", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1988.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ft84gb83q", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211360, "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-1988", "page_number": 76, "title": "RAS-1988", "content_text": "Introducing a motion for the adoption of the recommendations of the sub-committee, Mr. Bowley stated that in the Peace Treaty then under discussion provisions were made for an International Labour Convention and for a League of Nations. In the proposals for both organizations the welfare of women and children were dealt with. Appended to the section of the Peace Treaty dealing with the Labour Convention was the affirmation of the principle of an eight hour working day and a forty-eight hour week.\n\nMr. Bowley reminded the Board that the matters being proposed were on the agenda of the Labour Convention which was to be held in Washington, D. C. in the United States in October 1919. These developments had a particular meaning for Hong Kong as a British outpost in the East, for if Hong Kong took action as a part of the British Empire it might influence “our neighbouring allies' China and Japan, both of whom were parties to the Treaty and who had accepted both the League of Nations and the Labour Convention.” He continued. “If Hong Kong, China and Japan are to be included in the comity of nations on equal terms, it behoves us and our neighbours to consider these questions very carefully”.\n\nHe contrasted the absence of factory legislation in Hong Kong with Britain where such legislation had been gradually developed and enforced over the past eighty years. One reason for the difference between the two places was that Hong Kong until only recently had not been much of a manufacturing centre, but now there were many new factories. \"The time has come\", he said, \"when some, at least, of most of the elementary principles of the Factory Acts should be introduced into the Colony”. The experience of England had been that factory legislation had to be related to provisions for education and it would be difficult to apply the same laws to Hong Kong if there was no movement at the same time toward compulsory education, but since the Sanitary Board had no jurisdiction over education, the committee had concluded that it was impossible to prohibit employment of children even of the tenderest age, for it was better for children to be occupied with light tasks with their parents than playing in the gutter. Moreover, the criminal law contained provisions for the punishment of parents or masters and mistresses who ill-treated or neglected their children or child servants. So until something was done about universal education, the present measures were as much", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1988.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ft84gb83q", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211361, "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-1988", "page_number": 77, "title": "RAS-1988", "content_text": "53\n\nas could be expected under present conditions.\n\nThe Board felt it could propose, however, that children should not be employed in factories and workshops after 6 p.m. except when special permission had been obtained from the Board, for such employment must be injurious to the health of young children who would certainly be better in bed than working by artificial light in stuffy rooms. As the returns obtained by the committee on working conditions showed that most factories stopped work at 6 p.m., the prohibition of children working after this hour would not interfere to any appreciable extent in \"the better managed factories and workshops”.\n\nMr. Bowley admitted that the fixing of the age limit at fourteen was a compromise. In England a ten hour day was the maximum for women and children of any age. For Hong Kong he would have wished an age limit much higher than fourteen, but the Chinese members of the committee had not agreed and “for the sake of unanimity I accepted the age proposed by them\". The Chinese also urged the lowering of the English statutory age of fourteen for children engaged in dangerous occupations to the age of thirteen. They claimed that Chinese children developed more rapidly than European children.\n\nThere would be another difference between the factory legislation in Britain and in Hong Kong: both had a limit of ten hours, but in Britain there was to be no work on Saturday afternoon or Sunday, thus there was a work week of fifty-five hours, while in Hong Kong, where there were only two holidays every lunar month, the weekly average would be sixty-five hours.\n\nAll in all, Mr. Bowley regarded the recommendation before the meeting as reasonable and moderate and should “commend itself to every fair-minded person”.\n\nMr. Alabaster, the Chairman of the Board, put in a cautionary note. He conceded that everyone would be in sympathy with the proposed regulations, but how were they to be administered? The burden of the Sanitary Department would be greatly increased. One problem for the Inspectors would be to determine the age of Chinese children and it would be difficult for them to state what would be injurious to a child. The", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1988.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ft84gb83q", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211362, "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-1988", "page_number": 78, "title": "RAS-1988", "content_text": "54\n\npassing of the regulations would probably mean that the qualifications of the Inspectors would need to be upgraded. To be really effective they would need to possess medical knowledge.\n\nThe Chairman commented that while all agreed it was distressing to see small children struggling with loads up to the Peak, to prohibit them from doing so would deprive their families of needed income so the children would not have enough to eat and in the end would be worse off. He did point out that in the area around Bridges Street there were places set apart where children from the age of about eighteen months to six years were cared for by old, invalided women, but older children would not remain under the charge of such old women willingly and would wander the streets instead, thus running the risk of getting killed or encountering some other danger. Would it not be better for them to be engaged in some work?\n\nIn view of all these considerations he moved that the last clause in the resolution be deleted. It was not that he had no sympathy with the object of the resolution, he said, but there would be too many difficulties in carrying it out. Mr. Chatham suggested that Mr. Bowley would probably agree to this deletion, but if not, he would second the amendment made by Mr. Alabaster.\n\nMr. Bowley, for his part, was not willing to agree. If the number of inspectors were increased, their duties and tasks under the new regulations should not be excessive. It was merely a matter of money. As to determining the age of a child, the regulations might be changed so that a Magistrate or some other responsible person might estimate the age. He was not willing to support a deletion of the latter part of the resolution. He would be willing, however, to have it amended to the following, and prohibiting the employment of children and young persons under the age of thirteen in factories and workshops likely to be injurious to his or her life, limb or health, regard being had to his or her physical condition\". A list of such trades could be drawn up by medical and other experts for the guidance of the Sanitary Department in implementing the regulations. He was not asking the Board to legislate on the matter, but only to endorse certain principles which would then be forwarded to the Government for consideration. The amendment as changed by Mr. Bowley was then accepted and carried unanimously.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1988.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ft84gb83q", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211363, "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-1988", "page_number": 79, "title": "RAS-1988", "content_text": "55\n\nDr. Hickling suggested that the space required for each worker should be put at twenty square feet floor area. This suggestion was accepted. Another minor change was made by eliminating the word \"overtime\" in reference to work after 6 p.m.\n\n6\n\nThe editor of the Daily Press, in commenting on the proposals of the Sanitary Board, reviewed some of the steps which had led up to them: Miss Pitts' talk, followed by Mr. Bowley's statements at the meeting of the Church of England Men's Society. Their efforts were seen as examples of the good results \"that may flow from the discussion of matters of public concern by private individuals, and should encourage interest in local affairs\". The editor was confident the proposal would appeal to British pride, \"For every Briton in Hong Kong whose pride of race is based upon his country's efforts on behalf of humanity must hope that the resolutions passed by the Sanitary Board will be endorsed by the Legislative Council\". He believed that the enlightened members of the Chinese community would have no objections to them, as, in his opinion, they were extremely modest and were submitted in the interests of public health.\n\nThe editor recognised that the root of the problem lay in the Colony's educational efforts, but he contended that no matter how many schools were provided, there would not be enough “unless we are willing to educate the whole of South China\". A policy of unrestricted immigration made it impossible to make school attendance either compulsory or free.\n\nThe editor restated the views of Mr. Alabaster that it was better for the children to accompany their parents to work, so long as their little bodies are not strained beyond their endurance, as they would thus be both physically and morally better off than left to their own devices, and their earnings provided them with more food than they otherwise would have. He did advocate that some restriction be placed on the load they carried, as this responsibility could not be left to the parents' discretion.\n\nCase of Child Labour before the Magistrate\n\nApril 1920\n\nThe principles in the agitation for child labour laws had been a missionary and a solicitor, but in April 1920 a doctor publicly took up", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1988.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ft84gb83q", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211365, "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-1988", "page_number": 81, "title": "RAS-1988", "content_text": "57\n\nto the building sites, often staggering up the hillsides of the island under the weight of burdens which are far too heavy for their physical strength\". The editor tried to prick the consciences of his fellow countrymen. \"We are all apt, when pointing out the development and growth of Hong Kong to strangers, to indulge in petty platitudes concerning the evidence of British perseverance and skill to be found in the magnificent roads and the imposing houses on the higher levels. But do we ever stop to think that our Peak residences and the roads leading to them have been largely built by the sweated labour of women and children? It is a fact, none the less.\n\nWhat was needed, the editor wrote, was legislation that would deal with the whole problem. He was convinced that even worse conditions existed in some of the factories where children were employed, and he warned that eventually the colony was going to have to face the problem of compulsory, free education for all.\n\nThe editorial put the problem within the context of the \"white man's burden” and Imperial ideas. It reminded readers that only when the problem of child labour and universal education were seriously faced would expatriate residents \"be able to talk with more pride and justification both of Hong Kong's place in the Empire and of the object lesson which it provides China in the civilising influence of British ideals\".\n\nQuestion by Dr. Ozorio in Sanitary Board\n\n——\n\nMay 1920\n\nAt a meeting of the Sanitary Board in May 1920, Dr. F. Ozorio asked if the Government contemplated the creation of the post of Factory Inspector, and, if so, would the post be open to women.\n\nIn reply the Chairman stated that if by Factory Inspector he meant an inspector whose duties were to ensure the sanitary maintenance of factories, all inspectors of the Sanitary Department were already doing so. There was no plan to change them for women, but if vacancies occurred the matter would be kept in mind. If, however, Dr. Ozorio had meant Factory Inspector with duties as set forth in the British Factory Acts, the Chairman had been authorised to state that the question of the industrial employment of children was under the consideration of", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1988.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ft84gb83q", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211366, "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-1988", "page_number": 82, "title": "RAS-1988", "content_text": "58\n\nGovernment, but the Government had not at present a plan to create a post of Factory Inspector.\n\nThe Problem publicised in Britain\n\nMiss Pitts and Mr. Bowley both left Hong Kong for leaves in England in June 1919. During their stay they might have pushed the matter of child labour in Hong Kong, for in May 1920 there was published an article in the Child Guardian setting forth the situation of children in Hong Kong. This magazine was the organ of the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. The recommendations proposed by Mr. Bowley at the meeting of the Church of England Men's Society already referred to were published on the first page of an issue of the magazine. These were accompanied by the comment, “Judging from the necessity of bringing such proposals forward, it may be imagined this British Colony is a long way behind in its treatment of children”. It was noted, however, that a great many influential people in Britain were worrying the Colonial Office on the subject. The editor surmised, \"the Governor must be having quite a busy time answering the inquiries of the Colonial Office in regard to these questions“.\n\nIn November 1920 a Director of the British National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children asked the Secretary for the Colonies for an interview with Mr. Claude Severn, the Hong Kong Colonial Secretary who was on leave in England, to discuss with him the matter of the welfare of children in Hong Kong.\n\nParliamentary question\n\nDecember 1920\n\nMr. A. Davies in December 1920 asked in a Parliamentary Question if there was any legislation in Hong Kong controlling the type of work done by children, the hours they worked, or their employment in work injurious to their health. The Government spokesman replied that there was none, but the Governor was being asked for a report on the subject of child labour.\n\nAnother question was raised at a session soon after. Mr. Cope asked if the Secretary of State for the Colonies was aware that the resolution of the Sanitary Board passed in May 1919 regarding child labour had", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1988.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ft84gb83q", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211367, "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-1988", "page_number": 83, "title": "RAS-1988", "content_text": "59\n\nbeen thrown out by the Legislative Council and whether it was to be reconsidered. The questioner did not realise that the proposal had never come before the Legislative Council but had only been under consideration in the Executive Council.\n\nIn reply to the question the Government spokesman said the matter had been under consideration by the Colonial Government and the Governor was to be asked what measures, if any, were contemplated.\n\nA comment for the information of the Under-Secretary minuted on a Colonial Office Despatch contained the following history of the progress of the Sanitary Board's recommendation through the Executive Council. In June 1919 the Executive Council in Hong Kong had considered the proposals of the Sanitary Board but had postponed the matter. The next week it asked the Sanitary Board to supply statistics relating to the classes of work in which children were employed and the hours of work. This report was considered on 24 July, but the Colonial Secretary had concluded that if the education problem were solved, then the child labour problem would solve itself. Though the Executive Council side-stepped the problem, pressure for action was continued by interested groups. At the end of December the Council proposed appointing a Commission to enquire into the conditions of the industrial employment of children and to advise as to the desirability and feasibility of legislation. But as the agitation died down the Executive Council in March 1920 decided to postpone the appointment of the Commission.\n\nProposals passed at a Church of England Men's Society Meeting February 1921\n\nThe example Hong Kong could set for China was a theme which ran through the discussions on child labour laws. When Mr. Bowley again addressed the Church of England Men's Society on the subject in February 1921, he took up the theme. “Our Colony is in a unique position as an outpost of Western civilization on the fringe of one of the oldest civilizations of the world, and, if we are to justify our boast that Western civilization is the better, it behooves us to look carefully at the conditions of our own community.' \n\nIt must be noted, however, that he had preceded this by a reference", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1988.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ft84gb83q", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212606, "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": 160, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "140\n\ninhabitants got to know us better; they accepted our lack of dinner jackets, our effect on the drink stock at the Club, our — regrettable — neglect of the traffic signals, and our other little mannerisms, and treated us right royally.\n\nThere were two seasons in Maymyo, the second and briefer one, lasting several weeks, towards the end of the rains in October. The Club, a long rambling creeper-covered building, became gay with visitors. It looked out over a pleasance, cleared from the jungle, and spreading a mile towards the reservoir dam, built by Turkish prisoners in the last war. It goes without saying that a race course and golf links were laid out over the meadowland, very pleasant to behold. But here we were next door to India. The plumbing in the gentlemen's cloak room, consisted of a row of rusty and battered enamel utensils, set out at more or less even intervals on a long low shelf. Without the door, a shadow hovered, poised to dash in the moment he heard the rattle of a utensil returned to the board. No Americans visited Maymyo while I was there. It would have been interesting to hear their first reactions to these Arcadian simplicities.\n\nAfter all Burma was a rich enough country; it was not any lack of money that left it a Victorian remnant. Amongst the Burmese there is no caste, nor is there any desire to work. The house servants everywhere are Indians, of whom there were over a million in the country. Of the annual increase of 5,000,000 in India, a substantial proportion must be of the sweeper caste. Amidst a population with so abnormal a rate of procreation, the border line between a sufficiency and famine is a fine one, easily crossed; and any modernisation of sanitary installations would create serious unemployment: thus in India the vested interest in caste puts the brake, not only on plumbing, but on all progress; and Burma, until recently had been the backwater of India.\n\nI spent six months in Burma, but had little opportunity to learn much of the country. I saw very little of the Burmese, and never met one of those attractive country maids, who wait by the old Moulmein Pagoda, looking out to sea. Of the seventeen million inhabitants, only ten million are Burmans; besides the Indians, there are 300,000 Chinese, and the remainder are tribesmen from the hills.\n\nThe history of Burma is a bloody one; the country had seldom for long been united. The Chinese under Kublai Khan, the Mongol,", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213081, "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": 149, "title": "RAS-1993", "content_text": "130\n\nTo eradicate this focus of infection, it was resumed by the Government the following year. In the subsequent re-development, the old houses were demolished and replaced by new ones provided with windows, privies and space in front and behind as required by newly enacted legislation. Many other actions were taken to deal with the situation. The whole of Hong Kong was subjected to a thorough cleaning up. The laws related to public health were amended to impose strict measures against the Epidemic, including compulsory reporting and removal of patients. To enforce this, house-to-house search was conducted by British soldiers, against the violent objection of the Chinese community who regarded it as unwarranted intrusion into the privacy of their homes. Additional hospital facilities for the isolation of patients were hastily made and as the epidemic progressed, more had to be opened up from time to time.\n\nWithin the administration, responsibility for the health of Hong Kong was divided between the Sanitary Board and the Colonial Surgeon at that time. The membership of the Sanitary Board was as follows: the Registrar General, the equivalent of a Secretary for Chinese Affairs, as Chairman, the Surveyor General, the equivalent of a Director of Public Works, the Captain Superintendent of Police, the Colonial Surgeon, and five other members. After the Epidemic broke out, a Permanent Committee was appointed to recommend necessary legislation and bye-laws for taking vigorous action. In the post of Colonial Surgeon, the equivalent of the present-day Director of Health, was Dr. P.B.C. Ayres who had held it since 1872. Under him was Dr. J.A. Lowson, whose diary we are going to look into.\n\nJames Alfred Lowson was born in 1866. He graduated from Edinburgh University in medicine in 1888 at the age of 22. He came to Hong Kong, probably in or before 1892, because in October that year he represented Hong Kong at interport cricket in Shanghai. On the return trip, his ship, the S.S. Bokhara, was sunk off the Pescadores in a typhoon. He and one other member of the cricket team were among only twenty-five survivors out of about 150 passengers and crew on board. In 1894, at the age of 28, his posting was medical superintendent of the Government Civil Hospital, at the onset of the Epidemic. At that time, in the medical and health service, there were only three full-time medical officers, Dr. Ayres, Dr. J.M. Atkinson and Dr. Lowson, in that order of seniority, assisted by some private practitioners on a part-time basis. In the March 1st entry of his", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1993.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833t302", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213084, "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": 152, "title": "RAS-1993", "content_text": "133\n\nsecretary of the Sanitary Board. He turned out to be wrong.\n\nMay 8th\n\nI am diagnosed A. Hung as suffering from plague and isolated him\n\nThe identity of A. Hung was revealed in the Report to the Governor. He was a ward boy in presumably the Government Civil Hospital. He was admitted during Lowson's absence in Canton with the diagnosis of remittent fever but having seen him Lowson diagnosed it as plague. This then was the first case he saw in the Hong Kong Epidemic. Action had now to be taken as described in the following entry:\n\nMay 10th\n\nOrder from HE OAG for report on plague in Canton in morning Order an four Taler to visit Tung Wah where I found about 20 cases of bubonic plague Visited Tung Wah again with Ayres at 2:30 pm Sanitary Board at 4:00 pm Long Meeting Gave order to have Hygeia over in morning and prepare for epidemic Government proclaimed Colony suffering from plague\n\nThe Governor then was Sir William Robinson. He must have been away and the person acting for him, known as the Officer Administrating the Government, could be the General Officer Commanding. The Hygeia was a hospital ship moored in the harbour for the isolation of patients suffering from infectious diseases such as small-pox and cholera. The Tung Wah was the same hospital which still stands on its original site, on Po Yan Street in Sai Ying Pun District.\n\nWe will now follow the situation as it developed from the entries of the next few days:\n\nMay 11th\n\nHygeia over Sanitary Board in pm passing bye-laws 13 deaths from plague\n\nMay 12th\n\nSome difficulty with moving patients but got them all over before 4 pm Saw all settled Rabbit and Guinea pig injected from A Hung 26 deaths reported from plague", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1993.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833t302", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213086, "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": 154, "title": "RAS-1993", "content_text": "135\n\nBoard but both the Governor and the Colonial Secretary intervened. Consequently the Glass-works hospital was operated as a branch of the Tung Wah. It should be noted that the tradition at the Tung Wah Hospital was broken later during the Epidemic. Western medicine was introduced and a graduate of the Hong Kong College of Medicine was appointed as its superintendent.\n\nMeanwhile the situation took a different turn. At first it was thought that Europeans would escape from the infection because of their better living conditions and cleaner habits. The belief was shattered soon, Lowson recorded on May 29th: 'the first Shropshire case.' The Shropshire Regiment was stationed in Hong Kong at the time. Three hundred troops under eight officers were brought in to help in the cleaning up operation, including house to house search. Some soldiers caught the disease. One of the victims was an officer, Captain Vesey. 'Vesey got it,' wrote Lowson on May 31st. On June 2nd he went to see Vesey, on the 3rd Vesey was said to be better but he died at 9:45 p.m. on the 4th. In an annotation, Lowson wrote:\n\nMay 31st\n\nCaptain Vesey's attack was a serious business as up to this time we had everyone thinking Europeans would not get it and there was much consternation. The flight from the Colony to Japan and home was now almost a panic.\n\nOn June 7th he wrote that he offered to take sole charge of the sick at a meeting of the Sanitary Board but the offer was turned down. On June 10th there was some talk about the doctors refusing to work. In annotation on the entry on the 11th, he explained why.\n\nJune 11th\n\nThe trouble on last page regarding refusal to work arose from not one of the Permanent Committee knowing the state of affairs in town - May knew something but others did not but complained and made idiotic suggestions. The doctors were led up to having all the dangerous work to do and never one minute off duty, hence rebellion.\n\nMay was F.H. May, the Captain Superintendent of Police, who was a member of the Sanitary Board. In the diary, three names appeared a few times: Dr Penny, a naval surgeon, Dr. James, a major in the Army Medical", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1993.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833t302", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213087, "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": 155, "title": "RAS-1993", "content_text": "136\n\nService, and Dr. Molyneux, who came from Ningpo. There might be others helping out but these three evidently were doing more work, especially James who, Lowson recorded, was later appointed to the Sanitary Board. Though under strain and feeling frustrated, no one actually went on strike. So hard pressed were Ayres and Lowson that they had been sick but fortunately they did not contract plague as reported by the Hong Kong Weekly Press. Lowson was offered help from a probably unexpected source but it turned out to be no help at all. He wrote on May 22nd that 'the Alice Memorial students volunteered to help. But on May 31st: 'the Alice Memorial fellows scooted. Frightened to death.' However on June 8th they returned and were assigned to 'run the new pig sty.' These were students of the Hong Kong College of Medicine, which was established in 1887. The teaching hospital was known as the Alice Memorial.\n\nAs the disease continued to spread more facilities had to be made. Another make-shift hospital was opened in a pig and cattle depot, referred to as the new pig sty just now. This was to replace the Glass-works hospital which had to be closed because of its appalling conditions. On the 22nd Lowson mentioned that patients were diverted to the Alice Memorial Hospital. This however was not the teaching hospital of the Hong Kong College of Medicine but a matshed situated in the Kennedy Town Hospital compound. Also, at the request of the Chinese Community, operations were mounted to send patients back to Canton by junks. After waiting for junks to be ready on June 11th and 12th, on the 13th, Lowson wrote: 'loaded 45 patients for Canton in junk. 3 died.' and on the 15th: 'loaded junk for Canton, 36.' On June 26th there was 'news of the establishment of a hospital in Laichikok.' This was not ready until July 13th when Lowson wrote:\n\nJuly 13th\n\nGot ready to transfer to Laichukok Not one went All refused Went down myself\n\nIn an annotation, he explained: \"The Chinese refused to go to Laichikok Hospital because they thought they were sure to die.'\n\nAnd now to the discovery of the plague bacillus in the Hong Kong Epidemic, an event which earned for Hong Kong a place in medical history. Dr. Shibasaburo Kitasato, an eminent Japanese bacteriologist who was", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1993.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833t302", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213089, "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": 157, "title": "RAS-1993", "content_text": "138\n\nin the diary there were comments and criticisms of people Lowson had to deal with during the Epidemic, all being his superiors in the Government service. I will now read out the relevant entries in chronological order, with added comments, and you will hear another story which has not been told before.\n\nMay 25th\n\nLockhart angry because he could not get himself in the limelight He was of no assistance with the Chinese who distrusted him as the British distrusted him He was simply pushed aside by Francis and the rest His spite therefore landed on Ayres and me\n\nLockhart was J.H. (later Sir James) Stewart Lockhart who was Registrar General and acting Colonial Secretary at the time, also chairman of the Sanitary Board. Francis was J.J. Francis a Queen's Counsel, who was one of the five non-official members and chairman of the Permanent Committee.\n\nMay 26th\n\nSaw Governor anent Lockhart's idiotic interference\n\nMay 29th\n\nFrancis would listen to nobody Never went to infected areas therefore did not know the difficulties and what was happening Later on he went to some hospitals where there was no danger\n\nJune 30th\n\nBoth above (Aoyama and Ishiyumi) bad Brought up Kitasato and crowd here to stay They had been fired out of the hotel so I took them all up to house and got them in a matshed Lockhart afterwards tried to curry favour by saying that he had this done but he knew nothing about it for a week and actually prepared to censure me for doing it\n\nThis needs explaining. Kitasato and his two assistants were staying at the Hong Kong Hotel. Aoyama and Ishiyumi took ill on the 28th and were removed to the Hygeia. Lowson put Kitasato up in a matshed near his house. Apparently he did not ask for Lockhart's permission and Lockhart was not pleased, but one wonders why he should for such an obvious decision and move under the circumstances.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1993.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833t302", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213091, "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": 159, "title": "RAS-1993", "content_text": "140\n\nnot see the graves. About the use of lime as a disinfectant it appeared that this was being understood by the public, for Lowson added in an annotation to the July 16th entry that 'the lime which had been supplied to Laichikok and graveyard was brought over to Hong Kong and sold at high price to the Chinese in the streets. Or, was he talking about corruption and a black market?\n\nThe relationship between Lowson and Cantlie would seem to be strained at this stage. Cantlie made himself look ridiculous by writing to the Sanitary Board that the insanitary conditions in Victoria Town had nothing to do with the Epidemic. He was openly challenged by Major James in a letter to the Hong Kong Weekly Press. They made up afterwards. After they died together on July 21st, Lowson wrote: 'At this time he had ceased to be simply causing trouble and angry because he had not been taken more notice of but he began to see our side was right.'\n\nJuly 17th\n\nA meeting of the Permanent Committee Lockhart, myself and others A warm discussion arose and I had to tell Lockhart and Francis that they were both damned cowards as they were afraid to go near the plague cases They wanted many things done which were simply impossible When I called them damned cowards old Ayres backed me up and there was some scene May did not say much but silently agreed with us\n\nLowson knew that by calling Lockhart and Francis cowards to their face he could not expect to get any recognition for his work. He put down on this entry in bold letters: CMG strip. Also, 'that settled the question of future honours as neither would forgive me and they were bitter enemies for years.' In those days he could indeed expect the CMG, as the Order of the British Empire which later becomes the normal award for civil servants was not instituted until the reign of George V. However, he received some other rewards as we shall soon see.\n\nJuly 19th\n\nGovernor really played the bloody ox Feeling very bitter and strained at this time as Governor and Lockhart felt everybody was thinking them nonentities and fools and they had a very bad time It was entirely their own blame\n\nI think we have had enough of the bickering. Lowson ended the diary", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1993.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833t302", "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 }, { "id": 213093, "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": 161, "title": "RAS-1993", "content_text": "142\n\nimportance of an unexampled calamity. However in spite of difficulties in balancing the budget, many public works projects were completed during his term. He governed with a liberal-mind for he increased the number of unofficial seats in both the Legislative and the Executive Councils in response to a demand for reforming the government. He also agreed to have an unofficial majority on the Sanitary Board. Generally regarded as an able administrator he stayed for fully six years as Governor, the longest tenure held by any governor thus far. In the history of modern China, he would be remembered as the Governor of Hong Kong who imposed a five-year ban on Dr. Sun Yat Sen, who then went to London and was kidnapped but rescued by Sir James Cantlie but that is another story.\n\nSir James Stewart Lockhart, the main target of Lowson's attack, was Registrar General and acting Colonial Secretary in 1894. There is a biography of him written by Shiona Airlie entitled 'The Thistle and the Bamboo.' He emerged from it as a capable but ambitious man who was eager to seek promotion ahead of his time, and in spite of what Lowson said of him, he got on well with the Chinese. The function of a Registrar General in the early years was to deal with Chinese affairs, not legal matters as at present, in fact, the initial title was Protector of the Chinese. In this office, Lockhart maintained good relations with the directors of Tung Wah Hospital and Po Leung Kuk and the District Watch Committee, the three main representative bodies of the Chinese community. As to his character, he was said to possess 'humoured geniality which endeared him to his contemporaries' but 'occasionally his patience snapped and from a man considered in the main to be warm-hearted and genial, he became angry and stubborn.' He made at least one important contribution in connection with the Epidemic. After the Resumption of Tai Ping Shan Ordinance was passed, action had to be taken to demolish the old houses. Both landlords and tenants put up a spirited resistance as they both had to suffer financial loss, no rent to be collected by the landlords for sometime and no cheap lodgings for the tenants who were mostly coolies. The coolies threatened to go on strike which would paralyse the city in already very difficult circumstances. Lockhart, who was fluent in Chinese, having been a cadet in the Hong Kong Civil Service, was instrumental in solving the dispute which ended amicably. In 1895, at the age of thirty seven, he became Colonial Secretary when his acting appointment was substantiated. In addition, he was appointed as Special Commissioner for the New Territories in 1897 after the lease was settled. In 1902, he went to Weihaiwei as its first Civil Commissioner. On his departure the", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1993.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833t302", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213094, "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": 162, "title": "RAS-1993", "content_text": "143\n\nnewspapers were to recall that 'he was an exceedingly courteous and popular official and earned the respect of all with whom he was brought into contact' all except Lowson perhaps.\n\nJohn Jonathan Francis was first admitted as an attorney and solicitor in 1870 and called to the Bar in 1877. In 1887, he became the third barrister in Hong Kong to become a Queen's Counsel. He had served as a police magistrate and a puisne judge. For public service, he was once a captain in the Hong Kong Volunteers Corps, standing counsel for the Hong Kong College of Medicine when it was being established, and Chairman of the Permanent Committee of the Sanitary Board. There is an amusing and unflattering story about him told by Norton-Kyshe which gives us an insight into his character. He was presented with a silver ink-stand in 1895 in recognition of his services during the Epidemic but he returned it because he considered himself slighted by the treatment he received as compared with Mr. May who had been his colleague on the Committee.' May was awarded the CMG which Francis thought should also be given to him instead of a mere ink-stand.\n\nHowever, two other government officials, the Colonial Surgeon and the Captain Superintendent of Police, whose parts were of great importance, apparently escaped Lowson's wrath. Dr. Phineas Ayres held the office for twenty-four years, from 1872 to 1897, the longest ever in the history of the medical service. After he took up his post, he had been very critical of the sanitary conditions in the native quarters in his annual reports. Despite his warnings, it was almost ten years later than Osbert Chadwick was asked to conduct a survey. In his Report published in 1882, Chadwick made many recommendations to improve the conditions. Although a Sanitary Board was constituted to take action, still not much was done for another ten years until the Plague Epidemic burst upon the scene. Endacott wrote that Ayres criticised the Sanitary Board for its 'long, wordy, windy, desultory rambling discussions, ending in nothing being done' in 1895, the second year of the Epidemic. One can see why Lowson had some respect for him. Again quoting from Endacott, Robinson described Ayres as 'having a rather foolish manner, but he is in perfect possession of his senses', and acknowledged that 'he had warned the Colony continuously of the evil sanitary conditions.'\n\nMr. May won universal acclaim and admiration for the drive and energy he showed in carrying out his duties as head of the police force. Sayers", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1993.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833t302", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213501, "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-1995", "page_number": 97, "title": "RAS-1995", "content_text": "65\n\nactually a few wretched huts or matsheds built on shelves cut out on the acclivity of a ridge. They were filled with Indian sepoys, the Bengal Volunteers. A supplement of a survey of Hong Kong in the Canton Press dated February 1842 gave us information about the Sai Ying Pun Barracks in 1842.\n\n\"A half-moon battery or platform which is to mount some half-dozen heavy guns on carriages is constructing at the extreme west of the town to protect the barracks there and at which are stationed the Bengal Volunteers\" (Sayer, 1937, P. 209).\n\nThe sanitary conditions of the barracks in those days were largely neglected. The water closet system that existed in the barracks was unfortunately unsuited to a tropical climate. Epidemics of fever spread through Hong Kong every summer in those early years of British occupation. In 1842, the Indian troops, stationed in Hong Kong lost nearly half their number. The death rate for the army in Hong Kong for that year was 25%.\n\nIn 1843, the sanitary condition of Hong Kong was most alarming. In the summer of 1843 an extraordinary outbreak of malaria fever occurred which during the six months from May to October carried off by death 24% of the troops and 10% of the European civilians. It was noticed that this virulent fever ravaged chiefly the extreme west and east ends of the British settlement. (It was due to the opening up of the ground by the troops in making roads or new buildings created marshy conditions that helped to breed mosquitoes). At the West Point Barracks in Sai Ying Pun where the left wing of the 55th regiment quartered, sickness was so universal that the regiment lost 100 men between June and the middle of August. On 20 July 1843, the troops stationed there were hastily removed on board ships in the harbour and the Barracks were abandoned and ordered to be razed to the ground. At the recommendation of the Committee of Public Health and Cleanliness, the ground in the neighbourhood was ordered to be levelled and well-drained.\n\nSince Sai Ying Pun had proved to be one of the most unhealthy spots in the Island, the main forces of the army began to move out of the place. The Royal Navy also found the naval base east of Belcher's Bay unhealthy and lay fully exposed to the fury of a typhoon and moved.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1995.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/95941j25g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213504, "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-1995", "page_number": 100, "title": "RAS-1995", "content_text": "68\n\nsubdivided into a number of cubicles and sublet to a number of households or families. In the district, examples of over 25 people clustered into a living space of 600 square feet could be found easily. The great density and the serious overcrowding had become a matter of great concern. In 1890, an exhaustive report on the subject was submitted to the Government. However, no strong action was taken after that. In that report, an enumeration of the people of the district by the method of verbal inquiry, which could only be assumed as fairly accurate, had been made by the Chinese District Watchmen. A table (Table 2) has been drawn up to show the difference between the figures of the Overcrowding Report and that of the Census.\n\nThe question of insanitary conditions in Sai Ying Pun had also excited attention for a long time. The houses in the district were usually built back to back. The rooms were dark, damp, and badly ventilated. Very few houses had been cleaned or whitewashed inside since they were built. Latrines and dustbins seldom existed in those houses. A large proportion of the houses in the district had the old-fashioned drains which were built of bricks. As the old bricks rotted away, the sewers collapsed and blocked the pipes. Furthermore, a number of houses were converted or used as storage for grains and other goods. These contained an enormous number of rats and cockroaches. In 1881, the Government had decided to seek the service of a sanitary engineer, Osbert Chadwick, to advise as to the sanitary conditions of Hong Kong. A year later, he made a special report and proposed a number of sweeping changes, which included the provision of open spaces at the rear of buildings, of a window in every habitable room, and of 600 cu. ft. of unobstructed space for each adult in rooms divided into cabins, and the layout of roads and drains before the building lots were offered for sale. A Sanitary Board was set up in 1883, but it had only limited powers because of the stiff resistance from the Chinese as well as European property owners and the laissez-faire attitude of the government. The Public Health Ordinance of 1887, which, among other things, provided for the reservation of open spaces at the rear of buildings and the fixing of a minimum standard of 300 cu. ft. of internal living space per adult, and a clause in 1889 whereby mezzanine floors could only be constructed if provision were made for a vertical clearance of 5 ft. above and below, were also met with great opposition from the Chinese.\n\nThe insanitary conditions and the inevitable direct human contacts", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1995.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/95941j25g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213973, "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-1997", "page_number": 42, "title": "RAS-1997", "content_text": "7\n\n(f) their relationship with the departments of Government and with each other; and,\n\n(g) the degree of control which ought to be exercised by the central Government, having regard to the Letters Patent and Royal Instructions\n\nThe wording reflects close secretariat scrutiny of what some thought to be, if not dangerous, then courageous thinking; there should be care not to conflict with established institutions, there should be no derogation from the existing constitution, and the word 'selection' reassured those who feared politically partisan votes. Public criticism of this was immediately heard, upon reading the related press release, from some of the members of the Urban Council who were jealous for their own prerogatives. The Urban Council, little changed from the Sanitary Board created in Queen Victoria's reign, was mainly responsible for environmental public health, recreation & amenities, and provision of cultural services in Hong Kong Island, Kowloon & New Kowloon; it had 12 members appointed by the Governor, and 12 elected on a single limited but anomalously colony-wide franchise (embracing ratepayers and members of 23 qualifying categories of sane, non-bankrupt adults of 21 or over with three years' residence), with a small number of senior official members. It provided excellent services through the Urban Services Department (USD), but its freedom of speech on matters outside its purview gave it a mixed reputation in some powerful circles.\n\nThe membership of the working party consisted of administrative officers from the middle ranks, considered \"promising\" but not yet authoritative. They were a contract officer with much local government experience in eastern Nigeria and Uganda, an officer with happy experience in the USD and of the Urban Council; the most senior Chinese officer, who had served with the British Army Aid Group against the Japanese and now worked in the SCA; and two other expatriates with various past postings including the NTA. Like Dickinson, all continued to perform their current duties, and remained surprised that with his determination they covered so much ground of consultation and discussion and (under pressure from leave entitlements) reported as relatively promptly as they did; that was on 23 November 1966, by which time the Cultural Revolution was spilling", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1997.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/wp98g7579", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214383, "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-1998", "page_number": 241, "title": "RAS-1998", "content_text": "207\n\nideas prevailed for many years amongst even the more enlightened Europeans. Since Chadwick did not identify the Chinese inhabitants who approved of the plan, it is not possible to determine from his report whether the proposed changes in the District Watchmen's duties had the backing of the Chinese merchants who paid for their services. However, what is indisputable is that a Notification appeared in the Government Gazette on 21 April 1883 about the formation of a Sanitary Board. Chadwick's crusade for the inclusion of a dedicated Sanitary Officer was ignored and the Board comprised the Surveyor General, the Registrar General, the Colonial Surgeon and the Sanitary Inspector. The Notice stated that the Sanitary Board would be assisted by the following staff:\n\n1 Coloured Watchman for the Peak District;\n\n2 Head District Watchmen for Western;\n\n12 District Watchmen for Western;\n\n2 Head District Watchmen and 12 District Watchmen for Central District;\n\n2 Head District Watchmen and 12 District Watchmen for Eastern District.\n\nThis was the entire District Watch Force.\n\nLess than two months after the publication of this Notification, an Ordinance was enacted on 1 June 1883 entitled \"The Order and Cleanliness Amendment Ordinance, 1883\" (No. 7 of 1883). This allowed the Governor 'to constitute a permanent Sanitary Board to exercise supervision and control over all matters connected with sanitation in the Colony.' Whilst the District Watchmen were not mentioned by name, the ordinance stated that the Governor could, from time to time, appoint and remove 'such officers as the Board may require for the purpose of carrying out the duties of the Board and the laws relating to sanitation.' Ten days later the 'Instructions' to the various groups of people involved in the 'Maintenance of Order and Cleanliness' were published in the Government Gazette. The Instructions to the Se-\n\n13\n\nof", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1998.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/1g05n0794", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214581, "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-1998", "page_number": 439, "title": "RAS-1998", "content_text": "408\n\nwas said to have been a British Member of Parliament. Alice was a gracious lady. Choa gives her maiden name as Walkden. It is sometimes elsewhere, puzzlingly, quoted as Whitcome. Did she have a step father one wonders? Or was this an unfortunate mistake by some writer and a case of give a slip-up five minutes start and the truth never catches up with it?' This could be the case. Certainly the name on the huge family memorial, in the Hong Kong Cemetery at Happy Valley, is carved as Alice Walkden.\n\nBefore the couple arrived back in Hong Kong in 1882 the then Governor, Sir John Pope Hennessy, announced to the Legislative Council that this young Chinese had taken the highest honours at Lincoln's Inn. 'It was something that a gentleman belonging to the Colony should have gained such honours.'\n\nAnyway, back in the British colony in those days the 'superstitious' Chinese generally did not take readily to 'newfangled,' western medicine and Ho Kai switched to law. But a brilliant Chinese with fluent English was rare in those days. He was enticed into business. He also entered public service and, in addition to sitting on a number of other government committees, sat on the Sanitary Board (the forerunner of the Urban Council) and, in 1890, became a Legislative Councillor. He was the third Chinese to sit on this august body. He was also a Justice of the Peace.\n\nHaving lived in the West for a number of years it is not surprising he developed strong views about social reform and the modernisation of China. He became an associate of statesman Dr Sun Yat-sen. This was at a time when China was striving to rid itself of the Qing dynasty and there was danger the country would be assimilated by colonial powers.\n\nIn his latter life Ho Kai spent most of his time serving the community. He helped, together with his colleagues, to mould the Territory in which we now live. Ho Kai was capable and, understandably, there was no need for him to take to heart the Chinese axiom: 'If you do not become a good minister be a good physician.'\n\nHe was 'lionised and eulogised' after his death by all sectors of", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1998.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/1g05n0794", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215392, "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": 169, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "It's no doubt advisable to have every plague patient properly isolated but I fail to see how this can be done in practice as the Chinese do not like to part with our sick until there is no hope of saving them, and it is only in extreme cases, especially in the case of husband and wife and mother and child that they should do so. It has been amply known from experience that the Chinese rather conceal their sick until the last moment and dump their dead in cases where their fellow lodgers would be involved in trouble in order to avoid detection than to submit to forcible removal. Would it not therefore be better to give them the option of treating their sick in their own houses or in some places where the relatives can tend their sick or soothe the mind of the sick by being present oftener, thus ensuring the disinfection of every infected building and placing every plague patient under proper surveillance. The bye-law as to isolation has proved to be a failure; it is time that some new scheme should be tried.\n\nIn an early step towards resolving the problem, it was decreed that infant corpses could be brought to dispensaries, no questions asked, and a $1 reward given. Street Committees were appointed and coordination and funding entrusted to the Directors of the Tung Wah Hospital.\n\nPage 118\n\n[Some text appears to be missing or out of order in the original OCR output, but based on the provided rules, the above response focuses on correcting the text that is reasonably coherent and follows the instructions given.]\n\nFounder and Chief President in the Chinese Chamber of Commerce in 1913. Official Member of the Legislative Council (18) and Director of the Po Leung Kuk.\n\nAn indication of what the Chinese community wanted is provided by the report of letters from Mr. Lau Chu Pak (a member of the deputation at Government House) read at a meeting of the Sanitary Board on Tuesday, 24 December 1907.\n\nThe dumping of dead bodies in the streets or the harbour had been a life-threatening issue and all efforts to put a stop to it had been ineffective. Suspicions that the practice was the result of infanticide were disproved and the main reason it continued was fear of disinfection of households by the foreign authorities.", "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": 216427, "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-2003", "page_number": 186, "title": "RAS-2003", "content_text": "136 \n\nwhich they searched the holds for contraband and pulled the pigtails of the Chinese crew to see if they came off, and thus discover a Japanese on board in disguise.\n\n5 \n\nThere were few descriptions of the experiences of Chinese townsmen or peasants during the battles between Japanese and Russians, and the passage through their land by the armies of the two contenders. Several short paragraphs in the contemporary illustrated volumes simply mention in passing how in, for example, the old walled town of Port Arthur, the Russian residents started to flee north at an early stage and those who had hung on had finally to be evacuated on crowded trains, leaving behind their property and livelihoods. Also, there were several passing comments that after each battle there were Chinese loitering, waiting to loot.\n\nAs the winter set in Russian troops tore down many Chinese villages to provide material for quarters for their Army, and cut down trees for firewood, commandeered pigs, cattle, chickens and grain. Chinese refugees fled from Mukden ahead of the Japanese to avoid being caught up in the fighting, and nearby the Russians looted Chinese houses for food, clothing and women.\n\nIn contrast - as the Russian reinforcements arrived in Manchuria across the Trans-Siberian Railway so the requirement for accommodation and stores fell upon the Chinese population. \"The Chinese village of Mudzetun, a short distance to the south-east of Mukden, was utilised as a Cossack camp. The Chinese inhabitants had disappeared in a body, and their old quarters had been swept and garnished; the little courtyards had been cleansed of filth in which pigs and children had played together; several Russian baths had been constructed and strict sanitary regulations enforced. Sometimes some miserable-looking Chinese might be seen collecting from the banks of the frozen stream the discarded entrails of the cattle that had been killed for food, accompanied by outcast dogs that had been ousted from the village by its new masters.\"\n\nManchurian native bandits\n\nSparsely populated, and wild and poverty-stricken, Manchuria was a natural breeding ground for bandits, either as individuals or gangs.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390", "rank": 0 } ]