[ { "id": 204379, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1962", "page_number": 11, "title": "RAS-1962", "content_text": "Nevertheless the monthly meetings of the Society have been consistently well attended with audiences which often have more than filled this room and have averaged well over one hundred at each meeting. This regularity of attendance proves that there is in the Colony a reliable cross section of the community who appreciate what Professor Drake referred to in his inaugural lecture as the Study of Asia and our heritage.\n\nIn the earlier days of the Society up to 1859 when the Government of the Colony provided a home for the Society and its library it was honoured with the presence on its Council of the Governor, the Commander of the British Forces, the Chief Justice, the Bishop of Victoria, the Colonial Secretary, the Colonial Treasurer and the Attorney General, and it had the active support of the heads of the great merchant houses like Jardine, Matheson and Co. and Dent and Co. Although in these busier days we miss the successors of some of these eminent personages we are still honoured today by the patronage of His Excellency the Governor and the support of leading members of a more cosmopolitan community than in the earlier days. We particularly appreciate the keenness of the Hon. W. C. G. Knowles, who has recently joined the Council, and of the Honourable the Chief Justice whose athletic figure some of us recall striding along the slithery slopes of Lantao on the occasion of our archaeological excursion last year. We hope that this year we may provide a further opportunity for members who do not perhaps know one another as well as it might be desired, to join in a combined social and study expedition either to Lantao or elsewhere in the New Territories.\n\nDuring the year 1961 nine public meetings were held at which unusually interesting lectures were given, most of them illustrated with colour slides-\n\nJanuary 23rd\n\nJames Liu\n\n\"The Knight Errant in Chinese Literature\"\n\n\"Tibet As It Was (1936-1950)”\n\nFebruary 10th\n\nHugh Richardson\n\nApril 10th\n\nMay 13th\n\nMiss Mary Tregear\n\n\"Chinese Paintings in Formosa and America\"\n\nExpedition to Lantao to visit archaeological sites", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1962.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/9s166f47f", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 204474, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1962", "page_number": 106, "title": "RAS-1962", "content_text": "LIFE IN THE NEW TERRITORIES\n\n95\n\n2 Extracts from the Report are given between pages 181-209 of Papers laid before the Legislative Council of Hong Kong 1899, (Hong Kong, Government Printer, 1900). For this quotation see p. 198. Lockhart was referring specifically to development which was noticeably lacking. The same cannot be said of the population during this period. The evacuation of the coastal areas (1662-69) caused a great disruption to the villages at the time. For a brief mention in English, based on Chinese authorities, see S. F. Balfour, \"Hong Kong before the British\", an article in T'ien Hsia, Vol. XI, No. 4, 1941, p. 334. In any case there has been a continuous inward flow of both Cantonese and Hakka since then, more especially of Hakka in the 19th century, from which time many of the hill villages in the Colony take their origin.\n\nIt is interesting to compare this report with a book on Wei Hai Wei, Lion and Dragon in North China (London, John Murray, 1910) which was written by a junior colleague from Hong Kong, R. F. Johnston (1874-1938) who went to Wei Hai Wei as Magistrate and Secretary to Government in 1904, probably at Lockhart's request. Johnston, later knighted and Professor of Chinese in the University of London was a man of great application and erudition who became tutor to the deposed boy emperor, P'u Yi, (1919-25) and wrote the well-known book Twilight in the Forbidden City, (London, Gollancz, 1934). He was himself Commissioner of Wei Hai Wei 1927-30. His detailed description of Wei Hai Wei, its people and their customs leaves an impression of the striking similarity of life and thought between that remote part of Shantung and this small corner of Kwangtung. The means of government was of course the same, but so also are the ways of doing and thinking which seem, in my own experience, hardly to differ at all despite the different agricultural background. To anyone interested in the Chinese peasant Johnston's book is a mine of information. The annual reports on Wei Hai Wei presented to both Houses of Parliament are, too, an interesting commentary on life in this northern leased territory.\n\nThe market towns of the New Territories in 1898 were Tai Po, Yuen Long, Tai O, Cheung Chau, Sai Kung and Tsuen Wan. A despatch of 1905 in connection with the Kowloon-Canton Railway No. 59 dated 11th January 1905 from Governor Sir Matthew Nathan to the then Secretary of State, Mr. Lyttelton gives some figures. Yuen Long had \"seventy-four shops of which twenty-five are large and deal in rice, oil, samshu etc. The remainder belong to barbers, doctors, jewellers, vegetable sellers, piece goods dealers etc.\" Tai Po Market consisted of twenty-three large shops and fifteen smaller ones, Tsuen Wan had a few shops supplying the local needs\". No figures are given for Cheung Chau or Tai O with which the railway was not concerned, but an inscription of 1878 inside the grounds of the Fong Pin Hospital at Cheung Chau states that there \"used to be over two hundred shops trading here\". Lockhart Papers 1899, p. 207 gave Cheung Chau a population of 5,000, whilst Tai O with its fisheries and salt pans was reported to have about 3,000. These were larger towns than Yuen Long (no figure given), Tai Po (280), Sai Kung Market (800) and Tsuen Wan (900). The present New Territories towns were not the largest in the San On district. Pride of place went to Sham Chun, now on the Chinese side of the border, with sixty-one large shops and three hundred and twenty-three medium sized shops, and to Kun Lan Hui, also north of the border which was the cattle centre of the whole district with fifteen large and one hundred and thirty-six medium sized shops. (Enclosure C to No. 59). See Eastern No. 88 Correspondence relating to the Kowloon-Canton Railway (London, Colonial Office, 1907).", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1962.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/9s166f47f", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 204709, "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-1964", "page_number": 12, "title": "RAS-1964", "content_text": "3\n\nThe expedition to Tung Chung produced a new inspiration for the Society's activities, mainly the idea of our admirable Hon. Secretary, Mr. R. E. Lawry. It is proposed to hold a symposium during weekends to discuss the social organisation of village life and other aspects of life in the New Territories. A programme has been arranged for the weekend May 9th-10th, particulars of which have already been supplied to members. This extension of our activities is in accord with the avowed objects of the Society for it is our aim to direct attention not only to the cultural and literary heritage of the part of Asia in which we live, but also to practical pursuits such as its natural history, fauna and flora, and the lives of the people around us.\n\nA particularly noteworthy and important work of the Society is the production of the Journal, the fourth volume of which may be expected this summer. The Journal, built up on the meticulous standard of editorship set up by Mr. Cranmer-Byng and the Editorial Board of which, until his departure earlier this month, he had been Chairman, has already achieved a well-deserved reputation among the productions of learned societies in the same field. The contributions which come from non-members as well as members are sufficiently varied in nature and interest to appeal to the specialists as well as to the general reader. The Society may well be proud of its Journal and grateful to Mr. Cranmer-Byng and his colleagues for their splendid work and achievement.\n\nThe Financial Statement of 1963, which the Honorary Treasurer will present to you, shows a capital account of £1,699.10.0 and an apparent excess of income over expenditure of HK$2,947.26. The real position in the matter of income, however, is that the annual subscriptions from members during 1963 amounted to $6,177.91, while the expenses amounted to $7,459, leaving a deficit of $1,282. This deficit is met by recourse to income from the small capital investment fund, the greater part of which was established by the generosity of an anonymous donor, when the Branch was revived, for the purpose of establishing a library and for other capital expenditure necessary for the future activities of the Society and not for meeting current expenses. For the small annual subscription of $20, members receive, in addition to the benefit of the meetings during the year, a free copy of the Journal, which is sold to the public for HK$12. To place the Society on a sound", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1964.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qz20zx09r", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 204891, "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-1964", "page_number": 194, "title": "RAS-1964", "content_text": "169\n\nWARD, W. L.\n\nWATSON, K. A.\n\nWEI, Dr. Tat\n\n-\n\nWEINREBE, H. M.\n\nWEISS, K.\n\nWELCH, H. H.*\n\nWIANT, B.\n\nWILLAN, E. G.\n\n-\n\nWILLIAMS, H. V.\n\nWILLIAMS, Mrs. H.\n\n+\n\nWILLIAMS, Miss H. M.\n\nWILLIAMS, P. B.\n\nWILMOT-MORGAN, Mrs. D. M.\n\nWILSON, B. D.\n\n+\n\nApt. 3, No. 7 Magazine Gap Road, HK.\n\nc/o Lammert Bros., Pedder Building, H.K.\n\nH.K. Anti-Tuberculosis Assn., Queen's Rd., E., H.K.\n\nWeinrebe & Pennell, Ltd., 1103-4 Yu To Sang Bldg., H.K.\n\nP. O. Box 718, H.K\n\n33 Lexington Road, Concord, Mass., USA.\n\nChung Chi College, Ma Liu Shui, New Territories.\n\nc/o Colonial Secretariat, H.K.\n\nN.T. Administration Headquarters, North Kowloon Magistracy, Taipo Road, Kowloon.\n\nc/o District Office, Taipo, New Territories.\n\n612, King's Park House, Gascoigne Road, Kowloon.\n\nc/o Colony Headquarters, Arsenal Street, H.K.\n\nGilrudding Cottage, Winterbourne Kingston, Nr. Bournemouth, Dorset, England.\n\nSecretariat for Chinese Affairs, Fire Brigade Building, H.K.\n\nWINKLER, Mr. & Mrs. E.\n\n402 Clovelly Court, 12 May Road, H.K.\n\nWONG, Ching-yau\n\n-\n\nWONG, Kwok Fong\n\nWONG, Pao-Hsie\n\nWONG, Prof. Po-shang\n\nWONG, Shing-tsang\n\nWOO, Dr. Pak-foo\n\nWORTHY, E. H. Jr.\n\nWOU, Dr. Paul, P. C.\n\nWRIGHT, Miss B. R.\n\nWRIGHT, D. A. L.\n\n+\n\n-\n\n22, Middle Gap Road, H.K.\n\n92A, Pokfulum Road, 1st floor, H.K.\n\nc/o Messrs. Butterfield & Swire, Union House, H.K.\n\nB-5, Wah Kiu Mansion, 1st floor, 80 Tai Po Rd., Kowloon.\n\n16-B, Tai Hang Road, 1st floor, H.K.\n\n204 China Building, H.K.\n\nNew Asia College, 6 Farm Road, Kowloon.\n\nWise Mansion 8-C, 52 Robinson Road, H.K.\n\nc/o Dept. of Education, The University, H.K.\n\nc/o Hong Kong Club, H.K.\n\n* Life Member\n\nPlease notify the Hon. Secretary of any inaccuracy", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1964.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qz20zx09r", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205054, "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-1966", "page_number": 10, "title": "RAS-1966", "content_text": "4\n\nplace as Hon. Secretary he kindly introduced Miss Michaeliones, also of the British Council, who consented to take the position and was duly appointed. Mr. Lawry was not only a veritable god-send as Hon. Secretary but has been the mainstay of the Council and the pivot around which the activities of the Society revolve. Without his aid the Society would have found it very difficult to overcome the obstacles which it experienced in the early years. For the first two and a half years of its existence the rooms of the British Council were the Society's home, for, through the generosity of the British Council and the good offices of Mr. Lawry as its Representative, the rooms were placed at the disposal of the Society for its meetings free of charge, together with all their amenities and staff and the services of a projectionist with the necessary equipment for illustrating the lectures. On behalf of the Society I wish to express our deep appreciation to Mr. Lawry and to the British Council and their staff for all they have done and are continuing to do in support of the Society. Mr. Lawry's work was far beyond that of an Honorary Secretary. He has played a major part in building up the Society to its present flourishing position. He was largely responsible for initiating, inspiring and organising various activities of the Society, particularly our very successful excursions including the Macau tour last December and the symposium on the New Territories, which he organised in conjunction with Dr. Marjorie Topley in 1964 and which was one of the Society's most fruitful achievements. As I worked with Mr. Lawry more closely than anyone else, no one knows better than I how much the Council relied and the Society depended on Mr. Lawry and his ever-willing and devoted work. When the time comes I hope we shall have another opportunity to wish him and Mrs. Lawry god-speed and success in his future career.\n\nThe Hon. Treasurer's Report shows an excess of income over expenditure amounting to $1,915.96. The fact, however, still remains that last year, as in each of the previous years, the income from annual membership subscriptions fell short of the expenditure, though last year the deficit was only about $400, much less than in previous years. The deficit each year has been met from income from a small capital investment and from sundry small sums such as the proceeds of the sale of journals. In order to place the finances of the Society on a surer basis the", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1966.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/bz60k0811", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205669, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1968", "page_number": 211, "title": "RAS-1968", "content_text": "206\n\nGORDON, Hon. S. S.*\n\nGRANSDEN, J. H.\n\nGRANT, I. F. H.\n\n-\n\nGRANT, Mrs. I. F. H.\n\nGRAY, Miss Audrey M. - GREGORY, Prof. W. G.\n\nGRIFFITHS-OWEN, Miss M.\n\nGROVE, Mrs. Rosemary\n\n+\n\n-\n\n-\n\n+\n\nGUILLAUME, Baron P. de\n\nHADDOW, Dr. I. F. G.\n\n-\n\n-\n\nHAFFNER, C.\n\nHALE, Richard E.\n\n+\n\nHALL, Miss Joyce\n\n \n Messrs. Lowe, Bingham & Matthews, 22nd Floor, Prince's Building, H.K.\n \n \n Dept. of Modern Languages, The University, Pokfulum, H.K.\n \n \n c/o Jardine, Matheson & Co., Jardine House, H.K.\n \n \n As above.\n \n \n 9A Cameron House, 40 Magazine Rd., H.K.\n \n \n Dept. of Architecture, The University, Pokfulum, H.K.\n \n \n D-12, Bay Court, Repulse Bay, H.K.\n \n \n 10A Barbecue Gardens, 171 Milestone, Castle Peak Road, N.T.\n \n \n Flat 5, Abermor Court, May Road, H.K.\n \n \n New Territories Health Office, North Kowloon Magistracy, Taipo Road, Kowloon, Room 1002 Alexandra House, H.K.\n \n \n The Hong Kong & Shanghai Banking Corpn., H.K.\n \n \n c/o Colonial Secretariat, Room 514, H.K.\n \n\nHALLWARD, Miss C. L. J. - St. Stephens Girls' College, Lyttelton Road, H.K.\n\nHANSON, Miss Katherine •\n\nHARDEN, Mrs. Guy T, Jr.*\n\nHARRISON, Prof. B.\n\n+\n\n \n H.K.\n \n \n J\n \n \n P. O. Box 1209, Porterville, California 93257, U.S.A.\n \n \n 15 Shek-O, H.K.\n \n \n Dept. of History, University of British Columbia, Vancouver 8, Canada,\n \n\nHARTWELL, Sir Charles H. c/o Public Service Commission, Central Government Offices, H.K,\n\nHARTWELL, Lady ·\n\nHAYDON, E. S.\n\nHAYES, J. W.\n\n+\n\nHAYIM, E. J.*\n\nHAYWARD, G, W.\n\nHEANEY, Robert S.\n\nHECHTEL, F. O, P.\n\nHENSMAN, Dr. Bertha -\n\n-\n\n \n As above.\n \n \n The Supreme Court, H.K.\n \n \n c/o Secretariat for Chinese Affairs, 10th floor, International Building, H.K.\n \n \n 41, Island Road, Deep Water Bay, H.K.\n \n \n British Embassy, Kastelsvej 38-40, Copenhagen.\n \n \n Deer Park, Greenwich, Conn., U.S.A.\n \n \n 10 Branksome Towers, May Road, H.K.\n \n \n Chung Chi College, Ma Liu Shui, N.T.\n \n\n* Life Member\n\nPlease notify the Hon. Secretary of any inaccuracy", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1968.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833948d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205738, "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": 44, "title": "RAS-1969", "content_text": "38\n\nR. G. GROVES\n\nMany of the points mentioned above can be further developed. What interaction was there between gentry leadership, she-hsüeh, and kinship? How were the 'catchment areas' of she-hsüeh established? Is there a relationship between these elements and marketing communities? What was the pattern of consultation which preceded the mobilization of militia? What sorts of relationships were invoked and in what order? How effective were militia as fighting units? How was logistic support provided? Such questions are relevant, not only to moments of opposition to the British, but also to a more complete understanding of social structure and organization in rural Kwangtung at this time. The resistance to the occupation of the New Territories constitutes a 'case-study' which, in conjunction with Wakeman's analysis, provides a further opportunity to attempt at least partial answers to these questions.\n\nDescription of the New Territory.\n\nThe New Territory, it was originally styled in the singular, though currently used in the plural, is an irregularly shaped peninsula jutting down from the coast of Kwangtung toward Hong Kong Island.37 The extremity of the peninsula had been ceded to Britain by the Convention of Peking, 1860. In 1898 an additional 356 square miles were added to the Colony's land (see map at rear of volume).* The territory is surrounded by water on all but its northern boundary and 33 islands account for about one-quarter of its area. Rugged hills and mountains range across the peninsula from northeast to southwest. The eastern section is, therefore, an area of hills and small valleys, while the western and northern sections comprise a large and fertile plain which extends across the Sham Chun river to the mountains in the north of the district.38\n\nJ. H. Stewart Lockhart, Colonial Secretary of Hong Kong at the time of the lease, estimated the population of the territory to be 100,000, living in 423 villages.39 This population was not evenly distributed. For instance, the western plain supported 23,020 people, living in 59 villages. The much larger eastern section of the territory is said to have had a population of only 20,870 living in 182 villages.40\n\n* Plate 21.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1969.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/9g553n20d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205761, "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": 67, "title": "RAS-1969", "content_text": "33 Ibid., p. 113.\n\nMILITIA, MARKET AND LINEAGE\n\n61\n\n34 This event has a tangled academic history. The establishment of the association by the twenty-four villages was originally reported in the Chinese Repository (IV, 1836, p. 414), and is quoted by Wakeman (op. cit., p. 63) from that source. It is also quoted by Hsiao (op. cit., p. 309) as an example of inter-village co-operation for the purposes of defence and the maintenance of order. Skinner (op. cit., p. 39, n. 80), quoting from Hsiao, argues its significance for the analysis of standard marketing communities.\n\n35 Wakeman, op. cit., p. 39.\n\n36 Skinner, G. W. \"Marketing and Social Structure in Rural China Part II\". The Journal of Asian Studies, vol. XXIV, no. 2, February 1965, pp. 207f.\n\n37 Only those aspects of the New Territories most relevant to the argument will be discussed. There is a growing literature about the area which, taken together, gives considerable detail. Freedman, op. cit., p. viii, provides a bibliographical note on published works.\n\n38 The land frontier of the territory begins just north of the Sham Chun river and runs eastward from Deep Bay to the market of Sha Tau Kok. J. H. Stewart Lockhart, the then Colonial Secretary of Hong Kong, was deeply opposed to this boundary. \"It cuts in two the rich valley of which Sham Chun is the centre, and, while excluding that town, divides the villages in the valley hitherto linked together by family ties and common interests; all these villages regard Sham Chun as their central and most important market, where they dispose their goods and make their purchases\" Papers Laid Before the Legislative Council of Hong Kong, Extracts from Papers Relating to the Extension of the Colony of Hong Kong, 1899, Hong Kong, 1900, p. 196.\n\n39 Ibid., p. 187. Stewart Lockhart's population estimates cannot be regarded as very accurate. By 1900 he thought the number of villages to be 597. Papers Laid Before the Legislative Council of Hong Kong, 1900, Hong Kong, 1901, p. 252. The Hong Kong census of 1911 gave the total population of the territory as 104,101. In the Northern District alone, 398 villages were enumerated. Papers Laid Before the Legislative Council of Hong Kong, 1911, Hong Kong, 1912, pp. 103ff. On the other hand, as guesses go, Stewart Lockhart's count is by no means disreputable. His estimate of 100,000 is not all that far from the 1911 census figure cited above. Other examples could be given which suggest that his estimates are sufficiently accurate to indicate general magnitudes of population, if not precise numbers.\n\n40 Papers Laid Before the Legislative Council of Hong Kong, Extracts..., op. cit., p. 188.\n\n41 This discussion will be confined to that part of the territory which used to be known as the 'Northern District' and will not consider the markets at Sai Kung, Tsuen Wan, Sham Shui Po, and Cheung Chau island. For brief accounts of these, see Hayes, J. W., \"The Pattern of Life in the New Territories in 1898\"; \"Cheung Chau 1850-1898: Information from Commemorative Tablets\", Journal of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, vol. 11, 1962, vol. III, 1963.\n\n42 Papers Laid Before the Legislative Council of Hong Kong, 1911, op. cit., pp. 103f.; Correspondence (December 15, 1903, to February 27, 1907) Relating to the Proposed Canton-Kowloon Railway, Eastern No. 88, Colonial Office, London, 1907, pp. 85ff.\n\n43 For example, the marketing schedule of the two Tai Po markets was 3-6-9. That is to say, the markets met on the 3rd, 6th, 9th, 13th, 16th, 19th, 23rd, 26th and 29th days of each lunar month. The same principle applies to the schedules of each of the other markets. Normally, in specifying a schedule, only the first three days are given.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1969.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/9g553n20d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205970, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1970", "page_number": 50, "title": "RAS-1970", "content_text": "J\n\nHONG KONG CADETS, 1862 - 1941\n\n45\n\nThe recruitment of cadets changed the nature of administration in early colonial Hong Kong. The cadets were professionals, unlike the earlier officials who were a mixed lot from variegated backgrounds. They spent their working lives—20 to 30 years on average—in one or other of the Eastern colonies, for some of course transferred from, or to, Hong Kong. Since their profession was administration, and the government of Hong Kong was mainly a matter in those days of running a municipality—between 1886 and 1939 only four new departments were established, the District Office New Territories after 1899, the Kowloon-Canton Railway in 1906, and air services and broadcasting in 1929—they soon introduced routines and procedures, organised the files, and set the administrative machine into grooves, along which it ran, on the whole, smoothly and uneventfully for many years. Several governors evinced surprise at the little work they were called upon to do, for ways of doing things had soon become fixed and immutable, and colonial officials were reluctant to change well-tried methods. Sir George Bowen, Governor 1883-1885, declared that the routine and absolutely necessary work of Hong Kong administration \"seemed to me from the first to be much lighter than that of any Crown Colony which I had previously governed\";40 and Sir Frederick Lugard, Governor 1907-1912, of the same opinion, was amused by the bland efficiency and meticulousness of his able Colonial Secretary, Francis May. In Lugard's day, as Margery Perham writes, the officials \"were certainly efficient; the place was small and administration was conducted according to a system which had been seventy years in the making\". Of course, before 1941, most of the problems dealt with by administrators in Hong Kong tended to be workaday ones, and dramatic solutions were hardly called for until the post-1945 period, when massive immigration changed the face of things.\n\nWith regard to administration, then, Sir Hercules Robinson's scheme had worked. It also produced results in another respect, interpretation. Eitel wrote in 1878: \"There are now very few departments where there is not someone who can read a Chinese petition for himself and efficiently check the oral interpretation of the native clerks acting as interpreter. The Coroner's Courts, the Registration Office, and Chinese Protectorate, even the Colonial Secretary's Office, are well provided with a sufficient check on...", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1970.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ww72j0241", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205971, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1970", "page_number": 51, "title": "RAS-1970", "content_text": "46\n\nH. J. LETHBRIDGE\n\nany interpretation that may be going on'.42 On the other hand, the scarcity of cadets in government caused serious problems at the end of the century. No scheme of localisation, except at the clerical level, had been promoted in Hong Kong; and although Government had been forced, as a result of Sir William Robinson's Retrenchment Committee of 1894, to abolish the post of Clerk of the Councils, one Magistrate and the Superintendent of the Jail, and amalgamate the posts of the Colonial Secretary and the Registrar-General, the number of cadets was still far too small for the efficient administration of even a municipality. Alleyne Ireland, after a visit to Hong Kong at the turn of the century, argued that there was a need for more cadets, and reported that 'no one who has spent four months, as I recently did, in the Colony could fail to be impressed, as I was, with the fact that in the service as well as in the junior ranks of the service there are a few men of the highest ability and usefulness, nor could he fail to notice that such men were few and not many'.43 The reports of the Finance Committee for 1901 showed, moreover, that the attendance included an Acting Attorney-General, an Acting Colonial Treasurer, and an Acting Director of Works. The service of the colony, Ireland adduced, 'has suffered greatly from the evil of acting appointments, and a system should be introduced under which it would not be necessary to transfer so many officials from one department to another whenever a senior official goes on leave'.44 He also pointed out the inadequate size of the Government offices, and 'the employment of a large number of junior clerks, Chinese and Portuguese, at salaries little better than those paid to day labourers'. Ireland, however, did not mention that the incorporation of the New Territories had led to a drain of officials from Hong Kong.\n\nA concatenation of these processes of retrenchment, scarcity of cadets, acting appointments, and ill-paid clerical staff led to a major government scandal which brought to an end in 1895 the career of one cadet, N.G. Mitchell-Innes,45 who had joined the service in 1881, and this scandal led not only to a commission of inquiry but a rebuke from the Secretary of State.\n\nMitchell-Innes' troubles began when Alfred Lister was appointed Treasurer in 1888. Lister, who was also Postmaster General, served for the first six months of the year, but was", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1970.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ww72j0241", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205975, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1970", "page_number": 55, "title": "RAS-1970", "content_text": "50\n\nH. J. LETHBRIDGE\n\nSuperintendent of Prisons. In the 1920s a larger number of cadets were recruited—22 in all—but the number dropped to 12 in the 1930s. Three more were appointed in 1941, just before the Japanese occupation.\n\nThis increase, particularly in the 1920s, must be related to a general expansion of services and a growth in the functions undertaken by government, and to the near cessation of recruitment during the war years 1914–18. In 1901, the total number of employees in all grades of the government service was 715; and in 1938 the figure was 2,886.55 Another trend, which was to radically reshape the cadet service after the 1939–45 war and change its composition, was a growing demand for the appointment of local people to more senior posts. In the 1935 budget debate the Acting Colonial Secretary, echoing the views of the Governor, Sir Andrew Caldecott, declared that the ‘Government has fully and frankly accepted the policy of replacing wherever possible European by Asiatic employees’.56 But the pace of localisation was exceedingly slow and the policy was hardly implemented, outside the Medical and Health Department, before the Governorship of Sir Alexander Grantham, 1947–1957.\n\nColonial officials have been caricatured as stiff, arrogant and snobbish, bemused by questions of precedence and protocol.57 They have been accused by Americans in particular of ‘spirited amateurism towards administration and technological illiteracy in relation to the problems of economic development’.58 But these characteristics in a milder form are a reflection of the values held by the English upper middle class, from whom the cadets were recruited. The cadets did not suffer a sea change on their way out by P. and O. to Hong Kong. They were gentlemen trained in the ideology of the pre-war English public schools and older residential universities. In Hong Kong they went on launch picnics; they swam, played polo, golf and tennis, walked in the New Territories, and played bridge in the evenings. A substantial number, however, did not allow their curiosity and intelligence to slumber in a sub-tropical climate: they wrote books and scholarly articles about the East. And one cadet—Geoffrey Sayer, an historian of early Hong Kong—claims that the bridge between East and West has been bridged ‘in so far as it has been bridged, by \"linguist\", \"comprador\", \"missionary\", \"interpreter\", and \"cadet\"’.59", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1970.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ww72j0241", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205978, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1970", "page_number": 58, "title": "RAS-1970", "content_text": "HONG KONG CADETS, 1862 - 1941\n\n53\n\n19 Sir Francis Henry May (1860-1922), Educated at Harrow and Trinity College, Dublin. Hong Kong Civil Service 1881; Captain Superintendent of Police, 1893-1902; Colonial Secretary, 1902-1910; Governor of Fiji and High Commissioner of Western Pacific, 1910-12; Governor of Hong Kong, 1912-1919. First cadet to become Governor. Altogether May spent 38 years in Hong Kong.\n\n20 Sir Reginald Fleming Johnston (1874-1938), Educated at Edinburgh University (Gray Prize; prox. accessit., Lord Rector's Essay); Magdalen College, Oxford (mentioned hon, causa Stanhope Essay). Hong Kong Civil Service 1898; Assistant Colonial Secretary, 1899-1904, Transferred to Weihaiwai 1904; Senior District Officer and Magistrate, Weihaiwai, 1906-17. Tutor to the Ex-Emperor of China, 1919-1925. Commissioner of Weihaiwai, 1927-30. Professor of Chinese and Head of Department of Languages and Cultures of the Far East, School of Oriental Languages, London University, 1931-1937.\n\n21 Sir Cecil Clementi (1875-1947). Educated at St. Paul's School and Magdalen College, Oxford, Hong Kong Civil Service 1899. Clementi, following his uncle and godfather, Sir Cecil Clementi Smith, preferred an Eastern Cadetship, and was posted to Hong Kong. Land Officer and Police Magistrate in the New Territories, 1903-6, Clementi had the task of recognizing the land titles of over 300,000 claims. Appointed Colonial Secretary of British Guiana 1913-1921; Colonial Secretary, Ceylon, 1922-1925; Governor of Hong Kong, 1925-30; Governor of the Straits Settlements and High Commissioner for the Malay States 1930. In 1934 Clementi retired on account of ill-health.\n\n22 James Legge \"The Colony of Hong Kong\", China Review, Vol. I, 1872-3, p. 173.\n\n23 Dominions Office and Colonial Office List 1939, p. 624, states: \"The average number of cadets appointed to Malaya and Hongkong during the period of 1919-31 inclusive was between 9 and 10. Since 1931 the average has been 5-8, 6 generally. In 1937, 7 cadets were appointed, and 9 in 1938. There were none appointed to Hong Kong 1937, and only 2 in 1938. The demand for cadets in Hong Kong was always small”.\n\n24 For example, Thomas Sercombe Smith (1854-1937) was appointed a Hong Kong Cadet in 1882. In 1883 he was attached to the Colonial Office for a year; and in 1884, after a brief spell attached to the Colonial Secretary's Office, Hong Kong, proceeded to Peking where he studied Chinese, 1884-6. On the other hand, Arthur Winbolt Brewin (1867-1946), proceeded to Canton in 1888. Brewin, who was educated at Winchester, succeeded Eitel as Inspector of Schools in 1897; became Registrar General in 1901 and retired in 1912.\n\n25 Victor Purcell The Memoirs of a Malayan Official, London, 1965, pp. 108-109. The Index to Correspondence (of the Colonial Secretariat), compiled in 1902 by R. H. Kotewall, has a cryptic entry: \"Cadets studying Chinese in China must reside at a place removed from European social surroundings\".\n\n26 Alexander Grantham Via Ports, Hong Kong, 1965, p. 5.\n\n27 I have been able to discover the schools attended by 64 of the cadets: 52 went to schools listed in the Public Schools Yearbook; the other 12 to small private schools. Two cadets (H. E. Wodehouse and A. W. Brewin), it seems, did not go to a university; five I have been unable to trace; and of the rest - 78 in all — 55 went to English universities (Cambridge 25; Oxford 23; London 4; and one each at Leicester University College, Liverpool University, and Manchester University); 10 to universities in Ireland (Trinity College 8); and 11 to Scottish universities (Edinburgh 6,\n\n-55", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1970.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ww72j0241", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 205980, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1970", "page_number": 60, "title": "RAS-1970", "content_text": "HONG KONG CADETS, 1862 - 1941 \n\n55 \n\n19 Kenneth Myer Arthur Barnett (born 1911). Educated at Mill Hill School, London, and King's College, Cambridge, Hong Kong Civil Service 1934. Retired as Director of Census and Statistics 1970. \n\n40 Quoted in James Hope Hennessy's Verandah, London, 1964, p. 186. Hennessy is quoting, presumably, from Sir George Bowen's Thirty Years of Colonial Government, London, 1889, which I have not seen. \n\n41 Margery Perham, op. cit., p. 302. Lugard also liked and trusted A. W. Brewin, the Registrar General: \"if he once said, he was very 'pro-Chinese' this was really a compliment. He would allow Brewin to forbid his own delivery of a speech to a Chinese gathering. He could not always understand the reason ‘but I trust implicitly in him'.\" \n\n42 E. J. Eitel \"Chinese Studies and Official Interpretation\", p. 8. \n\n43 Alleyne Ireland, Far Eastern Tropics, London, 1905, p. 34. In 1901 Ireland was appointed Colonial Commissioner of the University of Chicago for the purpose of visiting the Far East. \n\n44 Ibid., p. 32. \n\n45 Norman Gilbert Mitchell-Innes (1860-1947). Educated at Repton and Edinburgh Academy, Hong Kong Civil Service 1881; Treasurer 1891; left Hong Kong Service in 1896 and transferred to the Home Prison Service. Des Voeux thought highly of Mitchell-Innes. See G. B. Endacott, Government and People in Hong Kong 1841-1962, Hong Kong, 1964, p. 112. \n\n46 Report on Defalcations in the Treasury, Sessional Papers, Hong Kong, 1893, p. 546. \n\n47 Ibid., p. 546. \n\n48 Norton-Kyshe, vol. 2, p. 447. \n\n49 Ibid., p. 447. \n\n50 Sir Arthur George Murchison Fletcher (1878-1954). Educated at Cheltenham College and Trinity College, Oxford, Hong Kong Civil Service 1901; transferred to Ceylon 1927; Colonial Secretary, Ceylon, 1926-9; Governor of Fiji and High Commissioner for Western Pacific 1929-36; Governor and Commander-in-Chief, Trinidad and Tobago, 1936-38. \n\n51 Geoffrey Norman Orme (1879-1966). Educated at Cheltenham College and Hertford College, Oxford, Hong Kong Civil Service 1902. Director of Education 1924-26. Left Hong Kong Service in 1926. \n\n52 The Report on the Land Court, 1900-1905, Sessional Papers, 1905, gives a list of the presidents and members of the Land Court in order of their appointment, most of whom were cadets. H. H. J. Gompertz was appointed in 1900 and resigned in 1904; Cecil Clementi in 1903; and C. M. Messer and J. R. Wood in 1904. The Registrars in order of appointment - all cadets were: J. H. Kemp, E. D. C. Wolfe, and S. B. C. Ross. The Land Court in 1905 consisted of three members: C. M. Messer, Cecil Clementi, and J. R. Wood. The New Territories became popular with cadets as a place to walk or shoot in on week-ends. Robert Oliphant Hutchison (1880-1920), the Superintendent of Imports and Exports, on his way to shoot snipe at Saikung fell off a launch in a squall and drowned. His body was never found. With him at the time was D. W. Tratman, the Colonial Treasurer. One imagines from the evidence that both had \"tiffined\" rather too well. \n\n53 \"At first British officials were limited in principle to two, dealing with police and land. In 1899 a police magistrate was appointed and also an assistant land officer to deal with land cases, and the police were placed \n\nPage 60\n\nPage 61", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1970.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ww72j0241", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206121, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1970", "page_number": 201, "title": "RAS-1970", "content_text": "194\n\nNOTES AND QUERIES\n\nThe map was clearly of potential value for any persons travelling in or having business with the District, and Colonial Office documents now in the Public Record Office, London show that it was, in fact, used by British diplomats and administrators during the important negotiations following the Convention of Peking of 6 June 1898, which leased the present New Territories to Great Britain, and before the take-over of the leased area in March-April 1899.\n\nOn 10 February 1899 the Governor of Hong Kong, Sir Henry Blake, sent a telegram to Sir Claude Macdonald, the British Minister at Peking urging him to secure the important market town of Shum Chun, just north of the leased area (an afterthought on the part of local Hong Kong officials) and advising that it could be located on the Missionary map of 1866'. This is clearly a reference to Mgr. Volontieri's map, which includes the date (May 1866) in the descriptive lettering.\n\nAgain, when Governor Blake wired to the British Secretary of State for the Colonies, Chamberlain, on 10 March 1899 he advised, in an accompanying 'Memorandum regarding the proposed survey of the Territory in Kwang Tung Province leased by Great Britain from China' (being Enclosure 1 to telegram No. 53): 'There is available a fairly correct map of the country, on a scale of an inch to the mile, prepared by the Jesuit missionary (sic). It shows the coast line correctly; the position of all villages, streams, roads, etc., approximately'. This memorandum was drawn up by the Director of Public Works in Hong Kong with the assistance of Colonel Elsdale, R.E.\n\nThese passages make it fairly clear that Mgr. Volontieri's map-making efforts in the early 1860s were of considerable assistance to British officials nearly forty years later.\n\nThe documents quoted above are in CO129/290 in the Public Record Office, London.\n\nHong Kong, 1970.\n\nPostscript\n\nJAMES HAYES\n\nThe notice that follows came to my attention recently. It appeared in the Hongkong Government Gazette, 26th May 1866 and is an interesting and valuable addition to our knowledge of this subject, being the original announcement of the project to the Hong Kong public.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1970.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ww72j0241", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206124, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1970", "page_number": 204, "title": "RAS-1970", "content_text": "NOTES AND QUERIES\n\n197\n\ntook place locally, in the areas just across the Sino-British border at Sha Tau Kok. The villagers of these three places became alarmed for the fate of their cherished Tin Hau image and brought it into British territory for safety. They also brought back two incense burners (†) dated in the 2nd and 3rd years of Kuang Hsü (1876-78) that had been donated by local shops and fishermen in one case and by Lin Ma Hang (A) natives then in Australia (J).\n\nThe leaders of the three villages then combined to form the Sha Tau Kok Three Villages Tin Hau Temple Building Committee (沙頭角三鄉籌建天后廟委員會) and obtained a temporary building permit from the Tai Po District Office to erect a temple for the image. The temple is situated at map reference KV 140962 at the west end of Kong Ha Village in the Frontier Closed Area. It is under the management of a special trust, the Sam Wo Tong (*) constituting one manager each from Tong To, Tan Shui Hang and Sha Tsui villages.\n\nPhotographs of this new temple and of the Tin Hau image which inspired such devotion can be seen at Plates 30 and 31.\n\nPlace names used in this note can be found in A Gazetteer of Place Names in Hong Kong, Kowloon and the New Territories. (H.K. Govt. Printer, n.d. but 1960) pp. 216-218.\n\nHong Kong, 1970.\n\nJAMES HAYES\n\nPILE HOUSES AT TAI O, LANTAU ISLAND, HONG KONG,\n\n7TH JANUARY 1937\n\nEditor's Note\n\nThe following details of some of the interesting pile houses or matsheds on stilts that survive in considerable numbers in Tai O Creek to the present day are taken from one of Mr. Walter Schofield's notebooks, under the date given in the heading. Mr. Schofield (1888-1968) served in the Hong Kong Cadet (Administrative) Service between 1911-1938 in various posts, including those of District Officer South, Chief Assistant Secretary for Chinese Affairs and First Police Magistrate. He was also a well-", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1970.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/ww72j0241", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206328, "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": 145, "title": "RAS-1971", "content_text": "THE DISTRICT WATCH COMMITTEE\n\n139\n\n36 In 1917 there were 31 guilds for employers only (in trades such as silk, sandalwood, wicker furniture and copper), 35 skilled craftsmen guilds (sandalwood workers, masons, tinsmiths, etc.) and 5 guilds with mixed membership (employers and workers). There were also 17 district societies, such as the Heung Shan (Hsiang-shan) resident merchants association and the General Commercial Association of the Tung Kun (Tung-kuan) merchants resident in Hong Kong. See the list of exempted and registered societies in the Gazette, 27 April 1917.\n\n37 Wei Yuk was appointed in 1891 and served until his death in 1929. He resigned several times in order to allow a newcomer to join the Committee but was soon re-appointed. Lau Chu-pak was appointed in 1902 and served until his death in 1922. Sir Shouson Chow was appointed in 1917 and was still a member in 1949, the year of the demise of the Committee.\n\n38 During the years 1929 to 1931 and in 1936 the Committee met four times a year at Government House. Lennox Mills states that members had the right to a guard of the District Watch Force on the occasion of weddings and other festivities'. The Secretary for Chinese Affairs tells us in his report for 1936 that through the kindness of His Excellency the Committee was able to meet the members of the Mui Tsai Commission on the occasion of their first visit to the Colony, 'All members attended and there was a valuable discussion with frank interchange of views'. When the Governor, Sir Henry Blake, left the Colony in 1903 on the day of his departure he inspected the District Watchmen. Clearly, everything was done by the government to give prestige and éclat to the Committee and the force.\n\n19 T. C. Cheng, op. cit., p. 18.\n\n40 Of the Chinese land population in the 1901 census 227,615 returned themselves as natives of Kwangtung Province, 179,296 of this number belonging to the Kwong Chau Prefecture, 28,844 came from Tung-kuan hsien, 28,587 from P'an-yü hsien, and 27,221 from Nan-hai hsien. The situation was substantially the same in the censuses of 1911, 1921 and 1931. In 1911, for example, 311,992 out of 350,418 Chinese in Hong Kong, exclusive of the New Territories, spoke Cantonese,\n\n41 Op. cit., pp. 399-400.\n\n42 Heung Shan, present-day Chung Shan, is the arid county on the west side of the Pearl River, stretching down to Macau. It was the Heung Ha, the Cantonese term for the province, district or village from which each person derives his ancestry, of many prominent Chinese, including Ng Choy (Wu Ting-fang), Yung Wing (Yung Hung), Wong Shing (Huang Shêng), and Sun Yat-sen. Many Chinese merchants in Hong Kong came from this county; for example, Wei Yuk, Ma Ying-piu (founder of the Sincere Company), M. Y. San (before 1941 the largest biscuit manufacturer in China), Tsang Foo, Look Poong-shan (founder of the Bank of Canton). Su Chao-cheng, organiser and leader of the Seamen' Strike in 1922, came from this county; in 1928 Su was elected to the Central Political Bureau of the Chinese Communist Party. The anarchist, Liu Ssu-fu, was also born there. In 1938 the Chung Shan Commercial Association had a membership of over 4,000 in Hong Kong.\n\n43 In 1905, for example, at least seven members of the Committee were compradores to important western firms; one was manager of a native bank; another of a prosperous pawnshop; a third ran a large export firm. Ho Kai was primarily a financier rather than an entrepreneur. See on this point the Chinese speculator Marie-Claire Bergère, \"The Role of the Bourgeoisie' in M. C. Wright, ed., China in Revolution: The First Phase 1900-1913, New Haven, Yale University Press, 1968, p. 236.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1971.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/z029vt43g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206329, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1971", "page_number": 146, "title": "RAS-1971", "content_text": "140\n\nH. J. LETHBRIDGE\n\n44 Sir Robert Ho Tung was never a member of the District Watch Committee although he was at one time chairman of the Tung Wah Hospital Committee. Sir Robert's brothers—Ho Fook and Ho Kom Tong—and other relatives became members of the Committee.\n\n45 Sir Chau Tsun-nin, who served on the Committee, was the son of Chau Siu-ki, a prominent financier and member of the Committee until his death. Chau Siu-ki (1863-1925) was killed in the collapse of a house during an abnormally heavy rainstorm.\n\n46 I think one may conclude that by the time the Committee met the Registrar General most of the problems to be discussed had been thrashed over previously, most likely at the Chinese General Chamber of Commerce or at the Chinese Club, both located in Connaught Road. There was also a Compradores' Club.\n\n47 For an account of Ho Kai's involvement in Chinese politics see Harold Z. Schiffrin, \"The Enigma of Sun Yat-sen\", in M. C. Wright, ed., op. cit., pp. 246 ff.\n\n48 The Hong Kong Chinese General Chamber of Commerce was in close touch with the Canton Chamber of Commerce and members flitted between one and the other. Many members of the District Watch Committee had offices and businesses in Canton and invested heavily in Kwangtung enterprises. Many bought land.\n\n49 Ho Kai, however, believed in the 'Open Door' policy in China, which he thought would be beneficial to both China, Hong Kong and the West. See the letter sent to Lord Charles Beresford in Beresford's book, The Break-up of China, London, Harper and Brothers, 1899, pp. 216-233.\n\n50 This is made clear, I feel, by a perusal of the commissions of enquiry into the workings of the Po Leung Kuk and the Tung Wah Hospital. In both cases Ho Kai worked in concert with Lockhart to protect the interests of the Chinese community. Ho Kai was no yes-man. On the other hand, he did use his inside knowledge of government activities to line his own pockets. Endacott states that Ho Kai and his cronies were suspected of spreading rumours about British intentions in the New Territories before the takeover in order to reduce land prices. Endacott, op. cit., p. 263. See also Despatches and other papers relating to the Extension of the Colony of Hong Kong, Sessional Papers, No. 32 of 1899, p. 20.\n\n51 For example, Ho Fook, Chau Siu-ki and Wei Yuk all died in office.\n\n52 This board was set up to oversee the working of the managing committee and to see that continuity in policy was maintained.\n\n53 See note 52. An important function of the Advisory Board was to see that money was spent wisely.\n\n54 The Committee controlled fee-paying cemeteries at Aberdeen and Tsun Wan. Burial was reserved for Chinese who had been permanently resident in the Colony.\n\n55 This Committee, like the others listed above, was under the chairmanship of the Secretary for Chinese Affairs. Chinese temples were controlled, in accordance with Ordinance No. 7 of 1928, by this Committee.\n\n56 The Chinese Recreation Ground was an open space situated off Hollywood Road. Funds derived from the rents of stalls in both Hollywood Road and the Yaumati Public Square in Kowloon.\n\n57 Before 1941 there were 9 Chinese Public Dispensaries controlled and maintained by a committee under the chairmanship of the Secretary for Chinese Affairs. They were originally established to help combat plague.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1971.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/z029vt43g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206520, "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": 68, "title": "RAS-1972", "content_text": "62\n\nHENRY JAMES LETHBRIDGE\n\nhad two meetings with the Chinese delegate, Huang Tsun-hsin1, and an agreement was signed at Government House on March 14. On the 16th Lockhart accompanied by the Director of Public Works left for Mirs Bay and proceeded to delimit the boundaries of the New Territory, which were fixed along a line joining the heads of Deep Bay and Mirs Bay, following the Sham Chun River for most of its course. Lockhart had urged the inclusion of Sham Chun and its valley but this was rejected later by the Chinese authorities.\n\nOn 1 April Lockhart and a party sent by the Public Works Department to erect the posts on the boundaries settled upon were stopped by villagers and informed that if they attempted to get on with their work they would be killed. Understandably, the party withdrew to Hong Kong. At the same time, Wei Yuk# 1 an unofficial member of the Legislative Council, procured a copy of a placard that was being posted up in many villages and market towns; the translation revealed that people in the New Territories were being urged to drill with firearms. This was the first sign that the occupation of the New Territories was not likely to occur without incident.\n\nThe Governor, Sir William Blake, accompanied by his Colonial Secretary, Lockhart, hastened forthwith to interview the Viceroy at Canton and they secured from him a promise of co-operation and the sending of Chinese troops to protect the two matsheds at Taipo that were being erected for the occupancy of police and officials from Hong Kong. On 3 April, however, F.H. May, Captain Superintendent of Police, and his small party of Sikhs and Chinese guards were set upon by 'villagers', the matsheds burned to the ground, and the group forced to retreat to Kowloon. The Governor immediately despatched troops by motor torpedo boat destroyer to Taipo. The troops were accompanied by Lockhart, of whom the commanding officer later said: 'I have to record my sense of the tact and judgment displayed by Mr. Stewart Lockhart in eliciting information most unwillingly given; and the interpreter whom he brought with him was simply invaluable owing to his proficiency in both English and Chinese and his knowledge of the system of dealing with the natives.' The interpreter was Ts'oi Yeuk-shan, First Chinese Clerk in the Registrar General's Department, a former pupil at Queen's College. Lockhart and the troops returned to Hong Kong later in the same day.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1972.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/gm80qf99h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206521, "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": 69, "title": "RAS-1972", "content_text": "SIR JAMES HALDANE STEWART LOCKHART\n\n63\n\nOn 16 April Lockhart returned to Taipo and in the presence of the General Officer Commanding, Major-General W. J. Gascoigne, and about 500 men, he hoisted the British flag and then read the Order-in-Council and Convention. The territory was now formally occupied. There had been some resistance from the people and from those living in the Sham Chun area. Lockhart had been asked to return to Hong Kong to attend a meeting of the Legislative Council but in a minute to the Governor he stated: 'I have consulted the General Officer Commanding, who thinks it very desirable for many reasons that I should remain here. I am of the same opinion, so propose to remain.'22 Since the situation was still unsettled, the Governor concurred with Lockhart's proposal and Lockhart stayed behind with the troops, accompanying them on a long sweep through the New Territories to make the British presence known.\n\nLockhart and the troops led by Lieutenant-Colonel The O'Gorman pushed on from Taipo on 18 April to Shek Kong; from that village they passed through Kam Tin, Yuen Long, Ping Shan, Sheung Shui, Fanling, and arrived back in Taipo on 27 April. The O'Gorman reported: \"To the Honourable J.H. Stewart Lockhart, C.M.G., Colonial Secretary, is due the admirable results that have been attained in the Civil Administration of this Territory during this brief state of turmoil; his measures have been taken with great energy and ability and in a manner that, long experience has shown him, were suitable to the occasion. The result has been a most complete success. Only those on the spot can realise the amount of labour and care he has devoted from early morning to late at night to the discharge of these trying duties. A most hearty co-operation has existed throughout between us and no difference of opinion on any one point has arisen.'23 The Secretary of State, Joseph Chamberlain, in a despatch to the Governor, commented: 'without wishing to undervalue in any way the services rendered by others, it is evident to me that much has been due to the energy of Mr. Lockhart, and to his local knowledge.\"24 Lockhart remained in the New Territories until July 1899 in order to start the civil administration. The headquarters of the new administration were fixed at Taipo. He was assisted in his task by C.M. Messer, a cadet officer, Ts'oi Yeuk-shan, First Chinese Clerk, and two Chinese assistants. The problems he had to face were at first formidable.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1972.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/gm80qf99h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206523, "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": 71, "title": "RAS-1972", "content_text": "SIR JAMES HALDANE STEWART LOCKHART\n\n65\n\npresent in the New Territories, he was much involved in its administration and in the drafting of proper legislation for its people. His continued interest in the New Territories is revealed in the three excellent annual reports he prepared for the years 1899 to 1901.\n\nIn March 1901 Lockhart was taken seriously ill - no doubt as a result of gross overwork and had to leave the Colony under medical orders and did not return until June 1901, when he continued to hold the post of Colonial Secretary but not that of Registrar General. In that same year he was appointed Civil Commissioner of Weihaiwei, the administration of which he assumed on 3 May, 1902. Except for two short periods of leave, Lockhart was to be continuously in charge of Weihaiwei for nearly 19 years. In his report on the New Territories for 1901 he wrote: 'This will be my last report on the New Territories and, in bidding it farewell, I do so with much regret, mingled with pleasant reminiscences of conflicting work carried on in the midst of its charming and beautiful scenery, and lessened by the recollection that I have been and still am a staunch believer in its future.'26 The leased territory of Weihaiwei to which Lockhart now moved resembled in many ways the New Territories, of which he had been the first administrator.\n\nCIVIL COMMISSIONER OF WEIHAIWEI\n\nWeihaiwei was leased from China on 1 July, 1898, as a counterpoise to the Russian occupation of Port Arthur in March of the same year, for Weihaiwei at that date was the only port of any significance in north China available for occupation by a foreign power. Under the terms of the 1898 Convention the port was leased to Britain for as long as Russia occupied Port Arthur. The territory of Weihaiwei was situated on the north-eastern coast of Shantung Peninsula and was formerly a part of the Chinese Province of Shantung. The total leased area was 288 square miles and comprised a belt of land, in the shape of an arc, ten miles wide with a coast line of 72 miles, containing the small village of Ma-t'ou, which was its only port, and some 320 villages, of which only four could be dignified as small market towns. Off Ma-t'ou was the small island of Liukung. In 1902 the population was estimated at 124,000, among whom only one family could be called wealthy, and consisted mainly 'of the orderly, hard working, conservative peasantry of the Shantung Peninsula.'27", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1972.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/gm80qf99h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206665, "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": 213, "title": "RAS-1972", "content_text": "NOTES AND QUERIES\n\n“LETTING GO THE WOODEN GOOSE”\n\n207\n\nLI Mau-ying (*), posthumous name Man-kan (††), an official of the Sung dynasty who graduated chin-shih in 1226, was given an estate on Lantau, one of the larger islands of the Hong Kong region.* His rights continued through succeeding dynasties but were mostly extinguished at the land settlement that accompanied the lease of the New Territories to Britain at the end of the 19th century. A curious story is linked with the Li's ownership of their Lantau estates, indicating that this grant of land may have been given in a novel fashion. According to a villager of Sha Lo Wan, Lantau Island (1913-1962) who had an interest in local tales, the emperor was so pleased with Li that he told him to put a wooden duck on the sea and that he could have whichever land it touched.\n\nThere is an echo of this in Cecil Clementi's minute to the Colonial Secretary of 16th June 1904 in a file about the Tang clan's claim to Tsing Yi Island (CSO1903/8551).† Without there being any apparent reason or preparation for making such a statement—probably because a whole section was omitted by the copier—one paragraph suddenly states 'For the method of \"letting go the wooden goose\" see minute of this date in N.T. 7466/03'. This file is unfortunately no longer in existence.\n\nCan any reader explain this 'system' of deciding upon which land to include in a grant?\n\nHong Kong, 1972.\n\nJAMES HAYES\n\nPROGRAMME NOTES FOR THE VISIT TO POKFULAM, HONG KONG ISLAND, 29TH JULY, 1972‡\n\nToday's visit is to a part of Hong Kong island that has not been subject to the same amount of change as other districts. Even today\n\n* For the Li family see Lo Hsiang-lin, Hong Kong and its External Communications before 1842, Hong Kong, Institute of Chinese Culture, 1963 (this is a part-translation of the Chinese version published in 1959), p. 73 and plate 20 and his article \"This Sung Wang T'ai and the Location of the Travelling Courts by the Sea Shore in the Last Days of the Sung\" in Journal of Oriental Studies, Vol. III, No. 2 (1958) at p. 212 (English text) and note 29 (Chinese text), with Plate XI.\n\n† Located in the Public Records Office of Hong Kong.\n\n‡ Printed here for the convenience of members who were unable to join the party on this occasion.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1972.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/gm80qf99h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 206773, "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-1973", "page_number": 50, "title": "RAS-1973", "content_text": "44\n\nPETER WESLEY-SMITH\n\n2 See Wong Chung Hong, \"Walled and Moated a Hong Kong Village\" Arts of Asia, Vol. 1, No. 4, July-August 1971. This article is accompanied by architectural drawings of Kat Hing Wai. See also Sun Hok-p'ang, \"Legends and Stories of the New Territories. III. Kam Tin” Hong Kong Naturalist, Vol. VIII, Nos. 3 and 4, December 1936, pp. 255-6.\n\n3 Stewart Lockhart's Report is relatively well known; it is published in Confidential Print, Eastern No. 66, Serial No. 51, p. 83: C.O.882/5,\n\n4 \"Journal of Inspection through the Newly Leased Territory”, and Stewart Lockhart to Acting Colonial Secretary (undated), Nos. 27 and 29 in \"Papers Regarding the New Territory, Hong Kong\", in Stewart Lockhart's Papers, Vol. 3. These papers are deposited in the National Library of Scotland, Acc. 4138, and are used here with permission.\n\n5 Hongkong Weekly Press. Vol. XLVIII, September 17, 1898, p. 239.\n\n6 See note 4 above.\n\n7 See note 5 above.\n\n8 Serial No. 172 (see note 3 above).\n\n9 See R. G. Groves, \"Militia, Market and Lineage: Chinese Resistance to the Occupation of Hong Kong's New Territories in 1899” JHKBRAS, Vol. 9 (1969), p. 31.\n\n10 Stubbs to Thomas, No. 246, June 7, 1924, enclosure 3: minute by W. G. Gerrard, Assistant Superintendent of Police (New Territories), dated June 2, 1924: Stewart Lockhart's Papers, Vol. 5. The Hon. Mr. Bird incorrectly recalled at the re-opening ceremony in 1925 that he saw the gates carried into the Tai Po camp on the day the Union Jack was hoisted there (that is, April 16, 1899). He also stated that it took ten coolies to carry each gate: Hong Kong Telegraph, May 27, 1925.\n\n11 Entry for May 4, 1899, in a diary kept by Stewart Lockhart and contained in Vol. 36 of his Papers.\n\n12 See entries for May 9 and May 29, 1899, in ibid.\n\n13 K. O'Dwyer, S. J., \"Kam T'in. Memories and Legends\" The Rock, April, 1940, pp. 157-62.\n\n14 A. E. Collins to Stewart Lockhart, August 19, 1924: Stewart Lockhart's Papers, Vol. 5.\n\n15 O'Dwyer, op. cit., p. 162.\n\n16 A translation of this Address is in the Colonial Secretariat Library, bound together with the official programme for the ceremony and the Hong Kong Telegraph's report of the proceedings.\n\n17 Hong Kong Telegraph, May 27, 1925,\n\n18 Ibid.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1973.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8910rj06r", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207332, "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": 100, "title": "RAS-1975", "content_text": "92\n\nH. J. LETHBRIDGE\n\ncolony of Hong Kong. In 1845, Charles May, a London police officer, was brought out to organise the new force. Most of the early police recruits were obtained locally from the army, navy, and merchant marine; but in time policemen were recruited directly from Britain or from other colonial territories. The quality and morale of the force was never high. Norton-Kyshe writes that in 1850 a European constable got only $15 a month,\n\nvery far below what the humblest in the Colony required, so that, in the case of steady men, they only accepted the position in the hope of something better turning up. But to this class, unfortunately, the chief objection was the readiness with which they yielded to the temptation offered by the many public houses about, and many of the deaths among the European constabulary were ascribed to their excessive indulgence in ardent spirits, a great portion of which, sold by the low tavern-keepers, was of the most abominable and deleterious description.4\n\nBecause of the demoralised state of the police, Sir Richard MacDonnell, Governor of Hong Kong, reported in 1869 to the Secretary of State that he intended to substitute Scottish for English constables. Altogether forty-five Edinburgh constables were enlisted in 1872. But the Scots contingent proved as susceptible as their English colleagues, for the next year several were dismissed from the force. As a group, they, too, had succumbed to the blandishments and corruptions of Hong Kong. In 1897 it was found that almost all the police—European, Chinese, and Indian—were receiving money illegally from Chinese gambling syndicates, including a British Deputy Superintendent of Police.\n\nBecause of the general shortage of European personnel in Hong Kong, police were often seconded to, or allowed to apply for, positions in other departments. The scarcity of suitable Europeans was, in the main, a consequence of the growing attractiveness of Australia as a land of opportunity, especially after the discovery there of gold in 1851, and of the rapid development of Shanghai, which soon became viewed as an arena more accommodating than Hong Kong for the adventurous and ambitious. Turnkeys at Victoria Gaol were often policemen; and the various Inspectors of Brothels (a post established in 1858), who came under the control of the Registrar General, were in nearly every case former police officers, for the principal duty of such functionaries was to detect", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207540, "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": 308, "title": "RAS-1975", "content_text": "300\n\nNOTES AND QUERIES\n\nJ. A. Prescott\n\nH. A. Rydings\n\nC. T. Smith\n\nPhotographers\n\nSouth China Athletic Association, Photographic Group:\n\nButt Chak-yu 畢澤宇\n\nHoh Wing-chan 何永燦\n\nJimmy Kwok 郭天志\n\nLai Yat-fung 賴一峰\n\nLau Cho-chak\n\nTam Yee-yin 譚以仁\n\nTong Wai-hang\n\nRoyal Asiatic Society:\n\nH.A. and J.W. Rydings\n\nH. Werle\n\nHong Kong, 1975.\n\nH. A. RYDINGS\n\nBOAT PEOPLE'S CEREMONIES OBSERVED AT ISLAND HOUSE ON 5TH AND 31ST JANUARY, AND 16TH NOVEMBER, 1975*\n\nThe following notes were provided by Mr. David Akers-Jones, Secretary for the New Territories and a member of this Society, whose residence is at Island House, Tai Po. The island Yuen Chau Tsai (AMA), connected by causeway to the main road, has long been a centre of the boat population. Ed.\n\n(I) 5th January, 1975\n\nA motorized sampan motored slowly round Island House from the bridge to the shelter used by the small in-shore fishing boats on the other side of the Island House causeway. On board a group of six young women were pretending to pole the boat along, wearing plaited red wheel-hats. Another girl was beating a gong, creating a tremendous noise, another standing in the bow facing aft was beating a drum in a frenzied manner, and on the roof of the\n\nPlate 18 illustrates these notes.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1975.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/j0995146d", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207674, "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": 62, "title": "RAS-1976", "content_text": "The Teochiu ethnicity in urban Hong Kong\n\n47\n\nThere are no comparable local level organizations in the urban areas,* though the government has encouraged the development of local-level urban neighborhood associations (Kaifongs), which are presumed to reflect local opinion and to be effective in influencing government decisions affecting the local area. The Kaifongs in resettlement estates with which I am familiar currently fulfill neither of these functions and are hardly considered organizations worthy of much effort to control. Teochiu have primarily been \"isolationist\" in devoting attention and effort to developing their own associations into what are clearly the most active and representative organizations in the local area. The local Kaifongs have thus not become an important focus of interethnic competition. Kaifong associations in other areas of Hong Kong are at times more active in local affairs. They appear to be particularly active when organizing local protest against new governmental policy which would adversely affect local residents. Hong Kong's newspapers periodically carry stories telling of the efforts of particular Kaifongs to mobilize support of local residents against new policy.\n\nThe primary functions of Kaifongs have been to provide social welfare services, serve as a communication channel to government, and to provide prestigious positions for ambitious local leaders (Kan, 1970:95). Kan describes the general image of Kaifongs in the following manner:\n\nthe more 'generalistic' orientation of the Kaifongs is more amenable to the government than is the 'particularistic' orientation of the clan, district, and dialect associations. For this reason, the majority of the population as well as the government itself have believed that the Kaifongs may become the most effective intermediaries between government and people. (Kan, 1970:94).\n\n*The City District Office scheme, initiated in 1968, is intended to bridge the communication gulf between the masses of people in urban areas and government. City District Officers are charged with assessing the overall impact of government policy, and with maintaining contact with all local organizations. In effect, the purpose of the scheme is to \"provide the public with a local manifestation of the Government... (The City District Officer Scheme, 1969: title page).\n\nFor brief discussions of divergent government policy in the New Territories and urban area, see Report by the Secretary for Chinese Affairs, The City District Officer Scheme, 1969; Wong, 1975; and Miners, 1975.\n\nSee Annual Departmental Reports of the District Commissioner, New Territories, for brief descriptions of the Rural Committees.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1976.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/hq382988q", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 207831, "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": 219, "title": "RAS-1976", "content_text": "204\n\nMAURICE FREEDMAN\n\nConnected with the union there was an organisation which operated a kind of agricultural insurance scheme, making good losses by theft of crops and beasts. Again, the Luk Yeuk was composed of both Punti and Hakka.\n\n24. There are other 'numerical' yeuk-complexes: the Four (Sz) Yeuk of Tsuen Wan, the Six (Luk) Yeuk of Sai Kung, and the Nine (Kau) Yeuk of Sha Tin. In these three cases, however, we see the influence on rural organisation of an urban and administrative centre. The walled city of Kowloon was the only official seat in that part of San On to be converted into the New Territories. It held the yamen of a deputy magistrate and certain military officials, no doubt acquiring some of its importance as a centre of government in the second half of the nineteenth century from the proximity of the British Colony.\n\nThe Kau Yeuk of Sha Tin appears to have consisted of forty-eight villages, of which the five largest were Punti and the rest Hakka. The Ch'e Kung Temple (now the property of the Secretary for Chinese Affairs in his part as a corporation sole) belonged to the Kau Yeuk, according to one account, but was taken over by the S.C.A. when a dispute was precipitated by a claim put forward by one village to control it.\n\nOn the Sz Yeuk of Tsuen Wan I have discovered little more than that it existed. Sung Hok-p'ang once told a Chinese scholar, who has since committed the statement to writing, that the area now called Tsuen Wan was in late Ming or early Ch'ing times known as Tsuen Wan Yeuk and that formerly all the villages in the area from Ting Kau to Kowloon City belonged to it.\n\nThe Luk Yeuk of Sai Kung, however, has left clearer traces. I cannot define its composition exactly, but I have been told that Ho Chung, Pak Kong, Sha Kok Mei, Tseung Kwan O and two settlements in Shap Sz Heung were the six yeuk. Once again, both Hakka and Punti were involved.\n\nThe three yeuk-complexes of Tsuen Wan, Sha Tin, and Sai Kung were in some fashion tied in with a council, formal or informal, in Kowloon City; and it appears likely that the local deputy magistrate used this organisation to make contact with the villages in his neighbourhood. In 1879 (according to its own records) there came into existence in Kowloon a body known as the Lok Sin Tong; members of the three yeuk-complexes were represented on it. Its primary object seems to have been to promote charity, public works, and education, while in character it would appear to have been an association of local gentry. The Lok Sin Tong still exists; indeed, it has grown", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1976.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/hq382988q", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208036, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1977", "page_number": 75, "title": "RAS-1977", "content_text": "TWO ESSAYS ON THE CH'ING ECONOMY OF HSIN-AN\n\n59\n\nThe study of perpetual tenancy systems has long constituted an important, if overlooked, avenue of research into the diversity of economic life which characterized pre-revolutionary rural China.13 Though the institution of perpetual lease was widespread, the degree to which it dominated the agricultural sector—as well as the particular form it took—varied considerably over short distances. In a communication to the Colonial Secretary's Office in January 1904, an officer of the Land Court complained of difficulties facing administrators attempting to codify the land tenure system:\n\nChinese law does not, so far as I can ascertain, contain any mention of perpetual lease and I am informed that the custom of leasing land perpetually is local in the New Territories and does not prevail a short distance from our borders.14\n\nThe variant of perpetual tenancy found in 19th-century Hsin-An closely corresponded to the ti-ku (地骨)/ti-p'i (地皮) system found in Ch'ung-An Hsien (崇安縣) of Northern Fukien. Hsu Tien-t’ai, in his \"Study of the Tenancy Systems of Fukien” (福建租佃制之研究), groups this system with the t'ien-ku (田骨)/t'ien p'i (田皮) category of perpetual tenancy (永佃制). His description follows:\n\nConcerning t'ien k'u (lit: \"field's bones\") and t'ien p'i (lit: \"field's skin\"), or k'u t'ien (骨田) and p'i tien (皮田), this system is found in several counties throughout the province, the names changing slightly from place to place. The value of the \"bones\" belongs to the landlord, and the value of the \"skin\" belongs to the tenant; both sides can freely sell their respective rights. While the landlord (\"bones-master\") can freely sell his title, he can, in no way, affect the rights of the tenant to the \"skin-value.\" Moreover, the responsibility of paying the land-tax resides, as usual, with the landlord. When the tenant sells his title, even if disputes arise, there is no way for the landlord to interfere. Indeed, even the government finds it difficult to intervene.15\n\nOne of the earliest British accounts of perpetual lease in Hsin-An is to be found in Lockhart's \"Memorandum on Land\" appended to his Report on the New Territory at Hong Kong (1900):\n\nThe relation between landlord and tenant is often a complicated one, chiefly owing to the system of perpetual lease. Under such leases the landlords have practically renounced all rights to the\n\nPage 75\n\nPage 76", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1977.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/np198x23n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208121, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1977", "page_number": 160, "title": "RAS-1977", "content_text": "MEMORIES OF THE DISTRICT OFFICE SOUTH, NEW TERRITORIES OF HONG KONG\n\nW. SCHOFIELD\n\nMy first introduction to the Southern District took the form of journeys by Water Police launches to various parts of it during the summer of 1919, when I lived for three months in the Water Police station quarters before my first leave. After it I sometimes repeated such voyages for purposes of geological research, on which I embarked with Government encouragement. A professional geological survey of the Colony was being planned in order to help in developing the resources of the Empire after the 1914-18 war, and to most people the Colony's geology was, quite understandably, a sealed book. The coasts and islands of the Southern District afforded many instructive sections, often showing the relations of different rock and mosses in a nearly undecayed state, which except in stream beds could hardly be seen anywhere else in the days before great motor roads cut the hills. This work enabled me to prepare a preliminary report on the Colony's sedimentary rocks and granite batholiths which was presented in 1923 not long before the Canadian geologists began their labours.\n\nIn 1922, while I was working as second assistant to the Secretary for Chinese Affairs and deputy registrar of marriages, on the first floor of the Post Office building, Mr. Wynne-Jones, the D. O. South, whose office was just above mine on the second floor, went to hospital with appendicitis, and I was instructed at ten minutes' notice to go upstairs and do his job till he got better. As I had coveted the job for some time, and had told my chief so (then the late E. R. Hallifax), I was delighted.\n\nIn those days one of the D.O.'s duties was to sit in his office as magistrate for the Southern District, excluding New Kowloon and the Lyemun area.† This court usually functioned from 9 to 10 a.m.\n\n* 1888-1968, Cadet Officer, Hong Kong Civil Service 1911-38. This article was written in response to my request to Mr. Schofield and others for memories of their service in the Southern District of the New Territories for which I was then (1958) District Officer - Hon. Editor.\n\n† Place names may be found in the official publication A Gazetteer of Place Names in Hong Kong, Kowloon and the New Territories (Government Printer 1960, since reissued).", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1977.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/np198x23n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 208607, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1979", "page_number": 64, "title": "RAS-1979", "content_text": "The Maryknoll Mission, Hong Kong 1941-46\n\n37\n\nSecretary, Procurator, and all his priests in the other parishes of the City were interned, he did not know where at that moment, but later on he was informed that they were at Stanley, in the prison. That evening our belated supper was eaten in more or less silence, as with guns booming in the distance and the suspense in the air, we did not have much heart for conversation. We retired early, but about eleven o'clock were awakened by the air raid siren, only to find that it was a false alarm. Incidentally, during the hostilities of Hong Kong there were no night air raids. However, after that false alarm, Father Downs in the city, at the Cathedral Rectory, could not get to sleep, and heard the clock strike every quarter of the hour until daybreak. And the next morning at about eight o'clock, the fun began! At that time planes appeared overhead, bombs were dropped at various points and wherever these bombs fell, anti-aircraft guns in the vicinity started barking. A couple of these anti-aircraft guns were set up in a small depression just below the Italian Sisters' Hospital on the hill to the east and south of the Cathedral, and when they began popping we thought they were in our backyard. During the day and those that followed, there were perhaps an average of four or five daily air raids, the targets being mainly gun emplacements, shipping and forts.\n\nHowever, on the very first day, as narrated by Fr. Downs a couple of bombs hit a portion of the Central Police Station, a block or two just west of the Cathedral. Guns were booming over on the Kowloon side and out in the New Territories along the Pearl River estuary where the Japanese landed, having come down the river from Canton. Whether these guns were land or naval batteries, of course we could not judge, but no doubt the shells came from both sources at times. On the night of the second day, after we had retired, the booming of guns seemed to be nearer, and finally we were awakened by a crash which seemed to be in the Rectory. As the booming kept up we were not desirous of making any personal investigation, and as we waited, another crash shook our building, and then another, a little farther away. The next morning we learned that the Japanese were evidently trying to get the range of the anti-aircraft guns just above us near the Sisters' Hospital, for the shells seemed to fall in a straight line; the first struck to the west of us, the second hit the edge of the roof of the house next door, the third crashed through the roof of the Cathedral, cutting a neat hole", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1979.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2801w5938", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209369, "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": 26, "title": "RAS-1982", "content_text": "4\n\nJANET LEE SCOTT\n\nneighbourliness is already developing in some multi-storey blocks where mutual aid committees have been set up, and people are now getting to know their neighbours in a way which seemed impossible before (Government Information Services 1974:9).\n\nThat the Mutual Aid Committees were believed to be succeeding in these endeavours, and for that reason were being promoted by the Hong Kong government, is suggested by evaluations made of the Scheme early in its history. Apparently, public opinion towards the committees was so favourable during the first years that an early decision was made to continue the formation of the MACs.1 In 1974, it was stated that \"Mutual Aid Committees should be regarded as a permanent requirement in helping to ensure a stable society and that the legal requirement for registration, i.e. exemption from registration as societies under the Societies Ordinance provided they were approved by the Director of Home Affairs (or the Secretary for the New Territories, outside the urban area), would be continued\" (Director of Home Affairs 1974:5). Such official support was to continue. During interviews conducted in 1976 and again in 1978, liaison officers of the City District Offices of the Wong Tai Sin and Mong Kok Districts were still expressing their satisfaction with committee operation. Further confirmation of committee success, in terms of organization, can be seen in the increased number of committees formed. At the end of their first year, 1973, a total of 1,214 MACs were formed (Government Information Services 1974:9), but by the end of 1981, this figure had risen to 3,573 (Government Information Services 1982:248). At present (to the end of February, 1983) the figure has risen to 3,752.\n\nIf the Mutual Aid Committees have been considered as valuable organizations by the City District Offices, they have been equally valued by others. Since their inception, the Mutual Aid Committees have proved themselves useful settings in which to investigate such diverse topics as the adjustments of the elderly (Ikels 1983), the delivery of community health services (Grandpierre 1978), and the dimensions of women's participation in urban organizations (Scott 1980). Other scholars have chosen to study the Mutual Aid Committees because they are neighbourhood associations, and thus can be used to explore the", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1982.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mk61z420p", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209372, "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": 29, "title": "RAS-1982", "content_text": "7\n\nTions living in many public housing estate blocks. As observed in 1980:\n\nOne of the largest estates where I interviewed, Tze Wan Shan Estate, is the largest in Hong Kong, housing well over 150,000 people. One of its blocks, Block #66, houses approximately 8,400 people. But it is not the largest. Across the street, Block #61, on the outer edge of the estate, houses nearly 9,900 people (Scott 1980:33).\n\nBlocks of this size, with such enormous resident populations, would make the standard arrangement not only impractical, but ridiculous. Yet, there have been some standard committees created under such situations. For example, in 1978 Blocks #62, #64, and #65 of Tze Wan Shan Estate, with a combined population of 11,000 inhabitants, were operating with one committee. Some blocks solve the population problem by dividing into floors; for example, one committee could be formed for, say, every three floors. In 1977, the Mutual Aid Committees of Block #23 of Tung Tau Estate, Wong Tai Sin District, were arranged in this way. It is also possible, if the block has wings, for each wing to have its own committee. Even with all these alternatives, there is probably no one perfect solution to the problem of committee allocation in public housing (Scott 1980:33).\n\n11\n\n“A Mutual Aid Committee must be approved by the District Officer/Assistant District Officer under delegated authority from the Secretary for District Administration on a biennial basis for the purpose of exemption from the Societies Ordinance (Cap. 151)” (City and New Territories Administration 1982:1).10 Each Mutual Aid Committee in Lok Fu Estate follows this rule and is registered for a period of two years. However, before October of 1981, the committees were registered for only one year. The lengthening of the registration period was felt to have a beneficial effect, as it would enable the committees to complete projects planned and generally function more efficiently. At the end of this time, each committee is reviewed by the District Officer or City District Officer and if found to be functioning without serious problems, its certificate is renewed. Each committee has its own biennial cycle, however, based on the time at", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1982.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mk61z420p", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209378, "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": 35, "title": "RAS-1982", "content_text": "13\n\nofficial information. Floor representatives also participate in their MAC's subcommittees, if there are any, and so do much of the work of organizing and carrying out activities.\n\nOfficeholders\n\nHow many officeholders are there? The basic committee structure consists of three officers: chairman, secretary, and treasurer. Section VII of the 1982 Model Rules (Composition of Committee) explains that, \"The MAC shall consist of at least three key office-bearers namely a Chairman, a Secretary and a Treasurer, and such other office-bearers as may be elected\" (City and New Territories Administration 1982:2). The three officers (and, of course, any additional officers) are required to show their identity cards and register at the District Office along with the committee itself. The registration practice, which is now standardized for all City Districts, involves giving certain personal data for recording in the District Office. The information recorded is: name, address, telephone number, identity card number, sex, date of birth, age, educational background, occupation, nationality, and C.C.C. number.15 All of the officers of all committees must register. However, the District Office does not keep records on any other members of the committee, nor does it record the structure of the committee itself.\n\nIn addition to the three officers mentioned above, most committees add extra officeholding positions to assist in the running of the committee. While government regulations do not state clearly what positions these might be, all the Mutual Aid Committees in Lok Fu Estate have vice-chairmen. Most have only one, but three committees have two vice-chairmen, one has three, and one has four. Committees have vice-chairmen because they recognize the need for someone to assist the chairman, on whom falls much of the responsibility for the affairs of the committee. Sometimes, there is too much for one person to do. Three more committees have either vice-secretaries or vice-treasurers, and two committees have both a vice-secretary and a vice-treasurer. The chairman of one of these committees explained that these extra vice-officers were the secretary and the treasurer of the previous term and were kept on to advise and assist the newly-elected secretary and treasurer. This ensured", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1982.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mk61z420p", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209379, "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": 36, "title": "RAS-1982", "content_text": "14\n\nJANET LEE SCOTT\n\nboth continuity and smooth operation, the desire for both being a common reason for electing vice-officers. One of the committees listed above as having two vice-chairmen, did so because one of these officers was soon to move to another estate and the second would be available to take over the position after he left.\n\nIn June of 1982, a decision was made by the District Offices to add auditors as appointed members of the Mutual Aid Committees. This was done on the advice of the Independent Commission Against Corruption, which believed that, although the MACs and their financial transactions were small, it was nevertheless a good idea to prevent any possible mishandling of funds.16 Any person living in the block who is not already an officer can become the auditor, but the MAC can, with the agreement of the residents, ask residents of other blocks to serve as their auditor. At the end of March, 1983, seventeen of the Mutual Aid Committees of Lok Fu Estate had appointed auditors, and one of these had also added a vice-auditor.\n\nThe largest committee in Lok Fu Estate, that of Block #15, has eight officers: one chairman, three vice-chairmen, two secretaries, one treasurer, and one vice-treasurer. The next largest, that of Block #12, operates with six officers: one chairman, two vice-chairmen, one secretary, and two treasurers. Block #19, the third largest, has also elected six officers: one chairman, two vice-chairmen, two secretaries and one treasurer. In size, these committees resemble the large scale MACs in Tze Wan Shan Estate, committees which have as many as eight to ten additional officers (Scott 1980:37). For example, the fifty-five member committee mentioned previously had fourteen officers altogether: one chairman, eight vice-chairmen, one secretary, two vice-secretaries, and one treasurer (Scott 1980:41).\n\nWhat are the duties of these officers? Of course, the chairman is the key officer, as he is the official representative of the MAC, convening the meetings, and acting on behalf of the residents when meeting with officials and representatives from the government. The vice-chairman, according to the 1982 Model Rules, is \"deputising the Chairman as and when necessary\" (City and New Territories Administration 1981:3). However, the vice-chairmen, acting in hand with the chairmen, sometimes", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1982.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mk61z420p", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 209380, "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": 37, "title": "RAS-1982", "content_text": "15\n\nhave a great many other duties to do as well, and step in to work whenever necessary. The secretary, with the assistance of the vice-secretaries, if any, handles the correspondence, takes the minutes at meetings, and in general keeps the letters and correspondence received from outside, although in some committees this latter duty is performed by the chairman. Finally, the treasurer prepares the income and expenditure statements (in cooperation with the chairman and the auditor), issues the cheques (also bearing the signature of the chairman and/or secretary), checks the validity of payment vouchers, and supervises the collection of voluntary contributions and monthly fees (City and New Territories Administration 1982:4).\n\nThese distinctions look neat on paper and the division of labour seems clear, but the actual situation is a good deal less distinct. The lack of enthusiasm on the part of committee members often means that the officers of some committees carry out all the work themselves, and so take on additional duties beyond those formally listed for their offices. In addition, the distinctions between responsibilities often become blurred because officers must help each other perform their duties, especially if one is ill or away. This is especially true for the chairman, who in some committees becomes the only working office-holder. All the chairmen of Lok Fu Estate Mutual Aid Committees stressed the cooperation between the officers and the fact that they all could do each other's jobs when and if that became necessary.17\n\nHow long do officers serve? The Model Rules of August, 1982, stated clearly that, \"The tenure of an office-bearer shall be two years\" (City and New Territories Administration 1982:3). Before these rules were enacted, however, the officers of Mutual Aid Committees served terms of one year. The District Offices had many reasons for extending the term of office, but the most important was that the new officers needed more time to become acquainted with the block, its problems, and the duties of an officer. This was especially true if they were new to the block. In addition, the one-year term of office did not allow sufficient time for the officers to complete projects. The reason for this was that the last two months of a term were taken to prepare for the next election. Therefore, officers were serving, in effect, ten-month terms and it was felt that a longer term of office was", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1982.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mk61z420p", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210166, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1984", "page_number": 137, "title": "RAS-1984", "content_text": "116\n\nJAMES HAYES\n\nThis did not mean, however, that local villagers were not averse to minor piracy and smuggling, and generally to taking advantage of opportunities for gain. There are too many accounts of villainy from the surrounding waters for us to rule out the occasional initiative. In this connection, the remarks of a Chinese brigade general ordered by his superiors to cooperate with two young British naval officers against pirates thought to belong to villages in the present day Yuen Long area of the New Territories, has to my ears the ring of truth to it:\n\n\"Having seen these eighteen villages we have, becomingly and properly, together admonished the people thereof, and I think that they will be compliant and obey our orders. But this is merely an affair of vagabonds who rob with violence and make forays, who are not in the same category with confirmed rebels and pirates.”37\n\nThe English officer in charge commented:\n\n\"It must clearly be borne in mind that piracy in China differs from piracy elsewhere in this respect that there the pirates live on the land and only put to sea occasionally to carry on their depredations... Nor is this state of things confined in this vicinity to the neighbourhood of Deep Bay. Piratical villages exist along the whole coast wherever the native traffic is sufficient to render such an occupation remunerative.\"38\n\n+39\n\nWriting specifically of Hong Kong itself on 11th April 1846 to the Secretary of State for the Colonies in his annual despatch on the state of the Colony, Sir John Davis observed that “A principal obstacle to the Chinese commerce of the place is the system of piracy which infests the approaches from the east and west. In another despatch dated 26 February 1848, Davis commented on the subject as follows: \"The former prevalence of piracy has been checked (as appears best proved by the increase of native trade) through the active exertions of Captain Loring of HM's ship 'Scout', by whom nearly 300 pirates were captured in the last year, and delivered over to the Chinese government.\n\n1540\n\nWhether the Hong Kong villagers joined in such behaviour", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1984.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/5h73wh572", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 210965, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1987", "page_number": 27, "title": "RAS-1987", "content_text": "2\n\nserved under him for the next nine months until he was replaced by the late (Sir) Ronald Holmes. It was my first posting after language study, and I was inexperienced and ignorant. Ken was formidable by reason of bulk and intellect, and I was instinctively wary of him. He was, too, one of those rather \"larger than life\" personalities around whom legends and stories had already accumulated. However, he turned out to be both kindly and helpful. More, he was informative; and for a new District Officer anxious to know more about his charges it was fortunate that he had written about local history, something that had attracted insufficient attention from the Civil Service, or anyone else for that matter. I probably saw more of him than the other DOS, because of our joint preoccupation with the Shek Pik Reservoir investigations and the fact that his town office was in the District Office (South) building on Gascoigne Road, Kowloon.\n\nHe used to come in once a week, on set days, and I remember once being indignant upon hearing his booming voice on another day. “Oh well” I thought resignedly, for I was still very new, “he'll come in shortly”, and dismissed him from my mind. Some time later I heard his voice again, and realized it was a tape recording on which his secretary must have been working, a draft speech or something of the kind.\n\nAfter he left the N.T., our association was mostly personal. Through joint interests, including membership of the Royal Hong Kong Defence Force, we met from time to time. The Royal Asiatic Society, Hong Kong Branch, to which he lectured occasionally, was another shared interest. After he left Hong Kong on retirement we exchanged letters periodically. I also saw him on his visits to his family here, and particularly remember the last occasion (1986) when, together with the then District Officer, Yuen Long, we arranged a visit to the border area including the Mai Po marshes. We began with a picnic lunch at Island House which had been his home when he was District Commissioner, New Territories. This was a particularly happy and relaxed family occasion, with his grandchildren, on which I look back with great pleasure.\n\nOne always got a lot out of Ken. Our mutual interest in local people and their history led me to send him copies of any draft", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1987.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/rx919b522", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 211594, "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-1989", "page_number": 9, "title": "RAS-1989", "content_text": "joined the Society since 3 April 1989. Inevitably, there have been losses too, but with more coming in than going out. May I extend a warm welcome to all new Members.\n\nLocal Ordinary and Life Members total 718, with 571 addresses; indicating that we have a fair number of husband and wife joint memberships. 99 Members have Chinese surnames, the best we can do in estimating this segment, which comprises over 13% of the total. (The Council, on the other hand, has 5 Chinese members out of 14). As for domicile, 448 Members (79%) live on Hong Kong Island, 75 (13%) \"belong Kowloon-side\" and 48 (8%) have New Territories' addresses.\n\nOverseas Members total around 80. The number is less than last year's, since one result of circulating the letter to the British Foreign Secretary to overseas as well as local Members was to learn, with regret, that there had been some unreported deaths.\n\nAdministration\n\nThe tried and tested team of our three ladies, Eveline Caldwell, Anita Wilson and Sharon Bruce, continued to provide the administrative back-up which keeps us moving forward, with occasional input from Phillip Bruce who is unable to avoid some \"overflow\" from his wife Sharon's duties. Or perhaps he just gets \"drafted\"! Our Hon. Treasurer, Robert Nield, gives help and advice from the side, always ready and willing when needed.\n\nI am most grateful to them all, and wish to record their conscientious, willing and friendly cooperation and assistance at all times. No President can do without them!\n\nThis is also the place to thank Dr. Anthony Siu who has translated the new RAS Brochure issued after the last AGM. Anthony was also responsible for the printing arrangements. The Chinese version, judiciously distributed when occasion offers, should help to bring in more Chinese members.\n\nFinance\n\nI will leave Robert Nield to make his annual report. The only thing I would like to add is that following upon the support given at last year's\n\nviii", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1989.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8336pm92h", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212455, "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": 9, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "would be surprised how many members have actually published a book over the last two or three years or are going to publish in this forthcoming year. We are a society whose members get consulted on a variety of matters from the Urban Council when they set up the Hong Kong Museum of History, to the Hong Kong Government when seeking assistance for the grading of historical buildings for the Government Antiquities Advisory Board, and by the Legislative Council inviting us to make representations on the Council elections and even from abroad by people who want to know for instance about how Chinese junks are constructed; we even have applications from persons who wish to work for the society full-time but unfortunately they wish for remuneration! So although we are inclined to look back, historically, we are a Society whose members consist of people from all walks of life and who take an active forward-looking interest in Hong Kong and events which are likely to affect the future well-being of the Society,\n\nAll this may sound too self-congratulatory and in some ways it is: there are of course some problems, but before coming up to them I would like to briefly outline what we have actually done to justify our existence over the last year. First and foremost there is the Journal. The 1989 Journal was published recently and if you do not have your copy please see the Assistant Secretary. I think you will agree with me that it is full of interest and is up to the high scholarly standards we have come to expect. For this we have to thank not only all contributors but particularly our Editor Dr. Patrick Hase. He has toiled long with spectacular results: but even so we are asking him to toil even harder to get out the 1990 Journal and we are hopeful this will be published later this year.\n\nThe next area I wish to highlight is the Programme: the Society has a Programme Committee under the able Chairmanship of Mr. Peter Leeds and arranges a variety of talks and visits: for the last year there have been the following talks:\n\nFather Louis Ha\n\nDr. Graeme Lang\n\nMs. J. Bresnihan\n\nMr. Peter Lee & Judy Bonavia\n\nDr. Patrick Hase\n\n150th Anniversary of the Catholic\n\nChurch in Hong Kong\n\nRise of a Refugee God\n\n(Wong Tai Sin)\n\nGovernor John Pope Hennessy\n\nTibetans and Tus\n\nNew Territories Poetry and\n\nFolk Song\n\nviii", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212457, "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": 11, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "having discussed it many times: there is no easy solution since the number of members are invariably limited due to external restraints, such as transport or the sheer difficulty in taking too many people around one place. One solution is to organise the trip twice or even thrice and you will note we have done this on a number of occasions.\n\nThe Council continues to be wary of running tours outside Hong Kong, after finding that the response to the proposed trip to South Korea early last year was not good, which led to its abandonment. However over the last year we have been to the Pearl River Delta and Xiamen and next July there is a thrust deep into China to be led by Mrs. Rosemary Lee and Mr. Peter Lee for which there have been some encouraging responses. It does seem therefore that this will be the pattern for the future, i.e. short or long trips into China rather than elsewhere.\n\nIt is customary for this report to include a paragraph on Membership, and this cannot be done without the assistance of our very capable Assistant Secretary, Mrs. Sharon Bruce, who is able to inform me from her records that our current numbers are 581 local members (450 from H.K. Island, 76 from Kowloon and 55 from the New Territories) and 114 overseas members, making a total of 695 members.\n\nThis compares with last year's figures of 596 local members (492 from H.K. Island, 65 from Kowloon and 39 from the New Territories) and around 80 overseas members, making a total of 676 members. In this transitory society it is considered that this is a satisfactory situation. May I ask that if you are leaving Hong Kong you will continue to keep in touch: we can keep you informed of our activities and send you the annual journal all for the modest subscription of HK$180. And on the subject of membership it is with great regret to note that we will be losing our patron Lord Wilson, later this year. Lord Wilson has been very supportive of the Society's activities and his presence at our Annual General Meeting dinner two years ago was very much appreciated. I regret to say I do not have a secret line to inform you as yet who our next patron will be but we will keep you informed as soon as we have anything definite.\n\nSuch a large membership does mean of course that they need servicing and that we have a system for keeping in touch: this is done very competently by Mrs. Anita Wilson, who produces a bi-monthly newsletter: this helps enormously to bind our Society together and also when we need assistance we have means to obtain it: this was clearly", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212705, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1992", "page_number": 14, "title": "RAS-1992", "content_text": "We are fortunate to have such an able person to look after our finances and I would like to place on record the Society's appreciation for all the work he does. Membership as a whole continues to fluctuate, with many leaving and new members joining and we hope in the long run they will at least be equal if not more for the latter than the former. Last year I reported to you that there were 533 local members (492 in Hong Kong Island, 65 in Kowloon, and 39 in the New Territories) and around 80 overseas members. This year our efficient Assistant Secretary, Mrs. Sharon Bruce tells me that there are 593 local members (241 single, 176 joint, 104 life, 8 student members, 4 institute) and around 102 overseas members. There has therefore on the surface been a decline in local members, but I am reliably informed that this is due to the stronger weeding out of those who have not paid their subscription rather than any other reason. However we do always welcome new members and in these days of uncertainty it is important that we keep up the good publicity we have and obtain new members. For $300 per annum membership is a bargain, particularly when you bear in mind it includes the journal.\n\nBefore leaving the subject of membership, however, I would like to report to you that the Governor of Hong Kong, Mr. Chris Patten has graciously agreed to become the Society's patron and thereby continue a tradition of the Society ever since it was re-established in 1959. We naturally hope that when life is calmer for him he will be able to attend one of our functions in an informal way.\n\nAnd how are we kept together and informed? This is by the newsletter which is very competently produced by Mrs. Anita Wilson and we owe her and Mrs. Sharon Bruce who helps to distribute it a great vote of thanks.\n\nYou will notice in this report that I have referred to several aspects of the Society's past, but I would not like you to think that we do not give some thought to the future, something as Gladstone said we cannot fight against. There are some wonderful metaphors going around in Hong Kong at present such as the second stove, the second kitchen, but I believe we are more interested in the through train, or perhaps I should say a stable kitchen. This Society will I hope be able in its own small way contribute to a stable yet enterprising kitchen; but in order to do this we will need the support of all members, and to continue to stimulate an active interest in Hong Kong's history and heritage (a task as Professor\n\nxii", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1992.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qf85tx75x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212882, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1992", "page_number": 191, "title": "RAS-1992", "content_text": "176\n\nfrom other places [to Shek Lei Tau].\n\nIt is now clear that we have come to the end of [the available] burial ground and that there is nowhere to which we can effect removal [of the graves]. We therefore appeal to you in grief and resentment for your understanding and support in this matter. We shall be most grateful if you will advise the concerned authority to rescind the order and cease development in the area.\n\n15\n\nNo further action was taken by the Lands Department at the time, and during my three years as Regional Secretary, New Territories, I was concerned to retain the grave area and wrote to the department on their behalf. So far as I am aware, the rights of the Kau Wah Keng people to this remaining part of their traditional burial area are still being respected.\n\nCharitable Graves\n\nAnother kind of grave should also be mentioned. This is the yi chung or 'charitable grave' which was built to contain the remains of persons without descendants. Sometimes it was provided by a charitable society or a conscientious local organization, or at times by worthy individuals, after or during an epidemic which had killed numbers of people. This action was taken by the Tung Wah Hospital of Hong Kong and by the Lok Sin Tong of New Kowloon after the Plague of 1894. It has also been taken by rural committees in the postwar New Territories, and by temples and other religious bodies, for the remains of persons who were killed or died during the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong between 1941-1945. Several such graves were provisioned by the Tsuen Wan Rural Committee.\n\nA grave of this kind had to be moved and reprovisioned at Sai Cho Wan on Tsing Yi Island when that part of the Island was being developed for industry in 1977. The Tsing Yi Rural Committee took up this responsibility, writing to the District Office to explain the position and ask for money to effect the removal and reconstruction in another place. The letter is not without charm and interest:\n\nBefore the War, Tsing Yi Island was a well-wooded spot, with lots of birds and wild-life. Magpies, partridges,", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1992.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qf85tx75x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212884, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1992", "page_number": 193, "title": "RAS-1992", "content_text": "178\n\nNOTES\n\n1\n\nSaid by one of the Tangs of Ha Pa. The father had won a Jockey Club lottery ticket\n\nMrs Wong Chau Yuk-bing, 10 July 1991\n\nI once became concerned with a grave on a hill above Tsuen Wan. There had been a mistake and confusion when exhuming illegal graves and removing the remains to an authorized cemetery. My subsequent enquiry showed that this slope contained a number of graves of Chans of Sam Tung Uk, repaired in 1919, and another old grave belonging to their cousins from Kwan Mun Hau, a recent reburial of another of their graves whose old site had been required for development; the earth grave with stone tablet dated 1954 belonging to another local lineage recently taken up and remains placed in an urn (whose removal caused all the trouble); and a Tsang grave dated 1909 but removed at some time previously. The enquiry showed that the hill was a favoured burial site, that it was mostly monopolized by the Chans of Sam Tung Uk; that they had received objections from Kwan Mun Hau to a new grave and had not used it but found another site.\n\n4\n\nThe exercise was prompted by what I personally felt was the misguided notion that all the owners of old graves could, and should, one fine day be asked to exhume them.\n\n4 This was still felt to be the case, even though some leading members of the clan were Christians, with forebears who had also been members of the local protestant Chuen Yuen Church, established in Tsuen Wan about 1905.\n\n+\n\nAddressed to DOTW but sent to NTA HQ. See Secretary for the NT's NT L/M No.(172) in E/948/78 to TM&DO TW dated 11 December 1980, enclosing Chinese letter dated November 1980.\n\n+ Chinese letter from Mr. Wong Kit-hung, Village Representative of Shui Pin Village, Yuen Long, dated 14 January 1980.\n\n\"Wong Cho-yip and 22 other villagers of this place are the owners of the grave of Ancestor Shui-tai at Tsing Lung Tau. Ancestor Shui-tai was buried there in the tenth month of the first year of Tung Chih [1862], so that the grave has a history of 120 years. The villagers have recently learned that the government will resume the land there for development. They fear that great damage will be done to the fung-shui [of the clan] if the grave is destroyed. We entreat you to remedy the situation quickly [by cancelling the notice] or by compensating for this loss, so that they may choose a lucky day for the removal of their ancestral grave (and another auspicious burial ground for).\n\nM\n\nChopped DOTW Inward. Serial No. 1861 of 17 August 1963. The District Commissioner gave an account of a ceremonial visit following damage to a grave. See Annual Departmental Report, District Commissioner, New Territories, 1955-56.\n\n4\n\nADR, DCNT 1955-56, para. 87.\n\nMr Wong Kwai-chi, Land Inspector, Class 1. He and I had been colleagues and friends since we first served together in the District Office South, twenty years before.\n\n|| DOTW file TW6/WL/71, Chinese letter dated 4 May 1971.\n\n1:\n\nSee JHKBRAS, Vol. 17 (1977), p.189 for background.\n\nFile TW130/983/77, for China Light and Power Company's electricity supply sub-station on NE Lantau.\n\n14\n\nThis was partly their own fault, as owing to a particularly intense intra-lineage feud, all through the late 1970s and most of the 1980s they could not agree on removal terms,", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1992.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/qf85tx75x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 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": 213439, "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": 35, "title": "RAS-1995", "content_text": "The New Territories were leased from China for 99 years from 1st July 1898. Then followed the New Territories Order in Council of 20th October 1898, by clause 1 of which those territories were declared to be\n\n\"part and parcel of the Colony of Hong Kong in like manner and for all intents and purposes as if they had originally formed part of the said Colony.\n\nBy Clause 3 of the same Order-in-Council it was ordered that, from a date to be fixed by the Proclamation of the Governor, all laws and Ordinances which should on that date be in force in the Colony should take effect also in the New Territories. The laws in force in the Colony of Hong Kong at that date were such of the laws of England as existed on the 5th April 1843,\n\n\"except so far as the said laws are inapplicable to the local circumstances of the Colony or of its inhabitants.\n\n718\n\nand local Ordinances modifying the laws of England in force on 5th April 1843.\" The Secretary of State instructed the Governor in a despatch dated 6th January 1899-\n\n\"On the principle that the new territory shall be taken to be and so far as possible be treated as an integral part of the Colony, it is desirable that as many of the existing laws of Hongkong as are applicable to its circumstances should be at once applied, the administration of the laws being carried out with tact, discretion, and sympathy with native custom and prejudice\n\n+++\n\nA week before the British flag was hoisted at Taipo and the territories were taken over from the Chinese authorities the Governor, Sir Henry A. Blake, issued a Proclamation which included this passage:-\n\n\"I would also impress upon you that this territory having been leased by His Imperial Majesty the Emperor of China to Her Britannic Majesty the Queen, as subjects of Her Majesty's Empire, your commercial and landed interests will be safeguarded, and that your usages and good customs will not in any way be interfered with.\"", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1995.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/95941j25g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213440, "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": 36, "title": "RAS-1995", "content_text": "The terms of the Order-in-Council were echoed and further implemented in the New Territories (Exemption from Laws) Ordinance, 1899 (No 6 of 1899). The position, therefore, as regards proceedings other than land cases is that such of the laws of England as existed when the Colony obtained a local legislature, that is to say, on 5th April 1843 are the governing laws subject to two provisions,\n\nFirstly \"except so far as the said laws are inapplicable to the local circumstances of the Colony or its inhabitants;” Secondly \"and except so far as they have been modified by laws passed by the said legislative.”\n\nThe first provision has always been construed to let in Chinese customary law when a necessity arises of preventing injustice or oppression. The passages already quoted from the Secretary of State's despatch and from the Governor's proclamation bear out that construction in regard to the application of section 5 of the Supreme Court Ordinance to the New Territories.\n\nAs to the date for the recognition of customary law to be applied in such cases, opinions differ. One opinion is to be found appended to the Report of the Committee appointed in 1948. The choice there offered is between custom existing in 1841, when Captain Elliot took over Hongkong, that existing in 1898, when the New Territories were leased to the United Kingdom, or that existing in 1905, when the New Territories Land Ordinance, 1905, was enacted. The anonymous author of that opinion inclined to select the latter year, but the Committee expressed no opinion on the matter. The New Territories Administration, on the other hand, has interpreted “Chinese Law and custom” to mean the law and custom of Manchu China as it existed on April 20th, 1899. For reasons given in my previous article, it is submitted that as in the Colony of Hongkong, so in the New Territories, a court should apply the Chinese customary law existing at the time that court is called upon to determine any issue. Particular support can be found for that submission in respect of the New Territories in the opinion of the Attorney General in 1898 that it was \"hardly necessary...to enter into the question as to whether any and, if so, which of the laws of England in force on 5th April, 1843... should be specially included in an exempting Ordinance, because such laws were only brought into force in Hong Kong “so far as they were not inapplicable to the local circumstances of the Colony or its inhabitants.” The Government was\n\nPage 17\n\n \n...", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1995.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/95941j25g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213442, "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": 38, "title": "RAS-1995", "content_text": "CHOK HUNG vs. LI FUI CHOI\n\n\"No enquiry has ever been made to ascertain what Chinese law is. It is an extraordinary fact that the Court of this Colony, in which the Chinese live and trade as freely as Englishmen and citizens of other countries, should do with regard to the Chinese what it would never dream of doing with regard to Frenchmen or Germans or Americans; and not only that, but that it should be entirely in ignorance of Chinese law on any subject which concerns the family life and family law of those who form the bulk of its inhabitants, which is so often before the Courts—its marriage law, and the rights of property it gives; its law applicable to children. We are in the dark as to the law of majority, as to the customary law of China generally, and above all as to its law of succession. The attitude of the Court has been to let the troublesome question wait until it is definitely raised by the parties. I myself have been guilty of this, though I have rebelled more than once or twice.\n\nPage 20\n\nDuring the last half century, there have been three such enquiries, of which the results have been published. I refer, of course, to the Report of the Committee appointed in 1948,1 Greenfield's article on marriage,2 and the report and recommendations on the same subject by the Attorney General and Secretary for Chinese Affairs in 1960.2 The latter two publications do not deal with any Chinese customary law of marriage particularly obtaining in the New Territories, but the first does deal with certain aspects of Chinese customary law peculiar to the New Territories.\n\nIf a search is made of the law reports, only two cases will be found where the particular Chinese customary law obtaining in the New Territories was considered. Prima facie, that is a remarkably small number for 57 years of law reporting, and it is worthwhile probing the reasons for this dearth of case law.\n\nFirstly, the Chinese much prefer to compose their disputes or to refer them to extra-judicial arbitration than to a court of law.**\n\nSecondly, in deference to this general desire of the litigants, the District Officers arranged for the bulk of the disputes which came before them, in their Small Debts Courts or when they sat as Assistant Land Officers to decide summary land cases, to be settled out of court, most", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1995.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/95941j25g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213449, "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": 45, "title": "RAS-1995", "content_text": "12\n\nOrdinances of Hong Kong is the governing law unless its application would be unjust or oppressive when Chinese customary law may be let in. It is fortunate, therefore that there is available a most comprehensive and authoritative memorandum describing the land tenure found in the New Territories when the area was taken over from the Chinese authorities in 1899. I refer to the \"Memorandum of Land” which forms an appendix to the Report of Mr. J. H. Stewart Lockhart, Colonial Secretary and Registrar General of Hong Kong, dated 7th February 1900.\n\nChinese law regarding land is there stated to be as follows:-\n\n“Land according to Chinese tenure is held as freehold by grant from the Crown. The land comprised in the original grant can be sold by the proprietors in sub-divisions and is most usually sold in perpetuity or for 1,000 years. The proprietors record their names in the district registry as responsible for the tax, and their possession is legally secure so long as that is paid. Deeds of absolute sale have been brought in from the New Territory for registration which were made in the reign of the Emperor KA TSING and of subsequent Emperors of the Ming Dynasty (A.D. 1519 to 1626) and which have been recognised by the present dynasty. Strictly, a grant issued by the present dynasty should be attached to all grants made by the previous dynasty. The present owners under such grants are all the existing male descendants of the original grantee and in one case the proprietors now number over 700.\n\nAll land under cultivation is supposed to pay a land tax and... must be registered or is liable to confiscation. On registration stamped title deeds are issued by the District Magistrate.\n\nOfficially registered title deeds are called \"red deeds” (Hung K’ai) because they are stamped with the official stamp in red.\n\nPrivate deeds of sale are called “white deeds\" (Pak K’ai) because they are simply written on plain paper and do not bear the official red stamp; but the purchaser has the right to register his purchase and obtain a red deed.\n\nThere are also mortgages, operating as deeds of sale, redeemable\n\nPage 45\n\nPage 46", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1995.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/95941j25g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213468, "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": 64, "title": "RAS-1995", "content_text": "31\n\n* These powers of the Land Officer sprang from the New Territories (Land) Ordinance, 1905 (No. 36 of 1905).\n\n1 Such powers were originally conferred on District Officers by the New Territories Small Debts Court Ordinance, 1908 (now repealed). By agreement of the parties, District Officers, by virtue of the proviso to that section, could determine suits with subject matter up to $5,000 in value ($1,000 HK is the approximate equivalent of £62-1st in 1962 - Editor).\n\nBy the Convention of Peking, 9th June 1898 vide Laws of Hong Kong, Allibone's Edition 1913, Vol. III, pp. 6-7.\n\nibid, pp. 8-9.\n\n* § 7, Supreme Court Ordinance 1873 (now s. 5 of Cap. 4).\n\nExtracts from a Memorandum on some Legal Aspects of the Hong Kong Extension, by W. Meigh Goodman, Attorney General of Hong Kong, dated December 1898, in Hong Kong Sessional Papers 1899, p. 209 at p. 210.\n\n19 Mr. Chamberlain (then Sir Joseph) to Sir Henry A. Blake, Hong Kong Sessional Papers 1899, p. 177 at p. 178, para 5.\n\nTranslation of the Chinese Proclamation dated 9th April 1899, being Appendix IX to Sir Henry A. Blake's Report to Mr. Chamberlain dated 19th February 1900, in Hong Kong Sessional Papers 1900, p. 280.\n\nvide my article \"The Choice of Chinese Customary Law in Hong Kong\" (1962) 11 International and Comparative Law Quarterly, 231 at pp. 232-233.\n\n\"Chinese Law and Custom in Hong Kong\" Hong Kong 1953, (hereinafter cited as Committee Report 1953) Appendix 1A at p. 122.\n\n1bid, Chap. II, para. 13 at p. 8.\n\n15 Memorandum of the District Commissioner, New Territories, to the Secretary for Chinese Affairs, dated 20th March 1958. It would appear that the 17th April 1899 was the date intended (vide the Governor's Proclamation of 8th April 1899 which appeared as Appendix XX to the Governor's Report in Hong Kong Sessional Papers 1900 at pp. 291-292) to bring the Colony's laws into force in the New Territories with effect from 17th April 1899.\n\n18 (1962) 11 International and Comparative Law Quarterly 231.\n\n17 loc cit para. 6.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1995.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/95941j25g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213469, "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": 65, "title": "RAS-1995", "content_text": "32\n\nnow s 5. Cap 4\n\n10 The late Mr. G.E. Strickland in the penultimate paragraph of his Appendix I to the Committee Report, 1953\n\n20 (1910) 6 HKLR 12, at p. 53 per Sir Francis Piggott, C.J.\n\n\"Committee Report, 1953.\n\nMarriage by Chinese Law and Customs in Hong Kong, (1958) 7 International and Comparative Law Quarterly, 437\n\n2 Chinese Marriages in Hong Kong, Government Printer, Hong Kong, 1960\n\n* TANG CHOY HONG vs TANG SHING MO & OTHERS. (1949) 33 HKLR 58 (concerning succession to land see below), and CHAN PUI vs CHU YAN KIT (1950) 34 HKLR 297 (concerning agricultural tenancies)\n\n* Committee Report 1953. Chap II para 11 at pp 6-7, and Annual Departmental Report District Commissioner New Territories. 1954-55, para 72 (Hereinafter such reports are referred to as Report DCNT 19)\n\nReport, DCNT, 1950-51, para 26 and 1954-55, para 72 This attitude among the Chinese was always the reaction to litigation and possibly was born of a general distaste for their ancient judicial procedure, vide R.H. Van Gulik, T'ang-Yin-Pi-Shih \"Parallel Cases from under the Pear-tree\". Leiden. 1956, P. 58\n\n\"Report, DCNT, 1956-57, para 106\n\n16\n\nReport, DCNT, 1957-58, para 98\n\npara 43\n\n* CHEUNG Sau Tim vs CHEUNG Yo, Lam (1948) 32 HKLR 31\n\n\"vide Committee Report, 1953. Chap III, para 31\n\n\"ibid paras 34 and 40\n\nLik\n\nMemorandum of 20th March 1958, addressed to the Secretary for Chinese Affairs\n\nvide McAleavy's article \"Certain Aspects of Chinese Customary Law in the Light of Japanese Scholarship.\" BSOAS, 1955, Vol XVII Part 3. p. 535\n\nFor the customs of the land-dwelling Cantonese and Hakka I have had recourse to notes\n\n \n \n \n \n !", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1995.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/95941j25g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213645, "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": 241, "title": "RAS-1995", "content_text": "Book Review\n\n217\n\nJAMES HAYES (1996), Friends and Teachers: Hong Kong and its People, 1953-87, Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 11 chapters, appendix, glossary, index, 320 pages.\n\nJames Hayes needs little introduction to most members of the Society. He was a former editor of the Journal and President of the Council for many years. He is also an extraordinarily nice human being with a passion for bow-ties. He allegedly retired, to Bondi Beach, Australia, in 1987 but there is little evidence that he is taking this seriously. Au contraire, he continues to write prolifically for the Journal and has also added many new books to the Society's collection through his constant forays into used-book shops.\n\nAll-in-all, James spent 32 years in Hong Kong. He was a member of the Administrative Service of the Hong Kong Government from August, 1956 (he was here briefly in 1953 with the Army). Although he had the varied career that characterises the Service, he spent almost half his time in the New Territories as District Officer South (1957-62), District Officer (and Town Manager) Tsuen Wan (1975-82), and Regional Secretary, New Territories (1985-87). He was, and remains, a noted sinologist and accomplished in the Chinese language. Academically, he was very sound with a PhD from the University of London and an Honorary Doctorate of Letters bestowed by the University of Hong Kong in 1992.\n\nJames has decided to share his memories of his service in Hong Kong with us in a new book. Autobiographies by former Hong Kong Government civil servants, and by Hong Kong people generally for that matter, are relatively rare events, almost as if the majority are reluctant to write their memoirs for fear of criticism or ridicule, or have little in their careers worth writing about. James has no problem on either count. His career was rich and varied, filled with achievements and may truly be said to have added value to public life in Hong Kong. As for the telling of it, he has avoided the inclination to embark upon a literary ego trip although he is not averse to describing the highlights in detail. Few will be offended by the style.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1995.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/95941j25g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213647, "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": 243, "title": "RAS-1995", "content_text": "219\n\nwould have been rakish nonentities in their home country, and it is incontestable that there was an element of 'keeping the numbers up' in the recruitment of British expatriates by the Hong Kong Government.\n\nJames, though, was never to give anything less than a hundred per cent effort to his work and to Hong Kong in general. After a year's language training, he was posted to the Southern District Office as District Officer. His first assignment was to co-ordinate the clearing of villages soon to be immersed under the new Shek Pik Reservoir on Lantau Island. Thereafter he served with the Resettlement Department, the Secretariat for Chinese Affairs, and the Commerce and Industry Department, in addition to his posts within the City & New Territories Administration. A notable posting was as Deputy Commissioner for Labour from 1982 to 1985. The apogee of his career was as Regional Secretary, New Territories, an area and whose inhabitants he had come to know and love. His postings are remarkable in that he spent almost all of his career outside the Government Secretariat, in contrast to the norm which is generally a mixture of work in the policy branches of government and, in James' words, 'key' departments. Generally, postings to the departments, other than to the most senior positions, are not sought after.\n\nThis book will make a good, informative read for people with little knowledge of Hong Kong and its government. It is written in an informal, pleasant style and there is no impaling of former colleagues or slagging of the system, although James does start drifting towards a characterisation of the political reforms of the eighties towards the end of the book, the impression being that he was not entirely enamoured of the new scheme of things. For 'insiders', there are few surprises and the book is not, therefore, riveting, although it will bring back memories for some, though.\n\nWell done, James, a good addition to the shelves from a former leading civil servant.\n\nPETER HALLIDAY", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1995.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/95941j25g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213970, "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": 39, "title": "RAS-1997", "content_text": "4\n\naloof on his return. The present writer can vouch for his active approval of an African-inspired experiment whereby departmental administrative officers in the urban areas would collect and transmit upwards a monthly 'intelligence digest' of local opinion, morale and responses to government action or inaction, and of attitudes to prominent local figures and to Chinese or foreign affairs: this was meant to supplement what was collected in their own specialist manners by the HK Police Special Branch (SB), the New Territories Administration (NTA), the Foreign & Commonwealth Office (FCO)'s Political Adviser (PA) and the Security Liaison Officer (SLO). Some of what was collected may have been too near the knuckle, some was rather too easily discounted as mere \"gossip,\" important though that might be as a reflection of influential belief at the grass roots, and some may have hurt the dignity of those who had the existing duty of intelligence-gathering. The governor was persuaded to drop the experiment as proving trivial.\n\nBut Trench also showed interest in another interloping proposal that, in the absence of any generalist government institutions to supplement the Secretary for Chinese Affairs (SCA)'s advisory staff (who liaised with the various kai fong (Neighbourhood) Welfare Associations, Clansmens' Associations and Residents' Associations, which were often self-perpetuating), District Officers (DOs) should be appointed in the urban areas; these should have certain executive functions, fewer than those of their colleagues in the New Territories so as not to encroach on the licensing prerogatives of the Urban Council, but sufficient to ensure that all should know of their existence and, above all, of where their offices were. Primarily they should oversee and co-ordinate the activities of the various professional and technical departments in their bailiwicks, but also, like paternalistic mandarins, inquire into, report upon and seek answers to the needs and concerns of the inhabitants. This suggestion was effectively smothered by a DCS who was unable to understand what such DOs might achieve in a city that existing institutions did not already adequately do: the concept of such junior, peripheral, government officers being responsive to people, as opposed to being mere executive agents responsible for essential infrastructural public services, was alien. Apart from the SCA's and District Commissioner New Territories (DCNT)'s contacts with often self-appointed élites, there was little by way of direct exchange with the man in the street: the same DCS once said, \"Government must, of", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1997.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/wp98g7579", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213971, "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": 40, "title": "RAS-1997", "content_text": "course, think about The Little Man; it can't think about little men.\" This is not to decry what individual officers could, and usually did, do for personal complainants in specific cases.\n\nSir David Trench had his own ideas; thoughts from on high are less easily smothered than unsolicited disturbances from below. The received wisdom, which equally impressed most of the interlopers, was that since most of the population might want to return home across the border at some time, the electoral roll would be far too fluid to embrace a stable, identifiable and representable society; and that in any event direct elections to Legislative Council (Legco) were unthinkable, because they would be hi-jacked by the Communist Party of China (CPC) and the Kuomintang (KMT) from Taiwan; the fundamental Chinese political battle would then be fought out in the streets and on any hustings of Hong Kong, which the Chinese People's Republic (CPR) would never be willing to stand idly by and watch being conceivably won by Hong Kong Chinese Nationalist sympathisers. However Trench recognised that Legco was not the only possible forum for expression of popular feeling.\n\nTrench had no problems with sharing some of the lifestyle of the taipans and Chinese millionaires who were so noticeable among those traditionally appointed by governors to Exco and Legco, and whose nature he did little to change; despite the familiar jibe that he ranked third, after the taipan of the Hongkong & Shanghai Banking Corporation and the Chairman of the Royal Hong Kong Jockey Club, all knew that in the last resort he recommended the names of Executive Councillors to the Secretary of State. In his earlier days, however, he had preferred the raffish and disrespectful ambience of the multi-racial Foreign Correspondents' Club to that of the Hong Kong Club, Fanling [the Governor's official residence in the New Territories Hon. Editor] and the Jockey Club; while he enjoyed the actual sports of golf and racing for their own sakes; he never lost touch with his humbler post-war acquaintances in the Chinese community, such as his language teacher. He insisted that the introductory review chapter of one year's colonial annual report should spell out the wide sweep and valued authority of the great number of statutory, non-statutory and ad hoc committees which he believed to be a valid response to critics who would not understand why the people had no democratically elected voice in his councils. Yet his broad sympathies told him that, even so,", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1997.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/wp98g7579", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213972, "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": 41, "title": "RAS-1997", "content_text": "6\n\nordinary people could play a greater part in their own local affairs without \"rocking the boat,\" and so strengthen what was still in the 1960s a nebulous sense of identity with Hong Kong as something more than a dependent entrepôt.\n\nBill Dickinson had come to Hong Kong from West Africa as a man of good report with capacity for high office, widely experienced in local government and as right-hand man to the deputy governor of the Gold Coast (now Ghana). It may be thought that he made insufficient effort to affect the outward manners of a society that regarded itself as more sophisticated than an officer who preferred to wear khaki shorts in summer; he was generally seen as a stranger from a dark continent, and though well-liked did not move in élite circles. As Clerk of Councils and a Principal Assistant Colonial Secretary, he had held positions which gave knowledge but little power. Sir David Trench found in him an appropriate officer to assist in solving his dilemma. On 29 April 1966, he appointed Dickinson to chair a working party with the following (typically for Hong Kong detailed) terms of reference:\n\nTo explore and advise on practicable alternatives for the development of an effective and convenient system of local administration in Hong Kong which will take account of the size and complexity of the existing Urban Areas, the planned creation of new towns in the New Territories, and the different stages and development in the rural areas, with particular regard to—\n\n(a) the types of local authority which might be established and the criteria which might govern their establishment;\n\n(b) their possible composition, and the various methods of selection and tenure of office of members which might be considered;\n\n(c) the powers and functions they might have;\n\n(d) possible sources of revenue and financial powers;\n\n(e) their staff and the means by which their functions might be carried out;", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1997.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/wp98g7579", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214759, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1999", "page_number": 174, "title": "RAS-1999", "content_text": "138 \n\nThe Diary \n\nSunday 7/12/41. Much talk about war with Japan but no one seems to think anything will happen. We, the RAF in Hong Kong, are a very small crowd; seven officers and sixty men with five aircraft, two Walrus and three Vildebeeste. Group Captain Horry sails for Singapore on the Ullyses leaving Wing Commander Sullivan as our CO. I have the doubtful honour of being IC of our one and only flight and have three other pilots FO Gray, or Dolly, who is also signals officer, FO Baugh, or Whimpey, equipment officer, PO Crossley, or Junior, a New Zealander just arrived from Singapore and with very little flying experience. PO Thomson the Colonel, our adjutant, is a VR who came to Kai Tak with me from Singapore last June. Finally we have an Australian, PO Hennessy, just arrived from Singapore to start a fighter operations room. The joke is that everything is being prepared for the arrival of fighters but they are not expected for a month. With only five obsolete aircraft and one aerodrome our prospects are not rosy and it looks as if we might finish up in the army if war comes to Hong Kong. During the day the news gets worse and all precautions are taken, everyone being confined to camp. I take a Vildebeeste with full bomb load on a test climb during which I try to imagine where would be the best place to drop them and what would be my chances if attacked by fighters. But everything is peaceful and Hong Kong looks quite beautiful far beneath. We park the Walrus on the water and disperse the Beests but what wonderful targets they make. The 2nd Battalion Royal Scots and two battalions of Rajputs and Punjabis are in their positions in the New Territories, the island being defended by two battalions of Canadians raw recruits, and, only just arrived, the Middlesex Battalion man the coast defences. Finally the volunteers, four thousand Europeans, Chinese, Portuguese etc. Our Navy has one destroyer, ten MTB's and a few gunboats. Not a very formidable force especially as we shall be completely cut off from outside help and our food and ammunition supply is only sufficient for a hundred days. Still everyone seems cheerful. I am duty officer and wonder if I shall get any sleep. \n\nMonday 8th. I am disturbed early as the Colonial Secretary rings up to say that war with Japan is imminent. Hell there goes my sleep and I wake the other officers. Over breakfast we are told that we are at war with Japan. We dash down to flights just in time to hear an ominous roar of planes and nine bombers escorted by over thirty fighters", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1999.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/s178b887x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 214859, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-1999", "page_number": 274, "title": "RAS-1999", "content_text": "242\n\nAppendix\n\nA list of RASHKB day or weekend seminars organised by the Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong Branch is as follows:\n\n* 1964: 'Aspects of Social Organization in the New Territories'\n\n• 1966: 'Some Traditional Chinese Ideas and Conceptions in Hong Kong Social Life Today'\n\n* 1968: 'The Changing Face of Hong Kong'\n\n• 1970: 'The Vegetation of Hong Kong-Structure and Change'\n\n• 1972: 'Hong Kong: the Interaction of Traditions and Life in the Towns'\n\n• 1973: 'The Fauna of Hong Kong'\n\n• 1982: 'The New Territories and Its Future'\n\n• 1988: (RASHKB) 'Looking Ahead/Reorganisation'\n\nNote: For those seminars listed above marked with a bullet, booklets containing papers presented and other details may be obtained from the RASHKB Assistant Secretary. Prices vary from HK$75.00 to $100.00", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1999.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/s178b887x", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215281, "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": 58, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "6\n\nStraits Settlements, but not to Hong Kong. The governor protested to the Colonial Office at Hong Kong's exclusion in 1907, 1910 and 1912 but the Canadian government refused to include Hong Kong within its preferential tariff on the grounds that goods from China might be shipped through Hong Kong's open port and fraudulently obtain the benefit of Canada's preferential tariff.\" So Hong Kong's exports of cement and refined sugar were taxed at the highest rate and soon lost their market in Canada. In 1912 a trade agreement was negotiated between Canada and the West Indian colonies whereby Canadian exports were granted preferential tariffs in return for Canadian preferences on Caribbean cane sugar, cocoa beans and lime juice. The West Indian colonies negotiated this trade agreement directly with Canada and the secretary of state for the colonies raised no objection. These preferences were increased by a new trade agreement in 1920 and were generalised to benefit goods from all empire sources.20 The Colonial Office invited all colonies and protectorates to consider the practicability of introducing preferential rates of duty for goods of imperial origin. But most of the colonial empire was prevented by international treaties from imposing discriminatory tariffs. Northern Rhodesia, Kenya and Uganda, being part of the Congo Basin, were forbidden to discriminate by the Convention of St. Germain (1919); Nigeria and the Gold Coast by the Anglo-French treaty of 1898; and Tanganyika, Togoland, Cameroons and Palestine were mandated territories of the League of Nations which prohibited discrimination. By 1932 the only colonies which were free to adopt imperial preference but had not done so were Somaliland, Ceylon, the Straits Settlements, Hong Kong and certain islands in the Pacific.\" Canada and New Zealand were the only dominions which granted any preferences to the colonial empire before 1932. Australia, South Africa, Newfoundland, Southern Rhodesia and India granted none.\n\nThe world trade depression which began in 1929 convinced British politicians that the liberal principles of free trade which had been followed for the past 70 years must be abandoned. The National government elected in 1931 quickly passed the Import Duties Act which imposed a general duty of 10 per cent ad valorem on all imports. Section 5 of the act granted an entire exemption from the general duty to imports from all colonies, protectorates and mandated territories, provided that at least 25 per cent of the value was derived from materials grown or produced or from work done within a part of the empire.\" Imports from the dominions and India were exempted from duty only until November pending the outcome of an Imperial Economic Conference.\" A circular despatch was sent by the Colonial Office to all colonies and protectorates drawing attention to the great advantages extended to the colonies by the Import Duties Act and inviting them to give similar preferences to United Kingdom manufactures", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215283, "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": 60, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "preferences granted to British goods, to increase the margin of preference on a few specific items and to review the level of existing tariffs which protected dominion manufactures against British goods. The dominions approved tariff preferences on specified colonial goods, mostly tropical agricultural products, asphalt, rum and cigars. Each dominion offered a different list of concessions to the colonies and not all were equally generous. South Africa granted preferences only on raw coffee and asphalt. Canada gave little more than the preferences already embodied in the 1920 trade agreement with the West Indian colonies.\" New Zealand was the only dominion which agreed to grant preferences at the same rates as were accorded to Britain to all the colonies and protectorates. The agreements with the dominions provided that the preferences accorded to British goods might be extended to the colonies, protectorates and mandated territories ‘if His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom so request'. All these preferences were for British manufactured goods. The development of manufacturing industry in the colonies was not anticipated by the governments represented at Ottawa. If it had been foreseen it is probable that the dominion governments would have raised strong objections to admitting goods manufactured under oriental conditions to their markets under a tariff designed to benefit British manufacturers.28\n\nAfter the Ottawa conference a circular despatch was sent to all colonies and dependent territories setting out the tariff preferences which would be granted by the dominions to colonial exports of foodstuffs and raw materials.\" These preferences would give the dependencies a reasonable prospect of replacing foreign imports by imports from empire sources in the dominion markets concerned. In return the dependent territories were 'invited' to grant to the dominions the preferences which the colonial secretary had negotiated at Ottawa. Cunliffe-Lister made clear that it was a matter of the highest importance that the Ottawa settlement should be put into effect as an integral whole.\n\nI should feel that I had been guilty of a breach of faith if the legislature concerned refused to grant the preference in question, unless I could put to the dominion government concerned clear evidence that there were really substantial reasons for not granting the proposed preference. It would not be an adequate ground of objection to say that the desired preference might increase the local cost of living, so long as the increase was only moderate and did not cause hardship to a particularly poor class of the community.\n\nGovernors prepared the necessary legislation for introduction into the colonial legislatures, but a number warned the Colonial Office that they\n\nPage 60\n\nPage 61", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215294, "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": 71, "title": "RAS-2001", "content_text": "19\n\nvery useful in the depression, and the factory would provide employment for 100 Africans.\" Hong Kong was also seen as a special case where the decline of the entrepôt trade with China justified the policy of fostering industrial development. After much discussion the only specific recommendation made by the committee was that when a protective tariff was granted an excise duty equivalent to the import duty should always be imposed. The final report of the committee was never published and apparently was never considered by the cabinet.\n\nSo the Colonial Office continued to vet proposals for new industries according to the guidelines laid down in the 1934 Report, that manufacturing should not be 'artificially encouraged'. Officials were concerned to safeguard colonial revenues at a time when most colonies were in financial difficulties as a result of the world depression. The Colonial Office insisted that budgets must be balanced, to avoid the need for a grant from the British government and the consequent Treasury control of the colony's finances. The Colonial Office had no money available in its own account to subsidise ingenious schemes, such as a project put forward by an entrepreneur from Trinidad to produce newsprint paper from bagasse and to power the factory with anhydrous alcohol distilled from sugar cane juice.70 Governors could apply for funds from the Colonial Development Advisory Committee which provided £36,500,000 for development assistance from 1929 to 1939. But this fund was originally set up to alleviate unemployment in Britain and no application for industrial development would be entertained which would be likely to compete with British industry.? Officials believed that by discouraging uneconomic industrial development they were acting in the best interests of the native inhabitants. An assistant secretary minuted, 'Manufacturing industry, which can be established in a colony only at the price of a monopoly protected by a high tariff, ends in producing a locally manufactured article which is too expensive for the primary agricultural producers to buy.' Governors were more suspicious of the motives of Colonial Office officials. The governor of Sierra Leone complained that any industrial project was approached from the standpoint that British trade interests must rank first, dominions' interests second and those of the colonies last. Perhaps the fairest summary of Colonial Office policy was made by a junior official: 'Generally speaking we do not want to encourage industrial development in the colonial empire, but we are reluctant to go so far as actually to prohibit it.'\"\n\nWhy then was it that Hong Kong was able to develop a flourishing export-oriented industry without any subsidy or assistance from the colonial government whatsoever when in all the other dependent territories the development of manufacturing industry was derisory, and the few factories that were established were heavily dependent on protective tariffs, special", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2001.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/zg651950g", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215836, "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-2002", "page_number": 135, "title": "RAS-2002", "content_text": "68\n\nAll associations were required to be registered under the Societies Ordinance of the Laws of Hong Kong or as limited companies under the Companies Ordinance. Partly because of this, another duty undertaken by officials was to attend or officiate at the inaugurations of new terms of office-bearers, including administration of an oath of office to the new incumbents. This was particularly the case with the rural committees and the kaifong welfare associations, which (as major channels of communication with the local public) had close links with, and came under the supervision of, the District Commissioner, New Territories, and the Secretary for Chinese Affairs and their senior staff in the districts.1\n\nDuring my fifteen years in the New Territories Administration (NTA), and five more in the Secretariat for Chinese Affairs (SCA, which later became the Home Affairs Department or HAD) both of them to be described as \"political\" departments whose staff had direct dealings with the public, we were also in contact with a miscellany of other community bodies, including the many clansmen's (same name) and district (same place) associations, in both town and country. From the early 1970s, these were joined by the government-sponsored and assisted Mutual Aid Committees, of which large numbers were formed across the whole territory.\n\nThose officials with district responsibilities (including police), were invited to all major local functions as a matter of course, and the officiating officers were either the District Officers, or their superiors in headquarters or in concerned departments. I attended a great many functions during my service in various departments, and thus became familiar with their way of conducting them. This hardly varied, the difference being mainly a matter of degree and extent, depending on the importance of the bodies concerned and the nature and significance of their events.\n\nThe Nature of the proceedings\n\nA marked formality characterized all their occasions. The ceremonies followed set procedures, and each stage was introduced by a\n\n1 For anyone wishing to learn more, the index to Friends and Teachers indicates where information concerning these and other Chinese associations, and their interaction with government departments during my service (1956-87) can be found.\n\nPage 135\n\nPage 136", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215912, "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-2002", "page_number": 211, "title": "RAS-2002", "content_text": "145\n\nand started to work on what he loved - studying local history.\n\nso I\n\n“By nature I'm a local historian,” said Hase. \"It's just nearly impossible to do it here for the 7th century English history started looking at local history.\"\n\nHase briefly removed his glasses and seemed to look different from the way he had the last 30 years, with glasses. Because of those spectacles, I was able to stumble upon the academic in the 1984 edition of \"Who's Who in Hong Kong.” In it is a picture of Hase with a bit thicker hair, but essentially looking very much the same.\n\n\"I have no idea how I got in there,” said Hase who was at the time one of many civil servants listed. \"I guess they just wanted all civil servants of a certain rank to be included.\"\n\nHase was listed as principal assistant secretary to home affairs and his boss Dr. James Hayes, also was listed in the book. It was through Dr. Hayes\n\n- a past president and previous editor of the RAS Journal that Hase got involved with the Society. Hase joined the RAS in 1980; he became a member of its Council in 1981 and served as honorary editor. But Hase said he was not a very good editor. When he took over, they had fallen behind by a year and a half, and later on, that was extended to three years.\n\n\"I was a good editor in doing the editing when I could get myself to do it, but I hated the work so the journals got horribly, horribly delayed... Eventually I did it, and I did it well.”\n\nHe edited seven journals and two books for the RAS. Hase has himself published over 30 articles on life in the New Territories, customs, Fung Shui and pure history. Hase's next article, on Ngau Tse Wan Village, will be published in Vol. 39 of the journal.\n\nMost of Hase's subjects were born between 1910 and 1920; those people that still remember how the New Territories was before major changes wrought by increased settlement between 1915 and 1925. But in another 10 years Hase likely will not have any sources left for his research.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2002.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278", "rank": 0 } ]