[ { "id": 212479, "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": 33, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "13\n\nto succeed him as chief comprador to Butterfield & Swire. However, Yang went into bankruptcy after a Shanghai financial crisis and left a debt of a hundred thousand taels to Butterfield & Swire. As the guarantor, Zheng was accused by the company and as a result he was imprisoned in Hong Kong for a few months. Zheng's business activities were not only confined to Shanghai, he had also been active in Canton. He had been in charge of the branch of Kaiping Coal Mines in Canton from 1891 and also of the Canton-Hankow Railway Co. Moreover, the first Chamber of Commerce in Canton was organised by him in 1905.\n\nXu Run, Tang Tingshu and Zheng Guanying, all came from the same place, Zhongshan prefecture, and shared the same experience in compradorial life and took part in the guandu shangban enterprises under the patronage of Li Hongzhang. Needless to say, they had all chosen Shanghai as the place to develop their careers. They could be regarded as leaders of the Cantonese community in Shanghai. Amongst the three persons, Xu Run was the earliest and youngest in arriving in Shanghai, Tang was regarded as the oldest, he arrived in Shanghai in 1858 aged 27, he had probably been educated and started his career earlier in Hong Kong for a long period. However, though Tang started his compradorial life later, it did not hamper his contribution to modern economic development of China. Tang joined the Kaiping Coal Mines from its beginning and remained with it until the end of his life. After Tang had been engaged in guandu shangban enterprises, particularly in the Kaiping Coal Mines, he confined his business activities mainly to Tianjin, while Xu and Zheng were still active in Shanghai, Canton and Hong Kong.\n\nAn obvious example was the nationalization project of China Merchants' Steam Navigation Co. advocated by Sheng's political rival Yuan Shikai in 1909. Considering Xu was from Yuan's clique and able to use his strong influence in Hong Kong and Macau, Zheng was sent by Sheng to compete with Xu in soliciting the support of Cantonese shareholders in Canton, Hong Kong and Macau in opposition to the nationalization project. Xu and Zheng at that time were backing their own patrons. Xu was pro-Yuan whereas Zheng was pro-Sheng. As a result, Zheng defeated Xu in gaining the support of Cantonese shareholders and successfully kept the company private. It was incorporated as a limited company in 1909.\n\n15\n\nConnection of Cantonese Merchants\n\nMerchants were among the first Cantonese to emigrate to Macau and", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212489, "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": 43, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "23\n\nCloth Mill in 1879. They were regarded as merchants willing to take risks in adventurous undertakings, however, some of them lost money from pouring capital in modern enterprises and some even went bankrupt by speculating.\n\nXu Run (1838-1911)\n\nXu was the earliest, before Tang and Zheng, to come to Shanghai for business and trade as a comprador. In 1852, at the age of 15 Xu left his hometown Zhongshan, trade as a comprador. In 1852, at the age of 15 Xu left his hometown Zhongshan, transited through Macau and Hong Kong to Shanghai where he lived with his uncle Xu Yuting who was working at the Dent & Company in Shanghai (the first Western firm to open a branch in Shanghai) as a comprador. Xu entered Dent & Co. through his uncle's connection. Four years later Xu was promoted from a trainee (as Xu himself stated, he first learnt the tea and silk trade when entering the Company) to an assistant comprador and finally in 1861, he succeeded his uncle as the comprador. His diligent performance was greatly admired by the manager of Dent & Co., E. Webb. From Xu's autobiography, we are able to assess the wealth of a Cantonese comprador in Shanghai accumulated during his compradorial years and also as an independent merchant in which his business investment included various modern enterprises. Furthermore, his autobiography also tells of his complicated relations with Sheng Xuanhuai and Yuan Shikai as well as a part of his personal family history.\n\n30\n\nIn 1868, Xu Run left Dent & Co. and started his own business. He opened the Baoyuanxiang Tea House. The name itself manifested a tea trade business. By 1883, Xu had accumulated a personal wealth of 3,409,423.3 taels.\n\nItem\n\nTable 4\n\nAssets Owned by Xu Run in 1883\n\n \n Item\n Amount (taels)\n %\n \n \n Landed property in Shanghai\n 2,236,940.0\n 65.61\n \n \n Miscellaneous stocks\n 426,912.0\n 12.52\n \n \n Capital in pawnshops\n 348,571.3\n 10.22\n \n \n Shares in custody\n 397,000.0\n 11.64\n \n \n Total\n 3,409,423.3\n 99.90\n \n\nSource: Ku Run, Qing Xu Yuzhi Kiansheng Run Zixu Nianpu, pp 67-8", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 212500, "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": 54, "title": "RAS-1991", "content_text": "34\n\nChan Kin Tong 陳健堂 Cheang Hoong WA Chen Xuyuan 陳照元 Ding Richang TRS Guo Piao 郭標\n\nHo Kai 何啟\n\nHo Tung 何東\n\nHuang Huan'nan #\n\nJian Dongfu 簡東甫\n\nGlossary\n\nWu Jianzhang f Xu Rongcun 徐榮村 Xu Run 徐潤 Xu Yuting 徐鈺亭 Yuan Shikai 袁世凱 Zheng Guanying\n\nZheng Tingjiang\n\nBaoyuanxiang 寶源祥\n\nZuo Zongtang E\n\nLaw Pak Sheung\n\nA\n\nBendi 本地\n\nLaw Sai Nam 劉世南\n\nLee Chak 李澤\n\nguandu-shangban\n\nLeung Xiu 梁喬 Li Hing 李慶\n\nLi Hongzhang 李鴻章 Lo Hok Pang #09 Ng A Cheong AS\n\nO Kee Cheung 柯其祥 Sheng Xuanhuai 盛宣懷 Soong Xe 宋琪\n\nSung Chin Tseung\n\nTong Mow Chee #\n\nTong Ying Shu (Xing Sing)\n\n唐廷樞(景星)\n\nWei Kwong #*\n\nWei Yuk 韋玉\n\nDanjia 晉家 #\n\nGuang Yang Xing 廣陽興\n\nGuang Zhao Gongsuo 廣肇公所 Heshengxiang #\n\nhuashang fugu huodong HÆ!\n\nKejia 客家\n\nlianhao 聯號\n\nO Chin Sin Tong\n\nQing Xu Yuzhi Xiansheng Run\n\nZixu Nianpu\n\n清徐雨之先生潤自序年譜\n\nSanyi 三邑\n\nShiyi 四邑\n\ntongxiang hui 同鄉會\n\nZongban 總辦\n\nWong Kong 黄亞廣\n\nReferences\n\nCheng, T C. 1969 Chinese Unofficial Members of the Legislative and Executive Councils\n\nin Hong Kong In Journal of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society 9: 1-30\n\nChoi, Chi-cheung 1991 Cong difangzhi kan Xiangshan xian difang shili de zhuanbian (The influence of migration in Xiangshan county as viewed from local gazetteers) In Zhongguo Shehui Jingjishi Yanjiu 1991/1: 60-8\n\n1993. Competition among Brothers: the Kun Tye Lung Company and its Associate Companies, Unpublished paper presented at the Workshop on Chinese Business Houses in Southeast Asia since 1870 School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1991.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/k356gt84j", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213174, "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": 242, "title": "RAS-1993", "content_text": "224\n\nREVIEW NOTES\n\nThe following publications briefly noted here have been received from the publishers.\n\nWEI PEH TI\n\nBonavia, David, China's Warlords, Hong Kong: Oxford University Press, 1995.\n\nThis paperback of the Oxford in Asia series represents the 'last contribution to Chinese studies' made by David Bonavia. Bonavia, who died in 1988, was a respected journalist on Asia and especially China, first reporting for the London Times, then commenting for the Far Eastern Economic Review. He was the author of several books on China as well, informing and explaining to readers all over the world the events of the turbulent years of the 1960s and 1970s. Always writing in a hard-hitting style but clearly with compassion and understanding of the Chinese, Bonavia completed this manuscript on the Chinese warlords before his death at the age of 48. His widow, Judy, brought out this volume but asserts that all the work had been done by Bonavia. For this work Bonavia looked backwards to the 1920s when the military governors of the provinces, known as the warlords, legacies of the Yuan Shikai era, devastated the country. They were always looked upon as a hungry bloc of blood-thirsty power seekers, but here Bonavia looks at them as individual human beings.\n\nChoy, Philip P, Lorraine Dong, and Marlon K Hom, The Coming Man: 19th Century American Perceptions of the Chinese, Hong Kong: Joint Publishing, 1994.\n\nThis publication comprises a collection of political and editorial cartoons of the Chinese in the United States that had been published in American journals and newspapers during the 19th century. The authors, all scholars in the field of Chinese-American studies, have included a chronology of the Chinese in America, a respectable bibliography, and a bi-lingual glossary in English and Chinese. This work is not just for students interested in the Chinese in the United States, it is for all readers to savour the flavour of being a Chinese immigrant in America. In perusing the clear text and superb reproductions of the cartoons, time is in suspense.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1993.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/66833t302", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213871, "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-1996", "page_number": 223, "title": "RAS-1996", "content_text": "197\n\n3) Politics, like other business investments, is risky but potentially profitable. It is very much the case in financing a government while trying to satisfy vested interests.\n\nMarket for Political Investments\n\nThis raises the question of under what circumstances financing a regional government is possible? A convenient starting point is to look into the mentality of the time. In a despatch to the Colonial Office, C. Clementi, the Governor of Hong Kong and a famous sinologist who graduated from Oxford, diagnosed a decade of unsuccessful British policy toward China by saying:\n\nA China united under a central Government is not applicable to the facts... China is a civilization, not a state\n\nHis contemporary also commented that\n\nIf Italy was but a geographical expression, China until very recent times has been but a social expression. China has been a society, not a state; and a Chinese, a familial not a political animal.\n\nIn a polity as large as China, regional distinctions are enormous, but these contemporaries believed that the split was between Canton and Beijing. In the book, “Oriental Trade Methods” one finds the following passage:\n\nI observed that the Cantonese have been called the Irish of China. They are traditionally and by temperament against the government, against the constituted authority of Peking [Beijing]...\n\nThe Beijing government was first under Yuan Shikai and his followers who were recruited from his Beiyang Military Academy. After Yuan's death, his followers divided into several camps such as Anhui and Zhili. They were named the \"Beiyang militarists\". The Canton government, nominally, was under Sun Yat-sen. Without an army of its own, until 1924 when the Huangpu Military Academy was established with Soviet aid, Sun and his Canton government had to rely on the \"guest armies\" from neighboring provinces - the Yunnan and the Guangxi troops, all of whom proved to be ungovernable.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1996.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/3n209j641", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 213876, "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-1996", "page_number": 228, "title": "RAS-1996", "content_text": "202\n\nstate through the mandarinate and extended downward. Dependence on the favour of aristocratic protection found in Europe was represented in China by dependence on the favour of personified officialdom from the central extending all the way down to the localities. Accordingly, the rivalry within central officialdom would extend downward to their protégés in the local regions. The Cantonese experience can illustrate this point.\n\nAs such \"reform-minded\" officials such as Li Hongzhang and Zhang Zhidong were competing for national influence, their protégés recruited in the provinces were also competing among themselves. After the opening of Shanghai and Tianjin, increasing numbers of men from Ningpo and Zhejiang were appointed compradores of western firms or advisors to the reform-minded officials. Even within the Cantonese group, some were more influential than others.\n\nIn terms of national influence, those Cantonese engaged in economic reforms always gained the upper hand from those engaged in legal reforms. As shall be seen, for those Cantonese engaged in economic reform (from Tang Jingxing to his nephew Tang Shaoyi, and through him to Liang Shiyi), they eventually advanced to positions in Beijing and monopolized the influential Board of Communications, which commanded huge economic resources in steamships, railways, mining and telegraph. This group of Cantonese was known as the Communications Clique. Their interests were vested in a China united under the central control of Beijing. This partly explains why Liang Shiyi and his clique were willing to finance Yuan Shikai's government after 1911, as well as his monarchical movement in 1916.\n\nThose Cantonese advisors such as Wu Tingfang and Ho Kai (He Qi) who were engaged in legal and diplomatic reforms, had not established their power base in Beijing and so eventually they based their influence in south China. After all, they were appointed Legislative Councillors in Hong Kong, the highest political posts that the Hong Kong Chinese could expect. They were sympathetic to the revolutionary activities in south China. As shall be seen, they sided with Guangdong in reform, in revolution, and in independence. Remarkably, both the Communications Clique and the \"legal-reform group\" turned out to be political patrons for competing groups of Cantonese merchants in Hong Kong.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1996.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/3n209j641", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 215041, "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-2000", "page_number": 137, "title": "RAS-2000", "content_text": "93\n\nWaters, D. D: The Chinese labour Corps in the First World War : Labourers buried in France : Journal of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society: Vol. 35 : 1995\n\nThe Commonwealth War Graves Commission,\n\n2 Marlow Road, Maidenhead, Berkshire, SL6 7DX\n\nUnited Kingdom\n\nTel: 44-1628 634221 Fax: 44-1628 771208\n\nImperial War Museum\n\nNOTES\n\n1\n\n3\n\nLambeth Road, London, SE1 6HZ Tel. 020 7416 5000\n\nLiang Shiyi (1869-1933). Chinese government official and financier. Under the Qing government, amongst his financial dealings, he helped found the Bank of Communications (1907). He was President of the Board of Communications (1912), Chief Secretary in the Presidential Office and General Manager of the Bank of Communications, acting Finance Minister (1913-1915); Director-General of the National Revenue Administration and Director-General of the Domestic Loans Office. He was linked with Yuan Shikai and in 1916 fled to Hong Kong. He formed the Wei Min Corporation for the recruitment of Chinese labourers to serve in France, as a proponent of China's entry into the war. Returning to Beijing in 1918, he was made Chairman of the Board of the Bank of Communications; Speaker of the National Assembly; Director of the Domestic Loan Bureau (1920); and Prime Minister (1921-1922). After exile (1922-1925) he again served in the Beijing Government under both Duan Jirui and Zhang Zuolin. He retired to Hong Kong in 1928 after the Northern Expedition reached Beijing.\n\nThis was usually referred to by “real” soldiers as the Crosse and Blackwells, as this British provision company had a very similar crest.\n\nLt Col. Bryan Charles Fairfax, a Yorkshireman, was born on 12th September 1873, the second son of Col. T.F. (or L?) Fairfax of the Grenadier Guards and passed through the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, being commissioned on 8th March 1893 into the Durham Light Infantry (DLI). He was posted to the 2nd Battalion, then serving in India. In 1898 he volunteered for service with the newly raised 1 Battalion, The Chinese Regiment of Infantry, stationed in Weihai", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/nk328168n", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216424, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2003", "page_number": 183, "title": "RAS-2003", "content_text": "133\n\nContraband of ordinary commodities such as flour, clothes, etc., may be transported at the risk of the owners, to the ports of belligerent countries.\n\nIn the event of the necessity arising of landing any cargo passing through a Chinese port, the same will be landed and stored at the expense of the owners.\"\n\nArguments arose over whether foodstuffs being exported from China to Japan for consumption by civilians should be considered as contraband of war as they could be used for military purposes. It was agreed that with formal consular certificates, certifying that the goods were not destined for the theatre of war, and stating clearly that the goods were shipped at the owners' risk; foodstuffs could be exported to Japan.\n\nThe day-to-day involvement of the Chinese population and their reaction to foreign soldiers\n\nTheir land and people suffered hardships, casualties, and financial losses without any thought being given to them by the Westerners or the combatants. It has been quite surprising just how few references to China and the Chinese there were in contemporary Western writings.\n\nChinese physical involvement was marginal. Apart from individuals being employed by both sides as spies, bands of Chinese mounted guerrillas were employed by both belligerents; some under Japanese leadership made Russian lines of communication dangerous and effectively tied down ever larger Russian forces. Yuan Shikai, the Viceroy of Chih-li, turned a blind eye to these and similar activities and made every effort to co-operate with the Japanese. Although the Russians were aware of this policy, there was little they could do about it. They did, however, take it out on any individual or groups of Chinese in territories under their control who appeared in any way acting for or sympathising with the Japanese.\n\nBritish illustrated periodicals tended to portray Chinese as ‘exotic and different, something sinister or inferior.' The same journals included not only sketches from their correspondents capturing the gruesome nature of the war in all its chaos, cruelty, and destruction but also photographic images.", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216441, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2003", "page_number": 200, "title": "RAS-2003", "content_text": "150 battalions of Hunanese soldiers in the New Town. The Chinese Minister in St. Petersburg was instructed to demand an explanation. They were quietly withdrawn at the end of the war.\n\nIn April 1905 Russian troops marched through Chinese neutral territory, paying no heed to Chinese protests, although as it was reported in the western press at the time it appeared that the Chinese Government was at last making some effort to resist Russian intrigues, possibly realising that the Japanese were more than likely to be the final victors in the war.\n\nAt about the same time Secretary Hay in Washington proposed to the Powers to renew their pledges as to the 'open door' and integrity of China. When Britain, Germany, Italy and the others had all replied moral pressure was imposed in the interest of Chinese neutrality. The Russians responded with an announcement that they had positive proof of Chinese violations of their neutrality and that unless China refrained from further such acts Russia would have to act in her own interests.\n\nDuring May reports were received of Russian plans to march their troops across Mongolia to checkmate a Japanese flanking movement, thus violating China's neutrality. Fears among western diplomats that this was the first step towards annexation of Chinese territory opened up once more the question of the partition of China.\n\nAlso in May 1905 it would appear from various semi-official reports that Chinese mandarins along the coast of south China and in the vicinity of the mouth of the Yangzi were warned to ensure that their military forces were alert during the passage of the Russian Baltic fleet towards the China Sea. The orders required the Chinese military to prevent, wherever possible, Russian infringement of Chinese neutrality.\n\nChinese fears that vanquished Russians might invade Chinese territory to avoid being taken prisoner by the Japanese, led to the rumour that the Viceroy of the metropolitan province of Chih-li, Yuan Shikai, had been proposed as Generalissimo of all Chinese Land and Sea Forces.\n\nChinese temples and monasteries as military accommodation\n\nBoth Russian and Japanese forces used Chinese public buildings", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390", "rank": 0 }, { "id": 216443, "series_id": 26, "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine", "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊", "series_use_hku_proxy": false, "document_key": "RAS-2003", "page_number": 202, "title": "RAS-2003", "content_text": "152\n\nemulate. The long term result was a higher standard of living in Japanese-occupied Manchuria than in China proper, leading to an increase of Chinese migrants from China proper. Many of the gentry and students had had contacts with Japan down the years and saw Japan as an alternative to life under the rapidly decaying Manchu Chinese dynasty in Peking. Sir Robert Hart, the IG of Chinese Maritime Customs, made an interesting comment when he referred to militarism having taken root in China following Japan's victory, particularly with the call on Chinese Princes and Nobles to send their sons and brothers to military schools.\n\nBy October 1905 Hart wrote that the Commission for Army Reorganisation, established in 1903 under the stimulus of the impending Russo-Japanese War, hastened the modernisation of the Chinese Army. 'Chinese military manoeuvres were over. The new troops were pronounced an immense improvement on anything before seen in China - stout men, well paid and well-dressed, strict discipline willingly obeyed, arms in good condition, and officers who are really soldiers and not merely be-buttoned mandarins with fans in their hands instead of swords. Even Yuan (Shikai), the Viceroy, and Tich Liang, the military chief of the War Bureau, got out of their Chinese robes and put on gold-laced trousers and jackets, etc.'\n\nJapan's victory over Russia led to Kaiser Wilhelm repeating the warning against the 'Yellow Peril,' whilst Japanese perception of a 'White Peril' in Asia reflected their concern with European and American penetration of China.\n\nThe Russo-Japanese War opened a new chapter in world history; however, Manchuria remained in Japanese hands until the end of World War II in 1945 when finally it reverted to China.\n\nPostscript\n\nA subject that might justify further research emanates from the inability of seasonal labour from Shandong province to cross over to Manchuria during the hostilities. This raises the question whether the Chinese labour shipped down to South Africa to work in the mines in the Transvaal in 1904 was a consequence and thus an act of desperation on the part of the labour force? (even though the initial decision to", "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2003.txt", "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/2v242g390", "rank": 0 } ]