RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1974
https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/x633mp077
NOTES AND QUERIES

THE EUROPEAN GRAVE ON SHEK KWU CHAU, HONG KONG

Sacred

To the Memory of Elizabeth Ann The Beloved Wife of

Capt. A. McIntyre

Who Died at Sea

21st of October, 1845

on Board the Ship “Castle Huntly” Aged 23 Years and 9 Days.

These words appear on a granite tombstone situated near the N.W. shoreline of Shek Kwu Chau, an island about two miles west of Cheung Chau. The island was generally barren and uninhabited until 1963, and the existence of the stone and inscription was unknown except, perhaps, to local fishermen. An old name for the island was Coffin Island, and it is tempting to think that the name was derived from this grave.

The island was taken over in 1962 by the Society for the Aid and Rehabilitation of Drug Addicts and it was quite by chance that a member of the staff, while exploring the territory, stumbled on the grave.

Since then several people have made attempts to trace the history of the "Castle Huntly”, but it was not until recently that any firm information came to light. An Australian friend, after visiting Shek Kwu Chau, thought of contacting the Board of Trade in Cardiff and they were able to provide the following details.

The "Castle Huntly” (or “Castle Huntley") was a three-masted wooden carvel of just over thirteen hundred tons, built at the Port of Calcutta and owned jointly by Thomas Garland Murray of London and John Paterson of Castle Huntley, North Britain. John Paterson was her first Master. Later she passed through the hands of various owners and, in 1838, was re-registered at Bombay.
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RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1986
https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063
163

The boys were received into the home of Dr. Legge's father in Huntley, Scotland. Here they attended the parish school. While Dr. Legge was going about England and Scotland telling about his work in China, the Rev. Mr. Hill, minister of the chapel at Huntley, superintended the general and religious education of the boys. As sometimes happens to young people who find themselves in an alien culture, they responded to the expectations and subtle pressures of their hosts and were baptised in October 1847.

Their baptism created great interest in England and Scotland and was widely reported. The fact that the boys were baptised in the same church from which William Milne, the first Principal of the Anglo Chinese College, had gone forth to China, made their baptism seem particularly significant.

A report of the event notes: “A deep hush pervaded the whole of the vast assembly, which the occasion had brought together. Hundreds of eyes glistened. Hundreds of hearts thrilled with emotions of love and praise."

Not only did it raise the expectations and vision of England, but it also acted in a similar manner on the boys themselves. Dr. Legge states that "they were full of schemes for the benefit of their countrymen — thinking and talking of the various ways in which they can render the knowledge they have acquired available to others."

Not long after their baptism, Dr. Legge took them on a trip through England preparatory to their return to Hongkong. The trip was intended to increase interest and support for the work in Hongkong.

The boys made a triumphal tour down from Scotland, thronged Manchester, to London. Everywhere public meetings were held. Crowds thronged to see and hear the young men. With these living examples of the success of his school, Dr. Legge found it easy to raise funds to support a theological class to be opened in connection with his Hongkong school.

Meeting followed meeting, excitement followed excitement, and climax followed climax. Both Dr. Legge and the boys found

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RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1986
https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/jq08c7063
223

In Canton were two small machine shops where foot engines and automatic tools were used to make such articles as screws and cylinder wheels. Nearby was a printery with a machine press and movable type.

Tailors and seamstresses were using American sewing machines, probably Singers, in spite of the opposition of the tailors guild.

Canton was also showing progress architecturally. Glass was replacing oyster shells in windows, venetian blinds took the place of shutters.

A few shops even had plate glass windows. Their interiors were adorned with elaborate kerosene lighted chandeliers and ornamental clocks ticked away the hours.

Foreign-style furniture was invading the living quarters of the prosperous merchant,

In shops, even in areas where foreigners were seldom seen, one could buy such familiar European products as Huntley and Palmer's biscuits, Bass' beer, Eau de Cologne and Florida Water, Keatings cough lozenges and worm tablets.

As the report put it, shop shelves had home brands and familiar labels of “foreign eatables, drinkables, smellables, and seeables.”

Waxing poetic but with an air of superiority, the article concluded: "These are the first buddings of that graft of our Western civilisation which after many failures is beginning slowly and unostentatiously to transform a dry and withered stock into a new life and verdure ere long to bear blossom and fruit.”

Ho A-mei was one of the pioneers of the process.

OUTSPOKEN HO A-MEI

Ho A-mei left his position with the Kwangtung customs administration about 1877 and returned to Hongkong where he became

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