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T. C. CHENG

uneventful one, and he was noted for his co-operative attitude towards Government policies. This at least had the merit of demonstrating that no hazard was likely to result from having a Chinese representative permanently on the Legislative Council. When his six-year term was up in 1890, he asked not to be re-appointed, and a very prominent "local boy", Dr. Ho Kai (later Sir Kai Ho Kai) succeeded him.

Dr. Ho Kai, born in Hong Kong in 1859, was the fourth son of the Rev. Ho Tsun-shin (alias Ho Fuk-tong) of the London Missionary Society. Having studied Chinese for several years, he was admitted to Class 4 of the Central School in 1870 at the age of 12. He was an extremely clever and hardworking boy for, according to the school record, he was already in Class 1, the top form, in September 1871. He completed his studies at the Central School the following year, and proceeded to Palmer House School, Margate, England. From there he entered St. Thomas' Medical and Surgical College and received the degrees of Bachelor of Medicine and Master of Surgery from the University of Aberdeen in 1879. In the same year, he was admitted as a member of the Royal College of Surgeons of England by examination. He then turned to the study of law and was admitted to Lincoln's Inn in May 1879. He was Senior Equity Scholar, Lincoln's Inn, in 1881 in which year he passed the finals with flying colours and also married a charming English girl, Alice, the eldest daughter of the late John Walkden of Blackheath. On his return to Hong Kong in 1882 with his newly-wedded wife, he first practised medicine but was unsuccessful, because the Chinese at that time were not prepared to avail themselves of western medical treatment unless it was offered free. He then turned to the Bar and since 1882 had practised as a barrister in Hong Kong.

Until his death in 1914, Dr. Ho Kai rendered his services freely and ungrudgingly to the Hong Kong community. For many years he was a valuable member of many important committees, including the Standing Law Committee, the Public Works Committee, the Examination Board, the Medical Board, the Sanitary Board, the Po Leung Kuk Committee, the Tung Wah Hospital Advisory Committee, the District Watch Force Committee, the Architects' Advisory Board and the Advisory Committee of the Hong Kong Technical Institute. For 26 years he was a Justice of the Peace and for 25 years he represented the Chinese community on the
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RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1969
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CHINESE UNOFFICIAL MEMBERS OF COUNCILS

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Legislative Council. He was awarded the C.M.G. in 1892 and created a knight bachelor in 1912. His achievements were many and varied.

Ho Kai's first and foremost contribution to Hong Kong was the promotion of western treatment and western medical education among the Chinese, despite the fact that he himself ceased practising western medicine soon after his return to Hong Kong. In the year 1884, when his wife died, he offered to provide the cost of building a hospital as a memorial to her. Thus the Alice Memorial Hospital, under the control of the London Missionary Society, was first opened in Hollywood Road in February 1887.12

The formation of a medical school in Hong Kong had been discussed by Dr. Ho Kai, Dr. (later Sir) James Cantlie and Dr. (later Sir) Patrick Manson who is often referred to as the "father of tropical medicine". With the opening of the Alice Memorial Hospital, the opportunity was therefore taken to start a medical school. Dr. Manson happened to be Chairman of both the Hospital's management committee as well as of the newly-founded Hong Kong Medical Society, and so was able to enlist the support of the profession. With Dr. Manson as its dean, the Hong Kong College of Medicine was formally inaugurated on 1st October 1887 and Li Hung-chang, Viceroy of Kwangtung, was Patron of the College until 1901. Dr. Ho Kai was the Rector's Assessor of the College as well as professor of medical jurisprudence. He held the latter post for nearly 20 years. This College had the distinction of having Dr. Sun Yat-sen, the founder of the Chinese Republic, as one of its first two graduates in 1892. In 1912 when the University of Hong Kong was founded, the College merged with it to form the Faculty of Medicine of the new university. Dr. Ho Kai also played an important part in the founding of the University of Hong Kong and was a member of the University Council. When the University was formally opened on 11th March 1912 by the Governor Sir Frederick (later Lord) Lugard, the occasion was also marked by the grant of a knighthood to Dr. Ho Kai.

The work of the Alice Memorial Hospital grew and it was not long before an extension was necessary. There was no land available adjoining the hospital in Hollywood Road, so the London Missionary Society gave a site on Bonham Road for the purpose,
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RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1971
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LETTERS FROM CHINA 1835-36

53

which were imposed upon their movement by the Chinese authorities. Their effect upon a sensitive person are readily apparent from the letters. The literary interests and charitable works of the writer and his relatives are also of interest, and the mentions of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge in China and the Medical Missionary Society remind us of the starting difficulties that surrounded the first of these ventures.

Both societies were inaugurated at meetings held among foreign residents at Canton. The Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge in China originated at a meeting of residents on 29th November, 1834. The Medical Missionary Society originated at a public meeting held in Canton in 1838 and, according to Samuel Couling, was "the first society of the kind in existence" in China. The Society was formed to develop and finance Dr. Peter Parker's ophthalmic hospital in Canton which had started in Singapore in 1834 and been moved to Canton the following year. (See Samuel Couling, The Encyclopaedia Sinica, Shanghai, Kelly & Walsh, 1917, pp. 345, 520 for further details. An account of the inaugural meeting of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge in China is given in The Chinese Repository, volume 3, page 378).

With the kind assistance of Mr. H. A. Rydings, Librarian of the University of Hong Kong and Honorary Librarian of this Branch, it has been possible to trace the reference in the letter written from the ship Asia to the Compendium of General History printed at Singapore, being the first work of the Society for Diffusing Useful Knowledge in China. This is Koò kin wàn kwo kang kéén or Universal History, 244 leaves, Singapore 1838. This appears as No. 34 on page 60 of (Alexander Wylie's) Memorials of the Protestant Missionaries to the Chinese, Shanghae, American Presbyterian Mission Press, 1867. Item 17 on page 58 is also relevant. Unfortunately, the mention of the Japanese Encyclopaedia, also in the long letter written on board the Asia, is too vague to allow for any identification.

It may be of interest to readers that in Volume 4 of this Journal (1964) we printed with Introduction and Useful Notes a recently discovered M.S. Journal of Occurrences at Canton during the Cessation of Trade at Canton 1839 which is considered to have been by W. C. Hunter, a resident of Canton and Macau contemporary with Stewart. Hunter published his reminiscences
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TRANSACTIONS OF THE

CHINA MEDICO-CHIRURGICAL SOCIETY, 1845-6

H. A. RYDINGS*

The connection between the China Medico-Chirurgical Society and the original China Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society has been related elsewhere in the Journal (1). Until recently, however, it was not possible to learn much in Hong Kong about this predecessor to our own Society.

Now the University of Hong Kong Library has obtained a Xerox copy of the Transactions of the China Medico-Chirurgical Society, from the original volume in the Library of the Royal Society of Medicine, one of only two copies recorded in the British Isles (2). This Xerox copy will be kept in the University's Hong Kong Collection. The volume runs to 80 pages, slightly smaller than those of this Journal, and the title page, here reproduced, gives the names of the officers and committee. Two names appear as Secretary because the first, Dr. B. Hobson, had to return to Europe for family reasons during his term of office (3).

Not a great deal has come to light about most of these leaders of the medical profession in the early days of the Colony, though it has been possible to find out what each of them was doing in Hong Kong. Dr. Tucker, the first President, was Surgeon on H.M. Hospital Ship Minden, which arrived in Hong Kong on 7th June, 1843 from Chusan. He died on board the Minden on 10th Sept. 1845, whilst still holding the office of President, in which he was succeeded by Dr. Dill. Francis Dill was Hong Kong's second Colonial Surgeon, appointed to succeed Dr. A. Anderson in 1844 on a date so far unknown, but probably between 7th May and 25th June. He may also possibly be identified with the "Mr. Dill, surgeon of the 'Atlas'" mentioned in a letter of Dr. Robert Morrison dated March 19th, 1822 from Canton (4).

The Society's first Secretary, Dr. Benjamin Hobson, was in charge of the Medical Missionary Society's Hospital, first in Macao,

* Mr. Rydings is Librarian of the University of Hong Kong and has been Councillor and Hon. Librarian of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society since 1965.
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H. A. RYDINGS

arrangements can be made for the Society's house) one, and the same building.” Amongst the reasons which he adduced for this was that the former Governor, Sir Henry Pottinger, had reserved a plot of land "between the Chinese Hospital [where Hobson worked] and the Gap" for an object of this kind. A special meeting was called on 8th July (14) to consider Dr. Hobson's proposal; two supporting resolutions were unanimously adopted, and the Society expressed its gratitude to Dr. Hobson for the zeal and ability with which he had performed his duties as Secretary, and its regret on his forthcoming departure.

As befits a medical missionary, Dr. Hobson believed in actions as well as words. The Chinese Hospital where Hobson worked, as already mentioned, was moved in 1843 from Macao to the vicinity of Morrison Hill in Hong Kong, and was thus close to the Morrison Education Society's school, from which Hobson attracted pupils to further studies in scientific and medical fields (15). In this he was following a practice established by Dr. Peter Parker, the first American medical missionary who started an ophthalmic hospital in Canton in 1835. Of Hobson it is said that the attention which he gave "to the education of young men as his assistants was amply repaid in the benefit derived from their intelligence. Some of those under his care were able to perform various operations, and one, more especially, had acquired so great an amount of professional skill that some of the European surgeons of the Colony of Hong Kong, by whom he was examined, expressed their admiration of his training" (16). These efforts may be considered the beginnings of medical education in China and Hong Kong, though it was not until 1887 that Hobson's vision of a College of Medicine for Chinese in Hong Kong was fulfilled, long after his death, and many years later than the establishment of other medical schools in China.

The idea of a medical school was linked quite sensibly in the minds of the members of the Medico-Chirurgical Society with that of their own premises, in which could be kept a museum for specimens of natural history and morbid anatomy, and their library of medical textbooks and journals. The problem of obtaining suitable premises seems to have dogged both the immediate and the latter-day successors of the Medico-Chirurgical Society, the China Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society (for which however it was solved by provision of a room in the Court House, presumably through the
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NOTES AND QUERIES

survey. Sir E. Belcher, accordingly, landed on Monday, January 25, 1841, at the foot of Taipingshan, and on the hill, now occupied by the Chinese Recreation ground, Captain Belcher and his officers, considering themselves the bona fide first British possessors, drank Her Majesty's health with three cheers, the spot being thenceforth known as Possession Point. The Point remained an open space and came under the management of the Chinese Recreation Ground Committee created in 1890.

In 1887 there was a rearrangement of streets to the south of the Recreation Ground. With the change there was a renaming. The western terminus of Hollywood Road was shifted from the present Possession Street to what was known as Gap Street, so that Hollywood Road emptied into Queen's Road on the south side of the Recreation Ground rather than on its east side.

On the south side of old Gap Street across from the Chinese Recreation Ground the original St. Stephen's Anglican Church opened in 1866. Here also the Baxter Memorial School was built in 1872 in memory of Miss Sophia Harriet Baxter. She had come to Hong Kong in 1860 and until her death five years later established schools for Chinese, Eurasians and orphans. St. Matthew's Anglican Church now occupies a part of the original site granted to the Church in 1864.

The neighbourhood could have been regarded as a good missionary area for it was dominated by establishments devoted to pleasure. Nearby was a theatre, and the present Possession Street was lined with brothels in the nineteenth century. It was also, however, near a more sobering district.

The hillside between Possession Point and West Point was used as a Chinese burial ground. The I-tsz Temple, built to house commemorative tablets for Chinese residents who died without a family to remember them, and, temporarily, for those whose families were in their home villages in China, was behind Possession Point on Tai Ping Shan Street. It adjoined the burial ground and thus, in accordance with Chinese practice, was in a convenient location to be used as a depository for those who were about to die. Publicity regarding conditions at the temple started a movement to provide better medical services for the Chinese community. This resulted in the formation of Tung Wah Hospital. It was opened officially in 1872 across the street from the I-tsz Temple, occupying land that was a part of the old burial ground.
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THE GREAT PLAGUE OF HONG KONG

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faced with our epidemic of great magnitude. By July, for example, there had been 2442 deaths. Hospitals were quickly established on board the "Hygeia", at Kennedy Town Police Station and at the Kennedy Town glass works. The first two hospitals were run by European staff whilst the third was manned by Chinese personnel of the Tung Wah hospital. Official despatches record that "it was deemed advisable to give the Chinese doctors a free hand at first. In any case, it is difficult to persuade the Chinese to report cases of sickness and their foolish and violent prejudice against Western medical men is quite sufficient to induce them, as they certainly did in the first fortnight or three weeks of the existence of the plague, not only to secrete their sick but often to desert their plague-stricken friends and relations after death."*

A house-to-house inspection was carried out by personnel of the garrison and those houses in which plague had occurred were cleansed and disinfected. This action gave rise to numerous complaints from the Chinese community for it was rumoured that the foreigners had sinister and unspeakable desires on the women and children. Indeed, so inflamed did feelings become that a deputation of Chinese petitioned the Governor, Sir William Robinson, to order the cleansing operations to be stopped. However, Sir William made it clear in no uncertain terms that the government was determined to take strong measures. Subsequently, an anti-government poster campaign was launched and this spread to Canton where further rumours were started to the effect that English doctors were accused of cutting open pregnant women and scooping out the eyes of children to make medicines for the treatment of plague-stricken patients.

The prompt answer of the governor in Hong Kong was to station the gunboat "Tweed" off Tai Ping Shan and to offer a reward for information leading to the arrest of persons distributing malicious posters. Additionally, the Chinese Viceroy in Canton was requested to issue proclamations denying the atrocity stories. However, these were not made with any great degree of vigour and feelings in Canton continued to run high to the extent that two women missionary doctors were set upon by a mob.

* "Further Correspondence Relative to the Outbreak of Bubonic Plague at Hong Kong between Sir William Robinson to the Marquess of Ripon 1894", p. 2 in Blue Book Reports on Bubonic Plague 1894-1903, Hong Kong.
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265 

In the Colonial Surgeon's report for 1873, he remarks that, 

This Institution at present hardly deserves the name of Hospital, in the ordinary acceptance of the word. It does good as a refuge of the destitute ... and in time when their inveterate dislike of European improvements is overcome, may do much more good than it can now.* 

These criticisms were soon picked up by the local English press. They indicate the difficulties the European had in recognizing any values in the traditional methods of Chinese medical practice. 

Year after year in newspaper editorials, letters to the editor and the annual medical reports of the Colonial Surgeon there was pressure for the introduction of western medical treatment. The Chinese replied that the population had no desire to expose themselves to any type of medical care than that to which they were accustomed. They had a strong dread of western medical practice and tried to avoid at all costs the fate of being sent to the Government Civil Hospital where they would be subjected to the attentions of a western trained doctor. In refutation of this claim, a newspaper editorial pointed to the example of the Medical Missionary Hospital at Canton under the supervision of Dr. Kerr, which treated some tens of thousands of patients—many more than passed through Tung Wah in its early years. The editor claimed that of their own free will the people of Kwangtung flocked to Dr. Kerr's Hospital to be treated according to western medical methods. I shall make no effort to delineate the argument further, only to suggest that each side may have had its points. 

At any rate the argument dragged on through the years: the European segment of the population regarding the Tung Wah of those days as little more than an institution similar to an English workhouse for the destitute, where, as the Colonial Surgeon commented in 1874, "the patients get good food and, according to Chinese ideas, very comfortable accommodations". 

The issue reached a crisis when the bubonic plague hit Hong Kong in 1894. It was a week or so before a number of cases of death diagnosed by Chinese doctors simply as "fever" were recognized as the plague. By the time the medical authorities were aware of its presence, 

the plague had a good hold, and when they instituted measures to control it, there was strong opposition in the Chinese 

* The Hong Kong Government Gazette, 1874 p.158, No. 62. Report of the Colonial Surgeon.
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NG LUN NGAI-HA

The person in Hong Kong who had the most direct influence on Sun's thought was Ho Kai, a founder and also a teacher of the Hong Kong Medical College, teaching medical jurisprudence and physiology.1 Ho was the son of a missionary of Cantonese origin who later settled in Hong Kong and became a businessman. Ho himself received his early education at the Central School and then left in 1872 to continue his secondary and then university education in Britain. He returned in 1882 as a qualified medical doctor and barrister. As a prominent civic leader, he served as the Chinese representative in various Government councils and boards, including the Legislative Council and the Sanitary Board. He was a great promoter of Western medicine and education for the Chinese in Hong Kong. In addition to the Alice Memorial Hospital and the Hong Kong Medical College, he was also a founder of the University of Hong Kong and patron of a number of Anglo-Chinese schools. In the Sino-French war of 1884-1885, when China failed to protect Annam, the Chinese seamen and coolies in Hong Kong reacted patriotically in boycott against French ships. Ho began to be concerned with the fate of China and the need for her modernization. From 1887 onwards, Ho began to contribute articles to the local English language newspapers, expressing his views on affairs in China. Most of his reformist essays were translated into Chinese or rewritten by Hu Li-huan and published both in Hong Kong and in China.2 Hu also received part of his education at the Central School both as a student and then as a student-teacher between 1862 and 1872. Unlike Ho, whose education was mainly in English, Hu had received very solid education in classical Chinese, and later won great fame as a gifted prose writer, scholar and poet. He was also a comprador and a very successful businessman.

Because of Ho's and Hu's prominence in Hong Kong, their essays must have caught the attention of many intellectuals. Ho's first essay was a long critical review of Tseng Chi-tse's article, "China, the Sleep and the Awakening". The review was published in the China Mail on February 12, 1887, three days after Tseng's article appeared in the same paper. Ho argued that the real cause of China's troubles lay not so much in her military weakness as in her "loose morality and evil habits, both social and political". He strongly emphasized complete and sweeping reforms in China's administration. More specifically, Ho demanded a new basis for recruiting officials as the existing civil examinations involved no knowledge of modern science or arts and were worthless as a test of real ability and talent. He also considered
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RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1993
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THE LADY DOCTOR'S “WARM WELCOME": DR ALICE SIBREE AND THE EARLY YEARS OF HONG KONG'S MATERNITY SERVICE 1903-1909

JANET GEORGE

Yesterday the first bricks were carried up to the site of the new midwifery Hosp Commend We are thankful indeed to have really made a beginning. We have hoped so long for this place and will have a very warm welcome for Dr Sibree (Mrs. Stevens, 24 April 1903).1

Maternity services for local women highlight the relationship between colonial governments and people over a matter which is bound up with culture, ritual and privacy. It is of course a matter central to the family and its maintenance. In Hong Kong the development of the maternity service is particularly interesting, because of its paradoxical quality. That is, the traditional midwives, the 'wan p'o', were increasingly regulated and legally excluded from practice by 1936, even though other traditional medical practices remain untouched. Interesting also is the pattern of development, because the lead was taken by the London Missionary Society's (LMS) Alice Memorial Hospital through the support of the Chinese subscribers, although over many years the Colonial Surgeon, Dr. Ayres had urged the Tung Wah Hospital to extend its services in this direction. The outcome was the appointment in 1903 of Hong Kong's first Lady Doctor, Dr. Alice Sibree, to the Alice Memorial Maternity Hospital (AMMH) to provide a maternity service for Chinese women and to train and supervise Chinese midwives employed by the Hong Kong Government. She completed only the first five-year contract, her resignation in 1909 following years of dissatisfaction with her role and conflict with Dr Gibson, the Medical Superintendent.

2

This paper is focused on that conflict as it sheds light on the way women were perceived and their role organised in medical practice, the relationships between the Chinese elite and the LMS District Committee, and the effects of the professionalisation of medicine. The latter generated competition between the Alice and the Tung Wah Hospital for patients, as the Tung Wah gradually moved towards the incorporation of Western medicine. It also generated competition amongst doctors for appointment to the faculty of the emerging University of Hong Kong. It is argued that
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was to promote the responsibility of District Committees, by requiring their 'joint charge and control over the whole range of the labours carried on by their individual members.' The medical mission work in China was already distinguished by local financial support and greater reliance was being placed on the local committee for hospital management and administration. Given these factors, the reply of the LMS Board of Directors is understandable.

The Chinese subscribers, 21 of the richest men in Hong Kong, therefore guaranteed a sum of $2,000 per annum for the lady doctor's salary, but added a condition: that she be available to treat the women of the subscribers' families in their own homes. As well, she would be required to spend her first year learning Cantonese in Hong Kong (rather than in Canton, where LMS language training was established), so that she could mix socially with the Chinese ladies and introduce to them Western hygiene and health care. Negotiations took several months, agreement reached in February, 1903, the delays attributed by the LMS Hong Kong Secretary, Mr. Pearce, to the inability of Dr. Ho to arrange a meeting of the subscribers. More likely, since the subscribers' money was essential, the delay was tactical, Dr. Ho certainly having been able to arrange their support very quickly initially.

For Dr. Gibson, pursuit of the project was important, because he feared that the Tung Wah Hospital, having introduced some Western medicine and by now handling obstetric cases, would threaten the viability of the Alice Hospital and thereby, the mission enterprise in Hong Kong, saying:

·

+

I feel confident that the Directors of the LMS do not wish that our Missionary Institution should be behind a purely heathen Institution in making provision for the relief of suffering.

18

His vision was at all times expansionary, having set up a clinic in Kowloon in 1901, in order to bring Western medicine to a wider public. In the event, he was obliged to accept a lady doctor on terms other than he would have wished. The repercussions of this were to affect the development of the service offered by the new AMMH and lead to the resignation of the lady doctor in 1909. From that point, supervision was fragmented until 1925, when Dr. Annie Sydenham took over the maternity hospital.
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Profession and Gender; controlling the lady doctor.

In March, 1903, Dr. Alice Sibree was appointed the Lady Doctor in charge of the new AMMH. Dr. Sibree was a licentiate of the Royal College of Physicians and the Royal College of Surgeons, Edinburgh. 19 She had studied at the London School of Medicine for Women and had received special training in obstetrics and gynecology, particularly at the Rotunda Lying-in Hospital. 2 At the time of her appointment, she was 27 years old and engaged to be married to a Mr. Wright, who was working in Rangoon. Her father was an LMS missionary, stationed in Madagascar, and she appears to have been well connected with the LMS hierarchy in London, regularly, in her correspondence with the LMS Joint Foreign Secretary, Mr. Cousins, including regards to his wife. With her appointment, the Chinese subscribers handed over their money and building proceeded.

The appointment desired by the LMS Hong Kong District Committee was quite specific. The Lady Doctor must.

1 have had a thorough training, specially in Midwifery and Diseases of Women

2 have a good knowledge of Children's Diseases

3 be a Lady willing to do visiting to attend cases in their own homes

4 be a lady willing to teach and train native women in western methods of midwifery

5 be a Lady Doctor to work exclusively among women and children

6 be a Lady who is willing to act under the medical Superintendent 21

These terms clearly limited her sphere of practice and defined her subordinate relationship to Dr. Gibson. They were apparently unacceptable to London. In response to a query from Mr. Cousins, Dr. Gibson declared that he 'did not think of the Lady Doctor either as a subordinate or an assistant and had no other thought than that she should be a member of the DC. & have the full status of a missionary' 22. On exactly what terms Dr. Sibree agreed to the appointment is not indicated, nor is what she knew of Hong Kong and its cultural nuances. In the event, her relationship to Dr. Gibson and her sphere of practice became and remained sources of conflict during her five years' contract.
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to them that I came from the new Hospital and that I should be glad to do anything for them if they would send for me Very few of them grasped it I am afraid Chinese husbands I suppose do not tell their wives much.

35

The remedy for this situation was precluded by the organisation of medical practice at the time, the second issue. Professional ethics made it impossible for Dr. Sibree to increase her work by taking patients from the registered doctors in private practice in Hong Kong, 36 who in 1900 numbered fifteen. Outpatient work and home visits amongst poor patients were the territory of students of the Hong Kong College of Medicine, for whom the Alice was the training ground. While Dr. Sibree bemoaned the fact that she was becoming 'rusty' for lack of general medical work and that the work with women and children was inadequate, with no way clear to improve the situation, Dr. Gibson was adamant that she be given no share of the general medical work of the Alice or Nethersole Hospitals. Indeed, he dissented from the District Committee's support for her clinic at Sham Shui Po on the grounds of her health, itself an attitude produced by prevailing views about women:

With reference to the foregoing minute and Resolution Dr. Gibson desires it to be recorded that he takes no responsibility in the event of the work becoming too great for Dr Sibree as it is likely to do if she undertakes much general medical visitation.

19

The Sham Shui Po clinic apparently did not eventuate. Why was Dr. Alice Sibree not acceptable for general medical in addition to maternity work? Before her arrival, Dr. Gibson had requested that a male medical missionary be sent as locum so that he could take furlough. It is not coincidental that this request was made shortly after the appointment of Dr. Sibree had been advised. Dr. Sibree, although a claimed equal, was not considered, and appears to have been excluded from consideration, as an acceptable replacement for Dr. Gibson. The reason becomes clear when the locum, Dr. Mitchell, explained why Dr. Sibree had been excluded from general medical work. The reason, simply stated, is that a woman doctor was unacceptable to the Chinese, be they patients, doctors or medical students:

Neither of the House Surgeons would be willing to take orders from a lady doctor, nor would it be easy to find any Chinese medical
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ever had for excessive caution to become reprehensible weakness in dealing with Dr. Gibson. He being now I presume in health will be held responsible in the same sense and degree that his colleagues are in the entire committee for his treatment of Dr. Sibree and for all his acts as a missionary." JB

If Dr. Gibson was 'difficult' with a senior male mission colleague, it is likely that his style led the young Dr. Sibree to avoid confrontation and try other measures to gain her objectives, complaining privately to Mr. Cousins, her pastoral support, and to friends in England, who then required answers from LMS on why she was so treated. In late 1904, she indicated that if, and only if, a replacement could be found, she would leave to be married.” In 1906, Mr. Cousins invited her to explore whether she could be released from her contract to take up a larger post in Hankow. Her engagement broken off in 1905, Dr. Sibree was free to move, but the appointment was virtually vetoed by the Chinese subscribers. Dr. Ts'o, whom she found ‘a most kindly little man, indicated that her leaving would be a personal affront, a loss of 'face', and damaging to the hospital, as the subscribers would feel that they had made donations for nothing. Dr. Ho Kai's 'sweetener' was to suggest that she should take over the female side of the Tung Wah Hospital. So Alice Sibree remained, continued her complaints to London, even though the work increased and she denied to her Hong Kong audience that a problem existed. The Minutes of the 1906 Annual Meeting of the District Committee record that 'Dr. Sibree was asked if she is now satisfied and was understood to answer that the opportunities of her special work have much improved'. This reply was elicited in response to a letter from the LMS Board. In 1908, she indicated that she would resign in February, 1909.

In early

To this point, the development of the AMMH and its outreach service was constrained by race and gender, as they affected the definition of the lady doctor's role, and exacerbated by the tensions in the relationship of Dr. Gibson and the LMS Hongkong District Committee. The influence of gender perceptions was far-reaching. Mission doctors were both medical people and missionaries, yet Dr. Gibson's role was restricted to hospital and clinic work, his inability to speak more than a little Cantonese precluding an evangelistic role with patients. However, Dr. Sibree was seen as more 'missionary' than ‘medical'. She was required to learn Cantonese and in her letters to England, she referred to her mission work, every afternoon visiting and teaching, and twice a week teaching hymns.
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singing at Mr. Wells' day school. "Other afternoons I give to what I think I was meant especially to do - visiting the small-footed rich ladies who so rarely hear anything of the Gospel ...'." Reaching Chinese women for evangelistic purposes was an objective of the LMS support for women missionaries, and thus was a legitimate part of Dr. Sibree's role as a mission doctor.

5}

For Dr. Gibson and Dr. Mitchell, who did not complete his Cantonese lessons, there were other missionaries who could work with Chinese men, although the District Committee was obviously concerned at the emphasis on 'medical' rather than 'missionary' amongst the male doctors. Mr. Pearce expressed the view that there was a need to devote more attention to the spiritual aspects of the medical work. With the opening of the Ho Miu Ling Hospital, the Committee requested the appointment of a further male medical missionary, to be trained in Cantonese language, so that pastoral work could occur. As well, the professional hierarchy within medicine, where surgery as an invasive skill in acute illness is seen as more important than obstetric care, a narrow specialisation which Dr. Sibree herself recognised, “reinforced the emphasis on a mixed role for the Lady Doctor.

It seems that this view of the female medical missionary as naturally and substantially involved in pastoral matters was held by Dr. Gibson, perhaps coloured, paradoxically, by a protectiveness. He was undoubtedly shaken by the death of Mrs. Stevens, noting that Miss Langdon, her successor, should not be pressured to stay long with the mission when her health may suffer. A similar concern probably prompted his view that Dr. Sibree should not be overworked. That would certainly be consistent with a patriarchal view of women as delicate and fitted more for pastoral work rather than 'real' medical work such as surgery. However, the weight of evidence points to his interest in protecting his autonomy vis-a-vis any interference in running the hospitals from the District Committee, and to his correct view that the Chinese subscribers were essential to the expansion of the medical mission. All this was allied with his interest in his work with the Hongkong College of Medicine and prospects of a role in the future University Medical School.

Replacing Dr. Sibree: Chinese subscribers and LMS control

Although Dr. Sibree was obviously unhappy with the limitations placed
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The relations of our medical missionaries Dr. Gibson and Dr. Sibree with each other have been almost from the time of the latter's arrival a cause of grievous distress here, now our relations with them both occasion constant searchings of heart.

Disagreement amongst missionaries was not uncommon, shown in their correspondence with the Foreign Secretaries, who gave pastoral support to each missionary. As Goodall notes, the criticisms missionaries made of colleagues just indicates their human characteristics.68 However, the relationship between Drs. Gibson and Sibree reached its lowest point at an important time for the District Committee. The change to District Committee responsibilities introduced in 1895 was under discussion in Hong Kong in 1909, with a view to devolving its powers to the locally established church of Chinese Christians. As well, the growth of the LMS was making funding of mission work very difficult. Thus, controversy within the District Committee would put at risk the credibility of the LMS and the continuity of local funding.

69

Miss Davies, Principal of an LMS school, and a long-time member of the District Committee, reported that Dr. Sibree, contrary to her claims, had been overworked through 1907-08, and expressed the view that Chinese women would not support her in private practice. Rather, they would support the new lady doctor, presumably because the latter would have the sponsorship of the subscribers and the hospital.70 In correspondence with Mr. Cousins, she wrote:

I wish the Lady Doctor were on her way out. There is no doubt that the right kind of woman will find abundance of work. We all have to make our own work. We all of us have had, in a large measure, to make our own work: certainly the best part of it.71

Dr. Mitchell, who felt that she had not made an effort to adapt to the conditions of Hong Kong, continued to support Dr. Gibson in his claim on the Nethersole and the existing male dominance of clinical medicine at the hospital.72

This contradiction between Dr. Sibree's claims and the perceptions of others, female and male, is puzzling. One explanation is that it was politically motivated, in that to overcome gender perceptions relegating her to midwifery, she needed to win a medical argument about the small
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was to resign, rather than a submission by which her services would not be renewed The first record of her intention to resign comes from the Minutes of the DC Annual Meeting of 1907, held 19-20 March, 1908, at which, after clarifying Dr Sibree's plans for departing Hong Kong, Mr. Brewin's correspondence was discussed. See LMS Box 17, 1908 Minutes enclosed in Mr Pearce to Mr Cousins 23 March, 1908

LMS Box 17, 1908 Memorandum to the Directors re communication, Chinese Gentlemen per Hon A.W Brewin, Dr Gibson to Mr. Cousins, 26 March, 1908

64 LMS Box 17, 1908 Mr. Pearce to Rev G Cousins, 9 October, 1908

6 See LMS Box 18, 1909 No 311 Dr Gibson to Mr. Sousins, 6 February, 1909, LMS Box 18, 1910 No 319 Dr Mitchell to Rev G Currie Martin, I September, 1910

66 Dr Ethel Tribe was a medical missionary in China, in Amoy from 1895-1909 and at the Lester Hospital, Shanghai, from 1909-1914 She is recorded as having enlarged the scope of work with women and children at the Lester Hospital. See Goodall, op cit, p 193

67

LMS Box 17, 1908 Mr Pearce to Rev Cousins, 28 April, 1908 Personal and confidential

68 Goodall, op cit, p 11

69 Goodall, op cit., pp 215, 550

70

LMS Box 17, 1908 Attachment to Minutes included with letter from Mr Pearce to Rev Cousins, 16 October, 1908

7 LMS Box 18, 1909 No 310 Miss H. Davies to Mr Cousins, 30 January, 1909

72 LMS Box 17, 1908 16 October, 1908, Mr Pearce to Rev Cousins, Minutes of Hong Kong District Committee Dr Mitchell was appointed acting medical superintendent of the Alice during Dr. Gibson's furlough in 1905-6. With his marriage to a Canadian lady doctor, he was sent to Poklo, to establish the medical mission there, during which time his wife died Given the marginality of the Poklo post, and the need for support in Hong Kong after Dr Sibree's resignation, Dr Mitchell returned to Hong Kong at the end of 1909 During his furlough in 1913, he married Dr Perkins, and, delayed by the war, they returned to Hong Kong in 1919, when he took up the post of medical superintendent until his resignation because of ill-health in 1924. Given his dissatisfaction with the LMS about finding him a medical mission post, it is possible that he saw his interests as in Hong Kong, thus influencing his support for Dr Gibson While Dr Sibree saw him as powerless to act in her interests during Dr Gibson's furlough in 1905-6, it is more probable that he did not wish to jeopardise his own position

73 Goodall (op cit., p.12) refers to the prejudice held by some missionary men against women missionaries, who they claimed were there only for the one hundred pounds per annum stipend See also N Eraser, Unruly Practices Power, Discourse and Gender in Contemporary Social Theory (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989), pp 164-5
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Gutzlaff was not unaware that his Union needed closer supervision. He appealed to German missionary societies to send out agents to assist him in his project. In response the Rhenish Missionary Society at Barmen and the Basel Missionary Society each sent two men in 1847. After a brief orientation period in Hong Kong, they were sent into China where they worked severally in areas where Cantonese, Hakka and Tiu-chau speakers lived. During the second Sino-British war they weathered out the war in Hong Kong and Macao. It was also the time when some took home leave. On the return of Rev. Rudolph Lechler of the Basel Missionary Society in 1861, he built a mission house, school and chapel at Sai Ying Pun. The church and school served the Hakka speaking community in Hong Kong. The congregation is now the present Kau Yan Church on High Street.

The Rev Heinrich Cocking, also a medical doctor, arrived in Hong Kong in 1855 as an agent of the Berlin Missionary Society. He opened a small dispensary and hospital in 1858 at the foot of Morrison Hill in Wanchai. It was principally for Chinese but German sailors were also treated there.

Agents of the Berlin Ladies Mission for China opened a home for foundling children on the top of Morrison Hill. The Berliner Frauenverein für China had been organised in response to the Rev. Charles Gutzlaff's appeal for support for his vision of the speedy conversion of the Chinese nation. The home was moved to No. 1 High Street in 1861 where it had built a large building, which was named Bethesda. It was not far from the mission house and chapel of the Basel Missionary Society.

Before the removal to High Street of the Berlin foundling home, German speaking services were held on Sundays at their establishment on Morrison Hill. At an earlier time these services were held in a tavern on Queen's Road East operated by a German. The Rev. Philip Winnes, of the Basel Mission, reported in 1858: “In this manner, I preached until the sailors had enough, and that they had quite soon". The Hong Kong Blue Books in their ecclesiastical returns list a place of worship for Europeans from 1871 at the chapel of the Berlin Mission House on High Street. A small chapel was built beside the foundling home in 1881. Its entrance was off Bonham Road. The services were moved to the hall of Union Church on Kennedy Road in 1902. They remained there until 1904 when they were moved back to the Bethesda Chapel where services were held.
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a Chinese novel into English.

Other eminent persons who were Fellows of the RASHKB first time around were Dr James Legge, of the London Missionary Society, sinologist and headmaster, who has been described as,

...perhaps the most important intellectual, among both foreigners and Chinese, in 19th century Hong Kong (Pfister 1993: 180).

One of his most important works is the eight-volume set of translations of the Chinese Classics.

Another Fellow of the RAS was Thomas Wade, the celebrated interpreter and envoy to China, who invented the Wade system of romanisation of Chinese. In 1887, as Sir Thomas, he became President of the RAS in London.

In 1996, Professor P.S. Erasmus G. Harland came from England to deliver a lecture to the Hong Kong Branch about his forebear. RAS Fellow Dr William Aurelius Harland MD, came to Hong Kong in 1843 to fill a post at the Seamen's Hospital. He also translated several Chinese medical works into English and later served as Secretary of the Hong Kong Branch of the RAS. He died in September 1858 and was buried in the Colonial Cemetery (now the Hong Kong Cemetery).

With the departure of Sir John Bowring and the death of its devoted Secretary, Dr W.A. Harland, the Hong Kong Branch collapsed. This came at an unfortunate time and deprived the RASHKB of prestige it would shortly have gained. Legge was on the eve of publishing his famous translations of the Chinese classics. Another member, T.W. Kingsmill, in 1865 had to obtain the help of the Shanghai Branch of the RAS to publish his studies on the geology of Hong Kong.

What about personalities connected with the RASHKB after its "reincarnation"? Although Walter Schofield was one of Hong Kong's first archaeologists, who served as a Government Administrative Officer from 1911 up until 1938, his main achievements were largely accomplished before the Branch was re-established, in 1959. But, from then on, in retirement in England, Schofield did write papers which were published in the Branch's journals. While he served in Hong Kong
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his contingent of coolies via the Panama Canal for New York and ahead of them was the Empress of Asia which was torpedoed, so they headed for the safety of Jamaica. From his memoires I cannot ascertain a date. He held a high opinion of his coolies and stated that the greatest aid to maintain discipline was to retain his sense of humour under all circumstances. He also believed in seeing that they were properly cared for when ill and, most important of all, when selecting coolies for promotion, to prefer the old man with character with the slow moving brain to the smart young town coolie.

Daryl Klein, who joined the CLC as a 2Lt in late 1917, assisted in escorting a large contingent by sea, leaving Qingdao in about February 1918, sailing via Japan where they coalled ship and on to Canada where they stayed for about ten weeks. They were then conveyed in June 1918, with some Canadian soldiers, on HMT Empress of Asia, this ship being used to convey troops and others, via the Panama Canal to Kingston, Jamaica and, after refuelling in New York, on to France. This contingent consisted of 13 officers [of whom one was an ex-banker, one an ex-officer from Russia and one an ex-missionary], 4,200 coolies with five interpreters and one medical assistant. During the voyage, Klein interviewed two First Class Gangers [or sergeants], Sgt Tang Chi-chang, aged 27 and previously a school teacher in Nanjing and a graduate of Weixin University; he was also a Christian. Sgt. Sen Shin-lin, aged 26, had served in a warlord's army for six years.

As Halifax, in Canada, had been so badly damaged by the accidental explosion of an ammunition ship in harbour, G. E. Cormack and his contingent had to stay at Victoria, British Columbia and whilst there he had to look after a coolie who had been admitted to hospital for a severe operation, which was successful. Later a deputation came to see Cormack and presented him with a carved wooden panel, which they had made, representing two stags fighting. This was their way of showing appreciation of his attention to their sick comrade. This carved panel is now held in the Imperial War Museum, London, and, at the time of writing, is not on display. [see photograph]

Working in France

In a Company of about 500 men, there would be 24 British officers and NCOs, lead by a major or captain; 476 Chinese labourers, with the
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Some years earlier, Stuckey became involved in the evangelical movement. After qualifying as an actuary with the Association of the Institute of Actuaries [London], he left AMPS, returning to Adelaide University to study medicine, so that he could better follow his vow to become a missionary, being accepted by the London Missionary Society [LMS]. Even at University, Stuckey was involved with the evangelical movement, meeting his future wife, also a student, Frances Helen Campbell, who held similar feelings. They both graduated in 1903, Stuckey as MB, BSc [First Class] and Campbell as MA. He was appointed as Junior Demonstrator in Physics at Melbourne University. They became engaged and married on 12th July 1905.

After a year as House Surgeon at Adelaide University, Stuckey went to London for post-graduate study, booking his passage as a ship's surgeon. On arrival in London the LMS notified him that he had been appointed to proceed at once to Siaochang, North China. He immediately returned to Australia, married Campbell and sailed from Sydney on 5th August 1905, arriving at Siaochang on 7th October, staying with Dr. and Mrs E. J. Peill and Rev. and Mrs J. D. Liddell. [Chariots of Fire - the parents of the famous runner] Dr. Peill was the brother of Dr. A. Peill, 'The beloved Physician of Tsangchou' and the Rev. S. G. Peill. Both Stuckeys started to learn Chinese, passing their final exam in 1908. In 1909 Stuckey was appointed Acting Dean of the Peking Union Medical College [PUMC], a teaching hospital supported by various missionary societies, and in September 1911 was appointed its Principal. He had become interested in diseases of the eye, publishing papers on his research.

In May 1913 Stuckey and his family, now four children, returned on leave to Melbourne, where he did eye work in various Melbourne hospitals and Deputation work for the LMS in all states except Western Australia. They returned to Peking in September 1914, where he resumed his role at the PUMC, also being elected Secretary of the Peking District Committee of the LMS.

In December 1916, Stuckey was approached by the British Legation as to his suitability for military service. After a joint decision with his wife, he left Peking on 12th March 1917 for Weihai Wei and to France for service with the CLC as a Lieutenant with the RAMC. He sailed via Nagasaki, Japan, under his C.O. Captain Hall Brutton, on the
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