RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1971
https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/z029vt43g
30

STEPHEN UHALLEY, JR.

counter."'48 But, of course, this act cannot be laid exclusively to Captain Dew. Another contemporary source charged perhaps more penetratingly that the Taiping possession of Ningpo was "peculiarly adapted" to thwart British Minister Frederick Bruce's "schemes for aiding and abetting" the Ch'ing side in China's civil war. The source noted that Taiping possession of the seaport would enable them to deprive Shanghai of the greater proportion of the customs duties, which not only might now be diverted into their own exchequer, but would frustrate the object of Mr. Horatio Lay's mission to London where he was seeking to put together an Anglo-Chinese flotilla to be used against the Taipings, and "destroy the main stay of the Imperial cause." The Taipings would also be able to obtain needed war munitions. Finally, they would have the opportunity to dispel "the illusion of their being inimical to foreign trade." This source concluded that from "such cogent reasons" Admiral Hope came to agree with the Minister's views, and "resolved on the recapture of the place by fair means or foul."49

Small wonder that the story of the Taiping occupation of Ningpo has received little subsequent attention in Western historical accounts of the Taiping period. When it has, it has too often been sadly distorted. It is not a happy episode to think about. But however that may be, it is an historical experience that is well worth reflection upon. It was a passing moment of history which, in a telescoped span of time, rather accurately reflected a larger contemporary story. It demonstrated that Chinese revolutionaries of the early 1860s had the capacity to achieve major objectives against a weak established government, including the conquest of much of the territory of the richest provinces in the lower Yangtze River basin and the seizure of a principal seaport. It also demonstrated that the Taipings did treat foreigners respectably well and promoted trade, which was, after all, the matter of greatest importance to foreigners. It also proved that neither the apparent military nor the civil capabilities of the revolutionaries made much difference to those key foreign officials who were determined to assist the weak established government. Finally, it showed that the intervention of foreign powers made a great deal of difference in the ultimate outcome of the civil war in China. At the most, the experience at Ningpo from December 1861 to May 1862 suggests the story in microcosm
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RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1976
https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/hq382988q
LAND AND RIVER ROUTES TO WEST CHINA 

169 

to Bhamo that the Irawaddy Flotilla Company doubled its service between Mandalay and Bhamo.* 

Simultaneously pressure in Britain from Chambers of Commerce persuaded the government to support the Indian government's plan to resume exploration of the Bhamo-Yunnan overland route, and to request co-operation from China through the British Minister at Peking. The King of Burma was also in favour of resuming trade relations with China, having been advised from Peking that China would like to resume "the old relationship, and continue the practice of exchanging decennial missions". 

Lieutenant Colonel Horace A. Browne, a former Deputy Commissioner in Burma, was chosen as leader of the Burma party, which would go from Mandalay to Bhamo by steamer, and then overland into Yunnan by one of three possible routes. At the same time A.R. Margary of the China Consular Service would start from Hankow—then the limit of steam navigation on the Yangtze—and go by junk to Yochow at the entrance to the Tungting Lake, through the Lake and by the Yuan River to the border of Kweichow, from where he would complete his journey overland. Browne's party arrived at Bhamo on 15th January 1875, and were joined by Margary, who had left Hankow on 4th September 1874, two days later. The latter had had a comparatively uneventful journey, although at some places the population was decidedly hostile. At Yunnanfu, however, the officials were courteous and helpful. All through Yunnan Margary had passed ruined towns and villages, and seen the widespread destruction caused by the recent rebellion. 

On 23rd January the combined party left Bhamo for Yunnan, accompanied by fifteen Sikh guards brought from India by Browne, and an escort of 150 soldiers provided by the King of Burma, who were to go as far as the border. At the last minute Browne decided to go by the Ponlyne instead of by the Sawaddy route, to avoid possible conflict with the Kachin tribesmen on the latter. A few 

The Irawaddy Flotilla Company was formed in 1864 when Todd Findlay & Co. of Glasgow (who had a branch in Rangoon) bought four old river steamers and three 'flats' of the Indian government's Irawaddy Flotilla, which had given good service in the Anglo-Burmese Wars. Hopes of greatly increased trade between Burma and Yunnan were high, and there was keen competition to buy the Flotilla, including an offer from a French company, and one from Mackinnon & Mackenzie, who were then managing agents of the Calcutta and Burma Steam Navigation Company which later became the British India Steam Navigation Company.
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RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1976
https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/hq382988q
178

A. D. BLUE

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Parliamentary Papers — Reports from the British Consuls at the Treaty Ports of China (various dates)

Unpublished Theses for Degree of Master of Arts at London University

a) British Interests in Trans-Burma Trade Route to China 1826-76 by MA THAUNG 1956

b) Anglo-Chinese Relations in the Provinces of the West River and the Yangtze River Basin between 1889-1900 by L. R. MARCHANT, 1965

Five Months on the Yangtze T. W. BLAKISTON

The Royal Navy and the Sino-Japanese Incident M. BRYCE

China in Turmoil G. H. GOMPERTZ

The Irrawaddy Flotilla Company M. J. GRUBB and G. L. D. DUCKWORTH

Gleanings from Fifty Years in China A. LITTLE

The Yangtze Gorges A. LITTLE

River Road to China

Glimpses of the Yangtze Gorges

To the Snows of Tibet through China

Yangtze Reminiscences

The Making of Modern Burma D. WOODMAN

Special Mission up the Yangtze Kiang R. SWINHOE

M. OSBORNE

C. PLANT

A. E. PRATT

G. R. TORRIBLE
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RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1989
https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/8336pm92h
73

twin Thorneycroft semi-diesel engines drove the craft at six or seven knots, a speed by no means excessive when we remember that during the summer the Yangtze ran five knots. Furthest aft were quarters and a galley for the Chinese crew, the “laodah” and his assistants in crime, the engineer, and two deck-hands.

Three of us were now accommodated in the "Hsun Si", and settled down to pass the time of day, assisted by the Consul's gramophone, which we had had the foresight to borrow, and his tantalus, which it had fallen to our lot to escort. We did well enough so long as the weather remained calm, but the houseboat was top-heavy, and when the east wind got up against the flow of the river, raising a short choppy sea, the boat would roll alarmingly and bump heavily against the side of the destroyer. The first lieutenant would come along and throw a jaundiced look over the side at his paint, and order us off. We would have to turn out the engineer to start up the engines, and away we would scurry, slapping into the chop, heading for a bend some miles up the river where we could find a lee under the north bank.

The Chinese authorities on shore had issued orders that no Chinese subject was to communicate with the foreigners in their ships: but the Navy had left guards in the hulks, to which launches passed back and forth; and it was not long before contacts were again established through this channel. For seventy years Chinese and foreigners had lived next door to each other in peace and friendship, and the ties thus formed could not so easily be broken. They had traded together to mutual advantage, they had feasted and toasted each other, they had helped each other in times of difficulty; on either side were memories of pleasant days and kind deeds.

So at night sampans would creep out in the dark; little gifts of food would be sent off from the shore, and news would be given of the situation. How much damage had been done? Were the native banks still open? Were our servants being ill-treated? Had the Garrison Commander issued any proclamation?

Meanwhile the Rear-Admiral, commanding the Yangtze British Gunboat Flotilla, had chartered a middle river steamer for the evacuees. The S.S. “Kiang Wo" had sufficient cabin and dining accommodation to take us all, and anchored in the Yangtze for three months the foreign population of Kiu Kiang lived in what came to be known as the "Floating
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RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1990
https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/d79206299
109

and the civilians were advised to leave their ships and get into the British gunboats, because if the battery opened fire the gunboats had instructions to steam out of range and leave the merchant vessels to their fate. The attraction of this invitation was not evident to the Britons concerned and they preferred to stand by their ships and the Chinese crews and employees, for whom they felt responsible. Fortunately the guns did not follow the example set in Wuhu, where they had opened up at point-blank range on H.M.S. "Bee" carrying the Rear Admiral Commanding Yangtze Flotilla. Japanese planes flew over on a number of occasions, and even swooped in playful dives over the ships, but no bombs were dropped and it gradually became evident that the urgent protests addressed by the neutral powers to the Japanese government were taking effect.

The whole of that day and the next were spent between the ships and the reeds. Each time a Japanese plane appeared, the few people still remaining in the ships would emerge, cock an eye at the approaching aircraft, and make for the reeds at a speed regulated to the rate of approach. Stretches of reed had been cut by the local farmers and the stooks were still lying about. They provided a convenient cover into which to dive, and as the noise of the aircraft receded you could see an array of dishevelled heads pop out, to be followed in due course by the bodies to which they were attached.

When it was quite evident the immediate danger was passed, sufficient hands were collected, with some difficulty, to raise steam, and the ships again anchored in mid-stream. Here we were joined by other British ships from Wuhu where they had had troubles of their own. The U.S.S. "Oahu" also steamed by, bearing the bodies of those who had been killed in the "Panay" bombing. Some days later, with Japanese permission, we moved down to Nanking, now in Japanese hands. From the deck of the ship the smoke of burning buildings could be seen rising beyond the city wall, but we had no information at the time of the extensive raping and mass murder, whose memory will make the Japanese army for ever infamous.

I had hoped our ship would be allowed to remain anchored off Nanking until it was again safe to go ashore, when we could reoccupy the various properties we had vacated. The Rear Admiral, in H.M.S. "Bee", had preceded us and it was his idea that the British ships still off Nanking should remain there until other ships could come
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RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1990
https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/d79206299
110

J

onto

up from Shanghai to relieve them. In this way he wished to show the Japanese that the British flag could not be driven off the Yangtze. But other ideas prevailed in Shanghai; the ships were ordered out. I was instructed to transfer my Chinese refugees, the employees from our office and their families, numbering some 200 souls, to the "Ewo" hulk, which was to be left anchored at Nanking under the protection of a British gunboat. Curiously enough, the refugees showed extreme reluctance to be abandoned thus to an unknown fate, and in the upshot, most of them went on to Shanghai with the ship. Our flotilla was augmented by the arrival of the light cruiser **Caradoc** from Hankow, where she had been wintering. Her 'tween decks were packed with several hundred British women and children, who were being evacuated from the upriver ports. A small ship flying the Italian flag added to our number; she was believed to be carrying the personnel of the Italian Aviation Mission, who had been training Chinese pilots at Nanchang. Led by a Japanese escorting destroyer, followed by H.M.S. "Caradoc", we formed line and sailed down the river, the journey enlivened by the anger of the Japanese Commander at the inability of the master of the Italian ship to understand the signals which, from time to time, he made in the International code. With our convoy went the last merchant ships to show the British flag on the Yangtze. The "Red Duster" was displaced; henceforth the Japanese view prevailed.

Hong Kong and South China 1938

The West river and its network of tributaries provide the highways over which the commerce of South China moves. Some distance outside Bocca Tigris, where the river debouches into the China Sea, an eleven-mile ridge of hills rises sharply out of the blue semi-tropical waters. We call it Hongkong, but to the Chinese it is "The Fragrant Lagoon". Why "fragrant" I cannot say, because the surrounding waters are salt, as any sea water, and full of large diaphanous jelly-fish that lie in wait to sting unwary swimmers, or of little black insects which get inside your bathing costume and bite you in places inconvenient to reach.

There is no record to show how these marine depredators spent their time before 1840. In those days, before the arrival of the British, the island was uninhabited and, though visited by fisher folk and pirates, I doubt whether they went swimming. The pirates have now
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RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-2002
https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/mp4901278
288

consul was nearly hit by a bullet that entered his office through the window. This same consul was involved during student protests later the same year when the police quarters were set alight and the students rampaged through the town intent on killing foreigners. He and his family were only saved by the timely arrival of Chinese soldiers, and escaped by river down to Shanghai.

Today the Zhenjiang Museum occupies the former British Consulate at 85 Boxian Lu in Boxian Park at the heart of the old town. Amongst the items on display in the grounds is an anchor said to have been from H.M.S. Amethyst, the frigate of the British Yangtze Flotilla, which, after weeks of being blockaded, stuck on a sand bank, escaped downstream despite having been badly damaged by shell fire from the PLA [People's Liberation Army] during their thrust south across the River in 1948 to liberate China from the Nationalists under Chiang Kai-shek. British efforts to seek a diplomatic solution involved Edward Youde, a twenty-four-year-old third secretary at the Embassy, who volunteered to reach the senior PLA military officer at Yangzhou to seek a safe-conduct pass for the Amethyst to sail unmolested downstream back to Shanghai. He first had to obtain passes to permit him to cross the line between the Nationalists and the Communists. After several days of adventures and lengthy cross-country hikes, sometimes under fire, Youde reached the senior PLA officer and his request was forcibly rejected. His mission a failure, he returned, again amidst numerous adventures to report to his Ambassador in Nanjing. He later became better known as Sir Edward Youde, one of the last Governors of Hong Kong.

Christian missionaries

There were Roman Catholic and Protestant missionaries, Anglicans and the 'faith missions', Baptists, Presbyterians and the Lutherans, and so on, as well as the individual evangelicals, zealous saviours of souls. The most important aspect of this work, though most would not see it in this light, was by setting an example, though this in no way belittled their social, medical and educational work. Medical missionaries, another dedicated breed, were an exception with their professional abilities being widely welcomed not only by Chinese but also by the Europeans within both treaty ports as well as in the remoter parts of China in which they lived and worked.
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