46
THE CHINA ASSOCIATION.
DISCUSSION OF WEST RIVER PIRACY.
VICEROY SHUM DENOUNCED.
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND
were
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A meeting of the Hongkong Brauch of the China Association to discuss the question of piracy on the West River was held in the City Hall on Saturday afternoon. Mr. M. Stewart presided over a large attendance, which included Mr. D. R. Law (Butterfield & Swire). Mr. A. G. Wood (Gibb, Livingston & Co.) Mr. G. H. Medhurst (Dodwell & Co.), the Hon. Mr. E. Osborne (Wharf Co.), the Hon. Mr. W. J. Gresson (Jardine, Matheson & Co.), Mr. H. E. Reckoned with seriously. No-one who went Hunter (Acting Chief Manager H. & S. Bank). Mr. T. P. Cochrane (Chartered Bank), Mr. P.
& Co.), Holyoak (of Messrs. Reis
Mr. H. W. Slade (Gilman & Co.). Mr. H.
White P.
(Douglas, Lapraik & Co.), Mr. D. K. Moss (A. Ross & Co.), Mr. A. Beattie (W. R. Loxley & Co.), Mr. T. F. Hough (Hughes & Hough), Mr. G. C. Moxon (National Bank of China), Messrs. W. G. Humphreys, B. Layton, W. Saunders, C. D, Wilkinson, G. L. Tomlin. J. Scott-Harston, E. J. Grist, M. W.
Slade, H. Pinckney, H. N. Mody, C. H. Ross, W. Parlane, F. Smythe, T. Skinner, E. G. Barrett, W. Armstrong, J. W. Kew, N. S Brown, H. W. Looker and others. The room was well-filled.
The CHAIRMAN. in opening the proceedings, said-Gentlemen,-In calling this meeting to- gether your committee have no other motive than an earnest desire to strengthen the hands of those whose official duty it is to assist in obtaining satisfaction for a gross violation of the British flag; to bring to justice the perpetrators of a diabolical outrage; and to insist that in future the Chinese authorities responsible for the safety of traders on the West River shall be made to fulfil their repeated promises of providing a lequate protection. I am a believer in the friendly watchdog theory of this Association. I conceive it to be no
part of our duty unnecessarily to worry British officials who are doing their utmost to firribes the interests committed to their care. As a rula, in my via it is only incumbent on us to offer an opinion when, looking at matters from a commercial standpoint, we are impressed by aspects possibly in danger of being obscured by considerations of a different order.
On the subject which we are here to discuss it may seem to some of you inconceivable that there can possibly exist any difference between official and mercantile views. It may seem to you a matter of certainty that every British official concerned, high and low, at home and abroad, from the Secretary of State in London to the Vice-Consul at Canton, must see eye to eye with those who are endeavouring, mainly out of patriotic sentiment, to develop the difficult, dangerous, and so far unprofitable carrying trade between Canton and Wuchow, or between Wucl ow and Hongkong.
to Wuchow in those days ever thought of it, any more than if the voyage had been to Macao. I was an early passenger. I remember the trip as if it had been made yesterday. The idea of danger never entered my head. But in a little time things began to change for the worse, Chinese launches, then entering upon the trade, offered good plunder to adven turous robbers and cases of piracy became frequent. Anyone who cares to study the
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(July 23, 1906
incidents following, one up ›n another, in logical reformer. His name apparently inspired a sequence. It would be tedious if I were to certain salutary awe. Outrages decreased in dwell in detail on all these incidents. Moreover, o number, while those that took place were time does not permit of it. Time only permits m confined, as ducing his predece sor's régim3, to indicate briefly certain broad and significant to attack 3 npon native craft. Unfortunately this aspects of the question. Broadly treated and satisfied him. Herein lay his weakness. As long circumstances may be as the pirates confined themselves t› small briefly stated, the summarised thus. The West River was offences hé confined himself to tinkering with declared open to trade in June, 1897, by the evil instead of honestly trying to root
At first Imperial Edict.
out. many difficulti & it Wrong -doors are quick to take shifting channels, no buoys, no lights and other anthority over them.
eucountered ill-conceived regalati os advantage of slackness in those placed in Little by little the pirates similar inconveniences incidental to pioneering gained o sufidence and their depredations assum - but that any danger existed of pirátical attacks ed more ambitions shape. Appɔtite grows by on steamers flying the British flag was not
what it feeds op. The appetite of the more adventurous spirits grew until eventually small native craft were no longer large enough to satisfy it. The first symptom was an attio made near Washow, in the latter part of last year, ou a launch flying the British fig but with a Chinese cxswain, which made it evident that a new state of thing had arisen. This incideat was allowed to pass without any striking measures of retribution being taken to impress the perpetrators with the enormity of the crima. Indeed by this time the Viceroy's attitude to all representations of foreign rights had
grown casual to a degree. Quite obviously he had come noder under the influence of the new wave of Chauvinism which now unfortunately animates mandarindom from oneend of the empire to the other. Not only was nothing really dous in the matter, bat about Chinese Now Yeir many of the patrol lanaches wir withdrawn frɔm the waters of the upper dita and hid up in the frout reach at Canton, where they lay until the other day and were they may very wil blying DOW. Possibly it may have bean about this tim that the Viescoy mid the suggestion to the British Consular authorities bhiad which he is now trying to shelter himself. I alla le to the ilea of making use of his braves to search Chin & passengers by foreign stemors. A great idea,truly worthy of a great administra- tor-just the sort of suggestion that you might Hanlin scholar with a de expect from a contempt for trade and a learned ignora 10.1 of its requirements! A cheap maus, to of enabling him to suirk his responsibilities: H would have saved the pay of the braves wao would no doubt have been well content to
records of the Chamber of Commerce and the China Association or ta consult the files of the
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exchange it for the squeeze exacted. Tas Chinese in obedience to their gambling in- stincts would natnrally prefer t Fisk of being held up in native craft to the certainty of betag thu bled. No better wh me for discourag.ng them from travelling by these steamers conli well be devised. Tue suggestion indicates that the Vicзroy wa well aware of the existence of the dangers, an also shows that he was nawilling to take effective masures to provide against them. Either he was unwilling or incom
do to
either peteut
80.
A fum'ng pusition called for his removal. him to have been able to put a stop to the intolerable state of affairs, the fact that he did not do it can only be explained on the supposition that he did not want to do it. Assuming, on the other hand, that he wanted to do it but could not, then clearly he was unfit for the post. In either event he should have ben replaced by someone who both could and would perform the obvious duty.
loesl press will find that the question of the proper protection of the West River trade has been constantly cropping up since then. We whose lot has been cast in Hongkong during the period know it as men kuow the things that have become woven into their daily life. We need no records to remind us that during the period of Li Hung-chang's viceroyalty these attacks became of much less frequent occurrence, and that towards the earl of it they had practically ceased. LA Hang-chan, in fact, put down piracy. I wish particularly to direct your attention to that fact. It is important inasmuch as it serves to make clear that in the hands of a strong administrator the thing Cau ba. doue applaus1). Agnia po records are needed to enable most of us to recall the circumstance that aftar Li Hung-chang's departure these outrages were renewed. This was predicted by the Chairman of the Hougkong Branch of the China Association in his report words: "A few months of feeble government on dated May, 1899. There you will find these the part of Li Hung-changccessor will again fill the river and its backwater with pirates and robbers as numerous and andacidir as ever."
Li Hung-chang's successor proted to be feeble, with the result indicated. The piracies which cecurred under his régime ware, however, still confined to attacks on native craft. circumstance is that the A noteworthy acting Viceroy appeared to believe that the British flag had still sufficient prestige in the eyes of the pirates to ensure profection | to In support of passengers travelling under it. this statement I may remind you that he went so far as to suggest to the British Consul in Canton that it would be desirable for the steamer companies' re-sels to call at the smaller ports, then unopened, in order that Chinese passengers might travel in safety. The result of his suggestion was a letter from the steamboat companies to the Chamber of Commerce o september 19, 1992, requesting them to press for the opening of these ports. The outcom was that the Chinese authorities declared the
The natural result ports open in January, 1903. The idea worked. of all this was that on February 14 an attack Passengers of all nationalities travelled in safety was mids on a large motor bat named the Tien Kong, owned by a British subjict. under the British flag, Chinese benefiting equally with foreigners in immunity from outrages then taling up the West River from Samsuni, $2,500) was stolen, and the motor bost was run constantly being perpetrated on passengers tra-
ashre by th pirates almost opposite and in fu 1 velling in Chinese launches or other natire craft. The outrages increas d iu number as hal been sight of a Cuinese guard boat, from which no assistance was forthcoming. As far as I can predicted and things were in a bad way in the dalta when the present Viceroy was appointed.learu uo satisfaction for the od rage has yet When he pissed through Hongkong on his w y to assume office be bad au interview with Sir To understand and appreciate all the circumst Henry Blake, in which he undertook to make the anoes it is necessary to think back over a decade, suppression of piracy one of his first duties. For
a time people believed that he futended to fulfi No one who came only yesterday to China can possibly understand or appreciate these circumst-bis promise. He started his official career in anoes unless he is gifted with a quick imagination Canion as a professed enemy to evil-do-rs of all Without that gift newcomers will naturally be sorts. Those interested in the developm-up of apt to regard the Sainom incident as an isolated the West River trade looked hopefully forward to the institution of a campaigi having for its object the destruction of those villages which are practically robbers' strongholds. whose location in the lower reaches of the river and in the upper delta is well known. For a time the Viceroy maintained some reputation as a
Your committee have every hope that this will prove to be the case. They hope that our author ities clearly perceive where the real responsibi. lity rests, and they confidently anticipate the presentation of a united front and a firm attitude in fighting down the inevitable opposi. tion of the Chinese authorities to our just demands Nevertheless they consider it their duty to invite discussion on a resolution which I shall presently propose, with a view to making local mercantile opinion perfectly clear. succeed in doing this we shall then have done what is required of us by the objects of the Association. The first object of the Association is to represent and express the opinion of the British mercantile community. The circumst- ances leading up to the Suinam piracy demand such an expression of opinion.
If we
We know that it is
event. Those of us who were here when tie West River was opened realise that it is nothing of the sort. merely the natural outcome of events which have taken place since then-that it is simply the pulminating point in a long series of
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0850
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of
been obtained. But if anything was done it was clearly not sufficient to emphasize the heinous nature of the crime of violating a foreign flig For on March 22 the Standard Oil Company's launch, the Comel, was held up and robbed and her crow brutally miltreate I, Still nothing
doue to viadicate the
siti in the foreiga shipowner as gascantel to him by China under the existing treaty. Follow ing upon this came the piracy of a Chinese launch be onging to the Po Oa Company, a Hongkong company, from which $10,00) were robbed. No punishment as far as is known here followed this outrage The desperadoes now
seemed to have come to the conclusion that it
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