400 Boundaries and Beyond
the Fu Chao Hang in Canton, had “always continued [to be] a wealthy
class”.^186 As shown in a declaration issued by the Liang-Guang Governor-
General, Ye Minchen, in 1856, the Fu Chao Hang, originally representing
the Fujian and Chaozhou Hongs engaged in the coastal and Nanyang
trade in Canton, had assumed the role of the former Thirteen Hongs
that supervised the European trade in Canton.^187 Therefore there are
many reasons that the word “decline” is inadequate to reβlect the actual
development of affairs around 1850.
Viewing the Min-Yue maritime enterprise in a broader perspective,
the reduction or stoppage in βitting out trading junks from the Chinese
home ports did not necessarily mean the end of the junk shipping they
organized. One salient feature of their junk trade was its state of βluidity
and elasticity, reβlected in the multi-port and border-crossing nature of
their activities. Its modus operandi was characterized by the continuous
movement to wherever there were new business opportunities. Keeping
pace with the development of the junk trade, the Min-Yue merchants
had created multi-centered enterprises on the China coast and in the
Nanyang.^188 The growing Chinese migrant communities abroad facilitated
the branching out of their activities into new areas. Successful Chinese
settlers or local-born Chinese merchants were able to play a decisive
role, independent of their native home ports, in the local and regional
trade on the China coast and in Southeast Asia. As for the Southeast Asian
region, with several centuries of their presence under their belts, it was
a familiar ground for trade. In that time, the merchant-settlers had built
up well-connected networks in the local and regional trade. The fact
that the Min-Yue merchants had established themselves so well in Siam
and Singapore, for example, can be attributed to the conducive trading
environment offered by the local regimes. All this led to their being ready
to step into the breach after the withdrawal of the Chinese junks from
the centuries-old playing βield of the Nanyang-bound carrying trade. The
junk traders simply established their operational headquarters overseas,
and junk shipping embarkations from Siam to trade in China were in full
swing. Concurrently, the intraregional junk trade of the Nanyang region
was expanding.
- Ibid., p. 54b.
- Enclosure in FO 228/198, Bowring to Lord Clarendon, no. 50, February 5, 1856.
- In Murakami Ei’s words, it became clear that, by the early 1830s, the South
Fujianese merchants had left Amoy for other port cities. See Murakami Ei,
“Binetsu engaimin no katsudō to shintyō”, p. 208.
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