Scandinavian Economic History Review

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Denmark in China 1839–65: A pawn in a British

game
An interim account of Danish economic and diplomatic activity

Ole Lange

To cite this article: Ole Lange (1971) Denmark in China 1839–65: A pawn in a British game,
Scandinavian Economic History Review, 19:2, 71-117, DOI: 10.1080/03585522.1971.10407694

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 The
SCANDINAVIAN ECONOMIC HISTORY
REVIEW
VOLUME XIX· No.2· 1971

Denmark in China 1839-65:

A Pawn in a British Game
An interim account of Danish economic and diplomatic activity

By OLE LANGE*

I. The opening of China

Denmark's trading connections with China date back to the seventeenth cen-
tury, but it was not until the establishment of Asiatisk Kompagni (the Danish
Asiatic Company) in 1732 that they became at all regular. In the period be-
tween the Company's foundation and the outbreak of war with England in
1807, 124 ships were sent to China; imported Chinese products were the
basis of the trade, and of course the Danish market was too small to absorb
such a volume of business. The China trade was therefore primarily a transit
trade with Copenhagen as the entrepbt: conditions for this were particularly
favourable during periods of war between the European great powers when, by
virtue of their neutrality, Danish ships were able to take over a major share in
supplying the north-west European market. The war of 1807-14 with England,
however, entirely changed both the external political and the internal economic
conditions for the continuation of this traffic. Thus the exceptionally large-scale
and, by Danish standards, profitable operations of Asiatisk Kompagni in the
eighteenth century were emphatically a passing phenomenon produced by the
peculiar business conditions of the time.'

Ole Lange, born 1937, research fellow in history at the University of Copenhagen.
Studies in London 1966 and Cambridge 1969-70. At present he is working on a book on
Anglo-Danish economic and diplomatic activities in China 1860-1900.
1 A. Rasch and P. P. Sveistrup, Asiatisk Kompagni i den tlorissante Periode 1772-92,
(Copenhagen, 1948); K. Glamann, 'The Danish Asiatic Co. 1732-1772', Scandinavian
Economic History Review, VIII (1960), pp. 109-49; J. H. Deuntzer, At det Asiatiske Kom:
pagnis Historie, (Kabenhavn, 1908).
72 OLE LANGE

1. Britain's China trade after 1834

In 1833, following a campaign by provincial Chambers of Commerce in Man-
chester and other expanding industrial towns, Parliament passed a statute revok-
ing the East India Company's monopoly of trade between Britain and China.
It quickly became apparent that the economic consequences of this liberalisa-
tion were of less immediate significance than had been expected, since abolition
of the old restrictions was merely unilateral and no comparable changes took
place in the Chinese Hong system. On the other hand the political consequences
were much more far-reaching. In 1834 the British government, in the person of
a Superintendent of British Trade in China nominated by the Foreign Office,
succeeded the East India Company as supreme authority over and direct cus-
todian of British commercial interests in China. To the diplomatic historian this
change is so fundamental as to constitute a starting point in China's interna-
tional relations."
As the representative of the British government the Superintendent of Trade
was awkwardly placed, for he lacked any formal basis for his authority. In rela-
tion to British subjects in Canton he was supposed to exercise functions analo-
gous to those of a colonial governor-but without having at his disposal any of
the appropriate sanctions. In relation to the Chinese authorities he was supposed
to act as the British government's ambassador-but without being recognised
as such. This left a wide opening for more or less irresponsible individualism on
the part of certain British merchants in Canton, who were held in check only
by their fear of possible reprisals by the Chinese authorities and who at the same
time were able to appeal to British public opinion at home and to the govern-
ment's obligation to protect British trade."
Thus, the political consequences of the reorganisation of Britain's China trade
in 1834 came to be of crucial importance as the differences between the Bri-
tish commercial interests and the Chinese authorities in Canton gradually
widened. In the outdated Chinese organisation of the trade (as it appeared to
Western eyes) and in Chinese policy on the opium question, there was matter
for conflict, from which the Opium War of 1839 ensued.

2. The Opium War and the treaties, 1839--43.

On 10 March 1839, Lin Tse-hsii arrived in Canton as the newly-appointed
Imperial High Commissioner charged with the specific task of resolving the

• M. Greenberg, British Trade and the Opening of China 1800-42, (London, 1951),
p. 191.
3 M. Costin, Great Britain and China 1844-60, (London, 1937), p. 48.
 DENMARK IN CHINA 73

opium question: this began the hardening of Chinese policy which ultimately
issued in armed conflict. For the first time the Chinese struck effectively at the
root of the trouble, the Western importers. In so doing they also raised the
delicate problem of jurisdiction over the foreigners in Canton. This question was
naturally bound to be highly controversial when the protagonists in the dispute
belonged to two divergent cultures with widely differing legal concepts and sys-
tems. On 18 March Lin issued his celebrated edict proclaiming a ban upon im-
ports of opium and requiring both the surrender of existing stocks and an
undertaking by Western merchants to abstain from this traffic in the future.
On 24 March <Jj policy of isolation was initiated against all foreigners living in
Canton; thereupon the confiscation order was complied with and all stocks of
opium were gradually surrendered. However, the British merchant houses,
unlike the Americans, refused to accept the Chinese ban on future opium im-
ports. In consequence, British ships and most of the British community left
Canton around 24 May, while the Americans remained and were able to con-
tinue in business. The British went to the Portuguese colony of Macao, but the
Portuguese were constrained to expel them in August following Chinese pressure.
The British merchants then went to Hongkong. In November, Lin gave orders
that no British ships were to be allowed to enter Canton after 6 December, and
on 13 December an Imperial edict was promulgated imposing an embargo
on all British trade. In London in November, Lord Palmerston decided upon
armed intervention, and in June 1840 a British naval squadron arrived in
China. The British swiftly demonstrated their military superiority even to
Peking, and in a few weeks negotiations commenced which resulted in the
Nanking treaty of 29 August. This was supplemented by a further treaty con-
cluded on 8 October 1843. 4
Specifically, the treaties provided that in addition to Canton, four further
ports were to be opened to British trade and British consuls, viz. Amoy, Faa-
chow, Ningpo and Shanghai; that Hongkong was to be ceded to England as
a colony; that China lost its tariff autonomy and that the extra-territorial prin-
ciple was applied to all British citizens in China, the Chinese renouncing all
jurisdiction over British persons and property. Finally, perhaps the most im-
portant feature of the treaty was the incorporation of the most-favoured-nation
clause, by which any advantages granted later to other nations in China were
automatically extended to England also. The clause became of great import-
ance when other nations sought and obtained treaties with China as well. The
British treaties became the prototype and the model, and the most-favoured-

4 M. Greenberg, op, cit. pp. 203, 206£ f ; Hsin-pao Chang, Commissioner Lin and the
Opium War, (Cambridge, Mass., 1964); Tu Lin-che's article on Lin Tse-hs 3 in A. W. Hummel,
ed., Eminent Chinese of the Ch'ing Empire, (Washington, 1942-43).
74 OLE LANGE

nation clause had a reinforcing effect, unforeseen by the Chinese, upon the con-
cessions yielded in negotiations with the various European nations.P

3. Britain's China trade during the war

It was characteristic that British trade with Canton should have continued
despite the Chinese embargo of December 1839. There were several reasons for
this. It was not unimporant economically to the south-eastern provinces of
China that the trade should continue. Further, the British merchant houses
practised the ancient use of concealing their trade, either by appointing Ame-
ricans as their unofficial agents in Canton or by employing neutral vessels and,
in some instances, placing British vessels under a neutral flag. The Danish flag
being one of those so used, this practice assumed significance in the Sino-
Danish treaty negotiations of 1845. It will therefore be discussed in some detail
below.
Messrs Jardine, Matheson & Co., the alrgest of the British merchant houses
in Canton, employed both methods with a certain amount of discreet approval
from the Superintendent of British Trade in China, Captain Elliot. 6 This
house had special opportunities for using the second method, for since 1820
its head in China, James Matheson, had been Danish consul at Canton for the
Danish merchants in the colonies of Trankebar and Serampore (Frede-
riksnagore) in India, both of which conducted trade with Canton. Matheson
was not involved in much work by this consular appointment, nor was it in-
tended indeed that he should be. But it did give him a formal status, which up
to 1834 placed him in a position to evade the East India Company's control,
just as, since the 1780s, other private British merchants in Canton had been
able to conduct business outside the company's monopoly by means of Austrian,
Swedish, Prussian and other European consular patents. This practice was
tolerated because economically this private British' inter-Asiatic trade (the
'country trade') was of increasingly critical importance to the Company."
In February 1840, P. Hansen, the head of the Danish establishment at
Serampore in Bengal, advised Kommercekollegiet (the Board of Trade) in
Copenhagen that a report dated at Tongkoo on 24 November 1839 and deal-
ing with conditions in the Canton district had been published in a Calcutta

5 Earl H. Pritchard, 'The Origins of the Most-Favored-Nation and the Open Door
Policies in China', The Far Eastern Quarterly, I (1942), pp. 168-69; John K. Fairbank, Trade
and Diplomacy on the China Coast 1842-54, (Cambridge, Mass., 1953), (henceforth cited
as China Coast), pp. 195-96.
6 M. Greenberg, op, cit., pp. 209-11.

7 RA, Kommercekollegiets arkiv, samlede sager til konsulatsjoumal, nr. 515.

B M. Greenberg, op, cit., p. 25.

 DENMARK IN CHINA 75

journal on 31 December the same year. This stated that at least three named
British vessels and one Dutch had adopted the Danish flag because of the
unsettled situation." In May 1840 Hansen reported that, among the various
ships then sailing in Chinese waters under the Danish flag, two, Norden and
Den Danske Konge, had been laid under embargo by the Chinese authorities
in Canton in January as being British property. These vessels were later relea-
sed because they had arrived in Canton before the port was closed to British
trade. Hansen's report continued:

In have reason to believe that, in reality, almost all the vessels aforementioned, as the
Chinese High Commissioner in Canton asserts in an Edict issued by him, have only bor-
rowed the Danish name, and in this belief I have recently been confirmed by private verbal
information from Mr Collin, Private Secretary to the Governor-General, who has had ships
papers of the kind in question in his hands. Probably the principal owner is Mr Mathe-
son, while some Danish mariner or other appears as the nominal owner and supplies a
Declaration, upon which the Consul furnishes an Interim Certificate of Registry.P

In August 1840 the consul-general in Manila, W. Kierulf, reported to Copen-

hagen that three British ships, the Vansittart, the Trinidad, and the General
Wood, were now sailing under the Danish flag, using the Danish names
Den Danske Konge , Norden and Syden respectively. When Syden had called
at Manila a short time before, Kierulf had ascertained that the ship's papers
were incomplete. The builder's certificate and bill of measurement were mis-
sing, and the most important means of identification, the so-called 'Latin cer-
tificate of registry,' was not in the possession of the ship's owner and master,
John Burd, although he did produce a certificate issued by James Matheson in
Macao on 1 August 1840. 11 In February and July Hansen reported that an
English ship which used the Danish flag and the Danish name of Den Danske
Konge when in Chinese waters had called at Madras shortly before under the
English flag and bearing its old name of VansittartP In September of the
same year the Danish vice-consul at Manila, F. Wolff, advised that Syden,
Den Danske Konge and Norden, were now back under the English flag, the
first two with the names General Wood and Vansittart respectively. Wolff
declared that these rapid switches of flag took place whenever circumstances
required, and that none of the vessels was at any time under bona fide Danish
ownership. On the contrary, in his view they belonged to Jardine Matheson
& Co., and he asserted furthermore that Matheson was abusing his office
by issuing temporary ship's papers.P

9 RA, Kommercekollegiets arkiv, Samlede sager nr. 515.

10 Ibid.
11 Ibid.
12 RA, Kommercekollegiets arkiv, Ostindisk journal, sag nr. 790.
13 RA, Kommercekollegiets arkiv, Samlede sager nr. 515.
76 OLE LANGE

These reports from Danish sources were largely correct. The procedure was
for British merchant houses nominally to sell their wares (especially Indian raw
cotton) at Hongkong, Lintin or Tongkoo to Americans in Macao. Thereupon
the goods were transhipped into non-British vessels, which carried them about
90 miles up the Canton delta to Whampoa, where Chinese products were taken
on as return cargo, and subsequently transferred into British ships for onward
conveyance. In this manner a need was generated in the summer and autumn
of 1839 for a fleet of non-British vessels capable of fast regular traffic be-
tween the Hongkong-Lintin-Tongkoo district and Whampoa. 14
At the end of July the Dutch consul in Macao annulled ship's papers be-
longing to the vessel Esperance} which sailed under the Dutch flag. This hap-
pened just as Jardine, Matheson & Co. were about to send it up to Canton with
a cargo of cotton, and according to Matheson the reason was simple malice.
At the same time the consul notified the Chinese authorities in Canton of the
matter. James Matheson thereupon invoked the aid of Captain Andreas Niel-
sen Melby, who moved in the same circles as John Burd and the three Lange
brothers at Lombok. Flying the Danish flag under a Danish captain-and
doubtless carrying Danish ship's papers too-the Esperance then sailed up to
Whampoa, although not until Matheson had secured the complicity of the
Chinese port authorities by a bribe. The Esperance was able to continue reg-
ularly in this traffic.P
Freight-rates to and from Canton increased enormously during the course of
the summer and autumn, for the scanty available tonnage of non-British bot-
toms was being called upon to handle a volume of trade that was not itself
much reduced. At the end of August the freight charges on a bale of Indian
cotton from the transhipment points at Hongkong rose from $ 11/ 2 to $ 4,
which represented about $ 16 per ton. The return freight-rate for Chinese
wares was $ 10. Two months later, the rates were $ 24 per ton from Tongkoo
to Whampoa and $ 10 for return cargo. The American firm of Russell & Co.
had ships engaged in this lucrative traffic at $ 30-40 per ton, and <two trips to
Canton and back were enough to pay for a good medium-sized vessel.l" James
Matheson took advantage of his Danish connections to profit from the situa-

14 Cambridge University Library (CULl, Jardine Matheson Archives (JM Arch.), James
Matheson Private Letter Book (PLB) 25 and 27 June, 17 July 1839, and 6 and 8 January 1840,
India Letter Book (ILB) 24 August 1839. My thanks are due to Mr A. Reid, of Messrs
Matheson and Co. Ltd., London, for permission to make use of the Jardine, Matheson ar-
chives in the Cambridge University Library.
15 CUL, 1M Arch., PLB 30 July, 19 August 1839, ILB 4 November 1839.
16 CUL, JM Arch., ILB 24 August 1839, PLB 24 November 1839, Hsin-pao Chang,

op. cit., p. 207.

 DENMARK IN CHINA 77

tion. Since the beginning of the 1830s he had had contacts with a group of
Danish shippers and traders associated with John Burd and the Lange brothers,
who conducted business in south-east Asia from the island of Lombok in the
Dutch East Indies. In the course of this Burd had got steadily deeper into
debt with Jardine, Matheson & Co.; the amount had reached $ 206,837 by
30 June 1838, and in consequence the firm took over his ship, Syden, in the
autumn of 1838 and transferred it to the British flag under the name General
Wood. Burd went to Lombok to continue his business there in collaboration
with the Lange brothers.!? With English trade in difficulties in the summer
and autumn of 1839 because of the deterioration of Anglo-Chinese relations,
Burd travelled up to Tongkoo and made an agreement with James Matheson
whereby he took over two English ships, Vansittart and General Wood, the lat-
ter his own former property. These ships were then transferred to the Danish
flag under the names Den Danske Konge and Syden, and doubtless they were
furnished with papers issued by Matheson in his capacity as Danish consul. The
object of this 'sale' was firstly to enable the two vessels to participate in the lucra-
tive carrying trade to Canton and to decrease Jardine, Matheson & CO.'s own
freight costs, and secondly to reduce Burd's debt, which by 30 June 1839 had
risen to $ 242,901. The agreement was that the vessels would revert to the
British flag when normal conditions returned.l" Thus the sale was nominal
rather than real, motivated by special conditions and the state of the economic
relationship between Jardine Matheson & Co. and John Burd. The Chinese
embargo on all British trade in December and the consequent sharpening of
Chinese supervision over trade in Canton meant a further complication of
business conditions for English firms. Transhipment at Hongkong and Tongkoo
for goods destined for Canton perforce ceased: Jardine, Matheson & Co.
transferred them to Manila.l" Thus, Jardine, Matheson & Co. had at least
four vessels--the Esperance, Norden, Den Danske Konge and Syden-plying
to Canton under the Danish flag during the trading season, which reduced the
dependence of this house upon rival American firms engaged in the legal trade.
When the season closed in June, the British land and naval forces arrived and
instituted a blockade. The Americans left Canton, and so the palmy days came
temporarily to an end. Between 30 June 1839 and 30 June 1840, John Burd's

17 CUL, JM Arch., Accounts Current 1832-38, PLB 9 April 1838, ILB 25 June, 6 July,
31 October 1838.
18 CUL, JM Arch, PLB 24 and 25 November 1839, 9 and 20 March 1841, Accounts

Current 1839; RA, Kommercekollegiets arkiv, Guvernar Hansens Bo., J. Burd to P. Hansen
28 September 1846.
19 CUL, JM Arch., PLB 8 January 1840.
 78 OLE LANGE

debt was brought down from $ 242,901 to $ 29,100, although as already

mentioned, Burd was detained in Canton with Den Danske Konge in January
and February 1840 because of Chinese doubts about his ownership of the ves-
se1. 20 In March 1841 Matheson terminated the special arrangement with
Burd; Den Danske Konge (the Vansittart) and Syden (the General Wood)
changed name and flag once again, while Burd departed for Lombok.F
The scale on which James Matheson exploited his post of Danish consul
to conduct transactions with British vessels during the Anglo-Chinese conflict
of 1839-42 seems to have been less than was imagined in Copenhagen on the
basis of the reports received from Manila and Trankebar in 1839-42. The
transactions were largely confined to the season of 1839-40 and were less high-
handed than the Danish observers in Manila and Trankebar believed, though
scarcely beyond juridical or moral reproach. The most important considera-
tion, however, and the one that had an impact on the Danish negotiations in
China in 1845, was not the precise extent of this practice but the fact that it
could happen at all. Up to 1834, British merchants in Canton had had to secure
the cover of foreign flags by undertaking consular duties for other European
countries in order to evade the control of the East India Company. In 1839-
42, British merchant houses concealed a large part of their trade behind
neutral flags so as to escape first the British, then the Chinese embargo on
their Canton business. The treaties of 1842-43 established for the first time
in China permanent British authorities with effective jurisdiction and adminis-
trative control over British subjects and their activities. Thus the situation
confronting the British merchant houses was decisively altered and comparable
with conditions prior to 1834, although the possibilities of conflict between these
economic interests and the Foreign Office on the subject of future policy were
very much increased. Sir Henry Pottinger, the British plenipotentiary in China
since 1841 and the man who carried through the negotiations for the Nanking
treaty of 1842, was clear about this. As a result of his brief experience he wrote
shortly after the conclusion of the treaty:

'1 am convinced that it will be a far more difficult undertaking to control than to protect
British subjects ... A new Era is opening in this quarter of the World, and 1 am apprehensive,
that unless the Head British Authority in China is vested with extraordinary powers, he
will find so many turbulent spirits to control that his best exertions owards carrying out
the T rea ty will fail. 22'

20 CUL, JM Arch., Accounts Current 1840, PLB 29 February 1840. Hsin-pao Chang,
oft. cit., p. 208.
21 CUL, JM Arch., PLB 8 and 31 March, 24 July 1841.
22 Sir Henry Pottinger 12 September 1842, cited here from W. C. Costin, China and Great
Britain 1833~O, (London 1937), p. 102.
 DENMARK IN CHINA 79

II. Governor P. Hansen's mission to China, 1845

1. The situation in Canton
The Sino-British treaties of 1842-43 were, to an unusual extent, regarded as
outline agreements to be interpreted and given concrete shape by practice. One
of the crucial questions on which the treaties were silent concerned the trade
in opium; at issue was a product which was contraband under Chinese law
but not under British. Economically the trade was of the highest significance,
for at this time opium was the most important of China's imports.P In these
circumstances the trade did become discreetly recognised after 1843. There was
a tacit agreement between the British and Chinese authorities, and between
them and the great merchant houses of Dent & Co. and Jardine, Matheson
& Co. which had the lions's share of the trade, on the limits within which it
would be tolerated. The logical consequence of this was the splitting of the
China trade into a many-sided legal trade in the treaty ports, under the super-
vision of the consuls and the Chinese authorities, and a specialised illegal
trade in opium, outside the treaty ports and not subject to any formal con-
trol. This system was already evolving in the Shanghai region by 1844, and
thereafter it spread elsewhere.P
In April 1845 Francis MacGregor, British consul in Canton, informed the
Governor of Hongkong, Sir John Davis, that he had received a complaint from
the Chinese authorities to the effect that on 18 March a British ship, the Sir
Edward Ryan, had discharged a quantity of saltpetre at Blenheim Reach on
the Canton river without having either notified its arrival or paid the obliga-
tory customs and port dues. Consul MacGregor had felt bound to enquire into
the matter and, since he found the Chinese complaint to be justified, he
imposed fines on the captain and owner of the vessel. The report concluded
by expressing MacGregor's concern over the growing scale and the openness
of smuggling. He was worried about the effects it would have on the legal
trade and on British reputations. So was Davis, who took measures forthwith
to secure consular control over all British vessels passing Whampoa in the
future, so as at least to drive smuggling away from the immediate neighbour-
hood of Canton.i"
This did not resolve the matter, however, since it was only British vessels
that were brought under control in this fashion. The problem was put to Mac-
Gregor in an address from about a dozen British firms containing their reac-

23 D. E. Owen, British Opium Policy in India and China (Newhaven, 1934), pp, 209-10.
24 J. K. Fairbank, China Coast, pp. 150-51, 232-34.
25 Public Record Office (PRO), FO 17/99, MacGregor to Davis 17 April, Davis to

MacGregor 21 ,April 1845.

80 OLE LANGE

tions to the new measures. It pointed out that British merchants would be
worse placed than their foreign Western competitors unless similar rules were
also applied to the latter. It averred that the illegal traffic on the Canton river
would still be carried on by foreign ships, by English-owned ships under foreign
flags, or by the multitude of small craft among which the Portuguese-registered
lorchas were especially prominent. The address concluded:
'We beg you will pardon our suggesting that the Government of China be requested to
give immediate effect to their fiscal and Port Regulations that the subjects of all nations
be made aware that vessels of every denomination contravening those established and re-
cognized rules will be liable to seizure if found within the Bocca Tigris ... and moreover that
this denunciation will not as heretofore be merely an empty threat, but that the laws
will be vigorously carried into execution as often as attempts are made to evade them. We
would add in conclusion that unless some such stringent and general Regulations as to
the foregoing are enforced the evils which you aim at removing by our present measures
will rapidly increase beyond the pale of British law and Interference to the great and
manifest disadvantage of British Commerce.s'"

This address pointed complete accuracy to the weakness in Governor Davis'

action and the probable consequences as long as it was not backed up by the
other side. For once Davis was at one with the British merchants. On 26 April
he sent to Ch'i-ying, Governor-General of the provinces of Kwangtung and
Kwangsi and responsible for Chinese policy in the five treaty ports, a note
whose contents were wholly in line with the address from the British mer-
chants in Canton. The note said, inter alia:

'I must state that not only have British ships smuggled at Whampoa, but it is notorious
that many vessels of other nations ly there among the regular shipping for the purpose of
selling opium... I am informed that a Danish and a Swedish" ship have been lying at
Whampoa laden with opium. If the Chinese officers at the Bogue permit Portuguese Lor-
chas and other opium vessels to enter the River, I fear smuggling will become general.?"

Ch'i-ying's reply concurred entirely with Davis in regard to the consequences

of continued smuggling on the Canton river. He stated that the Swedish and
Danish ships had been ordered to leave Whampoa, and that Chinese war-
junks had been told to intervene against foreign vessels engaged in smuggling.
This answer manifestly failed to convince Davis that Ch'i-ying had fully under-
stood the seriousness with which the British authorities viewed the situation.
He sent a second note to Ch'i-ying:

'It has given me a great satisfaction to be informed by your Excellency that the Swedish
and Danish vessels had been ordered to leave the River. As the Nations to which those
ships belong have not concluded Treaties with China, and are not under the orders of
Consuls, it is necessary that they should be obliged to obey the laws, in order to prevent

26 PRO, FO 17/99.
27 Ibid.
 DENMARK IN CHINA 81

their taking advantage of circumstances to evade the duties. If the British ships are com-
pelled by the consul to observe the treaty, while the vessels of other nations monopolise
the profits of smuggling, this is an unfair and unequal state of things, which cannot
be permanent. It is therefore desirable, with a view to ensure quiet and regularity, that
all should conform to the Regulations equally."8'

Davis's efforts were followed up by the consul at local level. In mid-May Mac
Gregor enjoined upon the British merchants and shipmasters their duty of
registering British vessels with the Chinese authorities, and to the Chinese au-
thorities he stressed the need to exercise supervision over the vessels of nations
that had not concluded treaties with China." The Chinese reaction to this
constant British pressure and to the continuance of smuggling came at the
end of June, when Ch'i-ying and Huang En-t'ung, after consultation with
MacGregor, framed a regulation applying to all vessels arriving at Canton.
Every vessel was to be registered and checked by Chinese officials on arrival
and departure, and its tonnage, cargo and other details were to be reported
through the consul of its country of registration. Ships from countries without
consular representation of their own could register themselves through the
consuls of other countries or else directly with the Chinese customs authori-
ties. 30
The constant pressure placed by British officials in the spring of 1845 both
upon the Chinese authorities and the British merchants in Canton demonstra-
tes how seriously the diplomats viewed the risk that legal Western trade might
be ruined by too flagrant smuggling. It was perfectly possible for Davis and
MacGregor to take effective measures against that part of the illegal traffic
which was carried under the British flag in the immediate neighbourhood of
Canton, but the main problem facing the British authorities lay in controlling
the illegal trade financed by British or foreign capital that utilised the ships of
nations which had neither treaties with China nor consuls there. Such con-
trol might be exercised by the Chinese, but Davis came to doubt both their
will and their capacity in this respect. Alternatively these nations might obtain
treaty rights and then exercise the function of control themselves. Such was
the situation when Governor Peder Hansen arrived in Canton at the end
of June 1845.

2. The Danish background

The decision to send Governor Hansen to China was taken at the end of
28 Ibid.
2& PRO, FO 17/99, MacGregor to Davis 17 May.
so PRO, FO 17/100.
82 OLE LANGE

1843. His instructions were to examine whether and how the Danish merchant
marine could participate in the carrying trade; he was authorised to investigate
James Matheson's position and activities as Danish consul and possibly to sus-
pend him; he was given the further task of seeking information about the
Danish trading post at Bally established by John Burd and the Lange brothers,
with a view to its possible use as a new bridgehead for Danish trading opera-
tions in Asia.s!
The background for this new initiative was undoubtedly the fact that the
Danish government was in process of disposing of its possessions in India,
(Trankebar, Serampore and the islands of Nicobar), and was therefore seek-
ing another basis for the renewal of Danish activities in Asia. The reports
about the opening of the treaty ports and the misuse of the flag played a part
too, as also did the liberalisation of Danish trade with China that would ensue
from the forthcoming expiry of the Asiatisk Kompagni's charter. Moreover,
it 1842 the Danish government had promulgated the first of the so-called 'aba-
tement orders' (remissionsordningen ), whereby a number of specified com-
modities from overseas were accorded a 25 per cent abatement of import duty
when imported direct and were also exempted from transit tolls upon re-export
under specified conditions. At first, however, this order did not apply to pro-
ducts imported from countries east of the Cape of Good Hope. In March
1844, a few months after the decision on Governor Hansen's mission to China,
the list of articles entitled to abatement was extended to cover East Indian and
Chinese goods, as the China trade had been thrown open a few days pre-
viously.P
The abatements directly supported Danish overseas trade: they must be
regarded as an instrument for promoting the direct Danish import of colonial
goods aimed solely at the supply of the Danish market. The government's only
intention was to counteract the dependence of Slesvig and the Danish kingdom
upon Hamburg for these commodities, especially after the opening of the Al-
tona-Kiel railway, which was due to take place in September of that year. It
is evident from the debates in the Estates (Strenderforsamlinger) and from
various private petititions to the government that business circles had started
to indulge in dreams of restoring Copenhagen to that position in the overseas
and transit trades which it had enjoyed in the halcyon era of the eighteenth
century.s"

31 RA, Kommercekollegiets arkiv, Guvernar Hansens 80.

32 R. Willerslew, 'Remissionen af 14. april 1842 og 27. marts 1944', Natumalekonomisk
Tidsskrift, LXXXIII (1945) pp. 140-81. Plakat af 22. marts 1844.
33 R. Willerslew, IDe. cit. pp. 158, 164; K. Winding, Frihandelsproblemet i Denmark
1855-1863, (Copenhagen, 1953), p. 17.
 DENMARK IN CHINA 83

The initiative taken by the government in 1843-44 III sending Governor

Hansen out to China must be viewed in this context-not as a casual whim
but as the outcome of a series of connected events.

3. The Sino-Danish treaty negotiations

Governor Hansen's arrival in China at the end of June could scarcely have
been timed more auspiciously. He did not set out until the spring of 1845, since
the Anglo-Danish negotiations in Calcutta concerning the sale of the Danish
possessions in India were not concluded until February 1845 and he led the
Danish team in these discussions." The Danish envoy in London, Count L.
Rewentlow, had ensured beforehand that the British government would sup-
port the Danish mission through its representative in China, Sir John Davis,
Governor of Hongkong." On 28 June, Ch'i-ying received a Danish note, the
English version of which ran as follows:
'To his Excellency Keying, Imperial Commissioner for Foreign Affairs.
I have the honour to inform your Excellency that I have been commanded by his Majesty
the King of Denmark to proceed to China in order to renew as far as lays in my
power the trade carried on in former days between China and Denmark, and to promote
that object by acquiring the necessary information of the existing Regulations of the
Chinese Empire and by appointing consuls at different Ports of the Empire open to for-
eign commerce for the purpose of superintending the Danish Trade and of facilitating
the intercourse of his Majesty's subjects with the constituted authorities of the Chinese
Empire.
Having arrived at Canton I beg to request that it may please your Excellency to depute
an Imperial officer to confer with me verbally on the above subject, and to point out to
me the best means by which the Trade between Denmark and China may be carried on
in peace and harmony and to the advantage of both Nations.P"

It is evident, from the reference to the precedent of the former Sino-Danish

trade convention and from the deft and tactful tone, that Hansen had profited
from British experience and knowledge in drafting his note. His proposal for
verbal negotiations was accepted and these took place immediately."
On 3 July, Governor Hansen received a declaration from Ch'i-ying and
Huang En-t'ung of which the English version reads as follows:
'Keying, a prince of the Imperial House, assistant minister of the Cabinet and Governor
General of Kwangtung and Kwangsi, Huang, Lieutenant Governor of Kwangtung, send the
following answer.

U J. Brandsted(ed.), Vore Gamle T'ropekolonier, (Copenhagen, 1952), I, p. 407.

35 PRO, FO 22/148.
36 RA, Kommercekollegiets arkiv, Sarnlede sager til konsulatsjournal nr, 975 b, P.
Hansen to Kommercekollegiet 8 November 1845.
37 Ibid., P. Hansen to Kornmercekollegiet 16 September 1845.
84 OLE LANGE

It appears from a report of the said Governor that he came to China in order to make
inquiry about the recently established Regulations. He at the same time requested me
the Governor and the Lieutenant Governor to appoint an officer for an interview, to consult
about a profitable and peaceful commerce and words to that effect.
We the Governor and Lieutenant Governor were delighted at this, and it appears that
all the nations trade here according to the same law. The great Emperor views them with
the same benevolence, and makes not the slightest difference whether it be much or little,
lest any foreigner should thereby suffer disadvantage.
Your honourable country had heretofore carried on commerce and has now resolved
upon appointing consuls for the management [of the trade]. By this measure harmony will
still more be promoted, and you will with all of the other Nations, enjoy your advantages.
We now present you with a copy of the tariff and the trading Regulations, that the said
governor may keep the same, and as soon as the consuls are appointed the said governor
may hand them over to them to manage matters accordingly.
This is the object of this answer, which is addressed to the Danish Governor Hansen.
3 copies of the Trading Regulations and one of the Tariff accompany this. s8 '

Danish wishes were thus met with surprising ease. Denmark was placed on
a footing of formal equality with the treaty powers of England, France and the
United States. Admittedly, a declaration by Ch'i-ying, published as early as
22 July 1843 by Sir Henry Pottinger and incorporated as article VIII in the
supplementary treaty of 8 October 1843, had extended all the advantages ac-
corded to the English to include all the Western nations that had traded with
China up to that time.P? However, the desire of France and the United States
for treaties in 1844 showed that Westerners did not feel they could entirely
rely on this Chinese declaration, and this doubt prevailed at the Danish Board
of Trade also.t" The feeling of uncertainty which impelled France, the Uni-
ted States and later Denmark, Belgium and Sweden-Norway, to seek treaties
in confirmation of their trading rights was certainly unfounded. The principle
which placed all nations on an equal footing with one another in relation to
China, had for centuries been fundamental to the attitude of the Chinese
state to the outside world. Thus the traditional Chinese policy continued unal-
tered after 1842-43. 41

4. The consular question

Governor Hansen's next task was to implement the first of the newly-estab-
38 Ibid.
39 J. M. Frochlisse, La Belgique et la Chine, Relations diplomatiques et economiques.
(1839-1909), (Brussels, 1937), p. 26; E. H. Pritchard, 'The Origin of the Most-Favoured-
Nation and the Open Door Policies in China', The Far Eastern Quarterly, I (1942), pp.
168-69.
40 RA, Kommercekollegiets arkiv, Guvemer P. Hansens Bo, Kornmercekollegiet to P. Hansen

20 June 1845.
41 E. H. Pritchard, loco cit., pp. 162-63.
 DENMARK IN CHINA 85

lished rights by appointing Danish consuls in the treaty ports. In the first couple
of years after the opening of the new ports the official British consuls in Chinese
ports had generally acted as guarantors for vessels of other Western nations
which had neither treaties with nor consuls in China. As in fact these ves-
sels were frequently sailing on British account this seemed quite proper.
Viewed from the official British standpoint, however, this was dangerous, for,
in the eyes of the Chinese authorities, the consuls became responsible for ac-
tions committed by persons over whom they had no jurisdiction and against
whom they could therefore impose no legal sanctions. Accordingly the practice
was stopped in May 1844 on the orders of Sir Henry Pottinger, Governor of
Hongkong, after Gribble, the official consul at Amoy, had been placed in an
embarrassing situation. The Danish vessel Dansborg, owned by John Burd
and probably skippered by Captain Haberbier, for which Gribble had accep-
ted responsibility, was caught in the act of smuggling in March 1844 and
promptly took to flight. 42
When Governor Hansen was nominating Danish consuls in the treaty ports
in July-August 1845, his choice lay between a handful of Danes without much
influence and foreign nationals of greater position and importance. Despite the
experience with James Matheson-perhaps even because of it-Hansen de-
cided to link Danish interests with a major English merchant house. In Can-
ton, the most important port, he chose Donald Matheson, head of Jardine,
Matheson & Co. in China and nephew of James Matheson, who had returned
to London. However, the principle in general and the appointment of Donald
Matheson in particular did not find favour with Francis MacGregor and Sir
John Davis, since from previous experience they feared that such an appoint-
ment would give a British merchant too much independence of the British
authorities and would lead to abuse. Davis suggested privately to Hansen that
instead of involving private British merchants, the official British consuls
should also act as consuls for Denmark. He offered to issue immediately a
temporary order to this effect pending receipt of confirmation from London,
although this cut right across the policy initiated by Pottinger after the Amoy
episode and would have meant a return to the unsatisfactory state of affairs
existing before. That the offer was made at all must be ascribed to the danger
seen by British officials in uncontrolled activity by great merchant houses under
cover of a foreign flag: Governor Hansen was also fully aware of this, and that
was precisely why he refused it. As a compromise, however, he agreed to nom-
inate Danes as consuls in ports where they lived, while for the time being

42 RA, Kommercekollegiets arkiv, Samlede Sager nr. 515, konsul Wolff, Manila to
Kommercekollegiet 15 February 1844; J. K. Fairbank, China Coast, pp. 213, 348.
86 OLE LANGE

ing Donald Matheson would act as Danish consul in Canton, where there were
no Danes."
Davis, however, had already taken further steps regarding Matheson's ap-
pointment. In July, at MacGregor's prompting, he had put the problem of
supervision of the great British merchant houses to the Foreign Office and
requested instructions on two specific points:

'The first point has reference to British subjects receiving consular appointments from
the sovereigns of other Christian states. I conceive that the Queen's prerogative would ex-
tend to prohibiting Her Majesty's subjects generally from accepting these appointments,
where such acceptance found to be attended with mischievous and embarrassing results. The
tendency can scarcely be otherwise in China, where British subjects, being by Treaty freed
from the jurisdiction of the country in which they reside, should be made as amenable
as possible to their own consuls. But Mr Matheson as Danish consul might consider
himself as co-ordinate authority with Mr consul MacGregor, and this assumption, however
groundless, might increase the disposition of the great opium-merchants, already sufficiently
inflated and independent, to set at nought the laws and authorities of their own country. The
very individual in question is a systematic opponent of the colonial government of
Hongkong, maintains one of the local papers, and through the agency of Dr. Bowring,
whose son is employed in the mercantile house, has exerted a secret influence at home.'

Later in his submission Davis continues:

'The second point refers to the employment, by British subjects, of vessels under Foreign
flags. From circumstances of Danish and Swedish ships being chiefly occupied as carriers
they have already been made use of by the English opium traders to evade the prohibi-
tion against trading to the northwards of 32° latitude. Were such fraudulent facilities com-
bined with the assumed authority and immunities of a Foreign consul, the results might
be highly inconvenient; and Mr Matheson as Danish consul, with a number of Danish
ships in his employ, would certainly be a very unmanageable character.v"

Davis' anxieties regarding the supervision of the great British merchant houses
were by no means unfounded. Only a month later he had to report that a news
item in the Hongkong Register had announced the establishment of a colony
on the island of Keeow, a short way below Bocca Tigris, although such a colony
was at variance with the terms of the treaties. Davis declared the finan-
cial backer of the project to be Jardine, Matheson & Co. He concluded:

'The effect of this colony is bad in every way, as it creates an independent feeling
subversive of all control. With the authority of Her Majesty's Government I could call
on Keying to expel the settlers from the place, but without such an authority I should hardly
feel justified to go so far. t S'

43 RA, Kommercekollegiets arkiv, Samlede Sager nr 975 b, P. Hansen to Kommercekol-

legiet 16 September 1845.

u PRO, FO 17/100, 23 July 1845.
4& PRO, FO 17/100, 22 August 1845.
 DENMARK IN CHINA 87

Relations between British diplomats and British commercial interests in China,

in other words, were so strained that the Governor of Hongkong was consider-
ing asking the Chinese authorities to intervene against British subjects. The prob-
lem of supervision caused the Foreign Office in the autumn of 1845 to seek the
opinion of the Attorney General. In the summer of 1846 Davis received orders
to do nothing: Donald Matheson could continue to act as Danish consul in
Canton."
The result of Governor Hansen's mission to China was that Denmark ob-
tained rights on an equal footing with the other treaty powers, an outcome,
to be sure, in accord with traditional Chinese policy and no more than a for-
malisation of actual practice, since in both the preceding and succeeding
years trading in the treaty ports was carried on by all nationalities, irrespec-
tive of formal rights. But what was notable about the Danish mission is
the light it sheds on Sino-British relations and on relations between British
diplomats and commercial interests. Chinese and British authorities had a
common interest in bringing all trading under control in order to stop the
manifest tendency to mix. legal and illegal trade. It is in this context that one
must view the reception accorded in both Chinese and British quarters to the
Danish treaty proposal. Both nations were interested in ending the use of the
Danish flag in illegal trade and, from both the Chinese and the British stand-
points, the best means of doing this was for Denmark to establish official
supervisory machinery.
Misuse of the flag was especially a problem for the British authorities, as
they had already had trouble with the great British merchant houses which
were dissatisfied with what they regarded as the soft line taken by the Foreign
Office, and especially by the diplomats on the spot, in dealing with the Chinese
authorities. If foreign consular appointments enabled British representatives
of these houses to escape the control of the Foreign Office and, in addition,
themselves to exercise formal control of the use of the flag of the country
represented, the sky would be the limit. It would be setting the fox to guard
the hencoop. From the standpoint of the great merchant houses, the situation
of 1844-45 was in principle very similar to that before the abolition of the
East India Company's monopoly. Now it was only the control of the Foreign
Office which had to be shaken off to free the conduct of business from all
unreasonable meddling. Thus the conflict merely continued the ancient struggle
between the 'old China hands', with their strictly economic self-interests, and
the British authorities, now represented by the Foreign Office, which had to
take into account not only economic interests but broader political considera-

46 PRO, FO 17/108, 25 June 1846.

88 OLE LANGE

tions as well. This struggle, rooted in a differing assessment of British economic

opportunity in China, continued and intensified throughout the rest of the
nineteenth century.s?
It was into this larger game, played by the British and Chinese authorities
and all the British and other Western economic interests involved, that Den-
mark entered as a pawn when Governor Hansen arrived at the politically
favourable juncture of June 1845. This is the chief reason for the ease with
which he accomplished his mission.
The case of Belgium confirms this. In February 1845 Lannoy, the Belgian
consul-general in Manila, arrived in Canton on an exploratory mission with
authority to conclude a treaty and open consulates should opportunity serve.
Lannoy proposed to the Chinese authorities at the beginning of March that
Belgium should be accorded the same commercial advantages as other coun-
tries and, in addition, should establish a consulate in Canton. This proposal
was received with great reserve. In his reply to Lannoy, sent on 5 March,
Ch'-ying declared that he had been unable to discover any information about
the kingdom of Belgium or any indication that Belgians had ever traded in
China before as Lannoy asserted. Therefore he was unable to comply with the
Belgian request without first submitting the matter to Peking. A reply in similar
terms was returned to the French diplomatic representatives in Canton when,
at Lannoy's request, they intervened on Belgium's behalf. Only after ref-
erence to Peking was the Belgian proposal acceded to. On 16 July, Ch'i-ying
issued a statement giving Belgium the same rights as the treaty powers.s"
The fact that it took Lannoy, with French support, four months to accomplish
what had taken Hansen less than a week, must be attributed to the special
circumstances operating in favour of Denmark, a country of whose existence,
unlike Belgium's, the Chinese had been aware beforehand.P
The success of Governor Hansen's mission made Denmark (not Belgium, as
stated in the standard works) the first country to obtain treaty rights in China
after the great powers of England, the United States and France.s? The ques-
tion now was whether the Danes would be able to exploit their new op-
portunities.

47 See Nathan O. Pe1covits, Old China Hands and the Foreign Office, (New York, 1948).
48 J. M. Frochisse. op, cit., pp. 37 ff.
•" J. K. Fairbank, China Coast, p. 198.
5D See e. g. H. B. Morse, The International Relations of the Chinese Empire, (London,
1910-18) j Henry Cordier, Histoire Generale de la Chine et de ses Relations avec les Pays
etrangers, (Paris, 1920); China Treaties, E. Hertsleg (ed.), (London, 1908). The only referen-
ce I have seen to Governor Hansen's mission is in John F. Davis, China during the War
and since the Peace, (London, 1852).
 DENMARK IN CHINA 89

III. Economic activity 1845-65

1. Private trade
The practical results of the treaty were slow to emerge. The hopes of restor-
ing Copenhagen to its long-lost position as an emporium of trade in Asiatic
wares for the Baltic region, as expressed during the discussions on the abate-
ment question in the Estates in 1842 and 1844, were totally Ialsified.v' The
government's judgment was more realistic, and the significance of the abate-
ments turned out to be merely to facilitate the supply to the home market of
Chinese products, especially tea. Only a few merchant houses in Denmark,
such as Jac. Holm & Sanner, M. W. Sass & Co. and Lorenzen & Gorrisen of
Flensborg, seem to have had vessels in direct regular traffic between China
and Danish ports in the first ten years after 1845. Even after 1855, when
Danes were well established both in the Chinese and in the rest of the Asiatic
freight market, the number of vessels arriving at Copenhagen annually direct
from the East Indies and China never exceeded seven. 52
The few Danes who established themselves in the treaty ports during this
period seem to have developed only a very limited business, the precise scope of
which is difficult to determine. These were John Burd, who in the early years
worked in Bally in collaboration with Mads Lange under the name of Burd,
Lange & Co.; F. H. Bloch, who joined Burd's firm in Hongkong and even-
tually succeeded him; Nicolai Duus of Duus, Rawle & Co. in Shanghai and
Hongkong; and J ens Barker and A. Melbye, Only Wilhelm Pustau who, as
quite a young man at the time of Governor Hansen's sojourn in China in 1845,
had applied in vain to be appointed Danish consul in Shanghai, really suc-
ceeded in building up a major enterprise, with branches in Canton, Shanghai
and Hongkong. H. P. Hanssen, a South Jutlander from Nerremelle, carved
out a unique career for himself. He arrived in China in 1852 and three years
later joined the great English merchant house of Dent & Co. He had worked
his way up to become a partner in the firm by 1864, but a concatenation of
unfortunate circumstances brought about its fall in 1867. In 1869 he was a
joint founder of Alfred Dent & Co., remaining a partner until he left China
in 1876 to settle in London."

51 R. Willerslew, loco cit. p. 158.

52 RA, Udenrigsrninisteriets arkiv, Departmentet for Handels- og Konsulatssager, Gene-
ralskibslisterne Hongkong 1849, 1851, 1852, 1853, Singapore 1849-57; Kornrnercekolle-
giets arkiv, Samlede Sager nr. 515, reports from John Burd, Hongkong 1847 and 1850;
Statistisk T'abelucerk, 1855 ff.
53 This is based on Chinese Repository 1844-48; The Anglo-Chinese Calendar 1844,
1845, 1847, 1848, 1854, 1855; The Overland Register and Price Current 1846--60; China
Overland Trade Report 1860-61; Erhvervsarkivet, Arhus, H. P. Hansens Erindringer. These
90 OLE LANGE

2. Shipping: the new freight market

An increased demand for transport resulted from the repeal of the English
Navigation Acts in 1849 and the conditions of general prosperity following the
great gold discoveries: this opened new opportunities for Danish overseas ship-
ping, which had benefited from the abatements in the preceding years. 54 Up
to the mid-fifties most of its overseas carrying traffic had been with Latin Ame-
rican ports, as clearly reflected in the establishment of new consulates and
in the General Shipping Lists (Generalskibslister) compiled by the consuls.P
From this time onwards the situation gradually changed: a steadily increas-
ing number of Danish vessels moved out of the South and Central American
carrying trade and into the expanding Chinese and Asiatic markets, probably
because of the level of. freight rates. The rise in the number of Danish ships
calling at Chinese ports in the years 1862-64 can almost be called explosive. 56
The factors crucial for this expansion were the growth of foreign and coastal
trade in China.
The great expectations nourished in British commercial and industrial circles
with regard to the huge Chinese market were not fulfilled: the notion of China's
teeming millions demanding Lancashire textiles and other Western industrial
products might fire the imagination but men overlooked the fact that a dif-
ferent and unknown civilisation was involved, with quite different standards
and needs and a different economic system based on self-sufficiency. Thus the
mercantile spirit, the individualistic profit motive and the Western concept of
economic advancement occupied a low place in the traditional Confucian scale
of values.P Against such a background the creation of a satisfactory market
for Western industrial products was bound to be laborious. In consequence
British businessmen in China and England felt almost continuously frustrated:
this manifested itself in political pressures upon a Foreign Office whose policy
they believed too feeble, thus permitting the Chinese to obstruct the expansion
of commerce. This viewpoint was expressed at its loudest and clearest in the
English-language press in China. 58

were written in the 1880s and 1890s and partially published under the title 'Erindringer fra
Kina-kysten i 1850-erne', Erhueroshistorisk Arbog, V, 1953, pp. 28-52.
54 R. Willerslew, loco cit., p. 171.
56 In 1845 there were 20 Danish consuls in Latin American ports. In 1858 the figure
was 47. Liste over kgl, Danske Consuler og Vicekonsuler, (Copenhagen, 1845 and 1858).
so Appendix, Table 1.
57 Mary C. Wright, The Last Stand of Chinese Conservatism: The T'Ung-Chih Restora-

tion 1862-74. (2nd ed., New York, 1966), chap. VIII.

58 See Prescott C. Clarke, 'The Development of the English Language Press on the China

Coast 1827-81'. M. A. thesis 1961, in the Senate House Library, London University.
 DENMARK IN CHINA 91

The most valuable import after 1842-43 continued to be opium, followed

by cotton, which also came from India. Estimated imports of opium grew
steadily from an annual average of about 35,000 chests in the five-year period
1843-47 to about 58,300 in 1856-60. 59 Exports increased sharply after 185!.
Exports of tea averaged 66 million lbs annually in 1843-47. The annual average
rose to 86 million lbs in 1848-52 and 110 millions in 1853-57. Silk went up
from an annual average of 9,750 bales during the five years 1843-47 to 22,210
in 1848-52 and then to 61,600 in 1853-57. 6 0 After 1860, the effects of
the treaty of Tientsin and the convention of Peking made themselves felt, with
their provision for the opening of nine more ports, four of them up-river on
the Yangtse as far as Hankow/" The growth of China's foreign trade up to
1860 combined with the new treaties to produce an expansion of commerce and
the freight market, especially as Western merchants were already heavily en-
gaged in the Chinese coastal trade.
The second factor in the expansion of the Asiatic freight market was the
development of the Chinese coastal trade, for one consequence of increased
foreign trade had been an expansion of traffic between the Chinese cities, espec-
ially the treaty ports. The drafting of the treaties and the customs tariffs in
1842 and 1843 was heavily influenced by the manner in which trade had been
conducted previously. When Canton had been the only port open to foreigners
there had been only one market to legislate for. The new customs regulations
were drafted as if the pattern of trade in the new treaty ports was bound to be
identical to that in Canton, with dues paid each time goods entered or left
the port. They envisaged them as five separate markets between which mer-
chandise could indeed be transferred, but not without paying duties just as
Chinese merchants had traditionally been obliged to do. Naturally such an
arrangement was not acceptable to British merchants wishing to move their
wares from one treaty port to another in quest of the best market: duty-free
novement of Western products between treaty ports was what they wanted. In
April 1844 the Chinese yielded to the British demands and agreed that only
goods brought ashore should be liable to duty. This concession was embodied
in the American treaty of July 1844, which provided that Western goods, hav-
ing cleared customs at anyone treaty port, could be freely shipped to another. 52
This arrangement gave a powerful stimulus to the coastal trade. In 1847,

59 J. K. Fairbank, China Coast, pp. 286-88. The figures of opium imports are based on
the material in H. B. Morse, The International Relations of the Chinese Empore, (London
1910-18), I, p. 556.
80 Morse, op, cit., I, p. 366.

81 Articles X and XI in the treaty of Tientsin, article IV in the convention of Peking.

82 J. K. Fairbank, China Coast, p. 314.
92 OLE LANGE

at the instance of Rutherford Alcock the British consul, the principle was ex-
tended in practice if not in form to cover merchandise re-exported from
Shanghai and Ningpo to ports other than the treaty ports, such as Singapore.
This naturally promoted inter-Asiatic trade. The existence of Hongkong with
its warehousing facilities and the rule of customs-free re-export from the treaty
ports produced the same effect as free ports upon the entire Western trade in
China and South-East Asia. One result of this Western traffic between the
treaty ports was a mingling of Western and Chinese trade. Once Western mer-
chants had secured permission for customs-free re-export of their imports, is was
but a short step to the inclusion of Chinese products in the coastal trade. In
the same way, Chinese merchants began to deal in Western products and to
use Western vessels for carrying them, so that the specialisation presupposed
by the customs regulations was not maintained. The mingling of Western and
Chinese trade in commodities initiated a Western invasion of the entire coastal
trade, on both the financial and the carrying sides." This brought an increase
in the employment of Western vessels in the coastal traffic, which had pre-
viously been reserved for Chinese junks. The latter were put out of business,
for even Chinese merchants went over to using Western vessels because of their
superior speed and manoeuvrability. Moreover Western ships and their cargoes,
unlike the junks, could be insured with the new Western insurance companies
in Hongkong and the treaty ports."
The coastal trade was expanding rapidly in the 1850s. Even before the new
treaties came into force in 1860, Western ships engaging in it, either on Chinese
or Western accounts, had been calling for many years at some of the hitherto
closed ports. In 1863, according to British consular reports, 70 per cent of the
British ships calling at Shanghai were engaged in the coastal trade, and in
1866, according to an official British estimate, half the British trade on China
was coastal."
The growth of China's foreign trade, the increase in coastal trade and the
Western invasion of the latter were the causes of the rising need for transport
that became apparent from the middle of the 1840s. A steadily expanding
fleet of Western ships found employment in this new market. The Chinese junks
were largely driven out of their own market." The most notable aspect,
63 Ibid. pp. 316 ff.
64 G. C. Allen and A. Donnithorne, Western Enterprise m Far Eastern Economic
Development: China and '[apan, (London, 1954), p. 127; J. K. Fairbank, China Coast, pp.
355ff.; StanleyF. Wright, Chinas Struggle for Tariff Autonomy, (Shanghai, 1938), pp.
186 ff.
65 Stanley F. Wright, op, cit., p. 191; Nathan O. Pelcovits, Old China Hands and the
Foreign Office, p. 70. (New York, 1948).
66 Appendix Table III.
 DENMARK IN CHINA 93

perhaps, is the fact that this Western invasion of the coastal trade took place
up to 1863 without being authorised by the treaties.

3. Denmark's new China trade

Western commercial expansion was the framework within which the number
of Danish vessels entering the China traffic steadily increased. At its peak in
1864, Danish tonnage had reached such proportions that only England, the
United States and Hamburg were more strongly represented in Chinese ports
than Denmark."? An attempt will now be made to sketch the outlines of this
growth, which was the real reason behind the treaty negotiations of 1843 and
to show how the interests behind the renewed Danish activity in China were
essentially new ones.
The constantly increasing participation of Danish vessels in the China ship-
ping trade can be seen from the tables in the appendix: it is explained not
only by the economic conditions already mentioned but also by certain poli-
tical factors. Up to 1854 the situation was one of steadily rising but rather
limited activity, consisting of freight traffic to other Asiatic ports and the Ame-
rican continent. The securing of treaty rights and the establishment of consula-
tes did not themselves appear to have any notable impact. Not until 1855 was
there any major increase in the number of Danish vessels and their tonnage.
Even thereafter the number of vessels actually fell in 1857 although this coin-
cided with a small rise in tonnage because the size of ships was gradually in-
creasing. The number of vessels fell partly because of the effects of the interna-
tional depression and partly because of the disquiet regarding the differences
between China on the one hand and England and France on the other, which
were settled temporarily by the treaty of Tientsin in June 1858. There again
followed a massive rise in the number of vessels and the tonnage; this can be
explained in terms of expectations raised by the signing of the treaties in 1858
and 1860 which opened several new ports to Western trade and shipping.
In 1862 also there was a decline, which is worthy of note considering the
prevailing atmosphere of expansion, but again there were special political cir-
cumstances. Article X of the treaty of Tientsin granted the British the right to
trade in the Yangtse river ports, but because of the Tai-ping rebellion the
Chinese had made reservations about immediate implementation since the
rebels controlled large areas along the river's banks. The Yangtse had therefore
only been opened as far as Chinkiang, and the British nominally had no right
in 1860-61 to demand the opening of more river-ports until the rebellion
67 Ibid.
94- OLE LANGE

had been put down. Following pressure from British mercantile interests, the
British minister in Peking, Sir Frederick Bruce, raised the question with the
Chinese authorities at the end of 1860. The negotiations with Prince Kung, who
from this time onwards conducted China's relations with the outside world,
led to the opening of the Yangtse ports of Hankow and Kiukiang in the spring
of 1861, after a British expedition in March had investigated the situation and
reached an agreement with the Tai-ping rebels on free passage for British ves-
sels so long as the latter observed strict neutrality. Similarly, the Chinese govern-
ment insisted that there should be no trafficking in weapons or supplies for the
rebels.P" By virtue of the most-favoured-nation clause and the traditional Chi-
nese policy of equal treatment, the trade and shipping of non-treaty powers also
benefited from these concessions.
During 1861, however, extensive smuggling of weapons and ammunition
to the rebels was discovered.P? Prince Kung consequently sent a note to Sir
Frederick Bruce on 21 September complaining that the conditions for the
opening of the river Yangtse were not being observed, and suggesting changes
in the regulations, combined with stricter measures of control to prevent sup-
plies reaching the Tai-ping rebels; he threatened to close the river completely
to foreign vessels if the controls were not effective.?" Bruce's reaction was posi-
tive. He regarded the opening of the river by the Chinese before the rising
had been quelled as 'an act of favour on their part' and acknowledged their
right to impose unilateral conditions upon the trade in order to obviate abuse.
He declared in his reply that measures would be put in hand by the British
to prevent abuse by British nationals in future; at the same time he emphasised
that it was up to the Chinese to enforce the new controls effectively, especially
where other Western vessels were concerned." On 9 November, vessels of non-
treaty powers were prohibited from the Yangtse river navigation, while simul-
taneously more stringent regulations came into operation for trade on the
river. 72
Danish vessels were included in the embargo, despite the Chinese declara-
tion of 3 July 184-5.73 This was the direct cause of the Danish decision in 1862
to initiate negotiations for a regular treaty. The closing of the Yangtse river to
Danish and other vessels in November 1861 must, considering both the econ-

68 Stanley F. Wright, op, cit., pp. 207 ff.

6. China Overland Trade Report, 30 November 1861; North China Herald, 31 January
1862.
70 PRO, FO 17/355.

71 PRO, FO 17/355, Bruce to Prince Kung 9 October, Bruce to Foreign Office 26

October.
7! China Overland Trade Report, 30 November 1861.

73 Weekly journal Freia, Abendl, 11 February 1862.

 DENMARK IN CHINA 95

nomic and the psychological significance of the Yangtse trade at this time, be
the main explanation of the setback to Danish shipping in China in 1862.74
There seem, moreover, to have been rumours (evidently unfounded) of an
impending closure of several Chinese ports to vessels of non-treaty nations,"
which also had an affect on the Danish debate of 1862. The explosive growth
in the numbers and tonnage of Danish vessels in 1863 and the peak attained
in 1864 are to be viewed in the context of this debate in 1862-63 on the
subject of a treaty with China, of the government's subsequent decision to send
out Colonel Raasleff, and of the expectations raised by this initiative. The con-
clusion of the treaty of 1863 and the decision that its provisions should become
immediately effective without waiting for ratification obviously reinforced this
process. 76
For the year 1864, when Danish shipping in China reached its zenith, it is
possible for the first time to indicate the scale of activity of Danish vessels
in all the treaty ports. From that year onwards, branches of the European-
managed Chinese Imperial Maritime Customs Service were established in all
fourteen treaty ports, and this department published statistics of trade and
shipping in them all.?? AB will be seen from the appendix, a hundred different
Danish vessels, totalling about 25,000 tons were recorded in 1864 in Hongkong
and those of the treaty ports for which General Shipping Lists are available."
A total of 789 arrivals and clearances of Danish vessels, amounting to 168,620
tons, are recorded in the fourteen treaty ports.?" Since every vessel is regis-
tered twice (in and out) the figures should be halved: so 395 Danish vessels
of nearly 85,000 tons called at the treaty ports. To these should be added 180
Danish ships, 43,390 tons, calling at Hongkong.s" This implies that each of the
hundred Danish ships recorded on the China coast in 1864 called on average
at Hongkong or one of the treaty ports five or six times. These calculations
do no more than illustrate the scope of Danish shipping in China: they can
scarcely reflect the full picture. The true situation was probably that some of
the ships, perhaps mainly the larger ones, were employed in long-distance

74 See Section IV.

75 Freia 11 February 1862.
76 See Section IV.

77 Chinese Imperial Maritime Customs, lst October 1860 to 30th of 1une 1865. (Shanghai,

1865), statement 1.
78 Amoy, Shanghai, Swatow, Foochow, Canton and from November-December Takow.
79 China, Trade Statistics of the Treaty Ports for the Period 1866-72. (Shanghai, 1873).

The figures diverge a little from those given in Reports of Trade 1866. See Appendix
Tables III and IV, and note 141.
8D RA, Udenrigsministeriets arkiv, Departementet for Handels- og Konsulatssager, gene-

ralskibslisten Hongkong 1864.

96 OLE LANGE

inter-continental traffic, while others, probably smaller inshore craft, were em-
ployed chiefly in the Chinese coastal trade and the inter-Asiatic traffic. Danish
ships called at thirteen out of the fourteen treaty ports but Amoy, Ningpo,
Shanghai and Chefoo were the ports most frequently visited.s'
A remarkable feature of this boom which deserves explanation is the very
modest role of Copenhagen and the consequent dominance of Altona and
especially of the Slesvig towns led by Aabenraa. Both Altona and the Slesvig
towns were among the biggest ship-owing communities of Denmark, and it is not
surprising to see them heavily representedr'" it only becomes striking in com-
parison with the astonishingly low figures from Copenhagen. Perhaps the vital
factor was the influence of Hamburg, to which Altona and the Slesvig towns
were subordinated. Without discussing in detail the complicated question of
the influence of Hamburg on Danish economic history in the 1850s and
1860s, we might suggest two ways in which Altona and the Slesvig towns
probably did benefit from the influence of Hamburg-the use made of Ham-
burg's capital and of its trade connections. The Aabenraa weekly journal Freia,
writing of the economic crisis in December 1857, said:

'That a town such as Aabenraa, whose chief prosperity is based upon shipping and
shipbuilding, cannot be untouched by Hamburg's great monetary Calamity, will be com-
prehensible to all who know that the foreign carrying trade of Danish merchantmen is
principally initiated and sustained by the mercantile houses of Hamberg, a natural conse-
quence of the position that Hamburg occupies in the world of commerce. It is regrettable
that so much should be dependent upon this foreign Hanse City, but such is the case,
and wishes alone uaccomplish nothing. As far as is known, however, no vital loss has yet
been suffered by our shipowners, and one nourishes the hope that the affair of the Ham-
burg merchant houses in which shipping companies here have investments will ultimately
be brought into order, without any significant loss being incurred.s"

The writer does not detail any further the forms of dependence upon Ham-
burg, nor does he say anything of the capital that we know Hamburg mer-
chant houses must have had invested in Slesvig ships: Gottlieb Japsen, for
instance, has cited three cases of investment in Aabenraa vessels by Hamburg
capital.P There was probably good reason for this reticence: ships sailing

SI Appendix Table IV.

82 G. Japsen, 'Aabenraas Bys akonomiske Historie', SfiJnderjyske Aarbeger, 3.R.1.
(1935), pp. 10.
S3 Freia 15 December 1857.

S4 G. Japsen, loco cit., pp. 54, 64: 1) Hans Mathiesen and the ship Caroline, in which
Hamburg broker, W. Braun, owned a one-third share: 2) Alderman M. Bahnsen was co-owner
of two ships. A certain Eggers, of Hamburg, owned a 15/32 share in one of these, the
Ellen. This was presumably H. H. Eggers, Hamburg, who as an independent shipowner was
already actively involved in the China trade. See H. H. Watjen, 'Die deutsche Handels-
schiffahrt in chinesischen Gewiissern um die Mitte des 19. Jahrhunderts', Hansische
 DENMARK IN CHINA 97

under the Danish flag had to be under Danish ownership, and foreign na-
tionals were therefore nominally ineligible as owners; this obstacle could, how-
ever, be evaded by a device whereby foreign part-owners of a vessel, instead
of being named in the certificate of ownership, received from the Danish co-
owner a 'note of reversion' (reverse) acknowledging the drawer's liability.
This procedure was used in the first of the instances cited by Japsen. How
common the practice was, and how much Hamburg capital was invested in
vessels from Aabenraa and other Slesvig towns, not to mention Altona, is dif-
ficult to determine because of the totally illegal character of the relationship.
Japsen declares (without of course being able to document it) that there are
unlikely to have been many Aabenraa ships in which Hamburg business did not
have a significant share. B5 Support is lent to this assertion by the growth in
the number of large vessels and their aggregate tonnage in the period 1851-
63 in the Slesvig towns of Senderborg, Aabenraa and Haderslev, though not
Flensborg:

1851 1851 1863 1863

Number of Number of
vessels over No. of lasts vessels over No. of lasts
100 lasts 100 lasts

Flensborg 20 2,487 14 1,729 1/2

Sanderborg 3 485 1/2 8 1,503
Ahenra 18 2,6831/2 26 4,702 1/2
Haderslev 1 1021/2 1 1021/2

Slesvig: total 42 5,758 1/2 49 8,037 1/2

N. B. One last = 21/ 4 tons. 56

Bearing in mind that the decline of Flensborg's merchant fleet is more than
offset by the increase in Sanderborg's the growth of Aabenraa's merchant
fleet in this period is impressive, since it is large vessels that are being added.
In 1851 the eighteen large Aabenraa's ships average 149 lasts each. In 1863, the
average capacity of the 26 large ships is 186 lasts. Even in the context of
favourable economic conditions and having allowed for Flensborg's decline
and the associated opportunities for reinvesting capital, it is doubtful whether
two such small towns as Senderborg and Aabenraa would have succeeded in

Geschichtsbliitter, J ahrgang 67/68 (1942-43), pp. 248. 3) A half-share in the ship Marie,
built at Abenci in 1859, was owned by the Hamburg shipping firm of F. Diesel. It was
registered at Abend as being owned by Niels Jacobsen, a shipbuilder, and his father-in-law.
85 G. Japsen, loc. cit., pp. 55, 64.
B6 Statistisk T'abeluark, 1852, 1864.
98 OLE LANGE

financing this substantial increase of tonnage in such a short time without an

influx of capital from elsewhere, irrespective of whether it was a matter of new
construction or the purchase of older vessels. B7 In the case of Altona vessels
it is practically meaningless to speak of Danish vessels and Danish capital ex-
cept in the most formal sense, since the real economic bonds cut across formal
state and national boundaries, and Hamburg-Altona must therefore be re-
garded as a single entity.
Hamburg's international commercial connections certainly played a vital
part in the way the China traffic of Altona and the Slesvig towns soared. Dur-
ing the course of the 1850s, indeed, a number of German merchant houses for
whose account Danish vessels almost exclusively sailed established themselves
in the Chinese treaty ports. BB A scrutiny of the shipping columns in the Eng-
lish-language press in 1859, 1860 and 1861 shows that German rather than
British merchant houses were the most frequent connections of Danish vessels
in Chinese ports. B9 German or German-dominated firms such as Siemssen
& Co., Bourjau, Hiibener & Co., Kielmann & Alisch, Schaeffer & Co., and W.
Pustau & Co., are the names most often encountered. If large amounts of Ham-
burg capital were invested in vessels from Altona and other Slesvig towns, this
constituted an incentive for the Hamburg interests to exploit their international
connections for the benefit of those vessels.
There is one further test. Danish economic activity in China in 1845-64
consisted almost exclusively of a steadily increasing volume of shipping, mostly
cargo traffic, in which vessels from Slesvig-Holstein predominated. By the time
China trade reached its peak in 1864 it was on a scale that was important in
Danish terms and not inconsiderable by international standards. A com-
parison of the shipping statistics for 1864, 1865 and 1866 reveals both the
prominent position occupied by Danish shipping in the peak year of 1864 and
the very severe decline in 1865 and 1866, when the loss of Slesvig-Holstein takes
effect. Vessels from the Duchies have changed flag. The figures fall to a third of
what they had been in 1864. 9 0

87 In 1857 a newly-built ship from an Abend yard cost 234 rixdollars per kommercelast,
With the cost of sails, rigging, anchors, and other gear added in, the price came up to
320 rix-dollars per kommerceltsst, Japsen, loco cit., pp. 55, 84.
88 H. P. Hansen, 'Erindringer Ira Kina-kysten i 1850-erne'. Erhuerushistorisk Arbog Vol.

V, (1953), p.4.
89 1859 The Overland Register and Price Current. 1860 China Overland Trade Report,

January-June. The Overland Register and 1861 Price Current, June-December. 1861 China
Overland Trade Report. According to contemporary German sources, in 1860-61 between
a half and two thirds of the coastal traffic was under German control. See H. Stoecker,
Deutschland und China im 19. '[ahrhundert, (Berlin 1958), p. 47.
90 Appendix table III.
 DENMARK IN CHINA 99

The treaty rights obtained by Governor P. Hansen ill 1845 turned out to
be an inadequate basis on which to secure the interests of Danish shipping in
China. When, in consequence of this, Colonel W. R. Raasleff, acting for the
Danish government, initiated negotiations for a regular treaty with the Chinese
in Peking in June-July 1863, the economic interests to be safeguarded were
substantial, in contrast to what had been the case in 1845.

IV. The negotiations tor a Danish-Chinese treaty} 1859-63

1. The debate in Denmark 1859-62
The growing Danish shipping interests in China and throughout Asia found
a political voice, as might be expected, at a moment of decline: the diminishing
volume of Danish shipping in Chinese ports provided the occasion for the ap-
peal addressed to the government by the shipowners and shipmasters of
Aabenraa in December 1858 for a treaty with Japan similar to those enjoyed by
the United States, England, Russia and France. In the submission it was
claimed that such a treaty would open new opportunities for the substantial
numbers of Danish ships plying in Asiatic waters and on the American west
coast. At the same time other towns with vessels in these regions were urged
to make similar representations." and Aabenraa's initiative was indeed followed
up: before the third session of the Council (Rigsraad) opened in Copenhagen
at the end of September 1859, addresses had been received from Flensborg,
Faborg and the Merchants' Guild of Copenhagen (Grosserersocietet). 92 These
aroused the government's concern to such a degree that it put forward a bill
at the beginning of the session to finance a naval mission to China and Japan
with the object of concluding a commercial treaty with those countries. It
was proposed that the expedition should last fourteen months and cost 248,000
rix -dollars. 93
During the debate on the proposal the question was raised of an expedi-
tion jointly with Sweden-Norway, and this idea dominated the rest of the
discussion. Despite widespread scepticism regarding the economic opportunities
for Denmark in the Far East, the Rigsraad decided in November 1859 to
grant money for a Danish naval expedition to China and Japan provided
Sweden-Norway would participate.P! It seems clear that the attitude of the
majority was decided not so much by any clearly defined consideration of com-
mercial and economic policy as by the internal and external political ef-

81 Freia, 23 December 1858.

82 Rigsraads-T'idende, 1859, Anhang B. colum 11-12.
8S Rigsraads-T'idende, 1859, column 21-22, Anhang A, column 107.
84 Rigsraads-Tidende, 1859, column 287-294, 894--936, 1211, Anhang B column 15-16.
100 OLE LANGE

fects which such a joint Scandinavian enterprise might produce. Scandina-

vian ideas and sentiments counted for more on this issue than did the material
but rather limited Danish economic interests, the scale of which might well
have suggested a degree of caution. The joint Scandinavian expedition never
came to fruition because Swedish-Norwegian interest was lacking, which can
be explained simply by the fact that Sweden-Norway had already in 1847 con-
cluded a treaty with China,95 containing the most-favoured nation clause.
The question of a treaty was not raised until the next session of the Rigs-
raad in 1862, but by that time the latest developments in China had made
it a matter of topical concern. 'When the Chinese closed the river Yangtse in
the autumn of 1861 to the vessels of nations not in treaty relations with China,
Danish ships were among those affected by the measure. On 9 November,
the very day the ban came into operation, there are reported to have been two
Danish ships in Shanghai, the Chico and the Canton, both registered at
Aabenraa.P" These were the very months when the Yangtse trade was undergo-
ing rapid expansion, and this was reflected in freight-rates. The Canton, of 117
lasts, was actually on charter to the American merchant house of Frazar & Co.
for six months, and was plying the river Yangtse at $ 1,500 per month, pilo-
tage paid.P? The demand in Shanghai for Western ships to ply the river be-
tween there and Hankow was heavy from the end of September to the beginning
of December. At the end of November the Hankow-Shanghai freight-rates
reached a peak of almost double the Shanghai-London rates. And at the same
time the China Overland Trade Report was able to conclude a survey of the
Yangtse trade thus: 'The most sanguine expectations are likely to be ex-
ceeded'i'"
When the ban was announced, one of the Danish vessels, the Canton, had
left for Hankow, though only half laden since the captain had formed a suspi-
cion of the impending closure the previous evening. But it was said the Chico
did not get away,99 though it is open to doubt whether the version of events
that reached Aabenraa was entirely correct. Reports published in the North
China Herald show that the Canton had been lying at Shanghai since at least 28
September and that it departed for Hankow on 9 November, but the Chico
is reported to have sailed from Hankow on 3 November and arrived at Shang-
hai on 22 November. Therefore the Chico cannot have been lying at Shanghai

DS E. Hertslet, (ed.), China Treaties (London 1908), I pp. 527-39.

06 Freia, 11 February 1862.
D7 China-Overland Trade Report, 14 November 1861, shipping Intelligence.

DS China Overland Trade Report, 11 September, 14 and 31 October, 14 and 30 No-

vember, 14 December 1861.

DD Freia, 11 February 1862.
 DENMARK IN CHINA 101

on 9 November, when the closing of the river Yangtse came into force, as was
alleged in a petition to Heltzen (the local member of the Rigsraad) on the
basis of private letters from Danes in China.P''
Wherever the version of events related in the petition originated, the clos-
ing of the Yangtse to Danish vessels must have been known in Aabenraa by the
end of January. The decision must have been taken there to raise the matter
during the forthcoming session of the Rigsraad. On 28 January Freia carried
an article demanding a renewed effort to obtain a treaty with China, and on
February 6 a group of shipowners and shipmasters in Aabenraa petitioned Helt-
zen, pointing out the economic importance of shipping in general and of the
China carrying trade in particular. They recounted their version of the latest
developments concerning the closing of the Yangtse, and expressed fears that
ships of nations not in treaty relations with China might be banned from
Chinese ports. The case was cited of an Aabenraa vessel refused entry by Japan
the previous year because there was no treaty with that country. The petition
continued:

'At the moment, the prospects for Danish navigation m those waters are therefore very
depressing. All the auguries are that the significance of trading activities will soon be all
the greater inasmuch as these lands, almost hermetically sealed hitherto, will open their
immense sources of business to all favoured nations. But our nation is not one of these,
for we have neither obtained a commercial treaty with China nor with Japan. Danish
shipmasters, who are so well regarded and so willingly employed by all merchants, there-
fore have to withdraw and to remain idle spectators while the seafarers of other nations
reap a rich harvest, to which our access is forbidden. It is plain that such a state of af-
fairs involved both loss and humiliation for the individual and for the nation. It is
understandable that enterprising shipmasters are anxious to arrive at a happier situation.
But every Dane will feel himself touched to the quick if it should be confirmed what
private letters report, viz., that steps are being taken to enable two Danish ships (one of
them a vessel registered at Faaborg) to participate under the Prussian flag in the advantages
granted to Prussian ships by the commercial treaties which have been concluded.P!

These were telling arguments, appealing to national sentiments at a time when

these were difficult to ignore. On 14 February Heltzen was already raising
the issue in the Rigsraad, referring to the latest events but not stressing the
economic side of the matter as much as the political. He argued that the
surest means of preserving the Danish character of the Slesvig towns was to at-
tend with vigour to the material interests of their inhabitants.l'" Prime Minis-
ter Hall intervened in the debate with an account of developments regarding
the treaty question since 1859, from which it emerged that the Swedish-Nor-

100 North China Herald, 28 September, 9, 23 and 30 November 1861, shipping intelligence.
101 Freia 11 February 1862.
102 Rigsraads-Tidende 1862, columns 805-807.
102 OLE LANGE

wegran government had refused to take part m a joint Scandinavian naval

expedition to China and Japan. The Foreign Ministry had been apprised of
the latest developments by the Danish consul in Hongkong and the government
had consequently instructed their representative in London to request forthwith
British intervention on Denmark's behalf in the matter of the Yangtse naviga-
tion. Until a reply was received, the government would reserve its position.
This account was accepted, and the matter was adjoumed.V"
The circles interested in the China trade continued their pressure. On 7
March a Slesvig member named Schmidt, a merchant, submitted a petition
to the Rigsraad from the Flensborg Chamber of Commerce appealing to the
government to initiate negotiations with China and Japan for trade links with
those countries, and on 19 March H. A. Kruger brought a similar petition
from the shipowners of Haderslev.l'" The reactions of the Slesvig towns in
the first months of 1862 can scarcely have been coincidental: about half the
Danish ships in Chinese waters at this time were registered in these ports and
although reports from China were probably scanty and lacking in any deep
knowledge or understanding of the precise background to the discrimination,
it was certain that good freight revenues were being missed. There was also
disappointment over the government's failure to obtain treaties with China and
Japan as had been planned in 1859. When the debate was resumed on 2
April, Hall announced that the London government had rejected the request
to procure the reopening of the Yangtse to Danish vessels, but it had agreed
to support formal Danish treaty negotiations with the Chinese in the event
of a Danish negotiator being sent out. The government had accordingly decided
to dispatch a diplomat: the idea of a naval expedition was finally abandoned.l'"

2. The Raaslej] mission

The government had already taken the first step before the matter was even
raised by Heltzen in the Rigsraad. On 1 January the Danish envoy in Lon-
don, Torben Bille, had been instructed to make confidential overtures to the
British Foreign Office for British diplomatic intervention in Peking aimed at
securing permission for Danish ships to navigate the Yangtse and for the
establishment of a Danish consulate at Hankow. On 10 February Bille
had a conversation with Edmund Hammond, the permanent under-secretary
of state whose responsibilities included East Asiatic affairs. Hammond believed
it would be difficult to get the river opened to Danish ships since according

103 Ibid, columns 821-27.

104 Ibid, columns 1481 and 1553.
105 Ibid, columns 1930-31.
 DENMARK IN CHINA 103

to the treaty of Tientsin the river was not to be opened until peace was estab-
lished in the areas along the river still controlled by the Tai-ping rebels. British
ships had only occasional access, Hammond asserted, and made references to
the Chinese complaints over smuggling of supplies to the rebels by vessels
belonging to nations not in treaty relations with China. Hammond did not
take a hard-and-fast line in his answer, but he did stress the principle that
envoy in Peking to get permission for Danish vessels to navigate the River
Yangtse were to be opened to Danish ships. He thought that an official note
to the Foreign Secretary, Lord John Russell, was needed.l'" In the official
note the British government was requested to use the good offices of its
envoy in Peking to get permission for Danish vessels to navigate the river
Yangtse. In support of the request it was contended that Danish ships in
China were engaged almost exclusively in British trade, that the Danish consuls
were all British except one, and that both Danish and British interests would
be ignored by the Chinese embargo.P? Lord John Russell's reply was a rebuff,
justified on the ground that the Chinese would probably take a negative view.
But the British government would be happy to see treaty relations established
between Denmark and China; it would exercise its influence in Peking and
offer all possible support should the Danish government decide to send a
diplomat to Peking to negotiate a regular treaty. lOB This reply was the direct
cause of the government's decision to follow up the idea of treaty negotiations
with China in the manner suggested by Lord John Russell.
In May the Ministry of Foreign Affairs made confidential approaches to the
Danish charge d'affaires in the United States, Colonel W. R. Raasleff, and
obtained his promise to undertake the task of going to China and possibly
Japan with a view to negotiating treaties with the governments of those
countries.P'' In the meantime the Foreign Ministry had produced a draft
treaty copied straight from the treaty of Tientsin. The Danish draft differed
from its prototype only by a modification of article XVI and the omission of
the articles dealing with diplomatic representation in Peking.P" The reason

106 RA, Udenrigsministeriets arkiv, 1860-65 Akter vedrarende den 1863 13. Juli afslut-

tede Handels-, Venskabs-, og Skibsfartstraktat mellem Danrnark og China, (Akter), report

no. VIn 10 February. 1862 from Torben Bille.
107 PRO, FO 22/297.

lOB RA, Udenrigsministeriets arkiv, Akter, Copy af Lord John Russell's note of 17.
February in Bille's report no. XI of 17 February 1862.
109 RA, Udenrigsministeriets arkiv, Departmentet for Handels- og Konsulatssager, Kopi-

bog 1862, journal nr. 842, Akter, Raasleff to Udenrigsministeriet 1 June 1862.
110 RA, Udenrigsministeriets arkiv, Akter, Udenrigsministeriets forestilling til Kongen
28. juni 1862. Departementet for Handels- og Konsulatssager. Kopibog 1862, journal no.
1350, Udenrigministeriet to Raaslaff 28 August 1862. It has not been possible to trace
the draft treaty.
 104 OLE LANGE

for modelling the Danish draft on the treaty of Tientsin is plain: both British
and Chinese approval was most likely to be secured for rules that were already
accepted and well tested in practice. Viewed from the Danish standpoint, too,
it seemed natural to exclude the rules concerning representation in Peking and
article XVI, which granted the British consul jurisdiction over British law-
breakers.P! This omission was important, however, and during the negotia-
tions with Peking it was to get Raasleff into so much difficulty, both with the
Western diplomatic representatives and with the Chinese, that at first his
whole mission seemed destined to fail.
The Danish government's aim was briefly summed up in its instructions
to Raasleff on 23 October 1862. His principal task was to conclude a treaty
with China along the lines of the draft. Failing this, he was to attempt to
secure for Danish trade and shipping the rights and treatment enjoyed by
England, France, the United States and Russia by obtaining, as in 1845, writ-
ten and binding undertakings from the Chinese. Two points were stressed:
firstly, it was important that in future Danish ships should enjoy the same rights
as vessels of the most favoured treaty powers. Secondly, Danish subjects com-
mitting criminal acts in China must be sent home by the consuls for trial,
partly because Danish consuls, unlike British, were not furnished with jurisdic-
tional authority, and partly because most of the Danish consuls in the treaty
ports were to continue to be British citizens, who lacked knowledge of Danish
law. Should the Chinese make other demands on the issue of jurisdiction,
Raasleff was empowered to agree to the sending out of a salaried official to
handle jurisdiction, but the Foreign Ministry would prefer such a provision
not to be agreed.v" Quite clearly, therefore, the government's aim was to
secure Danish shipping in Chinese waters within the framework established
by the treaty of Tientsin. There was no desire to obtain other formal rights, such
as access to or diplomatic representation in Peking, and still less any enlarge-
ment of trading and shipping privileges. It is important to remember this
limited Danish objective when examining the contents of the treaty con-
cluded on 13 July 1863.
Raasleff prepared himself very carefully for his task. While in the United
States he sought the advice of the former American minister in Peking, Wil-
liam B. Reed, he also consulted representatives of American merchant houses
in China, and in September he obtained a promise from the State Department
of diplomatic support by its envoy in Peking.v" In London, Raasleff had talks

111 E. Hertslet, (ed.), China Treaties, (London, 1908), I, 24.

112 RA, Udenrigsministeriets arkiv, Departementet for Handels- og Konsulatsager, Kopi-
bog 1862, journal no. 1672.
113 RA, Udenrigsministeriets arkiv, Akter, Raaslaff to Udenrigsministeriet 26 July and

28 September 1862.
 DENMARK IN CHINA 105

with Edmund Hammond of the Foreign Office, who informed him that
the British envoy to Peking, Sir Frederick Bruce, would be instructed to
support the negotiations, and he advised Raasleff 'to follow Sir Frederick's
advice and guidance in everything'. Hammond asserted at the same time that
effective consular jurisdiction was a desideratum to which the Chinese govern-
ment attached much weight. Raasleff also conferred with Sir Rutherford Al-
cock and Horatio N. L. Lay, two 'old China hands' who happened to be in
London at the time.P" From London Raasleff travelled to Paris, where he
had talks with the French Foreign Ministry and the newly returned minister
to Peking, M. de Bourboulon. He next called at Brussels and was briefed on
the recent Belgian-Chinese treaty, which comprised only three articles: the
first granted to Belgium the same advantages and rights as the other treaty
powers, the second provided that Belgium should appoint its own salaried
consuls or arrange representation by salaried consuls of other nations, and the
third dealt solely with ratification. Raasleff had a conversation with the For-
eign Minister, M. Rogier, in which the latter declared himself to be opposed to
Belgian ratification of the treaty because of the demand, unacceptable in Bel-
gian eyes, for salaried consuls. This treaty would place Belgium in a worse
position than the Chinese declaration of July 1845. Finally, Raaslaff went
to Berlin, where Quaade, the Danish envoy, promised to obtain details of the
treaty concluded between Prussia and China in September 1861.115
After these preparatory briefings in the Western chancelleries Raasleff foresaw
that difficulties might arise in negotiation over the problem of jurisdiction and
also over the terms of appointment of consuls. The Belgian treaty negotiations
constituted an inauspicious precedent for the Danish negotiations. He therefore
suggested to the Foreign Ministry in November that article X of the draft,
corresponding to article XVI of the treaty of Tientsin, should be altered to
'provide that, instead of Danish lawbreakers being sent to Denmark for trial,
they should be tried before a Danish consul in China. This alternative provi-
sion would obviate the practical and economic difficulties entailed in the original
draft, which implied an absolute rule of recall to Denmark. What it amounted
to, in Raasleff's judgment, was that Danish consuls in China would have to
be equipped with enlarged powers by special legislation. These changes would
improve the chances of bringing the negotiations to a succesful conclusion.P"
The Foreign Ministry's reaction at the time was strongly negative, but the
ultimate outcome was that after Raasleff's return to Denmark in the winter
of 1863-64 a bill for consular jurisdiction had to be prepared as a result of

114 Ibid., Raaslaff to Udenrigsministeriet 5 and 18 November 1862.

115 Ibid.
118 Ibid., Raaslaff to Udenrigsministeriet 22 November 1862.
106 OLE LANGE

British pressure.P? These deliberations over jurisdiction may appear trifling,

but the issue was not simply whether to recall the occasional lawbreaker or to
try him on the spot. The problem really involved the entire question of the
control of trade and shipping which had already been an issue in the autumn
of 1861.
The Danish preparations for the treaty negotiations therefore had obviously
been very thorough as the Foreign Ministry had assured itself beforehand of
the support of the United States and England, the two foremost treaty powers,
and the Danish envoy had consulted some of the weightiest China experts of
the day. Summarising his impressions shortly before his departure, Raasleff
predicted that he would encounter tactics of attrition and delay aimed at
softening him up sufficiently to accept the Chinese terms.P'' On his arrival
in Peking at the beginning of April 1863, however, he met with opposition
from a totally unexpected quarter.

3. The Peking negotiations

When Raasleff reached Peking at the beginning of April 1863, he found
himself confronted with two opponents in the forthcoming treaty negotiations.
In Tientsin he received from Sir Frederick Bruce a letter dated 10 March
from which it was plain that in addition to the expected Chinese resistance
he must also reckon with British hostility unless certain conditions were fulfil-
led. In the letter the British envoy advised Raasleff not to go to Peking and
asserted that the Chinese government wanted to offer a treaty on the same
terms as were offered to Belgium. Bruce laid emphasis on the question of juris-
diction and underlined the importance for all the treaty powers of an ef-
fective jurisdiction, which must be exercised by independent officials if the
principle of extra-territoriality was to be extended to other nations. From this
practice he could not recommend the Chinese government to deviate.P"
It was the old problem: the control of the trade and shipping of the various
nations was still an issue of topical concern. Previously, the traditional Chinese
policy of equality had precluded the imposition of discriminatory sanctions
against nations that did not supervise the activities conducted under their
flags. With British support, this policy was changed in November 1861, as has

111 RA, Udenrigsministeriets arkiv, Departementet for Handels- og Konsulatssager, Kopi-

bog 1862, journal no. 1824. Akter, Justitsministeriets letter of 25 April 1864.
118 RA, Udenrigministeriets arkiv, Akter, Raaslaff to Udenrigsministeriet 18 Novem-
ber 1862.
m Ibid., Raaslaff to Udenrigsministeriet 10 April 1863. Bruce's letter of 10 March
enclosed.
 DENMARK IN CHINA 107

been noted. Responsibility for the supervision of vessels of mmor Western

countries, previously resting with China alone, was now placed on the shoulders
of those countries themselves, together with a demand that it be effectively
exercised on pain of sanctions in the form of exclusion from certain ports.
Experience had shown that persons actively engaged in trade and shipping,
and thus involved economically themselves, were unsuitable for exercising the
supervisory functions falling to a Western consul in business conditions as
specific as China's. This policy found expression during China's treaty nego-
tiations with Belgium and Portugal, which were concluded on 12 and 13 Au-
gust 1862 respectively, but never ratified. One of their provisions was that
these two countries were to appoint salaried consuls.P? In regard to the
jurisdiction and supervision issue there was apparent unanimity between the
Chinese government and the representatives of the great powers in Peking
because of their common experiences and interests. Raasleff's prospects on ar-
riving in Peking were therefore not bright.
In the course of the following month a certain flexibility became discernible
in the original British standpoint. On 9 May Raasleff was able to report that
Bruce, and with him the other Western diplomats, were no longer insisting
upon the appointment of salaried Danish consuls but only demanding effec-
tive supervision of the consuls' activities. This demand seemed reasonable to
Raasleff, He was all the more disposed to meet it as support for the nego-
tiations by England and the United States, and thus their outcome depended
upon a solution of the problem of supervision satisfactory to those countries.
He envisaged as a minium demand that a Danish official with some such title
as consul-general would have to be sent out to supervise the consuls, exercise
effective jurisdiction over Danish subjects and act as the link with the Chinese
authorities. For formal reasons, however, he proposed to put up a vigorous
resistance against such a concession and to try to have it excluded from the
actual treaty, since it was not included in any other treaties.P! When the
Chinese at last entered into negotiation with Raasleff on 19 May, it was at
the request of the British that they did SO.122
The first question raised by the Chinese negotiators did indeed concern con-
suls, and their opening position was that Denmark, like Belgium and Portu-
gal, must agree to the demand for salaried consuls.P" On the advice of Tho-
mas Wade, First Secretary of the British Mission, who was acting as Raas-
10££'s interpreter and adviser, the latter did not enter into detailed nego-
120 Ibid., Raaslaff to Udenrigsministeriet 9 May 1863.
121 Ibid.
122 PRO, FO 17/392, Private letter from Bruce to Lord Russell, 28 April.
123 PRO, FO 17/392, Bruce to FO, 9 July.
108 OLE LANGE

trations but answered that there had never been any trouble with Danish
consuls in the past and was scarcely likely to be in the future, that he could
not yield to demands by the Chinese for undertakings not contained in any
of the treaties already in force, and that the Danish government would take
measures to ensure supervision of the activities of Danish consuls.P" Later
on, Wade negotiated with Chinese customs officials on Raaslaff's behalf.P"
On 5 June there was a diplomatic crisis resulting from the execution of a
French missionary in one of the Chinese provinces, and negotiations were
suspended, not being resumed until about 25 June.1 26 By 7 July the nego-
tiations were evidently brought to a conclusion, for on that day a memorandum
was issued over Raasleff's signature summarising their most important re-
sults.P? Raaslaff's reports give only scanty information about the specific con-
tent and course of the negotiations, stating merely the chronological sequence
and the final outcome.P''
The outcome, however, comes as a complete surprise, partly because all the
Danish demands were met, and partly because on certain important points the
treaty contains Chinese concessions that went further than the Danish draft
treaty. These may be specified briefly.
Article VII gave Denmark complete freedom in the choice of consuls; no
conditions were imposed as in the case of the Belgian or Portuguese treaties
of August 1862. 129 Danish views carried the day on the jurisdiction issue as
well: article XV and XVI extended the principle of extraterritoriality to
Danish citizens, and the Danish government was allowed to declare where
and how justice should be administered. It did not provide for the sending out
of a salaried official from Denmark to guarantee effective jurisdiction.
It was in the field of trade and customs that the concessions secured were
particularly unexpected. Article XLIV gave Danish vessels, and thus the ves-
sels of other Western nations, the right to participate in the coastal traffic
in Chinese products. This legalised a practice which had existed since the
1840s and that indeed constituted the foundation of a very large part of
Western activity in China. During the Tientsin negotiations, British trade and
shipping circles had sought to press the British negotiator, Lord Elgin, to in-
corporate such a rule in the treaty. However, Lord Elgin, supported by the

124 RA, Udenrigsministeriets arkiv, Akter, Raaslaff to Udenrigsministeriet 22 May.

125 Ibid., Raaslaff to Udenrigsministeriet 10 June.
126 Ibid., Raaslaff to Udenrigsministeriet 10 and 22 June, and 9 July.
127 Ibid., Bilag 3 in Raaslaffs report of 28 July.
128 One report is missing, dated sometime between 28 July and 6 August.
129 E. Hertslet, (ed.), China Treaties, (London, 1908) I-II; RA, Udenrigsministeriets arkiv,

Akter, Raaslaff's memorandum of 7 July 1863, bilag 3 in his report of 28 July. The account
of the treaty which follows is based on these two sources, unless otherwise indicated.
 DENMARK IN CHINA 109

London government, had declined to bring this issue into the negotiations 'on
the ground that it was not a right so recognized by international practice in
Europe as to justify us in imposing it by Iorce.P? Moreover, Article XLIV
exempted all Chinese goods re-exported to other treaty ports within a twelve-
month from export duties, and at the same time half the customs duty could
be used later as a medium of payment to the customs authorities at the same
port. Article XLV established the same rules for foreign imports. Further-
more, Chinese goods could be re-exported to other countries duty-free, since
the duty paid (the coast trade duty) was refunded through the medium of
drawback certificates. Article XI was of significance, too, for it increased
the number of treaty ports to sixteen with the addition of Nanking, although
the latter was still controlled by the Tai-ping rebels at this time. Article
XVIII declared a Danish last to be equivalent to two English tons for purposes
of calculating tonnage-dues in the ports. This would give Danish ships a reduc-
tion of 12 1/ 2 per cent compared with foreign ships, because in point of fact
a Danish kommercelcest was 21/ 4 tons.P! The 'Rules of Trade' and the 'Tariff
of Duties' were almost identical with those prevailing before. The most im-
portant change in the customs tariff was the lifting of the ban on exports of
beans, peas and beancakes from Chefoo and Newchang; this had been
established in 1858 out of regard for the important Chinese interests connected
with the trade. In 1860 Bruce estimated that about 3,000 junks were engaged
in the trade between Newchang, Chefoo and Shanghai, and that the capital
invested in it was equivalent to £ 7,500,000. 132
The operation of the most-favoured-nation clause secured the benefits
of all the concessions enumerated above for every nation enjoying treaty rela-
tions with China. In point of fact the concessions were only novel in their
guise. as treaty rights. What they amounted to was either the legitimation of an
existing practice, as in the case of the provision for Western participation in
the coastal trade, or else the definition in treaty terms of pre-existing, loose agree-
ments obtained through British initiatives. This applied to the export trade
from Newchang and Chefoo, for which Bruce had achieved a lifting of the
ban in practice as early as 1860. It also applied to the rules for re-export from
the treaty ports, on which the reduced dues came into force in February and
July 1863, presumably in conjunction with the Danish treaty.133
In these negotiations, two things need to be explained. The first is the
reversal of Sir Frederick Bruce's negative attitude as expressed in the letter

130 Stanley F. Wright, China's Struggle for Tariff Autonomy, (Shanghai, 1938), pp. 192-93.
131 RA, Udenrigsministeriets arkiv, Akter, Raaslaff to Udenrigsministeriet 28 July.
132 Stanley F. Wright, op. cit., p. 68.
133 Ibid., pp. 58 and 224-25. In the introduction to the memorandum of 7 July 1863
110 OLE LANGE

to Raasleff of 10 March stating that England would only support efforts

aimed at Denmark obtaining treaty rights similar to those of Belgium and
Portugal. This shift of policy had taken place by the end of April at the latest,
since in a private letter to Lord John Russell on 28 April, Bruce wrote that
at his suggestion the Chinese government had consented to negotiate with
Raaslaff. The letter shows that Bruce had changed his ground on the consular
and jurisdictional issues and would now be satisfied with the despatch of a
salaried Danish official to supervise the activities of the consuls. The second
feature of note is that the final treaty was not a copy of the treaty of Tientsin
but in certain particulars went far beyond what was prescribed by Raasleff's
instructions and the Danish draft treaty. The Chinese concessions were, as
stated, only a formalisation of existing practice, but presumably it was just the
prospect of this that supplied Bruce with the incentive, apparently lacking at
the beginning of March, to support Raasleff's endeavours. Bruce must have
judged that the advantages to be secured for the British through the Danish
treaty negotiations outweighed the risk involved in less effective Danish jurisdic-
tion and supervision, especially when he could put pressure on the Danish
government in regard to these questions both through Raasleff and through
the Foreign Office. And so it proved.P" The instrument for influencing and
guiding the Danish-Chinese negotiations was to hand in the British legation
staff, notably in Thomas Wade who was supposed formally to be advising
Raaslaff and acting as his interpreter. This presumably explains why the new
provisions of the treaty were liberalisations of trade, towards which Bruce had
been working since 1860 and from which the enormous British trade might
be particularly expected to benefit through the operation of the most-favoured-
nation clause.P" There is therefore reason to believe that Raasleff's most im-
portant contribution to the treaty negotiations consisted in his clarification

signed by Raaslaff, the treaty is characterised as follows: 'But embodying (as it does) both
these imporvements which have been introduced during recent years in the commercial
regulations of China, and these important concessions in regard to trade which the foreign
legations established at Peking (particularly the British), have from time to time succeeded
in obtaining from the Chinese Government, the Danish treaty marks (as it were) and at
the same time definitely secures that progress in the sense of a less exclusive and a more
liberal commercial policy which has been made in China since the Treaty of Tientsin,
that is to say during the last five years.' The signature may be Raasleff's, but the style and
content bear so British a stamp that his hand must have been at least guided by Wade, even
if the latter was not the actual author.
134 PRO, FO 17/391, Bruce's private letter to Lord Russell, 28 April. FO 17/392, Bruce
to FO, 9 July. FO immediately followed up Bruce's intentions through the British minister
in Copenhagen, Sir A. Paget, FO 22/299, FO to Paget, 17 August, FO 22/303, Paget to FO,
1 September.
135 PRO, FO 17/392, Bruce to FO, 9 July.
 DENMARK IN CHINA 111

of the supervision issue, especially ois-a-uis the British diplomats, while the prob-
lems of commercial and customs policy were handled by Wade.
The treaty was ratified without major difficulty twelve months later, when
Vice-Admiral Steen Bille as emissary for the Danish government exchanged
treaty instruments in Shanghai on 29 July 1864 with representatives of the
Chinese government.P" This was just when the most essential condition for
Danish benefits from the treaty was on the point of melting away: the loss of
Slesvig-Holstein after Denmark's defeat by Prussia in 1864 transferred the ship-
ping of the Slesvig towns to the German flag. In the course of the next
two years, the volume of Danish shipping calling at Chinese ports diminished
to less than one third of the level of 1864. 137
The fact that in 1863 Denmark achieved a more favourable result from
its treaty negotiations than Belgium and Portugal the year before, so upset-
ting the new Chinese policy, reflects Raasleff''s acquisition of a powerful ally:
to Sir Frederick Bruce he was a pawn in the game of advancing British in-
terests, and the Danish treaty negotiations became one of the elements, albeit
a modest one, in British economic expansion in China.

V. Conclusion
The years from 1839 to the middle 1860s constitute in Chinese history an era
of serious decline, the causes of which have been much discussed and dispu-
ted. What is clear is that the policy of the Western powers, and especially of
Britain, was one of aggressive expansionism, motivated primarily by economic
considerations. Up to at least the beginning of the 1860s, the British govern-
ment was ready to use force to compel Chinese recognition of what it unila-
terally regarded as British rights. In this era Britain so overshadowed the
other Western powers in China that she scarcely needed their support to carry
through her policies. But for internal political reasons it might also be advan-
tageous for the British government if others could be persuaded also to par-
ticipate in the expansionist drive in China, especially in the 1850s and early
1860s when anti-colonial and anti-expansionist views were often prevalent in
official attitudes and public debate.F" This is the background against which
Danish activity in China during this period is to be viewed; the constant
factor was its association with and dependence upon British activity, both in
the political and diplomatic fields and in regard to shipping: the diplomatic

136 Steen Bille, Min Reise til China, (Copenhagen, 1865).

131 Appendix Table III.
138 C. A. Bodelsen, Studies in Mid-Victorian Imperialism, (Copenhagen, 1960), pp. 42-50.
112 OLE LANGE

initiatives of 1845 and 1863 were both motivated by regard for shipping in-
terests, on both occasions British support was sought, and on both occasions
it was granted because it was in the British interest to lend aid to Danish
endeavours to secure a treaty.
In the economic field, shipping was the only important Danish interest.
On the other hand it does need to be stressed that these shipping interests grew
to dimensions significant even by international standards. The traffic was
largely dominated by vessels from the Slesvig towns, and thus the latter came
to take the lead in the successful campaign for the securing of a treaty with
China. The events attending the closing of the river Yangtse on 9 November
1861 produced repercussions first in Aabenraa, then in the Rigsraad and the
government, and the chain was completed by the negotiations in Peking and
the signing of the treaty on 13 July 1863. However, the loss of Slesvig-Holstein
in 1864, coming almost simultaneously with ratification of the treaty, tempo-
rarily destroyed the most important prerequisite for effective exploitation of
its terms.

Appendix
Sources of shipping information
Danish shipping interests were dispersed among a great number of small
shipowning businesses, and the shares in a vessel were usually distributed
among many individuals. Moreover, because the carrying trade is chiefly
involved it is difficult to discover a coherent body of sources capable of il-
luminating activity throughout the period. The chief source on overseas ship-
ping is the Generalskibslister (General Shipping Lists), which Danish consuls
had to submit in March every year, showing all Danish vessels arriving and
checked at the port in question, their ports of departure and destination, their
cargoes and possibly the freightage etc. 189 Unfortunately the consuls, includ-
ing those in the Chinese treaty ports, were not always punctilious about
sending in the lists every year. Moreover, it was only when the volume of
Danish shipping expanded that consulates were established. The Generalskibs-
lister have therefore had to be supplemented from other sources.
During the 1840s and 1850s, an English-language press made its ap-
pearance in Shanghai and Hongkong. The latter was of course a British
colony, but in the present context it may be counted among the treaty ports
because of its function as the most important base of Western economic ac-

138 Forordning af 4. august 1824. Instruktion for danske konsuler og kaptajner i [rem-

mede h.aone, (Copenhagen, 1824). Instruktion for de Kgl. Consuler i Udlandet, 11 Mai
1860, (Copenhagen, 1860).
 DENMARK IN CHINA 113

tivity in China in this period. This press was primarily the organ of Western,
especially British, commercial interests, and it is therefore an important source
of information about their political and economic activities.P'' The journals
published an 'Overland Edition', as it was called, for despatch with every
mail to Europe, which went once a month in the early part of the period
and twice a month later on. These editions were intended for trading con-
nections and business partners in Europe and the United States. They con-
tained resumes of the most important events in China and information on pri-
ces, market conditions and shipping. The 'Shipping Intelligence' columns of
the Overland Register and Price Current and the Overland China Mail, which
were based on reports from local correspondents in the treaty ports, have been
utilised here to supplement the Danish shipping data from the Generalskibslisier
in certain years where Danish source-material either does not exist or is inade-
quate.
In order to obtain a common yardstick for the data derived from these
divergent sources and to form a picture of Danish shipping over the whole of
the period, a summary has been compiled-in default of aggregated data for
each treaty port-showing the number of different Danish vessels recorded each
year as having called at a Chinese port, the aggregate tonnage of these ves-
sels, and their ports of registry in Denmark. This is reproduced in Table I.
In addition, a summary has been constructed showing the amount of Danish
shipping calling annually at Hongkong. Table II gives the absolute number of
Danish vessels and their tonnage. The reason for choosing Hongkong is simple
enough: it is the only port for which data are available over the whole period.
But because of Hongkong's importance, it is to be presumed that the level of
activity in this port is a reliable barometer of activity in all the treaty ports
taken together. Weight is lent to this assumption because in those years for
which Generalskibslister are available for both Hongkong and the treaty ports,
almost all the Danish vessels recorded in any of the treaty ports are also re-
corded in Hongkong. After 1864 the western-managed Imperial Maritime
Customs Service established departments in all the treaty ports and main-
tained reliable statistics. From that year onwards there are summaries of the
total volume of shipping in all the treaty ports and its distribution between
the various flags, as shown in Table III. Table IV shows the Danish shipping
calling at each treaty port separately in the year 1864. 141

140 Prescott C. Clarke, 'The Development of the English Language Press on the China
Coast 1827-81', MA thesis 1961, in Senate House Library, London University.
141 There are minor but negligible discrepancies between the data for the year 1864
in the Chinese Imperial Maritime Customs publications of 1867 and 1873. This applies to
almost all countries.
114 OLE LANGE

The approach adopted was dictated by the nature of the sources. It does
not permit any minute analysis of Danish traffic with China in these years,
but it does shed light on two circumstances that were crucially important in
the initiation of the treaty negotiations in 1863, viz., the gradual development
of Danish trade with China and its domination by vessels from Slesvig-Holstein,
The lasts (kommercelcester) employed as units of measurement in the Danish
sources have been doubled to convert them to tons, in accordance with the
practice in the treaty ports, though in fact one last equalled 21/ 4 tons.

STATISTICAL APPENDIX
Table I
Numbers of different Danish vessels recorded as calling at the Chinese treaty ports
and Hongkong. 1844--64, their tonnages and their ports of registry in Denmark

From Kingdom
Total Total From Holstein From Slesvig of Denmark
Vessels Tonnage Ships Tons Ships Tons Ships Tons

1844 2 591
1845 5 1.216 2 560 305
1846 2 524 305
1847 3 889 2 670
1848 2 435 2 435
1849 7 1.467 3 730 2 532
1850 7 1.428 4 851 3 577
1851 10 2.549 6 1.655 3 739
1852 11 2.806 2 595 7 1.952 1 135
1853 14 3.034 2 601 7 1.481 3 651
1854 14 2.965 8 1.591 5 1.075
1855 24 6.026 5 1.578 10 2.540 9 1.908
1856 25 6.969 8 2.251 11 2.964 6 1.754
1857 23 7.456 7 2.407 10 2.587 6 2.462
1858 25 8.246 7 2.381 11 3.497 7 2.370
1859 29 9.451 7 2.403 13 4.037 9 3.011
1860 37 10.859 12 3.500 16 4.440 9 2.919
1861 40 11.084 12 3.063 20 5.641 8 2.380
1862 34 8.039 8 2.048 19 4.023 7 1.968
1863 81 18.786 25 5.882 40 8.728 16 4.176
1864 100 24.882 31 7.791 49 11.412 19 5.559

Sources: RA. Udenrigsministeriets arkiv, Departement for Handels- og 'Konsulatssager. Ind-

kornne Skibslister fra Konsulerne. (Generalskibslister).
The Overland China Mail.
The Overland Register and Price Current.
 DENMARK IN CHINA 115

Table II
Aggregate numbers and tonnage of Danish vessels
recorded at Hongkong, 1842-64

No. of vessels Tons

1842 2 700
1843
1844 5 1,308
1845 4 1,245
1846 1 305
1847 3 1,070
1848 2 309
1849a) 3 1,365
1850 16 3,459
1851a) 10 2,969
1852a) 19 5,149
1853a) 14 3,319
1854- 13 2,634
1855 39 9,430
1856 50 12,889
1857 30 9,134
1858 32 10,312
1859 44 13,406
1860 61 17,989
1861 60 18,736
1862 58 15,988
1863 141 33,232
1864 180 43,370

Sources: 'Return of Vessels, Tonnage and Flag anchored at the Port of Hongkong 1842-53,
compiled by the British port authorities in Hongkong,' published in The Hongkong Govern-
ment Gazette of 4 March 1854 and here taken from The Overland Register and Price Current
of 11 March 1854. The figures for 1854-63 are taken from the Generalskibslist for Hongkong
of 1863, which contains a summary for those years. The 1864 figures are from the General-
skibslist for the same year.
N. B. For the years 1849, 1851, 1852 and 1853 there are Generalskibslister sent in by Consul
Burd in Hongkong, The figures in these lists do not agree with the statistics of the Hongkong
port authorities.
The figures in the Generalskibslister are: 1849, 6 vessels of 1,373 tons; 1851, 7 of 1,882
tons; 1852, 13 of 3,308 tons; 1853, 11 of 2,407 tons.
116 OLE LANGE

Table III
Major international shipping calling at the Chinese treaty ports, 1864, 1865 and 1866

1864 1865 1866

Total entered inwards Total entered inwards Total entered inwards
and cleared outwards and cleared outwards and cleared outwards
Flag
Number Number Number
of Tons of Tons of Tons
vessels vessels vessels

British 7,915 2,862,214 7,798 3,467,980 8,276 3,921,851

American 5,036 2,609,390 4,721 2,645,906 3,602 1,957,687
North German 2,248 620,322
Bremen 292 83,324 428 122,869
Hamburg 1,409 380,135 1,020 308,102
Hannover 157 30,026 134 21,894
Liibeck 24 7,452 14 3,734
Mecklenburg 53 10,518 20 3,704
Oldenburg 79 22,972 51 11,611
Prussian 187 46,143 205 45,278
Chinese 1,021 64,588 574 39,548 516 33,724
Danish 767 164,802 670 141,947 216 37,958
French 247 93,099 295 94,687 234 108,918
Dutch 197 59,471 176 56,090 194 69,883
Siamese 156 68,395 145 64,177 157 67,662
Norway/Sweden 140 38,195 118 26,877 62 13,927

Source: Chinese Imperial Maritime Service. Reports of Trade 1866. (Shanghai, 1867).
 DENMARK IN CHINA 117

Table IV
Summary of Danisb shipping calling at each
of the Chinese treaty ports, 1864

Entrances + Clearances Tons

Amoy 165 31,280

Ningpo 142 29,496
Shanghai 111 25,884a)
Chefoo 94 22,199
Takow 54 8,804
Canton 49 12,872
Newchang 46 10,976
Tientsin 42 7,724
Swatow 34 8,840
Foochow 24 5,435
Tamsui 22 3,818
Chinkiang 4 864
Hankow 2 432
Kiukiang

Total 789 168,620

Source: China: Trade Statistics of the Treaty Ports for the Period 1863-72. Compiled for the
Austro-Hungarian Exhibition, Vienna 1873. Published by Order of the Inspector General of
Chinese Maritime Customs, Shanghai, 1873.
N. B. There seems to be a typographical error in the tonnage for Shanghai: the figure given is
15,884, but this is presumed to be a misprint for 25,884 tons, as given here. Otherwise the
average size of the 56 Danish vessels calling at Shanghai in 1864 would be about 143 tons,
or a bare 72 lasts, which is rather unlikely. The tonnage figure in the Shanghai Generalskibs-
list fits in well with this corrected figure. The aggregate tonnage figure has therefore been
increased to 168,620 tons.