One Hundred Years' History Of The Chinese In Singapore: The Annotated Edition. Ong Siang Song
who did a large business in Boat Quay between Market Street and Bonham Street, and who, according to Mr James Guthrie,54 had employed Seah Eu Chin55 in his early days here as book-keeper. In 1831 or thereabouts Kim Swee bought half of the land belonging to Morgan & Co’s estate, extending from the corner of High Street near the Court House to the bridge on the riverside. He erected houses on this land which afterwards was acquired by Seah Eu Chin.
During this decade several retail druggists’ shops, e.g. Kye Guan, Seng Tek Kee, Tong Sian and Hok Ann Tong, were already doing a good business. The last named was started by Lee Eng Guan, a physician who had come from China and in time got to be well known. In those days the fee paid to a Chinese doctor [44] was only ten cents. Lee Eng Guan married a niece of Tan Che Sang,56 and their only son Lee Boon Lim, born in Singapore in 1842, became engaged in export and import business with Shanghai, but died at the age of 31 before he had managed to establish the business on a sound footing, leaving a son Lee Phan Hok aged 11. After being educated at Raffles Institution, where Mr RW Hullett57 had already taken up the appointment of Principal, Mr Lee Phan Hok was employed in the firm of Chip Hock & Co, Provision and Wine Merchants in Raffles Square. This firm was begun by E Chip Hock in partnership with Tan Beng Teck,58 a Straitsborn Chinese, who, after some years’ residence in Japan, had returned to Singapore with a large consignment of lacquer and brass ware and porcelain, and the earlier firm of Beng Teck, Chip Hock & Co was one of the first shops to deal in Japanese ware. Chip Hock & Co, however, had to be wound up, and Mr Lee Phan Hok joined the Police Office as clerk and interpreter in 1881, retiring in 1897. He started a spirit shop in the following year and still owns it. He has acted and continues to act as agent to collect house rents in Singapore for Malacca landlords, like the late Mr Tan Chay Yan59 and Mr Seet Kee Ann.60 He has travelled extensively in Japan, China and India, is a man of liberal views and is always ready to help in works of charity. He was one of the early adherents of the Singapore reformed party which discarded the queue in 1898. The cause of female education finds in him a keen and consistent supporter.
1John Turnbull Thomson (1821–1884) was a surveyor and artist born in Glorum, Northumberland. He first came to the Straits in 1838 as a young man of 17 and worked as a surveyor in Penang. In 1841, he became Government Surveyor for the Straits Settlements. For the next 12 years, Thomson surveyed the island and made long-term plans for the development of Singapore Town. He was responsible for many important public buildings, including the Dalhousie Memorial, the Ellenborough Buildings and Horsburgh Lighthouse. Thomson had an artistic hand, and his many articles, paintings and sketches of colonial Singapore provide an excellent glimpse into the lives of early settlers in Singapore. Proficient in Malay, he completed the first English translation of large segments of Munshi Abdullah’s Hikayat Abdullah. Thomson moved to New Zealand and became its first Surveyor-General in 1876. He retired in 1879 and died in 1884 at his home in Invercargill. See Justin Corfield, Historical Dictionary of Singapore (Plymouth: Scarecrow Press, 2011), at 272.
2The Reverend David Collie of the London Missionary Society. Collie was based in Malacca from about 1822. He spoke and read Chinese fluently and translated The Four Books, a classical Chinese text, which he printed in Malacca in 1828. He died on 27 February 1828 on a ship off the coast of Singapore. See The Missionary Register for 1828 (London: LB Seeley & Sons, 1829), at 528.
3JT Thomson, Translations from the Hakayit Abdulla (bin Abdulkadar), Munshi, with comments (London: HS King, 1874), at 230.
4See Boon Tiong (1807–1888), also referred to as ‘Seet Boon Tiong’, ‘Ban Tiong’ or ‘Boon Tiong’ in records, was an influential Chinese merchant who facilitated trade missions between the British and Pahang and Kelantan. He was said to be a close friend of pioneer merchant Alexander Laurie Johnston, after whom Johnston Pier was named. A Malacca-born Baba, See arrived in Singapore in 1825 as one of the early Chinese settlers and set up a trading business. He retired to Malacca in 1848 and became a Justice of the Peace in 1860. Boon Tiong Street is named after him. See Arnold Wright & HA Cartwright (eds), Twentieth Century Impressions of British Malaya (London: Lloyd’s Greater Britain Publishing Company, 1908), at 717.
5Also known as Ung Choon Seng or Ung Choon Sing. Born in Malacca, Ang Choon Seng (1805–1852) was a commissioning agent, merchant, and philanthropist. Along with several Chinese leaders, he wrote in 1850 to William John Butterworth, Governor of the Straits Settlements, to request a more lenient approach towards weddings, funerals, prayers, festive celebrations and other Chinese customaries. See
6Also known as Chee Teangwy, Chee Tiong Why and Chee Teang Wye. Along with Ang Choon Seng (see above), Chee Teang Why was one of several Chinese merchants who petitioned Governor Butterworth for a more sympathetic treatment of the Chinese. He owned and operated Teang-why & Co (active 1840–1858) in Market Street, and contributed generously to various causes including the Chinese Free School. He died in 1861. See
7Another Malacca-born merchant, Chee Kim Guan was a founding member of the Singapore Chamber of Commerce. His son, Chee Yam Chuan, was elected Head of the Malacca Hokkien community. See
8Born in 1808, So Guan Chuan became one of the wealthiest Straits Chinese in the 19th century. He contributed generously to the building funds of the Thian Hock Keng Temple on Telok Ayer Street and became its General Manager in the 1840s. Guan Chuan Street in Tiong Bahru is named after him. See
9See CB Buckley, An Anecdotal History of Old Times in Singapore 1819–1867 (Singapore: Fraser & Neave, 1902). Charles Burton Buckley (1844–1912) was born on 30 January 1844, the second son of Reverend John Wall Buckley, Vicar of Paddington, London. One of his younger brothers, Henry Burton Buckley (1845–1935) became Lord Justice of Appeal in England. Charles Buckley was educated at Winchester College, but did not attend university on account of his poor health. His neighbour, William Henry Read (then head of AL Johnston & Company in Singapore) suggested that he go to Singapore to recuperate and offered him a job. Buckley arrived in Singapore in 1864, aged 20. While working with AL Johnston & Co, he read law privately and in 1875, left AL Johnston & Co and worked briefly as assistant to Attorney-General Thomas Braddell. In 1877, he became partner at the firm of Rodyk & Davidson, retiring in 1904. In 1884, Buckley acquired and revived the defunct Singapore Free Press, turning it into a daily and expanding its history column. Buckley was active in numerous committees and causes and was the first person to import and drive a car in Singapore. He is most well-known for his book, An Anecdotal History of Old Times in Singapore. See ‘The Late Mr Charles Burton Buckley’ Singapore Free Press, 24 May 1912, at 7
10Sir Peter Benson Maxwell served as Chief Justice of the Straits Settlements from 1867 to 1871, and Recorder of Singapore from 1866 to 1871. Born in 1817, Maxwell was of Irish descent. He was called to the bar in 1841 and authored The Interpretation of Statutes. See Lim Kheng Eng, Sir Peter Benson Maxwell: His Malayan Career (1856–1871), Department of History Academic Exercise (Singapore: University of Malaya, 1959).
11Choa Choon Neo was a descendant of Choa Chong Long. In 1869, she successfully contested her ancestor’s will reserving properties in Malacca and Singapore in perpetuity for ‘Sinchew’ rites (for descendants to worship Choa and his wives) in favour of partible inheritance. She died in 1875. On her legal case, see Choa Choon Neoh v Spottiswoode [1869] 1 Kyshe 216.
12[1869] 1 Kyshe 216.
13Song considered this description erroneous because he distinguished between those “of Chinese descent”, who were newly-arrived Chinese migrants, and Straits-born Chinese, who were local born, like himself.
14Robert Ibbetson served as Resident and then, from 1832 to 1834, Governor of the Straits Settlements of Penang, Malacca