Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-rcrh6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-25T04:02:00.626Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The 1857 Chinese Rebellion in Sarawak: A Reappraisal

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 April 2011

Craig A. Lockard
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Given the great strides made over the past twenty years in our understanding of modern Southeast Asian history, it is surprising that many traditional and possibly outdated interpretations remain unchallenged. Despite the growing use of indigenous source materials, the willingness to take an Asian-centric (and occasionally nonelitist) perspective, and the increasing attention to social, economic, and cultural (rather than just political and diplomatic) history, a number of important themes need reinterpretation or reevaluation. Indeed, many modern historians continue to accept as valid traditional assessments of some nineteenth-century events. This is sometimes the case even when the original sources are compromised by a Western ethnocentric and colonialist bias, since European representatives of the imperialist imperative largely produced the documentary sources for the period. The colonial episode now seems a far less benevolent exercise than it did to an earlier generation of historians; yet, outmoded perspectives sometimes remain with us. Such a failure of reinterpretation characterizes the recent writings on one of the better-known episodes in Bornean history, the so-called “Chinese Rebellion” of 1857 in Sarawak. The time has come for a revisionist appraisal.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Southeast Asian Studies , Volume 9 , Issue 1 , March 1978 , pp. 85 - 98
Copyright
Copyright © The National University of Singapore 1978

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 Hall, D.G.E., A History of South-East Asia, Third Edition (New York, 1968), pp. 534–35Google Scholar.

2 Sir Spenser St. John, The Life of Sir James Brooke, quoted in Purcell, Victor, The Chinese in Southeast Asia, Second Edition (London, 1965), p. 369Google Scholar.

3 Ibid., pp. 369–70.

4 Runciman, Steven, The White Rajahs: A History of Sarawak from 1841 to 1941 (Cambridge, 1960), pp. 125–32Google Scholar.

5 Irwin, Graham, Nineteenth Century Borneo: A Study in Diplomatic Rivalry (Singapore, 1955), p. 183CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

6 Pringle, Robert, Rajahs and Rebels: The Ibans of Sarawak Under Brooke Rule, 1841–1941 (Ithaca, 1970), pp. 105–7Google Scholar.

7 Tarling, Nicholas, A Concise History of Southeast Asia (New York, 1966), p. 130Google Scholar.

8 Some of the discussion in this section is based on material in Jackson, James C., Chinese in the West Borneo Goldfields: A Study in Cultural Geography, Occasional Papers in Geography, No. 15, University of Hull (Hull, 1970), chs. 2–3Google Scholar; and Pringle, op. cit., chs. 1–2. A further discussion of the West Borneo pattern can be found in Lockard, Craig A., From Kampong to City: A Social History of Kuching, Malaysia, 1820–1970 (Kuala Lumpur, forthcoming), ch. 1Google Scholar.

9 Information on the Chinese taken from de Groot, J.J.M., Het Kongsiwezen van Borneo: Eene verhandeling over den Grondslag en den Aard der Chineesch Politieke Vereenigigen in de Kolonian (The Hague, 1885)Google Scholar; Jackson, op. cit.; Ward, Barbara, “A Hakka Kongsi in Borneo,” Jòurnal of Oriental Studies, I (July 1954), 358–70Google Scholar; Crawfurd, John, A Descriptive Dictionary of the Indian Islands and Adjacent Countries (London, 1856), pp. 273, 482Google Scholar; “Memoir on the Residency of the North-West Coast of Borneo,” in Moor, J.H., Notices of the Indian Archipelago and Adjacent Countries (London, 1837), pp. 8–9Google Scholar; Cator, W.J., The Economic Position of the Chinese in the Netherlands Indies (Oxford, 1936)Google Scholar; T'ien Ju-k'ang, “The Early History of the Chinese in Sarawak,” Appendix I in Ju-k'ang, T'ien, The Chinese in Sarawak: A Study of Social Structure, Monographs on Social Anthropology, No. 12, London School of Economics (London: 1956), pp. 8–9Google Scholar.

10 Kwee, Liew Peck, “The Relation between the Bau Kongsi and the Brooke Government,” in Teochiu Association Centennial Volume (Kuching, 1956), p. 171Google Scholar (text in Chinese). This account, by a well-known Hakka educator and amateur historian in Kuching, is based on oral traditions among the present-day Chinese in Bau, some of whom are descendants of the original Chinese settlers.

11 See St. John, Spenser, Life in the Forests of the Far East, II, Second Edition (London, 1863), 349–63Google Scholar; Helms, Ludvig, Pioneering in the Far East (London, 1882), p. 156Google Scholar.

12 See St. John, op. cit, II, 339–40.

13 For a discussion of Kuching's population growth, see Lockard, Craig A., “The Early Development of Kuching, 1841–1857,” Journal of Malaysian Branch Royal Asiatic Society, XLIX, 2 (1976), 107–26Google Scholar.

14 Capt. Mundy, Rodney, Narrative of Events in Borneo and the Celebes Down to the Occupation of Labuan, from the Journals of James Brooke Esq., I (London, 1848), 286Google Scholar.

15 Helms, op. cit., pp. 164–65.

16 Liew, op. cit., p. 172.

17 St. John, op. cit., II, 340.

18 Keppel, Henry, A Visit to the Indian Archipelago in H.M. Ship Meander, With Portions of the Private Journal of Sir James Brooke, K.C.B., II (London, 1853), 69Google Scholar.

19 St. John, op. cit., II, 353.

20 Charles Johnson Brooke, Ten Years in Sarawak, I (London, 1866), 28. Brooke does, however, relate that several Chinese merchants, presumably from Kuching, went to Bau in November 1852 to warn the kongsi of a impending search by Brooke for an accused criminal believed staying in Bau. The traders recommended that the kongsi hand the suspect over to the Rajah. This would suggest that at least a few Kuching traders had interests of some kind in Bau.

21 St. John, op. cit., II, 353.

22 Low, Hugh, Sarawak: Its Inhabitants and Productions (London, 1848), pp. 18–23Google Scholar; Mundy, op. cit., I, 362.

23 Low, op. cit., pp. 25–26; McDougall, Harriette, Sketches of Our Life at Sarawak (London, 1882). p. 125Google Scholar; Belcher, Edward, Narrative of the Voyage of H.M.S. Semarang, During the Years 1843–46, (London. 1848), 24Google Scholar.

24 Jacob, Gertrude L., The Raja of Sarawak: An Account of Sir James Brooke, K.C.B., L.L.O., Given Chiefly Through Letters and Journals, II (London, 1876). 236Google Scholar.

25 Low, op. cit., p. 25, claimed the kongsi Chinese were in constant communication with Sambas.

26 Liew, op. cit., p. 171.

27 Brooke, op. cit., I, 27–28.

28 St. John, op. cit., II, 354–55.

29 Keppel, op. cit., II, 70–81.

30 This interpretation was presented to me in April 1966 by C.P. Law, a long-time Teochiu community leader in Kuching and an amateur historian. Mr. Law had many contacts in Bau.

31 See St. John, op. cit, II, 358–77; Runciman, op. cit., pp. 119–33; Helms, op. cit., pp. 164–92; McDougall, op. cit., pp. 125–54.

32 Purcell, op. cit., p. 369.

33 St. John, op. cit., II, 375.

34 McDougall, op. cit., pp. 127–39.

35 Outram, Richard, “The Chinese,” The Peoples of Sarawak, ed. Harrisson, Tom, (Kuching, 1959), p. 116Google Scholar.

36 McDougall, op. cit., p. 131. A different account of this story appears in Helms, op. cit., p. 173.

37 St. John, op. cit., II, 406.

38 Helms, op. cit., pp. 176–77.

39 McDougall, op. cit., p. 141

40 Helms, op. cit., p. 176.

41 Ibid., p. 184.

42 Ibid., p. 190.

43 Brooke, op. cit., 1.220.

44 One of five modern administrative districts for Sarawak, Kuching is the centre of the divison.

45 Chaoanns are a small but influential speech group in Kuching. closely allied to the Hokkiens.