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The Rise of Singapore's Great Opium Syndicate, 1840–86

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 August 2009

Carl A. Trocki
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Extract

This study aims to reconstruct a neglected chapter in the history of the Singapore Chinese. The opium farm, which was the monopoly for the manufacture and sale of chandu, or smokeable opium, was one of the primary Chinese-dominated economic institutions of nineteenth-century Singapore. A study of the farm provides the historian with an institutional focus which can increase our understanding of the history of the Chinese community in Singapore during its formative years.

Type
Articles
Information
Journal of Southeast Asian Studies , Volume 18 , Issue 1 , March 1987 , pp. 58 - 80
Copyright
Copyright © The National University of Singapore 1987

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References

This article is based on a paper presented at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (ISEAS) in Singapore in March 1985. The author is grateful for the sponsorship of the ISEAS, as well as for financial support from a Fulbright-Hayes grant for research in ASEAN countries from the Committee for the International Exchange of Scholars (CIES) which made possible his research in Singapore in 1985. He would also like to express his thanks to the librarians and archivists in Singapore whose cooperation and assistance greatly facilitated his work, particularly Mrs. Patricia Lim, Librarian of ISEAS, Mrs Lily Tan, Director of the National Archives, Singapore and Mr. David K. Y. Chng, Reference Services Division, Singapore National Library.

1 Siang, Song Ong, One Hundred Years' History of the Chinese in Singapore (reprint, Singapore: Oxford University Press, 1984)Google Scholar; Blythe, Wilfred, The Impact of Chinese Secret Societies in Malaya: A Historical Study (London: Oxford University Press, 1969)Google Scholar. Blythe's work, primarily a regurgitation of colonial and police records of disturbances and arrests is essentially the history of the suppression of secret societies and offers no useful sociological or institutional analysis of the triads.

2 An interesting, but flawed attempt to demonstrate a theoretical approach is Ping, Lee Poh's Chinese Society in Nineteenth Century Singapore (Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press, 1978)Google Scholar. Lee's book has been sharply criticized by Ken, Wong Lin in “Review Article”, Journal of Southeast Asian Studies (JSEAS) XI, 1 (03, 1980): 151–86CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Kim, Khoo Kay, in Journal of the Malaysian Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society (JMBRAS) 51, 2 (1978): 153–58Google Scholar. While their critiques may have been excessively harsh, they demonstrate the difficulty of proving a theoretical model without a substantial factual foundation. The writings of Maurice Freedman are the most useful in this respect, but they too, lack a firm historical setting. More recently, Mak Lau Fong has written on secret societies. See The Sociology of Secret Societies: A Study of Chinese Secret Societies in Singapore and Peninsular Malaysia (Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press, 1981)Google Scholar.

3 Toddy is the fermented juice derived from tapping the flower of a coconut tree. Bhang was a cannabis preparation, which was smoked. Both were primarily consumed by Indians and the farmer was always an Indian.

4 Straits Settlements Records (hereafter, SSR) CC 18, p. 202.

5 The pioneering pieces were Ken, Wong Lin, “The Revenue Farms of Prince of Wales Island, 1805–1830”, Nan-Yang Hsueh Hui (Journal of South Seas Society) (JSSS) 19, No. 1 (1964): 56–127Google Scholar; the Academic Exercise by U Wen, Lena Cheng, later published as “Opium in the Straits Settlements 1867–1910”, Journal of Southeast Asian History (JSEAH) 2, No. 1 (03, 1961): 52–75Google Scholar; and Tong Teck Ing, “Opium in the Straits Settlements 1867–1909”, B.A. Honours Academic Exercise, University of Malaya (Singapore), 1955. More recently there have been a series of analytical studies on revenue farming systems in different parts of Southeast Asia, e.g. Butcher, John, “The Demise of the Revenue Farm System in the Federated Malay States”, Modern Asian Studies 17, No. 3 (1983): 387–412CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Rush, James R., “The Revenue Farms of Java” (Ph.D. Thesis, Yale University, New Haven, Conn. 1975)Google Scholar; Lysa, Hong, Thailand in the Nineteenth Century: The Evolution of Economy and Society (Singapore: ISEAS, 1984)Google Scholar; Brown, Ian George, “The Ministry of Finance and the Early Development of Modern Financial Administration in Siam, 1885–1910” (University of London, Ph.D. Thesis, 1975)Google Scholar; and Trocki, Carl A., Prince of Pirates: The Temenggong and the Development of Johor and Singapore 1784–1885 (Singapore: Singapore University Press, 1979)Google Scholar.

6 Legislative Council Proceedings (Legco), 1883, p. 7Google Scholar.

7 SSR W 45, No. 127.

8 The Straits Times Almanack, Calendar and Directory for the Year 1846 etc. and various other titles (standard abbreviation, SD) (Straits Times Press, 1845), p. 66. See also SSR CC 16 No. 476 which also lists Tay Eng Long as the Opium Fanner and makes no mention of Lao Joon Tek.

9 Song, p. 119.

10 SSR AA 18, No. 62.

11 SSR AA 43, No. 42.

12 Singapore Free Press (SFP), 19 April 1860. Actually the SFP gave his name as “Ong”, but since other sources give his name as “Heng”, and since he was apparently a Teochew, the Teochew pronunciation of “ ” will be used. I am grateful to Mr. David K. Y. Chng who helped me to track down Heng Bun Soon's full name, .

13 SSR W 37, p. 27, No. 38.

14 SSR R 28 No. 109, S 23 No. 161, S 25 No. 72, U 32 p. 153, R 31 p. 1.

15 SSR U 32 pp. 152–55; AA 35 No. 56.

16 Letterbook of His Highness the Maharajah of Johore, 1856–68 (JLB-I), Temenggong to Blundell, 1 December 1860; SSR AA 43 No. 43 and No. 44, SSR BB 113 No. 149.

17 SSR V 25 No. 108.

18 Straits Times (ST), 13 April 1861.

19 ST, 4 May 1861. See also a consistent series of stories, letters and editorials in the Straits Times supporting Sultan Ali and encouraging a “civil war” in Johor (cf. ST, 9 February 1861, 2 March 1861, 16 March 1861, and 23 March 1861).

20 SSR X 21, Resident Councillor to Governor, 2 April 1861. SSR U 42 No. 125.

21 ST, 20 April 1861.

22 ST, 13 April 1861.

23 ST, 20 April 1861.

24 SSR X 21 No. 87; SSR R 34 No. 79.

25 SSR X 21 No. 108.

26 ST, 4 June 1861.

27 ST, 8 June 1861.

28 ST, 6 April 1861.

29 ST, 18 April 1861.

30 ST, 27 April 1861. The reference made here to a wayang kulit is somewhat strange. The report probably refers to a Chinese opera and not to a Malay shadow puppet show.

31 ST, 18 May 1861.

32 ST, June 1861.

33 Indian Office (I.O.), Administrative Reports of the Government of India 1861–62, V/10/19, pp. 29–30Google Scholar.

34 ST, 1 June 1861.

35 Ibid.

36 Vaughan, J. D., The Manners and Customs of the Chinese in the Straits Settlements (reprint, Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press, 1971), p. 20Google Scholar.

37 Song, pp. 167–68, discusses the controversy over Cheang Sam Teo's will which occurred in 1871, and so it is possible that he may have been in retirement after 1863 and died around 1870. However, the account of the will controversy gives no mention of the date of Sam Teo's death. The suit over the will merely marked a falling out between the two brothers and the actual death may have taken place much earlier.

In the case of Heng Bun Soon, he apparently lived on until at least 1868, as Song (p. 118) mentions that he served on the board of the Tan Tock Seng Hospital for 7 years, presumably beginning in 1861. Since Board members were wealthy and respected individuals in the community it is clear that his speculations in the Farm did not leave him a pauper.

38 ST, 30 August 1862 and ST, 6 September 1862.

39 SSR W 42 No. 203.

40 SSR V 36, No. 333.

41 SSR W 45, p. 7.

42 SSR V 36, No. 24, pp. 392–93.

43 SSR W 45, No. 127.

44 This dispute has been discussed in Turnbull, C. M., “The Pepper and Gambier Trade in Johore in the Nineteenth Century”, JSSS XV, Pt. 1 (1959)Google Scholar and also in my Prince of Pirates, Ch. 5, pp. 129–43.

45 SSR R 46, p. 130.

46 JLB-I, Temenggong to Sec. of Government, 25 January 1867. Abu Bakar informed MacPherson that Seng Poh had been given the Johor farms for two years and eight months beginning 1 May 1867 until 31 December 1869.

47 ST, 29 May 1869.

48 Ibid.

49 ST, 13 February 1869 and 16 March 1869.

50 Legco, 1873, p. 124.

51 ST, 26 April 1869.

52 ST, 22 May 1869.

53 ST, 18 June 1869.

54 ST, 3 June 1869.

55 ST, 23 November 1869.

56 Straits Times Overland Journal (STOJ), 17 June 1870 and 1 February 1871.

57 STOJ, 28 March 1872 and 25 April 1872. Hong Guan sued Hong Lim, Wee Bock Seng, Low Tuan Locke and Tan Beng Chie for a conspiracy to forge Cheang Sam Teo's will. He admitted that he himself was a participant. The suit failed but Hong Guan was jailed for forgery.

58 STOJ, 8 November 1870.

59 CO 273/119, Exco Minutes, 17 February 1883, p. 323.

60 ST, 26 September 1863, Letter from “C.Z.-N”.

61 Sadka, Emily, The Protected Malay States 1874–1895 (Kuala Lumpur: University of Malaya Press, 1968), pp. 333–35Google Scholar.

62 Trocki, 1979, Ch. 6.

63 Song, pp. 119–20, 131–33, 141–42, 151–52, 167–70, 191, and 259.