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Hankou, alternately romanized as Hankow (), was one of the three towns (the other two were Wuchang and Hanyang) merged to become modern-day
Wuhan Wuhan (, ; ; ) is the capital of Hubei Province in the People's Republic of China. It is the largest city in Hubei and the most populous city in Central China, with a population of over eleven million, the ninth-most populous Chinese city a ...
city, the capital of the
Hubei Hubei (; ; alternately Hupeh) is a landlocked province of the People's Republic of China, and is part of the Central China region. The name of the province means "north of the lake", referring to its position north of Dongting Lake. The pr ...
province, China. It stands north of the Han and
Yangtze River The Yangtze or Yangzi ( or ; ) is the longest river in Asia, the third-longest in the world, and the longest in the world to flow entirely within one country. It rises at Jari Hill in the Tanggula Mountains (Tibetan Plateau) and flow ...
s where the Han flows into the Yangtze. Hankou is connected by bridges to its triplet sister towns Hanyang (between Han and Yangtze) and Wuchang (on the south side of the Yangtze). Hankou is the main
port A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as ...
of
Hubei province Hubei (; ; alternately Hupeh) is a landlocked province of the People's Republic of China, and is part of the Central China region. The name of the province means "north of the lake", referring to its position north of Dongting Lake. The ...
and the single largest port in the middle reaches of
Yangtze The Yangtze or Yangzi ( or ; ) is the longest river in Asia, the third-longest in the world, and the longest in the world to flow entirely within one country. It rises at Jari Hill in the Tanggula Mountains (Tibetan Plateau) and flow ...
.


History

The city's name literally means "
Mouth In animal anatomy, the mouth, also known as the oral cavity, or in Latin cavum oris, is the opening through which many animals take in food and issue vocal sounds. It is also the cavity lying at the upper end of the alimentary canal, bounded on t ...
of the Han", from its position at the confluence of the Han with the
Yangtze River The Yangtze or Yangzi ( or ; ) is the longest river in Asia, the third-longest in the world, and the longest in the world to flow entirely within one country. It rises at Jari Hill in the Tanggula Mountains (Tibetan Plateau) and flow ...
. The name appears in a
Tang Dynasty The Tang dynasty (, ; zh, t= ), or Tang Empire, was an imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 618 to 907 AD, with an interregnum between 690 and 705. It was preceded by the Sui dynasty and followed by the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdo ...
poem by Liu Changqing. Other historical names for the city include Xiakou (), Miankou (), and Lukou (). Hankou, from the Ming to late Qing, was under the administration of the local government in Hanyang, although it was already one of the four major national markets ( :zh:四大名镇) in Ming dynasty. It was not until 1899 that Zhang Zhidong decided to separate Hankou from Hanyang. Hankou was then divided into four districts, which are Juren, Youyi, Xunli, and Dazhi. Some of the names can still be found in modern-day Wuhan, where there are geographical names such as Xunlimen, Jurenmen, and Dazhimen. In 1926, Hankou was officially established as a city, where its municipal government was built in
Jianghan district Jianghan District (, Yangtze and Han River) forms part of the urban core of and is one of 13 urban districts of the prefecture-level city of Wuhan, the capital of Hubei Province, China. The district is part of the historical Hankou. Geograp ...
. In the same year, the Northern Expedition reached Hankou, and merged Hankou with adjacent Wuchang and Hanyang to make it the seat of the national capital, Wuhan. But in 1927, when
Nanjing Nanjing (; , Mandarin pronunciation: ), Postal Map Romanization, alternately romanized as Nanking, is the capital of Jiangsu Provinces of China, province of the China, People's Republic of China. It is a sub-provincial city, a megacity, and t ...
succeeded in the fight to be the national capital, Wuhan was returned to its original form, with Hankou being again a city by itself. This time Hankou was established as a "Special Municipality," which resembles a direct-controlled municipality in present day. Before 1949, Hankou has shifted between being a special municipality and a provincial city. In 1949, Hankou was finally merged with Hanyang and Wuchang to become Wuhan, when the communists arrived in Hankou on May 16.


Revolutionary periods

Hankou was the destination on the escape route of groups of missionaries fleeing the Boxers in the Northern provinces around 1900. The flight of some missionaries from the T'ai-yüan massacre in Shan-si is recorded in the work ''A Thousand Miles of Miracle in China'', by Reverend A E Glover, one of the fleeing missionaries. On 10 October 1911, a revolution to establish the
Republic of China Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the northea ...
and replace the
Qing dynasty The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing,, was a Manchu-led imperial dynasty of China and the last orthodox dynasty in Chinese history. It emerged from the Later Jin dynasty founded by the Jianzhou Jurchens, a Tungusic-speak ...
led to the involvement of Hankou in the struggle between Hubei revolutionary forces and the Qing army, led by Yuan Shikai. Although the revolution began in Wuchang with a revolt started by members of the New Army, revolutionaries quickly captured major strategic cities and towns throughout the province, including Hankou on October 12. The Qing Dynasty Army recaptured Hankou later, but as the revolution spread throughout China, eventually the town and the province came under control of the Republic of China.


Foreign concessions period

Hankou used to have five foreign concessions belonging to the United Kingdom (, est. 1862), France (, est. 1886), Russia (, est. 1886), Germany (, est. 1895) and Japan (, est. 1898). The German and Russian concessions ended in 1917 and 1920 respectively and those areas were administered by the Chinese government as the First and the Second Special Area. Early in 1927, the British concession was occupied in the course of the revolutionary troubles that accompanied the Northern Expedition when the Chinese
Kuomintang The Kuomintang (KMT), also referred to as the Guomindang (GMD), the Nationalist Party of China (NPC) or the Chinese Nationalist Party (CNP), is a major political party in the Republic of China, initially on the Chinese mainland and in Tai ...
forces occupied the concession and showed no intention of withdrawing. The Chen-O'Malley Agreement of February 1927 provided for a combined British-Chinese administration of the concession and in 1929 the British concession formally came to an end. From then on it was administered by the Chinese authorities as the Third Special Area. In the 1920s and 30s, Hankou was one of the Yangtze River ports patrolled by the US Navy to maintain US interests in the area ( Yangtze Patrol.) Hankou was flooded in the 1931 China floods. Hankou was captured by the Japanese invaders in 1938 ( Battle of Wuhan). An important logistical center, the city was heavily bombed in December 1944 by the US aircraft based in the Chengdu area (part of Operation Matterhorn). On 19 August 1945, a group of enraged Chinese civilians and soldiers massacred 26 Japanese soldiers in the
Hankou reprisal massacre Hankou, alternately romanized as Hankow (), was one of the three towns (the other two were Wuchang and Hanyang) merged to become modern-day Wuhan city, the capital of the Hubei province, China. It stands north of the Han and Yangtze Rivers ...
. The government of Vichy France relinquished the French concession in 1943, and the restored French Republic relinquished it formally in 1946. The Japanese concession came to an end with the surrender of Japan in 1945. Before the Communist Revolution, Hankou was the seat of the
Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Hankou The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Hankou ( la, Hancheuvensis, ) is a Latin Rite Metropolitan archdiocese, based in Hankou, Wuhan, Hubei, China. Its archiepiscopal see is the Cathedral of St. Joseph, in Hankou, Wuhan. It is since 1961, due to the ...
, covering the province of Hubei. The dioceses in Wuchang, Hanyang and elsewhere in the province were subordinated to it. In the 1930s, the airports served in Hankow were
Wuhan Wangjiadun Airport Hankow Airfield (Chinese: 王家墩机场), also known as Wuhan Wangjiadun Airport, was an airfield in Wangjiadun, Hankow City, Hubei, China that closed in 2007. Constructed in 1931, it was a busy military airfield during the Second Sino-Jap ...
and Wuhan Nanhu. Wangjiadun served as a civil and military base until 2007 while Nanhu, on the other hand, shut down while Tianhe Airport opened in 1995.


Modern status

"Hankou" remains a commonly used name for the part of Wuhan urban area north of the Yangtze and Han Rivers. The name was long preserved in the name of the old Hankou Railway Station (also known as
Dazhimen Station Dazhimen or Ta-chih-men railway station ( zh, 大智門火車站) in Wuhan, China, was the southern terminus of the Beijing–Hankou railway. It is located at the intersection of Jinghan Road and Chezhan Road in Jiang'an District, part of the f ...
), the original terminal of the Jinghan Railway. After the old Dazhimen station closed in 1991, the Hankou name was transferred to the new Hankou Railway Station, which opened in 1991 at a new location, farther away from central city. Railway passengers traveling to Wuhan need to purchase tickets to a particular station: the Hankou Railway Station, the Wuchang Railway Station (near central Wuchang, on the right bank of the Yangtze), or the new Wuhan Railway Station (which opened in 2009, also on the right bank, but a long distance from the historical Wuchang). Nonetheless, Hankou is no longer the name of an administrative unit (e.g., a
district A district is a type of administrative division that, in some countries, is managed by the local government. Across the world, areas known as "districts" vary greatly in size, spanning regions or county, counties, several municipality, municipa ...
), because its area now falls mostly within Jiang'an District,
Jianghan District Jianghan District (, Yangtze and Han River) forms part of the urban core of and is one of 13 urban districts of the prefecture-level city of Wuhan, the capital of Hubei Province, China. The district is part of the historical Hankou. Geograp ...
, and Qiaokou District. That contrasts with Wuchang and Hanyang, the names of which have been retained in the eponymous administrative districts within the City of Wuhan.


Media

Hankou once had an English-language newspaper, '' The Hankow Daily News'', which was published by a German individual.Walravens, p
91


Education

*
David Hill memorial school The David Hill memorial school was a school for blind girls in Hankou, China. It was affiliated with the Wesleyan Church. The school was founded in 1883. It was looted in 1911 when Hankou fell to imperial troops."Hankow Laid in Ashes". ''Boston Ev ...
(1883)


References


Citations


Sources

* ** Also available in Walravens, Hartmut and Edmund King. ''Newspapers in international librarianship: papers presented by the newspapers section at IFLA General Conferences''. K.G. Saur, 2003. , 9783598218378. * * *


External links


Historic US Army map of Hankou, 1945
{{Authority control Cities in Hubei History of Wuhan Jianghan District