The Old China Trade () refers to the early commerce between the
Qing Empire
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 ...
and the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
under the Canton System, spanning from shortly after the end of the
American Revolutionary War
The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was a major war of the American Revolution. Widely considered as the war that secured the independence of t ...
in 1783 to the
Treaty of Wanghia
The Treaty of Wanghia (also known as the Treaty of Wangxia; Treaty of peace, amity, and commerce, between the United States of America and the Chinese Empire; ) was the first of the unequal treaties imposed by the United States on China. As per ...
in 1844. The Old China Trade represented the beginning of relations between the United States and East Asia, including eventually U.S.–China relations. The
maritime fur trade
The maritime fur trade was a ship-based fur trade system that focused on acquiring furs of sea otters and other animals from the indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast and natives of Alaska. The furs were mostly sold in China in ex ...
was a major aspect of the Old China Trade, as was illegal trafficking in
opium
Opium (or poppy tears, scientific name: ''Lachryma papaveris'') is dried latex obtained from the seed capsules of the opium poppy ''Papaver somniferum''. Approximately 12 percent of opium is made up of the analgesic alkaloid morphine, which i ...
. The trade era overlapped the
First Opium War
The First Opium War (), also known as the Opium War or the Anglo-Sino War was a series of military engagements fought between Britain and the Qing dynasty of China between 1839 and 1842. The immediate issue was the Chinese enforcement of the ...
, which resulted from an attempt by China to enforce its prohibition on opium smuggling by Western traders and blockade-runners between 1839–1842.
Origins
Anglo-American hostilities ceased in 1783 following the Second
Treaty of Paris Treaty of Paris may refer to one of many treaties signed in Paris, France:
Treaties
1200s and 1300s
* Treaty of Paris (1229), which ended the Albigensian Crusade
* Treaty of Paris (1259), between Henry III of England and Louis IX of France
* Trea ...
that ended the
American Revolutionary War
The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was a major war of the American Revolution. Widely considered as the war that secured the independence of t ...
and subsequently freed
American trade
Foreign trade of the United States comprises the international imports and exports of the United States. The country is among the top three global importers and exporters.
The regulation of trade is constitutionally vested in the United St ...
from British control. At the time, increased global demand for tea was one of the primary reasons for a shortage of silver; this was the only currency that the Chinese, sole producers of the commodity at the time, would accept in payment. The
East India Company
The East India Company (EIC) was an English, and later British, joint-stock company founded in 1600 and dissolved in 1874. It was formed to trade in the Indian Ocean region, initially with the East Indies (the Indian subcontinent and Southea ...
(EIC), monopoly suppliers of tea to the English market, got around the problem by indirect sales of opium (grown on their plantations in India) to the Chinese, the proceeds from which they used to pay for tea.
The Americans meanwhile, also needed silver to finance their burgeoning international trade in furs, timber, and other commodities. They too looked to the Chinese market as a source of hard currency based on their monopoly of the opium trade in Turkey. The man who would become America's first
consul
Consul (abbrev. ''cos.''; Latin plural ''consules'') was the title of one of the two chief magistrates of the Roman Republic, and subsequently also an important title under the Roman Empire. The title was used in other European city-states throug ...
in China, Bostonian and former
Continental Army
The Continental Army was the army of the United Colonies (the Thirteen Colonies) in the Revolutionary-era United States. It was formed by the Second Continental Congress after the outbreak of the American Revolutionary War, and was establis ...
officer
Samuel Shaw Samuel Shaw may refer to:
Sports
*Dexter Lumis (born 1984), American professional wrestler also known as Samuel Shaw
* Samuel Shaw (bowls player) from Lawn bowls at the 1996 Summer Paralympics
* Samuel Shaw (tennis), played in 1883 U.S. National ...
(17541794), arrived in the port of
Guangzhou
Guangzhou (, ; ; or ; ), also known as Canton () and alternatively romanized as Kwongchow or Kwangchow, is the capital and largest city of Guangdong province in southern China. Located on the Pearl River about north-northwest of Hong Kon ...
privateer
A privateer is a private person or ship that engages in maritime warfare under a commission of war. Since robbery under arms was a common aspect of seaborne trade, until the early 19th century all merchant ships carried arms. A sovereign or deleg ...
'' Empress of China''. The "Chinese Queen", as the vessel was known, under the command of Captain John Green, carried a cargo of silver specie and ginseng for trade. In Guangzhou, the Americans encountered many European nations already trading under the Canton System, including the English, Dutch, French, and Danish. Shaw subsequently negotiated the sale of the ''Empress'' cargo and earned a substantial profit. As well as symbolizing a breach of the British
East India Company
The East India Company (EIC) was an English, and later British, joint-stock company founded in 1600 and dissolved in 1874. It was formed to trade in the Indian Ocean region, initially with the East Indies (the Indian subcontinent and Southea ...
's tea monopoly, the successful and lucrative voyage of the ''Empress'' inspired other American merchants to follow suit with the desire to enter a new market with great potential for profit. By 1803, American vessels outnumbered British and all other nations in the trade. While more numerous, American vessels were smaller, averaging just under 300 tons each, compared with the "East Indiamen" from Europe, which averaged 1,200 tons each.
Growth
Two years after the voyage of the ''Empress'', Shaw set up the firm of Shaw & Randall to advise American firms unfamiliar with trade in the Far East. Boston BrahminThomas Handasyd Perkins of Perkins & Co., the dominant American presence in the Turkish opium business, along with one of his partners and his 16‑year-old nephew
John Perkins Cushing
John Perkins Cushing (April 22, 1787 – April 12, 1862), called "Ku-Shing" by the Chinese, was a wealthy American sea merchant, opium smuggler, and philanthropist. His sixty-foot pilot schooner, the ''Sylph'', won the first recorded American yac ...
, subsequently opened operations in Guangzhou, where Russell & Co. had become the most important American opium dealer. The founders of Russell & Co., Samuel Russell, and Philip Ammedon, had set up in the Chinese city in 1808, buying opium at auction from the EIC in Bombay, which they then shipped clandestinely to Guangzhou on the south coast of China. By 1827 Russell and Co. had become the largest American opium dealer in China, competing in the market alongside British firms including Jardine, Matheson & Co. and Dent & Co. Of all the American firms, only Olyphant & Co. and one other abstained from the opium trade.
Trade with China, originally an enterprise of seemingly limited prospects involving significant risk instead turned out to be extremely lucrative. American traders, then with a stable foothold in Guangzhou, were eager to sell their goods to China, but the Chinese interest in foreign goods was limited. The first item that tended to sell in China was Spanish
bullion
Bullion is non-ferrous metal that has been refined to a high standard of elemental purity. The term is ordinarily applied to bulk metal used in the production of coins and especially to precious metals such as gold and silver. It comes from t ...
: American traders would devote large sums of money to buying and amassing large quantities of the metal for export to China. The Spanish silver bullion was primarily used to complement the less profitable American goods such as cheese, grain, and rum. The use of bullion eventually became considerable with over $62 million worth of species traded to China between 1805 and 1825. This practice, however, gradually declined after 1815, when American merchants began to participate in "chain trade" routes —the buying and selling of goods en route to Guangzhou. The second major —and by far the most lucrative— American export to China was ginseng. Hailed by the Chinese, among other cultures as shown by the genus' Latinate scientific name ''Panax'' as a panacea, the most potent and therefore most demanded type of ginseng, '' aralia quinquefolia'', grew in Manchuria and the Appalachian Mountains. Transported from the interiors of Pennsylvania and Virginia to Philadelphia, New York, or Boston, ginseng was then shipped to China and sold for up to 250 times its weight in silver. Furs were the third-most lucrative American export to China. Searching for another type of item that could be sold to the Chinese aside from specie and ginseng, Americans soon found that the mandarins had a taste for
sea otter
The sea otter (''Enhydra lutris'') is a marine mammal native to the coasts of the northern and eastern North Pacific Ocean. Adult sea otters typically weigh between , making them the heaviest members of the weasel family, but among the small ...
pelts, which could be inexpensively purchased from the Indians of the northwest coast of America and shipped to Guangzhou. The Chinese mandarins’ desire for bullion, ginseng, and furs was the primary impetus for America's initiation of trade with China. The return of the ''Empress of China'', which had carried all three commodities, and her by the now rich crew to Boston in 1785 inspired other Americans to make similar voyages. However, different reasons emerged for maintaining trade with China.
There had always been a general American desire for foreign and sometimes exotic wares, and, with the British East India Company no longer the dominant force in American trade, the job of satisfying this demand fell to American merchants. Therefore, when the ''Empress'' returned home, she brought with her a large stock of outlandish Chinese goods, which her owners sold for a significant profit of $30,000—a 25% gain. Other American merchants did not take long to realize that, while selling American species, ginseng, and fur to the Chinese was undoubtedly profitable, selling Chinese goods in America would be considerably more so. Further motivation came from the knowledge that China, as a whole, had a
mercantilist
Mercantilism is an economic policy that is designed to maximize the exports and minimize the imports for an economy. It promotes imperialism, colonialism, tariffs and subsidies on traded goods to achieve that goal. The policy aims to reduce a ...
-like attitude towards foreign commerce; they tended to resist the importation of foreign goods because of a mixture of
Confucian
Confucianism, also known as Ruism or Ru classicism, is a system of thought and behavior originating in ancient China. Variously described as tradition, a philosophy, a Religious Confucianism, religion, a humanistic or rationalistic religion, ...
doctrine, which deprecated trade, and the underlying ethnocentrism felt by the Chinese—they did not need to actively search for trade because the inferior white "barbarian" states would instinctively bring it to them as a form of tribute. Because of these factors, American traders began to focus their funds on acquiring Chinese goods—a practice that the Chinese were more willing to adopt—rather than on purchasing those of America. What resulted was the flooding of Chinese teas, cotton, silks,
rhubarb
Rhubarb is the fleshy, edible stalks ( petioles) of species and hybrids (culinary rhubarb) of ''Rheum'' in the family Polygonaceae, which are cooked and used for food. The whole plant – a herbaceous perennial growing from short, thick rhizo ...
nankeen
Nankeen (also called Nankeen cloth) is a kind of pale yellowish cloth originally made in Nanking (modern Nanjing), China from a yellow variety of cotton, but subsequently manufactured from ordinary cotton that is then dyed.''Oxford English Dic ...
s (durable, yellow cloth), floor-matting, lacquerware, fans, furniture, and porcelains, into America, to the extent that even those of poor social classes possessed some Chinese items—perhaps a painting of Guangzhou's harbor or a pair of trousers made out of nankeen cloth.
The development of the Canton System
The Cohong monopoly and supercargoes
In 1757, the
Qianlong Emperor
The Qianlong Emperor (25 September 17117 February 1799), also known by his temple name Emperor Gaozong of Qing, born Hongli, was the fifth Emperor of the Qing dynasty and the fourth Qing emperor to rule over China proper, reigning from 1735 t ...
of 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 ...
confined all Western trade to Guangzhou and regulated it through the use of merchants known collectively as the '' cohong''. This group owned a licensed monopoly on trade with foreigners and served as trading intermediaries accountable for their behavior and cargoes. Relations between the ''Cohong'' and the foreign merchants were cordial and very peaceful, as both parties valued their reputations and had vested interests in preventing the disruption of trade. The ''Cohong'' reviewed the cargo of each ship and collected tariffs that were then passed onto the ''
Hoppo
Hoppo or Administrator of the Canton Customs ( zh, t=粵海關部, s=粤海关部, p=Yuèhǎi Guānbù), was the Qing dynasty official at Guangzhou (Canton) given responsibility by the emperor for controlling shipping, collecting tariffs, and ma ...
'' (Inspector of Customs). The ''Cohong'' was at the mercy of the government's demands for revenue, and they had to add costs to the foreign merchants, in order to extract extra money for bribes to please the officials; although Qing Dynasty court officials did not actively supervise foreign trade, China's government treasury reaped the benefits of tariff revenues. Additionally, each foreign vessel had to contract a
comprador
A comprador or compradore () is a "person who acts as an agent for foreign organizations engaged in investment, trade, or economic or political exploitation". A comprador is a Indigenous peoples, native manager for a European business house in East ...
responsible for supplying the ship with provisions and servicing the factories onshore.
Before the rise of four American trading houses in the 1820s that controlled seven-eighths of the China trade by 1825—Perkins and Company, Jones Oakford and Company, Archer, and T. H. Smith—the American trade was conducted through the use of supercargoes. Each American ship had a supercargo who acted as the commercial agent responsible for the purchases of Chinese goods. He had to arrive and leave on his vessel. It was not until 1800 that supercargoes began to establish themselves as resident agents in Guangzhou. These agents either served trading houses or operated off of commissions from other private merchants' transactions. Upon their emergence, large trading houses, greater capitalization, and higher volumes of trade became possible.
Finding mediums of exchange
One of the largest problems faced by foreign traders in Guangzhou was finding a reliable medium of exchange that would enable sustainable trade with the Chinese. The Chinese were always willing to accept bullion, in exchange for tea and other products. This was because the Chinese were fairly self-sufficient and did not have a large desire for foreign goods. Specie was very expensive and difficult to acquire considering that the supply coming from South America fluctuated and it required a lot of goods to attain through a trade. Unable to afford to sustain high-level trading in specie, British merchants turned to the lucrative drug trade, obtaining trading rights for opium from India and importing it to the Qing Empire. Beginning in 1767 and rapidly expanding through the early 1800s, opium was illegally traded for specie with the Chinese and then reinvested in tea for importation to Great Britain.
The Americans had less difficulty finding a variety of different products to barter for tea. The Empress of China and the following early vessels were able to use ginseng and some species to secure tea. Yet, the market for ginseng was rather small, so the Americans began trading furs with Indian tribes in the American Northwest, which was in turn traded for species in Guangzhou, which was then used to purchase tea. From 1790 to 1812 supplies of furs and then sealskins were depleted and new products had to be found as demand also waned. In the Pacific Islands, merchants evaded cannibals and traded with natives to get sandalwood and sea slugs that could be traded for species. But those items soon ran their course, and by 1814 species had risen to nearly 70% of total American exports. In the 1820s, they attempted to compete with the British opium trade that monopolized the Indian crops by trading for Turkish opium. Massachusetts General Hospital, McLean Hospital and the Boston Athenæum, the Bunker Hill Monument, many factories, mines, the US's first railroad, university buildings, high schools, public libraries, and an orphanage were built with the proceeds of opium smuggling. The opium trade allowed the US to transfer China's wealth to fuel the industrial revolution.
The innovation of the British credit system and issuance of banking bills allowed the American traders to clear their debts with co-hong merchants and gradually substitute their cargoes away from carrying specie and more towards domestically manufactured items. The Americans could then later pay off the principal and interest on their loans to the British banks. From 1830 to 1850, faster and larger tea clippers were introduced, thereby replacing the earlier, smaller privateering vessels from the American Revolution. As a result, Americans could achieve greater scale with the combination of tea clippers and British credit. Tea could be transported to American markets in less time and with greater freshness, translating into higher profits. By 1834, tea accounted for over 80% of the American trade from China.
American diplomacy in China
The American trade in Guangzhou existed primarily through private traders and without the supervision and supporting authority of the United States government. Soon after 1784, an
American consul
American(s) may refer to:
* American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America"
** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America
** American ancestry, pe ...
was appointed in Guangzhou and functioned as a reporting agent on trade to the U.S. government. The consul was not recognized by the Chinese authorities or the ''
hoppo
Hoppo or Administrator of the Canton Customs ( zh, t=粵海關部, s=粤海关部, p=Yuèhǎi Guānbù), was the Qing dynasty official at Guangzhou (Canton) given responsibility by the emperor for controlling shipping, collecting tariffs, and ma ...
'', and was not allowed to fly the American flag over its factory until well after 1799. The Americans had to trade with the Chinese as subordinates instead of equals and use the '' Cohong'' for any and all demands. Consequently, the Americans did not have the leverage to raise political or legal protests and had to submit themselves to the Chinese justice system that believed in a "life for a life" and holding groups accountable for the actions of individuals. The chief concern of foreign traders was preventing the Chinese from closing trade, as they could threaten to do over legal disputes.
Denouement
At the end of the First Opium War in 1842, Britain and China signed the Treaty of Nanking, which effectively overthrew the original mercantilist system and forced open the ports of Guangzhou,
Xiamen
Xiamen ( , ; ), also known as Amoy (, from Hokkien pronunciation ), is a sub-provincial city in southeastern Fujian, People's Republic of China, beside the Taiwan Strait. It is divided into six districts: Huli, Siming, Jimei, Tong'an, ...
("Amoy"),
Fuzhou
Fuzhou (; , Fuzhounese: Hokchew, ''Hók-ciŭ''), alternately romanized as Foochow, is the capital and one of the largest cities in Fujian province, China. Along with the many counties of Ningde, those of Fuzhou are considered to constitute t ...
("Foochow"),
Ningbo
Ningbo (; Ningbonese: ''gnin² poq⁷'' , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ), formerly romanized as Ningpo, is a major sub-provincial city in northeast Zhejiang province, People's Republic of China. It comprises 6 urban districts, 2 sate ...
("Ningpo"), and
Shanghai
Shanghai (; , , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is one of the four direct-administered municipalities of the People's Republic of China (PRC). The city is located on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the Huangpu River flow ...
to British trading. Seeing that Britain could easily eliminate foreign competition in China with its new privileges and considerable trading prowess, Americans found the need to reestablish their diplomatic relations and commercial equality in China. For the previous fifty-nine years, Americans had been interacting with China merely through their business transactions, without government-to-government communication. As a result, the administration of President John Tyler sent the commissioner
Caleb Cushing
Caleb Cushing (January 17, 1800 – January 2, 1879) was an American Democratic politician and diplomat who served as a Congressman from Massachusetts and Attorney General under President Franklin Pierce. He was an eager proponent of territoria ...
to negotiate a treaty in which America would receive the same privileges as Britain. Cushing, in the Treaty of Wanghsia in 1844, not only achieved this goal but also won the right of
extraterritoriality
In international law, extraterritoriality is the state of being exempted from the jurisdiction of local law, usually as the result of diplomatic negotiations.
Historically, this primarily applied to individuals, as jurisdiction was usually cla ...
, which meant that Americans accused of crimes in China were to be tried by American courts only. This treaty was monumental in that it laid the foundation for a more extensive and regulated American trade with China; American ships would no longer make the sporadic—and somewhat reckless—voyages to China so characteristic of the Old China trade.
Category of the trade
Fine art
Porcelain
In the late 18th century, Chinese porcelain could be purchased from two sources: the licensed Hong merchants or the porcelain specialized shopkeepers.
=Porcelain specialized shopkeepers
=
From the records, the original porcelain market was concentrated on a street several blocks north of the thirteen factory area. Until 1760, after the Co-hong was created, all the small shopkeepers were moved to a new street on the quay which was later referred to as "China Street" (called Jingyuan Jie 静远街/靖远街 in Chinese). There were about 180 different names of porcelain shops from foreign trade records between 1700 and 1800. However, since many of them appear in records only once or for a few years, there were only a total of 25 to 30 shops dealing with the porcelain business. Most of the porcelain dealers in Guangzhou were small, family-run operations with sales of less than 1,000
Jingdezhen?--> from October to December. The items were completed and shipped to Guangzhou in August or September for export. From the early 1780s to the 1810s, the export market started to shrink. Records show that in 1764, there were 20,116 piculs exported, while in 1784, the porcelain export declined to 13,780 piculs. Although it reached 25,890 piculs in 1798, soon the porcelain exports shrank to only 6,175 piculs in 1801. Finally, the amount of porcelain exported remains at an average level of 6,000 piculs per year around the 1820s. The reason for the drastic change in amounts of porcelain exported could result from the increase in the porcelain price due to the increasing labor cost and Chinese duties on exporting porcelain.
Legacy of the Old China Trade in Salem, Massachusetts
In
Salem, Massachusetts
Salem ( ) is a historic coastal city in Essex County, Massachusetts, located on the North Shore of Greater Boston. Continuous settlement by Europeans began in 1626 with English colonists. Salem would become one of the most significant seaports tr ...
there are important examples of
American colonial architecture
American colonial architecture includes several building design styles associated with the colonial period of the United States, including First Period English (late-medieval), French Colonial, Spanish Colonial, Dutch Colonial, and Georgian. T ...
and
Federal architecture
Federal-style architecture is the name for the classicizing architecture built in the newly founded United States between 1780 and 1830, and particularly from 1785 to 1815, which was heavily based on the works of Andrea Palladio with several inn ...
from the Old China Trade in two historic districts,
Chestnut Street District
The Chestnut Street District is a historic district bounded roughly by Bridge, Lynn, Beckford, and River Streets in Salem, Massachusetts. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1973 and enlarged slightly in 1978. The district ...
, part of the
Samuel McIntire
Samuel McIntire (January 16, 1757 – February 6, 1811) was an American architect and craftsman, best known for his work in the Chestnut Street District, a classic example of Federal style architecture.
Life and career
Born in Salem, Massachus ...
Historic District containing 407 buildings and the
Salem Maritime National Historic Site
The Salem Maritime National Historic Site is a National Historic Sites (United States), National Historic Site consisting of 12 historic structures, one replica tall-ship, and about 9 acres (36,000 m2) of land along the waterfront of Salem Harbo ...
, consisting of 12 historic structures and about of land along the waterfront in Salem, Massachusetts.
File: Hamilton Hall (Salem).jpg,
Hamilton Hall Hamilton Hall can refer to several buildings including:
*Hamilton Hall (Columbia University)
*Hamilton Hall (Montana State University) named after James M. Hamilton.
*Hamilton Hall (Salem, Massachusetts)
Hamilton Hall is a National Historic Lan ...
File: Salem Inn (West-Cogswell_House).jpg, The Salem Inn on Summer Street
File: Stephen Phillips House.jpg,
Stephen Phillips House
The Stephen Phillips House is a historic house and museum located in the McIntire Historic District in Salem, Massachusetts, United States and was designed by Samuel McIntyre.
Phillips House began with Elias Hasket Derby, one of America's firs ...
at 34 Chestnut Street
File: Pickering House - Salem, Massachusetts.JPG, The Pickering House, 18 Broad Street
File: Peirce-Nichols House.jpg, Peirce Nichols House, Federal Street
File: Benjamin Hawkes House - Salem, Massachusetts.JPG, Hawkes House, Derby Wharf
File:Nathaniel_Bowditch_House_-_Salem,_Massachusetts.JPG,
Nathaniel Bowditch House
The Nathaniel Bowditch House, sometimes called the Bowditch-Osgood House and the Curwen-Ward-Bowditch House, is a historic house and National Historic Landmark at 9 North Street in Salem, Massachusetts. With a construction history apparently dat ...
File: Gardner-White-Pingree Place, 128 Essex Street, Salem (Essex County, Massachusetts).jpg, Gardner-Pingree House
File: Derby House - Salem, Massachusetts.JPG, Derby House in Salem Massachusetts. Elias Hasket Derby was among the wealthiest and most celebrated of post-Revolutionary merchants in Salem, Massachusetts, and owner of the ''Grand Turk'', the first New England vessel to trade directly with China.
John Perkins Cushing
John Perkins Cushing (April 22, 1787 – April 12, 1862), called "Ku-Shing" by the Chinese, was a wealthy American sea merchant, opium smuggler, and philanthropist. His sixty-foot pilot schooner, the ''Sylph'', won the first recorded American yac ...
Fanning & Coles
Fanning & Coles was an American firm engaged in the Old China Trade and related Maritime fur trade. The two principal partners were sea captain Edmund Fanning and financier Willet Coles. The firm existed from 1798 to 1815, owning several large mer ...
*
John Murray Forbes
John Murray Forbes (February 23, 1813 – October 12, 1898) was an American railroad magnate, merchant, philanthropist and abolitionist. He was president of both the Michigan Central railroad and the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad in ...
*
Robert Bennet Forbes
Captain Robert Bennet Forbes (September 18, 1804 – November 23, 1889), was an American sea captain, China merchant and ship owner. He was active in ship construction, maritime safety, the opium trade, and charitable activities, including food ...
*
Charles W. King
The of 1837 occurred when the American merchant ship, ''Morrison'' headed by Charles W. King, was driven away from "sakoku" (isolationist) Japan by cannon fire. This was carried out in accordance with the Japanese Edict to Repel Foreign Vessels ...
*
Abiel Abbot Low
Abiel Abbot Low (February 7, 1811 – January 7, 1893) was an American entrepreneur, businessman, trader and philanthropist who gained most of his fortune from the China trade, importing teas, porcelains, and silk, and building and operating a ...
John Renshaw Thomson
John Renshaw Thomson (September 25, 1800September 12, 1862) was an American merchant and politician from New Jersey.
Life
Thomson was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the son of Edward Thomson (1771-1853) and Ann Renshaw (1773-1842). His fath ...
William Shepard Wetmore
William Shepard Wetmore (January 26, 1801 – June 16, 1862) was an Americans, American Businessperson, businessman and Philanthropy, philanthropist who was an Old China Trade merchant.
Early life
He was born on January 26, 1801 to Nancy Shepar ...
*
John Jacob Astor
John Jacob Astor (born Johann Jakob Astor; July 17, 1763 – March 29, 1848) was a German-American businessman, merchant, real estate mogul, and investor who made his fortune mainly in a fur trade monopoly, by smuggling opium into China, and ...
See also
*
Foreign relations of Imperial China : ''For the later history after 1800 see History of foreign relations of China.''
The foreign relations of Imperial China from the Qin dynasty until the Qing dynasty encompassed many situations as the fortunes of dynasties rose and fell. Chinese cul ...
*
History of the west coast of North America
The human history of the west coast of North America is believed to stretch back to the arrival of the earliest people over the Bering Strait, or alternately along a now-submerged coastal plain, through the development of significant List of pre- ...
Turkey merchant
The Levant Company was an English chartered company formed in 1592. Elizabeth I of England approved its initial charter on 11 September 1592 when the Venice Company (1583) and the Turkey Company (1581) merged, because their charters had expired, ...
References
Citations
Further reading
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
* Haddad, John R. ''America's First Adventure in China: Trade, Treaties, Opium, and Salvation'' (2013 online *
*
*
*
* Morris, Richard J. "Redefining the economic elite in Salem, Massachusetts, 1759-1799: A tale of evolution, not revolution." ''
New England Quarterly
''The New England Quarterly'' is a peer-reviewed academic journal consisting of articles on New England's cultural, literary, political, and social history. The journal contains essays, interpretations of traditional texts, essay reviews and book r ...
'' 73.4 (2000): 603-624. online
* Richards, Rhys (1994), "United States trade with China, 1784-1814" ''The American Neptune'', a special supplement to Vol 54.
* Various reprints.
*
*