The Six-Day War of 1899 was fought between the

British Empire The British Empire was composed of the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates, and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It began with the overseas possessions and trading posts e ...

and the major ''

punti ''Punti'' ( zh, t=本地, j=bun2 dei6, l=locals) is a Cantonese endonym referring to the native Cantonese people of Guangdong and Guangxi. ''Punti'' designates Weitou dialect-speaking locals in contrast to other Yue Chinese speakers and other ...

'' clans of the

New Territories The New Territories is one of the three main regions of Hong Kong, alongside Hong Kong Island and the Kowloon Peninsula. It makes up 86.2% of Hong Kong's territory, and contains around half of the population of Hong Kong. Historically, it ...

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delta i ...

on 14–19 April 1899. The British quickly and decisively ended armed resistance from the ''punti'' clans, but to prevent future resistance made concessions to placate the indigenous inhabitants. Despite losing to the better equipped British military, they achieved their ultimate goal which was to preserve their land rights, land use, and traditional customs. The special status and rights of the minority indigenous people of Hong Kong are extant to this day. The battle resulted in two wounded on the British side and about 500 dead on the Chinese side.

Background

On 9 June 1898, the British and the

Qing government 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-speaki ...

signed the

Second Convention of Peking The second (symbol: s) is the unit of time in the International System of Units (SI), historically defined as of a day – this factor derived from the division of the day first into 24 hours, then to 60 minutes and finally to 60 seconds each ...

, granting the British a 99-year lease of the

as part of

. Feeling abandoned by the Qing government and fearing for their traditional land rights and land use, the punti

Chinese clans A Chinese kin, lineage or sometimes rendered as clan, is a patrilineal and patrilocal group of related Chinese people with a common surname sharing a common ancestor and, in many cases, an ancestral home. Description Chinese kinship tend to ...

mobilised the clan militias which had been trained and equipped to defend against longshore raids by pirates and attempted to resist the British takeover of the territory.

Events

The war began on 14 April when the insurgents burnt down the matshed the British had prepared for a flag-raising ceremony at the Flagstaff Hill in

Tai Po Tai Po is an area in the New Territories of Hong Kong. It refers to the vicinity of the traditional market towns in the area presently known as Tai Po Old Market or Tai Po Kau Hui () (the original "Tai Po Market") on the north of Lam Tsu ...

. 125 Indian soldiers of the Royal Hong Kong RegimentDisbanded in 1902, this regiment is not to be confused with the later

Royal Hong Kong Regiment The Royal Hong Kong Regiment (The Volunteers) (RHKR(V)) ()), formed in May 1854, was a local auxiliary militia force funded and administered by the colonial Government of Hong Kong. Its powers and duties were mandated by the Royal Hong Kong R ...

formed from the body of the Hong Kong Volunteer Defence Corps consisting primarily of Europeans and Chinese. were sent to Tai Po on 15 April and were soon besieged by the villagers. They were rescued after the

Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the United Kingdom's naval warfare force. Although warships were used by English and Scottish kings from the early medieval period, the first major maritime engagements were fought in the Hundred Years' War against ...

's HMS ''Fame'' shelled the insurgents' position. On 17 April, the British forces launched an attack on the insurgents in Lam Tsuen Valley and chased them up the hill. On 18 April, about 1,600 insurgents assaulted the British troops at Sheung Tsuen but were soon defeated. Further resistance was ended when British artillery was brought up against the punti walled villages, and the insurgents and villagers surrendered on 19 April. Most prominent of the villages in the resistance Kat Hing Wai, of the

Tang clan The Tang Clan of Hong Kong () is one of the Five Great Clans of the New Territories (). The others are Man (Wen; 文), Hau (Hou; 侯), Pang (Peng; 彭) and Liu ( Liao; 廖). The Tangs are one of the region's oldest families and can trace their li ...

, was symbolically disarmed, by having its main gates dismounted and removed.

Aftermath

After the war, Governor

Henry Arthur Blake Sir Henry Arthur Blake (; 8January 184023February 1918) was a British colonial administrator and Governor of Hong Kong from 1898 to 1903. Early life, family and career Blake was born in Limerick, Ireland. He was the son of Peter Blake of Cor ...

adopted an amiable co-operation policy with the villagers and it remained the official policy of the colonial government on the New Territories throughout almost the entire British rule. The British made the concession of allowing the indigenous inhabitants to retain traditional laws and customs to land inheritance, land usage and marriage, these differed from the laws made for Kowloon and Hong Kong proper and the legacy of which continues to this day.

Notes

References

Bibliography

* {{British colonial campaigns 1899 in Hong Kong Conflicts in 1899 British Hong Kong History of Hong Kong New Territories Six-day events Wars involving Hong Kong Wars involving the United Kingdom