H.B. Morse, Customs Commissioner and Historian of China

339 Pages·2014·29.258 MB·English

by  John King Fairbank, Richard J. Smith, Martha Henderson Coolidge

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H.B. MORSE
Customs Commissioner
and
Historian of China
H.B.
MORSE
Customs Commissioner
and
Historian of China
John King Fairbank
Martha Henderson Coolidge
Richard J. Smith
THE UNIVERSITY PRESS OF KENTUCKY
Copyright© 1995 by The University Press of Kentucky
Scholarly publisher for the Commonwealth, serving Bellarmine College,
Berea College, Centre College of Kentucky, Eastern Kentucky University,
The Filson Club, Georgetown College, Kentucky Historical Society,
Kentucky State University, Morehead State University, Murray State
University, Northern Kentucky University, Transylvania University,
University of Kentucky, University of Louisville,
and Western Kentucky University.
Editorial and Sales Offices: The University Press of Kentucky
663 South Limestone Street, Lexington, Kentucky 40508-4008
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Fairbank, John King, dl907-
H. B. Morse, Customs Commissioner and historian of China I John
King Fairbank, Martha Henderson Coolidge, and Richard J. Smith.
p. em.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-8131-6002-3
1. Morse, Hosea Ballou, 1855-1934. 2. Customs administration
China-Officials and employees-Biography. 3. China-Foreign
relations-1644-1912. I. Coolidge, Martha Henderson, 1925-
11. Smith, Richard J. (Richard Joseph), 1944- III. Title.
HJ707l.A3M674 1995
951'.035'092--<lc20
[B] 95-22097
This book is printed on acid-free recycled paper meeting
the requirements of the American National Standard for
Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials.
§
In Memoriam
Charles Kingsley Webster
1886-1961
Visiting Lecturer at Harvard University, 1928-1932
Professor of International History
at the University of London, 1932-1953
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Contents
Preface, by Richard J. Smith ix
Introduction, by John K. Fairbank 1
1. Origins and Education, 1855-1874 5
2. Entering China's Service, 1874-1877 19
3. Adventures in North China, 1877-1879 38
4. Rising in the Service, 1879-1885 54
5. Advising the China Merchants' Company, 1885-1887 68
6. Shanghai and Pakhoi, 1887-1892 88
7. Tamsui, 1892-1895 103
8. Taiwan in the Sino-Japanese War, 1894-1895 120
9. Lungchow and Pakhoi, 1896-1899 134
10. Yochow, 1899-1900 145
11. Long Leave and Resumption of Duty, 1900-1903 162
12. Heading the Statistical Department, 1904-1908 175
13. Morse's Second Career, 1909-1934 192
14. Morse as Historian, by John K. Fairbank 215
Afterword, by Richard J. Smith 230
Appendix A: Summary ofH.B. Morse's Customs Career 239
Appendix B: Obituary of Morse, by C.A.V. Bowra 241
Notes 247
Bibliographic Notes, by John K. Fairbank 283
Bibliography 285
Index 301
Illustrations follow page 114
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Preface
Richard J. Smith
When John King Fairbank died on September 14, 1991, at the age of
eighty-four, he left unfinished a book that had been on his mind for nearly
sixty years: a biography of Hosea Ballou Morse, one of the best commis
sioners in the Imperial Chinese Maritime Customs Service during the latter
part of the nineteenth century and a scholar whose books profoundly
influenced the writing of Chinese history in the West for much of the first
half of the twentieth. Throughout John's own distinguished career as a
historian of China, he invariably had a number of scholarly irons in the fire.
Although he had completed a substantial part of the long-planned Morse
biography by January 1989, he laid the manuscript aside temporarily to
work full-time on his magnum opus, China: A New History, which with
predictable dedication and exquisite timing, he delivered to the Harvard
University Press on the day he suffered his fatal heart attack. The book was
published posthumously in 1992.
In the meantime, Fairbank had enlisted the aid of Martha Henderson
Coolidge, a friend and former graduate student (now an associate in research
at the Fairbank Center, Harvard University), to help complete the Morse
book. Martha, with characteristic energy and enthusiasm, began to "dig in
on research," exploring recently published books as well as the priceless
letters exchanged by Morse and Fairbank during the early 1930s. Inquiries
in Nova Scotia unearthed valuable sources on Morse's ancestry and child
hood; investigation of the North China Herald yielded colorful descriptions
of the various places Morse served in the course of his multifaceted Customs
career; careful work on Morse's correspondence with Charles F. Thwing,
an 1876 graduate of Harvard and president of Western Reserve University,
produced a wealth of crucial information on his second career, as a historian,
lX