Chapter 3 Section 2 Early Chinese laborers and businessmen who went to America

The early Chinese workers and businessmen going to the United States were related to the opening of the Pacific "Silk Road".As we all know, Chinese silk was exported to the west as early as the Han Dynasty, along the world-famous "Silk Road", passing through Central Asia and West Asia, and exported to Greece and Rome.Since the Ming Dynasty, it has been exported to the east, from the Pacific "Silk Road", through the Philippines, to Mexico, and exported to the whole of Latin America. Since the Eastern Han Dynasty and the Three Kingdoms period, my country has gradually opened up air routes from Taiwan to the Philippines. In 1565, when the Spanish colonists invaded the Philippines, the local residents were still living a self-sufficient life, and the natural resources on the island were undeveloped, which attracted many Chinese laborers to move to the Philippines.At the same time, due to the shortage of commodities available for export in the Philippines, the colonists of the Philippine Islands tried every means to open the sea route to China, transporting commodities such as silk and porcelain produced in China into the Philippines, and then shipped them to Latin America by sailing ships through Manila. This opened up the China-Philippines-Latin America Maritime "Silk Road".

From the late Ming Dynasty in China in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, some Chinese laborers in the Philippines crossed the rough Pacific Ocean on the Spanish "Manila Galleon" and went to live in Mexico.The Chinese laborers living in Mexico City, the capital, created the first Chinatown in American history.Sometimes, the Spaniards also hired Chinese servants, sailors, craftsmen and businessmen to go to Mexico for their various needs.Chinese barbers who immigrated to Mexico City established a barber shop in the city in 1635 to compete with those opened by the Spaniards.Some Mexican Chinese workers were also employed in textile handicraft factories and mines, and together with local Indians, blacks and people of mixed race, they did heavy labor.The Chinese laborers who went to Latin America on the Manila Galleon were the first batch of Chinese laborers to go to America. They opened the prelude to the history of overseas Chinese in America.

In 1797, Britain captured the American island of Trinidad from the Spaniards. However, the island had a shortage of labor force and could not be developed and cultivated. Therefore, it planned to import immigrants from outside to develop the local sugarcane plantation economy. In 1802, Picton, the British governor of the island, suggested to London to recruit indentured Chinese laborers from China to work as coolies in Trinidad.London immediately ordered the Governor of India to formulate a recruitment plan, and ordered the representatives of the East India Company to abduct more than 300 Chinese in Guangzhou and smuggle them to Macau. They were first transported to Penang by Portuguese ships, and then changed to British ships. Linida, were all driven into sugar plantations to do hard labor.

In 1808, in order to avoid the invasion of Napoleon's army, the Portuguese royal family, the suzerain of Brazil, was stationed in Rio de Janeiro, the capital of Brazil.In order to stabilize the political situation, the royal family took some improvement measures to develop the colonial economy.One of the measures is to recruit tea farmers from China and let them bring tea saplings and transport them to Brazil to develop Chinese-style tea farming. In 1810, the Portuguese in Macau were ordered to recruit hundreds of Chinese tea growers from Guangdong and Fujian to emigrate to Sao Paulo, Brazil, in an attempt to develop tea into a commodity for bulk export.But because Brazil's climate and soil conditions are different from those in China, and Chinese tea workers are dissatisfied, Brazil's attempt to develop a tea industry has failed.

Whether it was the Portuguese who transplanted Chinese laborers to Brazil, or the British who transplanted Chinese laborers to Trinidad, they all adopted the traditional folk method in which residents along the southeast coast went to various parts of Southeast Asia to work in groups since the late Ming and early Qing Dynasties, that is, the form The government adopts the method of recruiting Chinese laborers and signing labor contracts.These indentured Chinese laborers were the pioneers of the large-scale importation of indentured Chinese laborers in Latin America after the mid-19th century.

The Chinese laborers who went to Canada in the early days were directly related to the British colonists' development of the coastal areas in western Canada. In 1776, Britain announced the occupation of an area of ​​nearly one million square kilometers in western Canada, called New Caledunia.When the British occupied New Caledonia, the population in this area was very small, and there was a shortage of labor. It was urgent to import a large number of cheap labor to develop this vast virgin land.In order to meet this need, in 1788, British captain John Mills moved a small number of Chinese blacksmiths and carpenters from Macau to Vancouver Island in western Canada, and built the first 40-ton ship in North America at the port of Nukasang on the island. The big ship "Northwest America".The following year, the Spanish colonists invaded Vancouver Island and looted all the wealth of the British in Nukasang Port, while the whereabouts of the Chinese laborers were unknown.According to Captain Mills' records: "It is a practice to transport Chinese laborers; they are generally respected as a race that can endure hardship, industriousness and ingenuity. They live on rice and fish, as long as the wages are low, which is based on economic considerations. Hire them. There is every reason to be satisfied with their services throughout the voyage." It is said that there is also a Chinese named Mark Meng, who arrived in Toronto, Canada from England, and opened a restaurant on York Street, now the center of Toronto's old Chinatown. A grocer for a living.These industrious Chinese workers and Chinese businessmen set a precedent for the Chinese to enter Canada.

Before the independence of the United States, that is, in the 17th and 18th centuries, the trade exchanges between North America and China were carried out by the then Spanish territory and California on the west coast of the United States through the "Manila Galleon".The galleon travels regularly between Manila and Mexico every year. During the voyage, it first arrives at a port on the coast of California, unloads some Chinese goods, and then sails to Mexico.This was an indirect channel for trade with China on the west coast of North America at that time, and it was controlled and monopolized by Spain.At that time, the number of Chinese arriving in North America was very small.According to records, in 1571, a group of shipbuilders arrived in California, North America.From 1571 to 1748, Chinese laborers were already engaged in shipbuilding activities on the southern and northwestern coasts of California.

In 1776, the people of the North American colonies formally declared their independence. After a arduous seven-year war of independence, they forced Britain to sign a treaty recognizing the United States in 1783. The victory of the North American War of Independence against Britain created favorable conditions for direct trade with China and the immigration of Chinese laborers.On February 22, 1784, the year following the successful end of the War of Independence, the American merchant ship "Empress of China" with John Green as the captain and Major Yamazhao Shigeru, who had served in the American Revolutionary War, as the ship's administrator, departed from the Set sail from New York, crossed the Atlantic Ocean, bypassed the Cape of Good Hope, arrived in Macau on August 23, and arrived at Huangpu Port in Guangzhou on August 28, successfully completing the trial voyage from New York to Guangzhou. The successful trial voyage of the "Empress of China" marks the beginning of direct trade between China and the United States, and is a major event in the history of Sino-US relations.

After the successful trial voyage of the "Queen of China", a large number of merchant ships such as the US "Test", "Turkish Emperor", "Confederation", "Columbia" and "Washington" sailed to China one after another, and exchanged fur, cotton cloth and opium for China. Goods such as textiles and tea are produced.As the trade between China and the United States became more and more frequent, Chinese laborers also arrived in the United States sporadically. In 1785, when the American merchant ship "Goddess of Ballas" arrived in Baltimore on the east coast of the United States from Guangzhou, China, three of the 35 crew members on board were Chinese sailors A Xin, A Jin and A Xin.After they landed, they stayed in the United States for nearly a year before returning home. In 1796, when a member of the Dutch East India Company moved to Philadelphia, he brought five Chinese servants with him. In 1807, there was already a Chinese living in New York.However, in the official records of the US immigration authorities, 1820 is listed as the year when the first Chinese came to the United States.According to the records of the American Immigration Council, in the 20 years from 1820 to 1840, only a dozen or so Chinese came to the United States.

In short, the Chinese laborers who went to America before the Opium War were just sporadic and largely accidental.Strictly speaking, they are not immigrants in the modern sense.They are fundamentally different from the large number of Chinese workers who were kidnapped and forced to sign contracts of prostitution after China's "open door" in the middle of the 19th century.That is to say, Chinese labor and contract Chinese labor in the modern sense began after the Opium War.

---

Notes: