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“Coolie work”: Sir Reginald Johnston at the School of Oriental Studies, 1931–1937 ⋆

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2009

Robert A. Bickers
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Extract

Surprisingly, the history of Chinese studies in Britain has received little academic attention. In fact, its development in the twentieth century, and its problems and lack of world standing actually tell us much about the background to Sino-British relations, and especially about the resources available to enable those interested, for professional, business, evangelical or plainly academic reasons, to understand China and the Chinese. British sinology in the interwar period, if discussed at all, is routinely condemned by historians. After 1949 China was closed off to outside contacts; not surprisingly, commentators thereafter look back jealously to the opportunities for close and frequent contact that were available before the revolution but which they saw as being apparently wasted. This common judgement does not, however, do full justice to the scale of the underlying problems, especially financial ones, faced by academic institutions that taught Chinese.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society , Volume 5 , Issue 3 , November 1995 , pp. 385 - 401
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Asiatic Society 1995

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Footnotes

⋆

This paper could not have been written without the help of all those who shared their memories or mementos of the leading characters, especially Innes Herdan, taught by Johnston in the 1930s, and Dr Katherine Whitaker, who began her career in SOAS in 1944, and teaches there still. I also owe thanks to Maxine Berg for sharing with me her biographical research on Eileen Power. My gratitude also goes to Professor T. H. Barrett, and to the former Secretary of the School Mr D. L. Edwards, for first giving me permission to consult the SOAS archives, to the present Secretary, Mr F. Dabell for giving consent to publication, and to Debbie Rhys, for facilitating my searches.

References

1 Although there is as yet no history of sinology in Britain, short introductions can be found in Twitchett, Denis, Land Tenure and the Social Order in T'ang and Sung China (London, 1962), pp. 1–14Google Scholar, and Barrett, T. H., Singular Listlessness: a Short History of Chinese Books and British Scholars (London, 1989)Google Scholar. Some idea of the numbers and personalities involved in London can be found in the Annual Reports to the Governing Body of SOS and of the China Association's School of Practical Chinese (SOAS Library, China Association Archives, SOAS CHAS S.I.3.)

1 Barrett, , Singular Listlessness, p. 19.Google Scholar

3 For a sketch of the School's history see Philips, C. H., The School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, 1917–1967: An Introduction [London, 1967].Google Scholar It is prominently absent (architecture apart) from Thompson, F. M. L. (ed.), The University of London and the World of Learning (London, 1990).Google Scholar

4 School of Oriental Studies, Report of the Governing Body and Statement of Accounts for the year ending 31st July, 1934 (London, 1934), p. 28.Google Scholar

5 E. Denison Ross to Johnston [hereafter RFJ], 20/5/31, Johnston papers, SOAS Administrative files; Jiang is, of course, better known as the writer and illustrator Chiang Yee, the “Silent Traveller”, Edwards to Chiang enclosed in G. W. Rossetti to Professor Turner, 8/4/38, Chiang Yee papers, SOAS Administrative files.

6 Walter Perceval Yetts papers, passim; G. W. Rossetti to Edwards, 8/3/38, Edwards papers, SOAS Administrative files.

7 For the problems this caused, and attempts to reform it see my “Changing British Attitudes to China and the Chinese, 1928–1931” (Unpublished Ph.D. Thesis, University of London, 1992), pp. 167–9.Google Scholar

8 Pollard, D. E., “H. A. Giles and his translations”, Renditions, No. 40 (Autumn, 1993), pp. 103–21Google Scholar; Barrett has also pleaded Giles's, case, Singular Listlessness, p. 85–6.Google Scholar

9 The story was first told by Professor C. D. Cowan, ex-Director of SOAS, to T. H. Barrett, and was most recently repeated by the present Director of the School of Oriental and African Studies, M. D. McWilliam, in his introduction to the inaugural lecture of the present incumbent of Johnston's post, Professor Hugh D. R. Baker, on 8 December, 1993. Cowan remembers it as the received doctrine in the Far East Department on his arrival at the School in 1950 (private communication).

10 RFJ to Sir James Stewart Lockhart [hereafter JSL], 31/3/14, Sir James Stewart Lockhart papers [hereafter JSLP], Vol. 9, National Library of Scotland, Ace. 4138; on Werner and Harding see Coates, P. D., The China Consuls: British Consular Officers, 1843–1943 (Hong Kong, 1988), pp. 440–1, 483–4Google Scholar; the reference to Harding's, academic ambitions survives in the Foreign Office Index (London, 1937), Part 2, p. 339.Google Scholar

11 The most notorious fraud was, of course, Sir Edmund Backhouse, on whom see Trevor-Roper, Hugh, Hermit of Peking: the Hidden Life of Sir Edmund Backhouse (2nd ed., London, 1993)Google Scholar, and on whose forgery see Hui-min, Lo, “The Ching-Shan diary: a clue to its forgery”, East Asian History, I: 1 (06 1991), pp. 98–124Google Scholar, and McMullen, David, “‘Glorious veterans’, ‘sinologistes de chambre’, and Men of Science: reflections on Professor Hugh Trevor-Roper's life of Sir Edmund Backhouse”, New Lugarno Review (Art International), 1979, no. I, pp. 78–83.Google Scholar

12 Barrett, , Singular Listlessness, pp. 91, 97–9Google Scholar; Twitchett, , Land Tenure, pp. 1–14.Google Scholar

13 Encheng, Ning, “Lao She yu Yingguo” [Lao She and Britain], Mingbao yuekan, 5, No. 5, p. 21Google Scholar; the error was repeated in, for example, Hu, King, “Lao She in England”, Renditions, Autumn, 1978, p. 46.Google Scholar Shu was fairly caustic about the abilities of Bruce Lao She, “Dongfang xueyuan” [The School of Oriental Studies], in Guangcang, Zeng and Huaibin, Wu (eds), Lao She yanjiu ziliao [Lao She research materials], (Beijing, 1985), i, p. 120.Google Scholar

14 He makes appearances in Pamela Atwell's history of Weihaiwei, British Mandarins and Chinese Reformers: the British Administration of Weihaiwei (1898–1930) and the Territory's Return to Chinese Rule (Hong Kong, 1985)Google Scholar, and Airlie's, Shiona Thistle and Bamboo: the Life and Times of Sir James Stewart Lockhart (Hong Kong, 1989).Google Scholar

15 Twitchett, , Land Tenure, p. 12.Google Scholar

16 Toynbee, Arnold J., A Journal to China, or, Things which are Seen (London, 1931), p. 233.Google Scholar

17 RFJ to JSL, 26/8/10, JSLP, Vol. 9.

18 Sir Mathew Nathan to C. P. Lucas, 7/4/05, CO 5714, CO 521/8; Stubbs minute on Weihaiwei No. 14, 4/4/12, CO 521/13, quoted in Airlie, , Thistle and Bamboo, p. 135.Google Scholar

19 When Commissioner of the Leased Territory of Weihaiwei from 1927 to 1930 Johnston, previously somewhat of a recluse, held a weekly “At Home” often attended by a hundred people. Weihaiwei was a popular summer resort for expatriate Britons, it was also an important base and summer camp for the China Station; Imperial War Museum, O. W. Philips memoir, PP/MCR/153, pp. 214/5; RFJ to JSL, 21/6/28, JSLP Vol. 10a.

20 Not without reason Johnston blamed Sir Miles Lampson, then British Minister to China, for the decision. At the time he claimed not to have minded, but there is more than a trace of bitterness in his later comments on the subject. (The FO had also scuppered his appointment as Colonial Secretary in Hong Kong in 1926 because of his close ties to the ex-emperor.) Colonial Office officials had long thought Johnston a “clever crank” but asked for the FO's opinion of his putative appointment in 1929. When asked for his views, Lampson announced that Johnston was “rather an old woman” and “doubted that he was a big enough man for the job” but actually supported the proposal (which was looked upon favourably by the FO). In fact, Lampson's comments turned the scale against Johnston in CO eyes. RFJ to JSL, 9/9/32, 2/2/30.JSLP Vol.ioa; Robinson minute, 11/4/16 on Weihaiwei No. 8, CO 521/17 (quoted in Airlie, , Thistle and Bamboo, p. 181Google Scholar); Lampson to Sir Victor Wellesley, 17/11/29, F5930/5795/10 and file, FO 371/13961.

21 “Lin Shao-yang”, A Chinese Appeal to Christendom concerning Christian Missions (London, 1911)Google Scholar; Johnston, R. F., Letters to a Missionary [1918]Google Scholar. Neither of these works appeared on the curriculum vitae he submitted when he applied to SOS in 1931; he was actually offered an acting appointment at Hong Kong University in 1918 by the Chancellor, Sir Charles Eliot, but the University Senate refused to endorse the offer, RFJ to JSL, 16/8/18; 3/11/18JSLP, Vol. 10.

22 Yi, Aisin Gioro Pu, Wo de qian ban sheng (Hong Kong, 1964), i, p. 120.Google Scholar

23 RFJ to JSL, 15/1//22, 17/1/23, JSLP, Vol. 10.

24 Johnston, R.F., Twilight in the Forbidden City (London, 1934), p. 205Google Scholar; Chinese Appeal to Christendom, pp. 219–24.Google Scholar

25 See the gossip from Perceval Yetts on Sir Edmund Backhouse and the Oxford chair, RFJ to JSL, 31/8/16; RFJ to JSL, 11/3/13, JSLP Vol. 10; RFJ to JSL, 1/5/17; 15/11/17, 17/11/17, JSLP, Vol. 10.

26 According to RFJ to JSL 28/2/25, this letter, described in Airlie, , Thistle and Bamboo, p. 205, n. 42Google Scholar, cannot be traced at present.

27 RFJ to JSL, 2/1/29, JSLP, Vol. 10a.

28 RFJ to JSL, 21/6/30, 29/6/30, JSLP, Vol. 10a.

29 RFJ to JSL, 26/11/30, 18/1/31, JSLP, Vol. 10a.

30 RFJ to JSL, 21/2/31, JSLP, Vol. 10a.

31 See the correspondence in file F2219/2219/10, FO 371/14734.

32 They were in fact engaged, but the match was called off, largely because of Johnston's reservations, in early 1932, RFJ to Stella Benson, 12/8/31, Cambridge University Library, Stella Benson Papers, Add. 8367; Eileen Power to Charles Webster, 5/4/32, Webster papers, London School of Economics. I owe this last reference to Maxine Berg. The most up to date sketch of Power's career is Berg's, “Eileen Power and Women's History”, Gender and History, VI:2 (08, 1994), pp. 265–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar See also Berg's forthcoming biography.

33 For Stewart Lockhart's correspondence on the election see JSLP Vol. 13, “Chair of Chinese”; RFJ to JSL, 21/2/31, JSLP, Vol. 10a.

34 The applicants included the Rev. F. S. Drake, the only other one seriously considered, Herbert Goffe of the Consular Service, E. W. Mead, seconded from that Service to the Salt Administration, one Chinese applicant, two other missionaries and a gentleman who had worked for the Chinese government, S. J. Worsley to JSL, 19/2/31, JSLP, Vol. 13, “Chair of Chinese”.

35 Academic Registrar, UL to Sir E. Denison Ross, 4/3/31, Johnston papers.

36 See RFJ to unnamed, 3/1/31, RFJ to “My Dear” unnamed [but different], 26/1/31, both with RFJ to Frederick Anderson, 30/12/34 in RFJ to Rossetti, 3/1/35, Johnston papers; RFJ to JSL, 4/3/31, JSLP, Vol. 10a.

37 Denison Ross to Edwards, 6/3/31, Edwards papers.

38 This supposition is based on Soothill's earlier letter to Johnston. In fact Johnston thought little of the “mere Soothill” as a scholar, would have thought even less of him because of his missionary background, and believed he had “hopelessly antagonised him” during the Boxer Indemnity delegation in 1926, RFJ to JSL, 24/12/20, JSLP, Vol. 10; 21/6/30 JSLP, Vol. 10a.

39 Her testimonials are to be found in the file “Chair of Chinese” JSLP, Vol. 13; R. L. Turner, Director, SOS, to J. T. Pratt, Ministry of Information, 13/10/39, Edwards papers.

40 Academic Registrar, University of London [UL”, to Sir Edward Denison Ross, 27/3/31; Vice Chancellor, UL, to Denison Ross, 2/6/31, Johnston papers.

41 RFJ to JSL, 15/8/31, JSLP, Vol. 10a; J. H. Lindsay to RFJ, 9/6/31, RFJ to Lindsay, 19/6/31; RFJ to J. H. Lindsay, 7/4/32, Johnston papers.

42 E. Denison Ross to L. Hopkyns Rees, 6/7/20, Rees Papers, SOAS Administrative files.

43 The correspondence, and Bruce's curriculum vitae, are both to be found in his files at SOAS; Academic Registrar to Miss C. L. Clegg, 24/7/28, Bruce Papers, SOAS Administrative files.

44 RFJ to Bruce, 5/10/33; RFJ to Rossetti, 1/1/34, enclosing Bruce to Johnston, Johnston papers.

45 RFJ to Rossetti, 22/12/33, Johnston papers.

46 RFJ to Rossetti, 11/4/34, Johnston papers.

47 Enclosed in RFJ to Rossetti, 29/6/34, Johnston papers.

48 RFJ to JSL, 4/10/34, JSLP, Vol. 10a.

49 RFJ to Blagden, 3/10/34, Johnston papers.

50 RFJ to JSL, 11/11/34, JSLP, Vol. 10a; G. W. Rossetti to JSL, 14/12/34, F. Anderson to JSL, 16/12/34 JSLP, Vol. 10a.

51 RFJ to JSL, 11/11/34, JSLP, Vol. 10a; RFJ to Frederick Anderson, 30/12/34, in RFJ to Rossetti, 3/1/35, Johnston papers.

52 S.J. Worsley to RFJ, 14/12/34, Johnston papers.

53 RFJ to JSL, 11/11/34, JSLP, Vol. 10a; Enclosure in 15/4/36, “Copy of Meeting of the China Association Re: Professorship Oriental School, January 10th, 1935.”

54 RFJ to JSL, 11/11/34, JSLP, Vol. 10a.

55 RFJ to Rossetti, 7/4/36, Johnston papers.

56 RFJ to Frederick Anderson, 30/12/34 in RFJ to Rossetti, 3/1/35, Johnston papers.

57 Rossetti to Academic Registrar, UL, 31/1/35, Academic Registrar, UL, to RFJ, 21/3/35, Johnston papers; “Copy of Meeting of the China Association Re: Professorship Oriental School, January 10th, 1935”, Enclosure in RFJ to JSL, 15/4/36, JSLP, Vol. 10a.

58 RFJ to Rossetti, 6/5/35 and 7/5/35, Johnston papers.

59 RFJ to Rossetti, 7/5/35, Johnston papers.

60 RFJ to JSL, JSLP, Vol. 10a.

61 RFJ to Rossetti, 16/10/35, Johnston papers. Quite characteristically Johnston gave his address as “c/o The Minister of the Imperial Household, The Palace, Hsingking, Manchuria”. He could never resist such temptations; in 1923 he is to be found writing from “The Forbidden City, Peking”, RFJ to JSL, 17/1/23, JSLP, Vol. 10.

62 “Obituary: Evangeline Dora Edwards”, Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies, XXI, pt. 2 (1958), pp. 220–4Google Scholar; Edwin Dollar to Denison Ross, 15/3/24; Secretary to Academic Registrar to Denison Ross, 11/11/25; Secretary to Academic Registrar to Denison Ross, 24/1/29, Edwards Papers.

63 Barrett, T. H., personal communication. These were her Chinese Prose Literature of the T'ang Period (London, 1937–1938)Google Scholar and her “A classified guide to the thirteen classes of Chinese prose”, BSOAS, XII (1948), pp. 770–88.Google Scholar She reviewed widely for that journal in the 1930s, and was tactful enough to give reasonably enthusiastic reviews to Johnston's, work, BSOAS, VII (1933–1935), pp. 637–639Google Scholar; BSOAS, VIII (1935–1937), PP. 1129–1130.Google Scholar

64 “Obituary: Evangeline Dora Edwards”, passim.

65 E. H. Parker to JSL, 22/12/20, JSLP, Vol. 13. On the cadets see Lethbridge, H. J., “Hong Kong Cadets, 1862–1941”, Journal of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, X (1970), pp. 36–56.Google Scholar

66 RFJ to J. O. P. Bland, 25/4/34, University of Toronto, Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library, Bland papers, Box 19.

67 For Roger Soane jenyns [1904–1976] of the Oriental Antiquities and Ethnography Department in the British Museum, in an encomium written during the attempted putsch, he conveyed” the soul and spirit of Chinese poetry; after all, the message of China…is too subtle an essence for the ordinary mortal to convey”, R. Soane Jenyns, 17/12/34, RFJ to Rossetti, 3/1/35, Johnston papers; RFJ to Miss Beavis, Registrar, SOS, 14/11/34, Johnston papers; RFJ to Lady Lockhart, 28/1/35, JSLP, Vol. 10a; Innes Herdan, letter to the author, 1/3/94.

68 “I am not a trained teacher—I mean teaching has not been my profession—and I have never before had to ‘get up’ Chinese subjects for teaching purposes, but merely for my own interest or for literary purposes, which is a very different matter”, RFJ to Rossetti, 11/4/33; RFJ, “Memorandum”, 8/10/32, enclosed in RFJ to J. H. Lindsay, 12/12/32, Johnston papers.

69 RFJ to J. H. Lindsay, 12/7/32; RFJ, “Memorandum”, 22/2/33, Johnston papers.

70 Sir Robert Hotung to JSL, undated [May, 1932”, JSLP, Vol. 12.

71 RFJ to Sir Cecil Clementi, 23/2/28, Rhodes House Library, Clementi papers, Box 20.

72 Ibid.; RFJ to JSL, RFJ to Innes Jackson, 1/7/35, courtesy of Innes Herdan.

73 RFJ to JSL, 21/8/27, JSLP, Vol. 10a.

74 RFJ to JSL, 3/3/27, 13/5/27, JSLP, Vol. 10a; Lampson minute on RFJ to Sir Miles Lampson, 10/4/28, FO 228/3726/3 2p.

75 Minute on RFJ to Legation, 19/4/30, FO 228/4254/85 51a.

76 The approach came via D. G. M. Bernard of Matheson's in a letter to S. W. G. Randall of the Far East Department, 14/6/35, F3884/3884/10, FO 371/19333.

77 See, for instance, the report of an interview in Manchuria taken from the Japan Advertiser on 13/9/35, F6385/3884/10, FO 371/19333.

78 Sir. R. Clive to C. W. Orde, 30/8/35, F6022/3884/10, FO 371/19333.

79 RFJ to J. O. P. Bland, 28/3/34; 9/4/34. Bland papers, Box 19. There was a Japanese edition of the book in 1935.

80 RFJ to JSL, 17/10/32, 22/12/32, 7/3/34, JSLP, Vol. 10a;Johnston, , Twilight, p. 455.Google Scholar

81 Johnston, , Twilight, p. 451.Google Scholar

82 RFJ to JSL, 4/10/34, JSLP, Vol. 10a; RFJ to Innes Jackson, 1/7/35; “Obituary: Evangeline Dora Edwards”, p. 221.

83 RFJ to Rossetti, 27/4/36, Johnston papers.

84 RFJ to Rossetti, 12/11/36, 2/3/37, Johnston papers.

85 Edwards circular, 8/6/37; RFJ to Miss Buck, 16/6/37, Johnston papers; private information.

86 Edwards to Elizabeth Sparshott, 28/3/38; Turner to Sparshott, 3/6/38; Sparshott to Turner, 6/6/38; Rossetti to Clerk of Court, University of London, 23/6/38, Rossetti to Sparshott, 28/6/38, Johnston papers.

87 Notable activities were undertaken by E. R. Hughes in Oxford, see the file in the Bodleian, MSS. Eng. misc. c. 516. For the activities of the US see Fairbank, Wilma, America's Cultural Experiment in China, 1942–1949 (Washington, 1976).Google Scholar

88 Report of the Interdepartmental Commission of Enquiry on Oriental, Slavonic, East European and African Studies (London, 1947), p. 8.Google Scholar

89 There is little to be found in Qian's, Xiao Traveller Without a Map (London, 1990)Google Scholar; or the chapter on England in Yi's, Jiang China Revisited after 42 years (New York, 1977), pp. 35–47.Google Scholar On Lao She at SOAS see my “New light on Lao She, London, and the London Missionary Society, 1924–1929”, Modern Chinese Literature, VIII, Nos. 1/2 (1994).Google Scholar

90 Latourette, K. S., “Chinese historical studies during the past nine years”, American Historical Review, XXXV, No. 4 (07 1930), p. 748Google Scholar; Chi'en, Hsiao [Xiao Qian”, Etching of a Tormented Age: A Glimpse of Contemporary Chinese Literature (London, 1942), p. 48.Google Scholar

91 Innes Herdan, letter to the author, 1/3/94.