Robb, Sandi (2019) North Queensland's Chinese family landscape: 1860-1920.

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Robb, Sandi (2019) North Queensland's Chinese family landscape: 1860-1920.
PhD Thesis, James Cook University.
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NORTH QUEENSLAND’S CHINESE FAMILY
LANDSCAPE: 1860-1920
by
Sandi Robb
A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the
requirements for the degree of
Doctor of Philosophy
James Cook University
2019

i
JAMES COOK UNIVERSITY
ABSTRACT
North Queensland’s Chinese Family Landscape: 1860-1920
This thesis outlines the Chinese Family Landscape, which developed across North Queensland
in the nineteenth and early twentieth century. It specifically focuses on women and the role that
women and family played in the Chinese Diaspora, and the contribution they made to longevity
and renewal of settlements such as Chinatowns, precincts and String Communities. This thesis is
set within the framework of the historical pattern of settlement across the colony of Queensland,
with a focus on North Queensland. It is firmly embedded in the broader global Chinese
Diaspora, and confirms the importance of established links between destination countries and the
ancestral village, China. By statistically and geographically mapping the presence of women as
wives, lovers and friends of Chinese men across North Queensland, new understandings and
interpretations of Queensland’s Chinese experience have emerged. This indicates that a gender
integrated approach to Chinese settlement patterns is important as a means to understand urban
and social development of colonial Chinese settlements.
A female presence in the Chinese settlement experience led to generational renewal of
Chinatown’s, and establishment of an Australian born, intergenerational Chinese presence within
the Australian community. The politics of the private sphere, highlighted by a female approach
to domestic affairs emerged through the application of “soft economics”, which played out from
an increase in male status due to the presence of a wife, to the strategic formation of companies
via the marriage of Australian born sons and daughters. The presence of women in the
community enabled the network of translocal and transnational kinship and family linkages to
establish and grow but more importantly, enabled a Chinese presence to take root and prosper in
a foreign land. The river of money and ideas, which flowed back to the village in China, from
families moving between the two worlds, impacted on those who remained in the ancestral
village in ways which are only just beginning to be understood in Queensland.
Woman’s participation in community formation, renewal and longevity emerges as an essential
element in the North Queensland Chinese settlement experience and challenges the long held
popular narrative of a single male gold-seeking sojourner, who was confined to the Palmer River
Goldfields. A holistic approach to a gender integrated narrative should be included in future
investigations with North Queensland’s Chinese Family Landscape providing a starting point for
this process.
ii
TABLE OF CONTENTS
List of Figures ......................................................................................................................... vii
List of Tables ............................................................................................................................ xi
List of Maps ............................................................................................................................. xi
Acknowledgements ................................................................................................................. xii
Glossary .................................................................................................................................. xiii
Chapter I: Introduction ......................................................................................................... 1
Research Questions ................................................................................................................... 3
Findings ..................................................................................................................................... 3
Logistics .................................................................................................................................... 6
Methodology ............................................................................................................................. 8
Chapter Outline ....................................................................................................................... 12
Conclusion .............................................................................................................................. 14
Chapter 2: Literature Review: Introduction ..................................................................... 16
Part 1.: North Queensland and Queensland ........................................................................... 17
Gender and the Diaspora ........................................................................................................ 22
Family Histories ............................................................................................................ 25
National .......................................................................................................................... 27
Part 2.: International Literature ............................................................................................. 36
America, British Columbia and Mexico ....................................................................... 37
West Indies, Caribbean and South America ................................................................. 45
Pacific Rim .................................................................................................................... 46
Britain and Europe ......................................................................................................... 47
Contribution to scholarship .................................................................................................... 50
Conclusion ............................................................................................................................. 51
Chapter 3: Chinese settlement in North Queensland ....................................................... 53
Introduction: Overview of Chinese Settlement ...................................................................... 53
Settlement Drivers: Three Key Industries .............................................................................. 55
Pastoralism ..................................................................................................................... 56
Mining ........................................................................................................................... 58
Agriculture ..................................................................................................................... 61
iii
Population Trends ................................................................................................................... 70
Restrictive Legislation ............................................................................................................ 76
Conclusion .............................................................................................................................. 77
Chapter 4: Chinatowns and Cultural precincts ................................................................ 79
Introduction ............................................................................................................................ 79
Part 1. The Meaning of “Chinatown” ................................................................................... 79
“Chinatown”: Architecture and Layout ....................................................................... 83
“Chinatown”: Lifecycle ............................................................................................... 85
Other Types of Community: Cultural precincts and String Communities ................. 90
“Cultural precinct” ........................................................................................................ 90
String Community ......................................................................................................... 91
Part 2.: North Queensland “Chinatown’s” ............................................................................ 94
“Chinatown” Elements and Characteristics ................................................................. 98
Transplanted Communities ........................................................................................ 102
“Cultural precinct’s”: North Queensland ................................................................... 112
Market Garden Areas ................................................................................................. 113
Business Districts ....................................................................................................... 115
Conclusion ............................................................................................................................ 116
Chapter 5: Overview: Families Associated with Chinese men in North Queensland 118
Introduction .......................................................................................................................... 118
Statistical Trends: Queensland vs. North Queensland ......................................................... 119
Ethnicity ....................................................................................................................... 119
North Queensland ........................................................................................................ 120
Intimate Relations ....................................................................................................... 121
Legal Marriage versus co habitative relationships ..................................................... 121
Marriage: The Marriage Act 1864 .............................................................................. 122
Population Geography of Families ............................................................................. 122
North Queensland ........................................................................................................ 124
Settlement Patterns ............................................................................................................... 124
Queensland ................................................................................................................. 124
North Queensland ........................................................................................................ 127
Conclusion .......................................................................................................................... 130
iv
Chapter 6: “A good yellow man is better than a bad white one…”: White women and
Chinese men ......................................................................................................................... 134
Introduction .......................................................................................................................... 134
Part 1. Exodus ....................................................................................................................... 135
Interracial Marriage Patterns: Global Trends ....................................................................... 138
United States ................................................................................................................ 139
England ....................................................................................................................... 142
New Zealand ................................................................................................................ 144
Part 2. National Trends: Australian Colonies ...................................................................... 145
New South Wales ........................................................................................................ 145
Victoria ...................................................................................................................... 147
Myths and marginalized: Irish Women .............................................................................. 150
Queensland Trends: Queensland All .......................................................................... 154
Part 3. Chinese-White Family Landscape: General Patterns ............................................... 158
Conclusion ............................................................................................................................ 163
Chapter 7: “number four wife catchem boy…”: Chinese Female Diaspora ............... 166
Introduction .......................................................................................................................... 166
Part 1. The Filial Family ....................................................................................................... 167
Part 2. Chinese Female Diaspora ......................................................................................... 169
Settlement Drivers ..................................................................................................... 169
Transnational Trends ................................................................................................. 172
Part 3. National Trends ......................................................................................................... 177
Australian Colonies: Victoria and New South Wales ................................................ 177
South Australia, Northern Territory, Western Australia, Tasmania ........................ 180
Districts of Origin ...................................................................................................... 181
Queensland Trends: Queensland ......................................................................................... 183
North Queensland ..................................................................................................... 184
State Distribution: ...................................................................................................... 186
Part.4: China-born Chinese Family Landscape: North Queensland.................................... 189
“Two Primary Wife Family” ....................................................................................... 190
Polygamy ..................................................................................................................... 194
Bound Feet .................................................................................................................. 195
Mui Tsai ..................................................................................................................... 196
Kinship Networks and Marriage Patterns .......................................................................... 198
v
Conclusion .......................................................................................................................... 200
Chapter 8:“…co-habitating with his Aboriginal Paramour”: Aboriginal women and
Chinese men ........................................................................................................................ 202
Introduction .......................................................................................................................... 202
Part 1. Global Trends: ........................................................................................................... 203
Legislation, Regulation and Exploitation ............................................................................ 203
Colonizing Attitudes towards Chinese-Local Interracial Marriage ................................... 206
British Empire ............................................................................................................. 206
European Empires ....................................................................................................... 207
Social Interface of Chinese-Local Marriage: Reciprocity, Difficulties .............................. 209
Part 2. Australian Colonial Comparisons ............................................................................. 215
Colonial Legislations, Interracial Relationships: Racial Panic .................................. 221
Part 3. Queensland ............................................................................................................... 224
Colonial Queensland Legislation controlling interracial relationships ..................... 224
Part 4. North Queensland Chinese-Aboriginal Marriage Trends ....................................... 230
Conclusion ........................................................................................................................... 237
Chapter 9: The Chinese Family Landscape .................................................................... 242
Introduction .......................................................................................................................... 242
Part 1. Transplanting Confucian Social Structures to North Queensland ........................... 242
“Married bachelor” Communities ............................................................................... 245
Part 2. The Family Landscape, Diverse Places: Cultural precincts and Chinatowns ......... 250
Cultural precincts: West and North West Queensland ............................................... 253
Camooweal ...................................................................................................... 253
Normanton ....................................................................................................... 254
Cloncurry ......................................................................................................... 258
Chinatown’s .......................................................................................................................... 261
Large Scale Agriculture: ....................................................................................................... 262
Cairns Chinatown: ............................................................................................ 262
Mackay Chinatown ........................................................................................... 266
Geraldton/ Innisfail Chinatown: ....................................................................... 269
Lower Herbert River District: Chinatowns and Cultural precincts ................. 272
Mining Areas: ....................................................................................................................... 277
Charters Towers Chinatown ............................................................................. 277
Cape River Chinatown ..................................................................................... 284
vi
Ravenswood Chinatown ................................................................................... 285
Palmer River Goldfields ................................................................................... 288
Georgetown Chinatown .................................................................................... 291
Croydon Chinatown .......................................................................................... 294
Port Towns: .................................................................................................................. 297
Cooktown Chinatown ....................................................................................... 297
Thursday Island Chinese Community .............................................................. 301
Townsville Chinese Community ...................................................................... 304
Conclusion ........................................................................................................................... 308
Chapter 10: Conclusion ...................................................................................................... 310
Introduction .......................................................................................................................... 310
Transplanted Territory: The full reach of the Confucian Family ........................................ 311
Limitations and Intentions ................................................................................................... 316
Research Questions and Key Findings: ................................................................................ 317
Settlement Patterns and Community Formations ................................................................ 319
Gendered Analysis ................................................................................................................ 322
Chinese Family Landscape ................................................................................................... 327
Areas for Further Research .................................................................................................. 330
Conclusion ............................................................................................................................ 334
Bibliography ................................................................................................................... 337
Appendix A: Chinese Families: North Queensland 1860-1920 .................Attachment pdf
Appendix B: Couples or individuals identified in Select Newspapers ......Attachment pdf
vii
LIST OF FIGURES
Number ................................................................................................................................ Page
1. Global Literature Comparison – Gender focused Scholarly Review ............................... 52
2. Chinese Population in Key Census Districts, 1886 ........................................................ 70
3. Chinese Population in Key Towns, 1901 ........................................................................ 72
4. Chinese Population in Key Towns, 1909 ........................................................................ 73
5. Chinese population in Key Towns, 1909, by percentage ............................................... 75
6. Chinese Population in Key Towns, 1909, Industry identified ......................................... 75
7. String Communities: Lineal Relations, Townsville to Richmond ................................. 93
8. A Leong String- String Community ................................................................................ 94
9. Cooktown Chinatown, C.1887 .......................................................................................... 96
10. Cairns Chinatown 1895 .................................................................................................... 96
11. Chinatown on the Lower Palmer ..................................................................................... 96
12. Chinatown Geraldton 1910 ............................................................................................... 96
13. Chinese Consul’s visit to Townsville: 1913 ..................................................................... 98
14. Cooktown “Chinatown”: Recreational and Social Activities ...................................... 101
15. Temple Distribution: Queensland .................................................................................. 104
16. Queensland Temple Distribution 1870-1940 ................................................................ 104
17. Colonial Temple Distribution, 1850-1930 ...................................................................... 105
18. Comparison Temple Western Host Countries 1850-1910 ........................................... 105
19. Interior of Mackay Temple, 1908 .................................................................................. 106
20. Identified Temples across North Queensland ................................................................. 111
21. “Cultural precincts”: Queensland: 1860-1920 ........................................................... 113
22. Chinese Garden, Normanton 1935 ................................................................................. 115
23. Chinese orchards, Charters Towers ............................................................................... 115
24. Chinese Gardener, Bowen ............................................................................................... 116
25. Chinese Garden, Hughenden c.1915 ............................................................................ 116
26. Cultural Background Women: Queensland:1847-1920 ............................................... 120
27. Cultural Background Women: North Queensland: 1860-1920 ...................................... 120
28. Percentage Primary Marriages by District: 1848-1920 ................................................ 122
29. Percentage Marriages: Location known: 1848-1920 ...................................................... 122
30. Total Marriages and Unions by District: Queensland 1848-1920 ................................. 124
viii
31. Total Marriages and Unions where location known 1847-1920 .................................... 124
32. Total Marriages and Unions per decade district by district-1920 .................................. 125
33. Combined Chinese Marriages and Unions: 1839-1859 by District. ............................. 126
34. Geographic Location and Ethnic Background: Queensland Population: Chinese
Family Landscape: 1847-1920 ........................................................................................................ 132
35. Cultural Background: North Queensland: Chinese Family Landscape showing
period when Commonwealth Legislation Introduced ................................................................... 133
36. White Female migration to other colonies and countries : 19th Century ..................... 135
37. UK migration to United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand: 1870-1913 ....... 136
38. Colonial Chinese – White marriage in three colonies: 1850-1890 .............................. 149
39. Queensland: Total number White wives identified in colony:1847-1920 ................... 155
40. Queensland: White Wives Location known:1847-1920 ................................................. 155
41. Chinese – White Families across Queensland by relationship status: incl. North
Queensland insert ............................................................................................................................ 157
42. Chinese Female Diaspora: Destination Countries:1850 onwards ................................ 171
43. Snapshot of Global Chinese Female Diaspora: Eight Key Destinations ....................... 173
44. Snapshot of Colonial Chinese Female Population: 1856-1921 .................................... 181
45. Natal Districts: Guangdong Province: Chinese Females North
Queensland:1860-1920 ................................................................................................................... 183
46. Census Snapshot: Chinese Women in Queensland: 1876 .............................................. 185
47. Census Snapshot: Chinese Men in Queensland: 1876 .................................................. 185
48. Regional identification: Locations known: Chinese Women 1860-1920 ................... 187
49. Chinese Women: Marriage Patterns: 1860-1920 ........................................................... 188
50. Representative Map: Maintenance of Confucian Marriage Patterns associated
with North Queensland Families: District, Village and Kinship Links ....................................... 200
51. Chinese Migration Patterns: Asia Pacific Region: Known location where
interracial Marriages occurred ........................................................................................................ 205
52. Chinese migration: Areas of Micronesia, Melanesia and Polynesia. ............................ 211
53. “Queensland Aboriginal Australians attacking Chinese Diggers on Gilbert River”:
1873 220
54. “The Fight at the Conglomerate: “Burking a Chinaman”: 1878 ................................. 220
55. Queensland: Chinese – Indigenous Families: 1847-1920 ............................................ 231
56. North Queensland: Chinese –Indigenous Families: 1860-1920 ..................................... 231
57. Chinese -Aboriginal Family Landscape: 1890-1920 ................................................... 232
ix
58. Nth Queensland: Chinese Family Landscape by Cultural Background: 1860-1920 ..... 240
59. North Queensland: Number of Families per identified town: 1860-1920 ..................... 241
60. Cairns Chinatown: 1900 showing Lit Sung Goong and Buk Ti Goong temples .......... 244
61. Winton Commercial and Market Garden Districts: 1890- 1920 .................................... 247
62. Winton Town Commercial District: Allotments owned by Chinese men married
to White Wives: 1890- 1920 ........................................................................................................... 247
63. Hughenden “Bachelor” Community ............................................................................... 249
64. Number of Couples across North Queensland By Industry: 1860-1920 ....................... 251
65. North Queensland: Location of Couple: Settlement by Industry: 1860-1920 ............... 252
66. Camooweal Garden Cultural precinct and Storekeeper community:1890-1925 ........... 254
67. Normanton: Green Street precinct: Chinese Family Landscape: 1890-1910 ................ 256
68. Normanton: Cultural precinct Changes associated with Chinese Family
Landscape: 1920-1940 ..................................................................................................................... 257
69. Cloncurry “Chinatown” Cultural precinct: 1913-1933 .................................................. 259
70. Cloncurry “Chinatown” and Business Cultural precinct ................................................ 259
71. Tommy Ah Fat ................................................................................................................. 260
72. Tim See Foo ..................................................................................................................... 260
73. Cloncurry Chinatown gardens ......................................................................................... 260
74. Cairns Chinatown: Allotments associated with Chinese Family Landscape: 1900 ...... 263
75. Cairns Chinatown: Ethnic background of Women by Allotment: 1900 ........................ 265
76. Lit Sung Goong with Community Children ................................................................... 265
77. Cairns Chinatown: Japanese Woman resident c. 1902 ................................................... 265
78. Mackay Chinatown: c.1900............................................................................................. 268
79. Mackay: Chinese Greengrocer with Woman and Children ........................................... 269
80. Innisfail Chinatown: c.1910 allotments owned or occupied by women ........................ 271
81. Lower Herbert District: Ingham, Halifax, Chinatowns, Mills and Plantations. ........... 273
82. Halifax Chinatown: C. 1900 showing area occupied by women ................................... 274
83. East Ingham Chinese precinct showing, Houng Yuen & Co: 1916 ............................... 276
84. Ingham Chinese Commercial Cultural precinct including Cowden/Gairloch
Chinatown: 1886-1930s................................................................................................................... 277
85. Charters Towers, Queenton, Millchester: Chinatowns, & Market Garden areas .......... 279
86. Charters Towers Chinatown: 1880-1900 ........................................................................ 280
87. Japanese Woman: Gards Lane ....................................................................................... 280
88. Millchester Commercial Cultural precinct and Temple area: 1890-1900 ..................... 283
x
89. 89 (a & b) Cape River: Graves of Ah Hee and Mary Rhoda Ah Hee ............................ 285
90. Ravenswood Chinatown, Commercial Centre and Garden Areas ................................. 287
91. Ravenswood Chinatown: Shop Jang Lum Kee and Temple: 1911 ................................ 287
92. Maytown Chinatown: Chinese Owned Allotments: 1882 .............................................. 290
93. Edwardstown Later renamed Maytown:1872 ................................................................. 290
94. Georgetown Chinatown: 1890-1910 ............................................................................... 293
95. Georgetown Chinatown, Garden and Cemetery Area: 1890-1910 ................................ 293
96. Yet Hoy, Luk Yet Ho and Family: Croydon Chinatown ................................................ 296
97. Croydon Chinatown:1890-1910 ...................................................................................... 297
98. Cooktown Chinatown, Garden and Cemetery area ........................................................ 300
99. Thursday Island: Chee Quee Open Air Theatre, Douglas Street: c.1920s ..................... 304
100. Townsville “Chinese Quarters”: Flinders Land and Hanran Street: 1890 ..................... 305
101. Townsville Commercial precinct including “Chinese Quarters”: 1880-1901 ............... 307
102. Townsville Chinese: An Integrated Community: 1860-1901 ........................................ 308
xi
LIST OF TABLES
Number ................................................................................................................................ Page
1. Colonial Chinese – White Marriage Populations: 1850-1889 ...................................... 148
2. Birth Place of White Women married to Chinese men: 1860-1892 ............................. 153
3. Australian Colonial Chinese Populations with Global Female Diaspora Trends: 1856-
1921 ....................................................................................................................................... 175
4. Colonial Chinese Populations: Percentage ratio Women to Men: 1856-1921 ............. 179
5. Global Analysis: Marriage and Partnering: Chinese men to Women who are identified
as Indigenous, Local non- White or Mulatto women ........................................................ 214
6. Chinese- Aboriginal Family Landscape: North Western Gulf District ........................ 235
7. Chinese –Aboriginal Family Landscape: First Generation Marriage patterns associated
with Market Garden communities ........................................................................................ 237
LIST OF MAPS
Number ................................................................................................................................ Page
1. Map of Queensland showing North Queensland region of study .................................. 15
2. North Queensland Gulf districts: Chinese – Indigenous Family Landscape ............... 234
xii
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
At the very top of the long list of people who have supported, shared, kicked, cajoled and helped
me over the many years for the duration of this thesis, I wish to express my most heartfelt and
sincerest acknowledgement, love and appreciation to the three most important people in my life:
my children Rhiannon, Hugo and Simone. Not only have my family experienced every research
trip, writing headache, frustrated tears, insecurities and financial hardship, they have grown up,
remained unjudgemental and are still my strongest supporters. I am the luckiest woman alive.
For her part, my supervisor Dr Wegner is the next most important stalwart to acknowledge. She
has provided me with unwavering advice, direction and support over the years as well as
encouraged, patted, threatened, and sweet talked me above and beyond her role as supervisor. I
have been truly blessed to have her as my supervisor and mentor. Without the unerring support
of my children and supervisor, this thesis would not have been completed.
I have received much support from various academic and non-academic quarters; some of which
has been entirely unexpected. I would like to thank my associate supervisor Professor Richard
Nile, as well as the many individuals who warrant a special and heartfelt mention including
mentors’ Dr Mark Chong and Dr Nigel Chang; Dr Patrick Hodgson, Dr Hilda McLean, Dr
Kevin Rains, Dr Michael Williams, Professor Darryl Low Choy, Dr Joanna Boileau, Paul
Macgregor, Chris Cheng, Gordon Grimwade, Juanita Kwok, Marguerite Andrews and Ray
Poon. An extra special thank you goes to friend and mentor, Big Ears.
This thesis has been an emotionally and financially draining undertaking of mammoth
proportions. Little could I guess the steep cultural learning curve I would need to take to
understand a nanosecond of thousands of years of Chinese family and societal culture, let alone
the impact of the nineteenth century Chinese Diaspora. None of this could have happened
without the support of the many Chinese families, descendant of early settler families, family
history and genealogy tragics and the broader Chinese and non-Chinese community. Thank you
to those who reached into their hearts to help, share family stories and explain cultural nuances.
For without your assistance and sharing, the thesis would lack soul. In particular I would like to
provide special mention to Mary Low, George Wah Day, Geoffrey Jue Sue and Dr Joe and Judy
Leong for opening up their homes and hands of friendship to me.
A large thank you goes to many people in Local Councils, Family History Societies, Church
Archives, and Historical Societies, as well as Museums, and local organisations. They opened
their doors and helped with access to hidden, protected and fragile records. I would like to make
special mention the Carpentaria, Cloncurry, Flinders, Etheridge, Croydon, and Winton Shire
Councils as well as Townsville, and Charters Towers Regional Councils who provided access to
vital early administrative records. In particular, I would like to single out Mike Power, Charters
Towers for sending me as much Market Garden Area information he could find. Many
volunteers from Historical Societies, Family History Societies and Genealogical Societies helped
along the way. Special mention goes to the organisations in Cairns, Innisfail, Townsville,
Mackay, Ravenswood, Charters Towers, Hughenden, Winton, Cloncurry and Normanton, in the
north and Gayndah, Miles, Chinchilla, Roma and Dalby in the south. In addition, many
individuals were happy to share their passion in Eidsvold, Monto, Miles, and Gladstone.
Lastly, I dedicate this thesis to my mother Alice, who gave me a love for history and encouraged
me to have an enquiring and open mind.
xiii
GLOSSARY
Cantonese (c.); Mandarin (m. pinyin); Long Dou (l.)
Characters (traditional, simple, pinyin)
Note: Some Characters used for places in Queensland, had the mouth radical added and are non-standard and difficult to reproduce
today. They were sometimes phonetic. For Example: Atherton. To be as inclusive as possible to all learning capabilities I have
included all language variations to reach as broad a range of audience.
Aborigine
/Aboriginal
土著
The first inhabitants on the land from its earliest time. Also
referred to internationally as First People, Native and
sometimes Locals. Term can be used interchangeably with the
word ‘Indigenous’ though ‘Aborigine’ or ‘First People’ are
preferred.
In this thesis ‘Aborigine’ refers to the first inhabitants living in
Australia. It does not include people who lived on islands
across the Torres Strait, who are referred to as Torres Strait
Islanders, or other islands of Micronesia.
Ancestral Village
Ancestral Home
Overseas Chinese
native place
Qiaoxiang (m.)
kiu hoeng (c.)
僑 鄉
Pinyin
鄉下
家鄉
The ancestral village or home where the primary couples are
from and where the Clan ancestral tablets are kept.
Characters also used which mean ‘ancestral home’ but which
may not relate to migration.
Amoy
Xiamen
廈門
Xiamen, also known as Amoy, is a sub-provincial city in
southeastern Fujian province. Principal historical dialect of
Amoy was Hokkien/Fujian.
Atherton
丫打頓
亞瑟屯
Traditional
Key town over the ranges in the hinterlands to Cairns, known
for its Chinese led industry of Maize.
Australian born
Chinese
See also overseas
Chinese
A person born in a colony of Australia with at least one parent a
China born migrant. It can refer to a person where both parents
are China born as well as to a child born into mixed heritage /
interracial families.
xiv
Bachelor society
A popular term used to describe a community of men who live
together seemingly without women or family.
However, while presenting outwardly as “single”, this term is
deceptive because the absence of women does not describe
individual circumstance of overseas Chinese men. Many men
had wives back in the ancestral village.
A better term to describe overseas Chinese men living together
is “married bachelor” society.
See also Married Bachelor society
Bound Feet 缠足
The practice of breaking a female toddlers’ toes and bending
them over while “binding” them to the foot with cloth
bandages. This over time creates little feet or “lotus feet”.
Women from the middle to wealthy elite bound the feet of their
daughters as a visible sign of wealth. Would be husbands
would need to have the means to employ a servant to attend to
a wife with bound feet. It was a crippling practice for women.
Brisbane 布里斯班 Capital of Queensland and site of largest Chinatown in the
Southern District.
Cairns
堅士埠
pinyin
堅市
堅時
Northern port town in Queensland above Townsville. It had the
largest and longest running Chinese Chinatown outside
Brisbane.
The characters are phonetic.
The 1900s term (and there are two) based on Cantonese.
Central District
昆士兰中部
Region of Queensland taking in Gayndah and Wide Bay
Burnett, ports of Rockhampton, Gladstone and Maryborough
and out to the Northern Territory border. It forms one of four
districts for this thesis.
Chain Migration
The process of movement by migrant people from their
homelands to destination host countries whereby networks are
built upon using familiar social relationships such as clan and
kinship associations, to construct new places of habitation that
reflect the cultural norms and societal expectations of the
homelands.
Charters Towers
Tung Wah News 6 June 1900
差打士
倫亞士 cantonese
巷 利 區
Simplified
車打士滔
Key town over the ranges in the hinterlands of Townsville,
known for its rich mineral ore in gold.
Closely located near Cape River and Ravenswood goldfields.
xv
Chinatown
Tong Yen Gai (c.)
Tángrénjiē (m. / p.)
Tong jangaai
(Jyutping)
唐人街
pinyin
For the purpose of this thesis
“Chinatown” describes a community within a community
where Chinese people, their businesses, social institutions and
families were confined, and which developed as a gender
diverse, self-sufficient and inter-generational society, which
was tolerated only to the extent that the host colony allowed it
to exist.
Chinese Diaspora
The dispersal or spread of Chinese people in the nineteenth
and twentieth century across the globe from their homeland,
China.
Chinese Family
Landscape.
中国家庭观
The Chinese Family Landscape describes the sum total of all
elements involved in the coupling, family making and
intergenerational pattern of relationships experienced through
legal marriage, defacto unions, and casual intimate relations
found associated with the Chinese Diaspora.
In Queensland the Chinese Family Landscape is made up from
China born migrant Chinese men married to Chinese migrant
women, White women, Aboriginal or Torres Strait women,
South Islander women or Japanese women, but for other host
destinations, the interracial racial mix may vary according to
settlement variations
.
Chinese Female
Diaspora
華人女性
The dispersion or spread of Chinese females both girls and
women, in the nineteenth and twentieth century across the
globe from China.
Chinese woman
Chinese female
Chinese women
(plural)
中國婦女(c.)
中国妇女
pinyin
中國女性(m.)
An adult woman of Chinese ancestry born in China.
Sometimes used incorrectly in historical texts to refer to a
woman or girl born in a host country, such as Queensland,
where both parents are Chinese migrant settlers.
This thesis, which focuses on primary couples, defines the
term to a Chinese female zhōng guó nǚ xìng 中国妇女born in
China to Chinese parents.
妇女 = more old fashioned. 女性 = simplified and neutral
Ching Ming
Qingming
Tomb Sweeping
Day
.
清明
pinyin
Ching Ming or “tomb sweeping day” is an important part of
the Chinese solar calendar dedicated to paying respect to
community ancestors while making provision to assist them in
the afterlife with food and offerings.
Ching Ming was observed in the Queensland colonial
community through the preparation of food, drink at the
xvi
temples and transported to the cemetery. Graves of deceased
were tended and food offerings (roast pig and fruit) laid out at
the gravesite. Incense (joss sticks) and paper offerings were
then burnt in purpose built ceremonial burners at the cemetery.
I.e.: Ceremonial burner memorial at Cooktown Cemetery.
Chung Shan (l.)
HeungShan (c.)
Xiangshan (m.)
Chongshan (c.)
Zhongshan (m.)
中山
The dominant region in Guangdong province where number of
settlers migrated from. Located in the Southern Pearl Delta
region of China, it takes in smaller districts of Long Dou and
Leung Dou.
See Definition Long Dou and Liang Dou
Pre-1925 it was known as Heungshan in Cantonese or
Xiangshan in Mandarin. After 1925 it became Chungshan in
Cantonese or Zhongshan in Mandarin. 1925 was the year Dr
Sun Yat Sen died, and the area he was from was renamed.
Colonial born
A person male or female who is born in the colony of
Queensland or another Australian colony to non-Aboriginal
parents.
Concubine
Qiè (m.)
妾
traditional
A historical term for woman who lives with a man but has
lower status than his wife (in polygamous societies).
Unable to be regarded as First or primary wife in female
hierarchy.
Confucius
Kǒngfūzǐ (m.)
孔夫子
pinyin
Confucius, born in 551 BCE and died at around 479 BCE,
China was a teacher, philosopher and politician who founded a
societal movement of rules which governed every tier of every
aspect of life pertaining to Chinese society, its people and its
families.
Confucianism is based on five principles: Humanness, Loyalty
to one’s self, ritual norms, reciprocity and filial piety.
These principles set out how an individual conduct themselves
throughout life according to the five relationships: Emperor
and Subject, Father and Son, Husband and Wife, Elder
Brother and Younger Brother and Friend and Friend. Each of
these relate to superiority for example: Parent over child, Man
over woman and eldest over youngest and permeated
throughout family life influencing decision making,
relationships and personal conduct associated with the
Chinese Diaspora.
Cooktown
库克敦
Simplified
谷當埠
Tung Wah Times
Key port town which developed in Far North Queensland
which serviced the Palmer River Goldfields.
Many goods and exports flowed through this town including
gold, bones, sandalwood, beche- de- mer and people.
Cultural precinct
A “cultural precinct” is a community which is smaller than a
Chinatown and unable, through its population size to be self
xvii
sufficient or isolated from the broader community.
It is usually an area consisting of two or more Chinese
commercial interests, household or gardens located in or near
White settlements with an extended longevity over time or
generations.
This term encompasses both the social development within a
town of more than one cultural community, and makes
provision for a definition of an alternative physical footprint
of place within an urban environment to the much larger
Chinatown.
Destination
Country
The country where Chinese Diaspora immigrants migrated to.
Used inter changeably with Host Country.
See also Host Country.
Emigrant
Hometown
僑鄉 Emigrant hometown, characterized by remittances
Exhumation
zhé fǎn (m.)
折返
魂歸故土
（Soul returning to
homeland）
To dig or disinter a deceased buried person out of the earth;
disinter; for the purpose to relocate to another place i.e.: China.
Related to action of Returning Bones.
Filial Piety
孝順
Filial piety is the living of a good and wholesome life through
a daily virtue of respect for one's parents, elders, and ancestors
as set out by Confucius in his book Xiaojing (m.) or
Filial Piety is crucial to Confucian moral and ethical
wellbeing and played an important role in transnational
transgenerational settlement patterns associated with the
Chinese Diaspora to Queensland.
First Generation
The first-born generation of children to a primary couple in
this study.
First Nation
土著
A term used in British Columbia to describe an Aborigine or
first inhabitant of the country prior to British colonization.
See Definition Aborigine.
Four Districts
Siyi (m.)
SzeYap (c.)
四邑
Guangdong's "Four Counties" (Sze Yup) district included four
main districts. In Cantonese these places include Toishan, Hoi
ping, Sunwui and Yanping, now called in pinyin Taishan,
xviii
Ssu Yip (l.) 台山 Kaiping, 開平 Xinhui, 新會 and, Enping 恩平. These
districts speak Sze Yap dialect.
Goong, gong (c.)
宮殿 c.
宮
pinyin
Cantonese for "palace“. It is used for temples with multiple
buildings or high status.
Guangdong
Guǎng dōng (m.)
Kwangtung (c.)
廣東
pinyin
A province in the Southern Pearl Delta Region of China
where the Chinese Diaspora originated from in the nineteenth
Century.
Guanxi (m.)
guānxi
關係
Pinyin
广西
A system of exchange through mutual benefit extended by
one party to another through actions, alliances, marriage
relationships. It can extend inter-generationally.
Gold Mountain
Firm
Kam Shan Chong
(Gam San
Chong)(c.)
Jin Shan Zhuang
(m.)
金山莊
traditional
金山庄
simplified
A firm formed in host country by overseas Chinese men.
I.e.: Hap Wah Sugar Mill in Cairns which was set up by a
consortium of men led by Andrew Leon, 1882.
Gold Mountain
Men
Gum San Haak (c,)
金山啊伯
Chinese men who left the village and went overseas to seek
their fortune in order to return home with glory.
Gold Mountain
Woman
Jin Shan po (m.)
Kum San Ah Po (c.)
金山阿婆(c.)
金山婆
A married Chinese woman who remained in the village
ancestral home and received remittances from a husband or
son, sent from overseas destination countries.
一个在中国的妻子-汇款的妻
Grass Widow 草寡婦
A married woman who is left behind in the village whose
overseas husband fails to send remittances back home to
support her or their children. It can also apply to a man who
has abandoned his wife and never returns to the village.
Host Country
The country where Chinese Diaspora immigrants migrated to.
Used interchangeably with Destination Country.
See also Destination Country.
Hua qiao
華僑
See Overseas Chinese
Huiguan (c.)
Wiukoon
Wui gun (l.)
會館
traditional
Meeting Hall (association)
See Kongsi
xix
Indigenous
土著
The first inhabitants on a land from its earliest time. Also
referred to internationally as First People, Native and
sometimes Locals, and is also used interchangeably with the
word Aborigine/ Aboriginal.
In this thesis ‘Indigenous’ refers collectively to the first
inhabitants living in Australia including both Aborigines and
Torres Strait Islander peoples. It does not include Melanesian
people outside the Torres Strait, or Polynesian people.
Indigenous woman
土著
A woman who is neither Chinese nor White but Indigenous to
the country on which she is living.
See also Aborigine/ Aboriginal
Indigenous wife 土著妻
An indigenous woman married to or in a relationship with a
Chinese man.
Intergenerational
The relating, involving or affecting of several generations of the
one family or extended family linked with couples associated
with the Chinese Diaspora over a period of time. Over multiple
generations.
Interracial
Marriage
異族通婚 (m.)
A marriage between two people of different culture and
ancestral backgrounds.
Interracial marriage yì zú tōng hūn 異族通婚 (m.)
Also referred to as Mixed Marriage.
See Mixed Marriage.
Jiapu (m.)
jiāpǔ
家譜
pinyin
The family ancestral genealogy tree kept in the family history
book. The jiapu relates to the family and are patrilineal
leaving out the names of wives and daughters.
Joss house
A western term used to describe a Chinese Temple.
Commenced use in the 19th Century and sometimes
colloquially mis- referred to as a “Josh house”.
Kongsi (c.)
Ui-koon
Huiguan (c.)
Wiukoon
Wui gun (l.)
空寺
公祠
pinyin
A meeting hall for benevolent organisation of overseas Chinese
of the same origin, or same place association: 同鄉會
tongxianghui (m.) tung hoeng wui (c.) who form a company or
society in mutual benefit.
Could also be regarded as a ui-koon, huiguan or wiukoon. An
association place. 會館 The meeting-hall was usually
attached to the side of a temple and a place for district
members of community to meet, discuss community business
xx
and mediate disputes.
In a Queensland context, Kongsi’s also referred to as the clan
hall. I.e. The Kongsi at Texas in Southern Queensland.
Leung Dou (c.)
Liang Dou (m.)
Leoong Doo (l.)
良都
traditional
A small district in Guangdong Province where a number of
Chinese migrant settlers came from to North Queensland.
Leung Dou has many clan, kinship and family links through
marriage to neighboring Long Dou.
See Definition Long Dou.
Local woman
本地人妻
An indigenous woman who is “Local” to the land/ island/
country being referred to.
The term can be applied to women who identified as First
Nation woman from British Columbia, a Native American
Indian woman from the US, or a woman Indigenous to the
colony or country.
It does not include African women as former slaves; Mulatto
women, or South Sea Islander women in Australia.
Long Dou (c.)
Long Du (m.)
Loong Dou (l.)
隆都
pinyin
A slightly larger district in Guangdong Province from which
the majority of early settler families migrated from to North
Queensland. Dialect spoken in that region is Loong Dou.
Long Dou has many clan, kinship and family links through
marriage to Leung Dou.
See Definition Leung Du.
Married Bachelor
A term used to describe a community of Chinese men who live
together seemingly without women or family but who have a
wife back in the ancestral village.
Refer to “bachelor” society.
Miao (m.)
miào
廟
Traditional
A temple which mostly enshrines nature gods or national gods.
I.e.: the Hou Wang Miao, Atherton.
Mixed Marriage
撈嘅婚姻 (c.)
A marriage between two people of different culture and
ancestral backgrounds. Also referred to as Interracial Marriage.
A Mixed Marriage.
See Interracial Marriage.
Mixed Race
A person born of parents who have two different cultures and
race.
Mui tsai / jai (c.)
Mei zi (m.)
mèizi
妹仔
Little Sister / slave girl
A female Chinese bonded servant usually sold as a child from a
poor family or family unable to meet the needs of a large
family, into a wealthy family as a servant or companion to a
daughter or wife.
xxi
Mulatto female
A woman of mixed white and black ancestry. This term is
used in the USA, South American and former colonies of the
British West Indies.
Natal village
The birth place of a person.
Native American
A term used in the United States to describe an Aborigine or
first inhabitant of the country prior to British colonization. See
Definition Aborigine.
New Gold
Mountain Sun
Gaam San (c.)
Xin Jin Shan (m.)
新金山
The term or nickname given to Australia (specifically starting
with Victoria) when gold was discovered to delineate between
the two major places where gold mining occurred.
See Old Gold Mountain
Northern District 昆士兰北部
The region where this thesis is geographically located. It takes
in an area which includes the towns of Mackay, Winton and
Boulia on its Southern border, taking in all of the towns and
communities up to Thursday Island and the Torres Straits. It is
the region which includes Cairns Chinatown, the largest and
longest running Chinatown outside Brisbane.
Old Gold
Mountain
Gao Gaam San (c.)
Jiu Jin Shan (m.)
舊金山
Gold Mountain is the term which was applied to California, San
Francisco and more broadly to western regions of North
America, British Columbia and Canada. California was the
original Old Gold Mountain.
Where North America was Old Gold Mountain, the colonies of
Australia were considered New Gold Mountain.
See New Gold Mountain.
Overseas Chinese
Huá qiáo (m.)
Wah kiu (c.)
華 僑
Traditional
华桥
simplified
For the purpose of this thesis overseas Chinese refers to migrant
people of Chinese birth living outside China associated with
the Chinese Diaspora in the nineteenth and early twentieth
century.
Port (place)
Fowl (c.)
Bu (m.)
埠
A town or city with a harbour or access to navigable water
where ships load or unload. [Used by Cantonese to mean any
market port.]
Polygamy 一夫多妻制
A term to explain the relationship of one man with more than
one “wife” married at the same time. In traditional terms one
man is “married” to only one woman, with subsequent “wives”
being concubines or denoted as Second Wife, Third Wife etc.
xxii
Primary Couple /
Generation
A primary couple is the first man and woman to come
together whether in marriage, defacto union or casual intimate
relations producing a child for the purpose of this study.
Private
Altar/Shrine
jì tán(m.)
祭坛
A small private altar set up in stores and private quarters to
remind individuals of their filial obligations and to provide a
place for requests for special blessings. Private altars included
a small shrine, altar, incense, deity or altar ware such as
candlesticks or incense burners.
In Queensland they were often situated in the private sphere/
quarters and attended to by women and children as part of
cultural maintenance and transferral associated with filial
piety.
Qiaoxiang (m.)
Kiu hoeng (c.) 僑鄉 Overseas Chinese native place. Place of origin of Diaspora
individual.
Remittance Letter
Gold (remittance)
letter
jin xin (m.)
gum shan (c.)
僑皮
traditional
金信
simplified
The letter with money sent home to the ancestral village family
to keep the father, mother, sons and wife in the family home.
Returning Bones
魂歸故土
（Soul returning to
homeland）
The exhumation of bones of departed friend 先友xianyou (m.)
sinjou (c.) in Queensland and returning bones back to village
for re-internment.
See also Exhumation.
Returning home
with glory
man zai rong gui
(m.)
mun zoi wing gwai
(c.)
滿載榮歸
(m.)
A traditional Chinese expression mun zoi wing gwai (c.)
to emphasize the importance for overseas Chinese to return
home with honour and large amounts of capital to the ancestral
home.
San cong (m.)
Sāncóng
三從
traditional
A woman’s Three Obedience’s: to her father, to her husband, to
her sons. Known as “Three Obedience’s and Four Virtues”.
Sān fú cóng de hé sì xián liáng 三服從的和四賢良 (m.)
三服從嘅同四賢良(c.)
San Po Tsai (c.)
Sim Pu Tsai (h.)
Xīn pú zǎi (m.)
新蒲仔
A daughter in law, raised in the family of her husband from a
tender age. She is betrothed to her husband and leaves her natal
home as a child to live with her in-laws until she reaches
marriageable age. She assumes the official status of daughter in
law when the sheung tau ceremony takes place.
xxiii
Sitong/ citang (c.)
Cìtóng (m.)
莿桐
pinyin
A term sometimes used to describe a village ancestral hall.
Soft Economics.
Soft economics describes the influence women in Chinese
settlements made upon community decisions from behind
closed doors from the private sphere of the family
home/quarters.
Soft economics is the outcome of gender inclusive
discussions, matchmaking, gender politics, advocating and
interference. It affected first and second generation marriage
patterns, commercial partnerships, female community
relations and decision making as a result of probate.
The sphere of influence of soft economics extended from the
Chinese ancestral home to North Queensland and back.
Southern District 昆士兰南部
The Southern District is one of four districts used in this
thesis taking in the historical districts of the Darling Downs
and out to the Northern Territory and New South Wales
border and across to the Morton Bay districts and city of
Brisbane.
South Sea Islander
A person, whose place of origin is from one of the 80 islands in
the South Pacific, including: the Solomon Islands, New
Caledonia, and Vanuatu (formerly the New Hebrides) in
Melanesia as well as the Loyalty Islands.
Cajoled, kidnapped or recruited from the mid to late nineteenth
century as labourers to service the burgeoning sugar plantation
industry, both men and women were brought across to
Queensland.
String Community
A String Community is a lineal model of connections between
individuals through kin and commerce associations over one
or more towns involving one or two individuals in each town
as singular nodes linking the string together.
It relies on loose kinship association for mutual benefit
support and first generation Australian born children for
marriage partners or labour to strengthen family alliances.
Three Districts
Sam Yap (c.)
Sān yì (m.)
Sam Yip (l.)
三義
traditional
邑
三邑
simplified
Formerly forming part Guangdong's "Three Counties" (Sanyi,
meaning the ‘three districts’) (Sam Yup): the district included
(romanised Cantonese) Nam-Hoi, Poon-Yue and Sun-dak
which are now recalibrated into districts Nanhai, 南海 Panyu
番禺, and Shunde 順德.
Toishan (c.)
Taishan (m.)
TàiShān
泰山 (m.)
台山
Country district in Guangdong Province in the Southern Pearl
Delta region of China.
See Definition Four Counties.
xxiv
pinyin
Tong Yen Gai (c.)
Tángrénjiē (m.)
Tong jangaai
(Jyutping)
唐人街
Traditional
The Chinese term for place, which literally means “Streets of
the Tang Chinese” (m.) also known as`Tong jangaai’ /
Tángrénjiē.
See also “Chinatown”
Two Primary Wife 2位妻子的家
庭
A term coined by Adam McKeown to explain the prevelance of
one man with a wife in each country. Ie: Two “primary wife”
family- One wife China/ One wife Queensland.
位妻子在中国/ 一位在昆士兰
Thursday Island
Thursday Island, (TI) is an Island in the Torres Strait Island
group, situated approximately 39 kilometres north of Cape
York Peninsula at the top of Queensland, Australia.
Thursday Island was originally called Somerset. Established in
1848. it was originally set up as a colonial outpost as a trading
port, but also served as a strategic customs centre and port to
protect the Torres Straits, commercial interests and migration to
Australia.
Torres Strait
Islander
An indigenous person from the Torres Strait Islands between
northern Australia and Papua New Guinea.
Townsville
Tung Wah Times, 26
October 1912.
湯士威爐
Tung Wah Times
爐士威
爐 威
Key port town which developed in North Queensland which
serviced the early mining towns of Ravenswood, Cape River
and Charters Towers.
Many bones for return to China passed through this port.
Transmigration.
The act of migrating from one country to another for the
purpose of settlement and economic benefit.
Transnational
The two-way flow of people, goods, products, services, and
ideas across national borders from one country to another.
For the purpose of this thesis, transnational is applied to
migration patterns and formation of the Chinese Family
Landscape to describe the two way flow of clan, kin and family
models between China and Queensland which at times also
included interracial family groups and cultural exchange.
Huiguan
huìguǎn (m.)
Also referred to as
会馆
pinyin
Association place.
A county guild hall or meeting-hall usually attached to the
side of a temple and a place for the community to meet,
xxv
Wiu koon
Ui-koon
discuss community business and mediate disputes.
In Queensland it may also denote a Kongsi.
See Definition Kongsi
White concubine
bái qiè
白妾
From a Chinese perspective the term given to White woman
who were married to a Chinese man who also had a Chinese
wife back in the village.
White wife 白妻
A White woman legally married to a Chinese man.
White woman
bái rén fù nǚbai
白人婦女
A woman of White birth who is either colonial born or a
migrant woman from the British Isle or a country of Europe.
Sometimes referred to in other texts as “European” although
this technically does not delineate between women born in the
colonies or geographical country of birth.
Wife
qī zi
妻子
Simplified
A woman married or living in a defacto relationships with a
Chinese man for the purpose of this thesis.
Zupu (m.)
zúpǔ
族谱
pinyin
Clan or lineage records kept on ancestral tablets at the village
temple in China. These records are patrilineal and as such,
women and girls are rarely mentioned.

1
C h a p t e r 1
INTRODUCTION
Between 1860 and 1920, just over three hundred Chinese settler men married or partnered with
women across North Queensland and raised families. In doing so they contributed to and
participated in the settlement and development of North Queensland, and its three key industries,
pastoralism, mining and agriculture. Women and families associated with Chinese men played
an integral part in the settlement narrative, yet they remain historically marginalised despite
academic interest. This has led to underrepresentation in the Chinese Diaspora account and is
characterised by an absence in local, regional and State histories. This thesis aims to provide a
gender integrated approach to the settlement narrative by identifying the Chinese Family
Landscape associated with North Queensland. It hopes to identify the location of women and
families across the region and understand the role that the presence of wives and children of
Chinese men played in the formation and longevity of Chinese communities.
This thesis will explore the three different types of women associated with family formation,
White, Chinese and Aboriginal, to provide a cultural perspective to family and community
formation. In addition, it will explore the impact of the Confucian family model and the role it
played in the development of North Queensland’s Chinese communities. It will reveal that
transnational commercial and family networks not only linked the ancestral village with North
Queensland but were strengthened by strategic marriage arrangements made locally between
Australian born daughters and older migrant men in the community. The thesis will also analyse
the “married” bachelors who remained separated from their China based wives and children, and
explore how this arrangement was negotiated through frequent sojourns back to the village or
casual intimate relations made locally.
This thesis combines quantitative and qualitative data to provide voice and meaning to women’s
experiences which are validated through text and visual mapping. The identification of towns
and places where early Chinese families and women lived, including Chinatowns, cultural
precincts, and String Communities, provides a valuable future resource for researchers, heritage
practitioners and the community to understand, record and interpret the Chinese Family
Landscape in a colonial setting.
2
Since the 1970s there has been a growing push to understand Chinese family history by
genealogists and academic researchers alike. The push for knowledge follows national and
international research trends into the study of the overseas Chinese or huá qiáo 1 and has resulted
in a better understanding of the Chinese Diaspora for those who have an active or vested interest
in the subject. Yet despite this push, the Chinese family landscape remains buried in the popular
myth that Chinese men were single and/or sojourners, and remained removed from any family
connection whilst in Queensland. However, this perception can no longer be sustained and is
challenged by family researchers and academics alike. On one hand, genealogists have
concentrated (rightly) on personal family stories which are shared with immediate relatives yet,
like most family histories even if published, these works remain in the private domain. On the
other hand, academic researchers have concentrated on “big picture” history, an area
characterised by data interpretation, historical themes, events, commercial economics and race
behaviour to describe Chinese experiences. More recently, this focus has expanded to
transnational transmigration interpretations and the analysis of global trends, colonialism and
China’s historical interaction with the world. Yet while these works provide understanding into
the Chinese settler experience, they fall short of addressing the gender imbalance or emphasise
the male experience, rather than adopting an integrated approach to the narrative: one which
includes women, families, gender and age.
Chinese marriage and family formation occupied a special space within the transmigration
experience. It is characterised by women’s activities and an ability to influence community
decisions from within the private sphere. The “soft economics” surrounding provision of
conjugal comfort, production of children, and female companionship for the broader male
community, can no longer be ignored as inconsequential to Diaspora studies, particularly when it
involves a shift in century-old traditions or involves non – Chinese wives. “Soft economics”
played an influential role in any Chinese social relations and in Queensland also contributed to
Chinatowns’ longevity and ability for community renewal. Women (and children) were clearly
present in the North Queensland Chinese community and “family” in all of its forms
underpinned aspects of the Chinese Diaspora.
To be able to understand North Queensland’s Chinese Family Landscape, both the statistical
quantity of marriages and relationships is required, along with an accurate pinpointing of
1 Overseas Chinese or huá qiáo (m.) or Wah kiu (c.) 華僑, referes to Chinese overseas who retain Chinese
nationality. See Glossary.
3
locations where Chinese families may have lived. Both data sets must be firmly based on reliable
primary data. The combination of these two data sets enables an accurate picture or “landscape”
to emerge which, when combined with the pattern of settlement and development of industry
across the colony, enables new understanding of settlement trends to emerge which otherwise
may remain hidden. Underpinning analysis of the trends is a series of questions about gender,
women and families within a Chinese community. These questions assist to fold back the layers
of what is already known, to reveal the potential effect if any that women and families had on the
success, failure or longevity of an overseas Chinese community. These questions are supported
by answers to the major research question: “How important was the presence of women and
families to Chinese communities, cultural precincts and places throughout North Queensland?
This provides an overarching direction to the thesis and is scaffolded by six questions divided
into three key areas. They are:
Settlement patterns and community formation:
1. What factors contributed to the pattern of Chinese settlement throughout North
Queensland?
2. What type of Chinese community formed in North Queensland and was this
consistent with community formation associated with the Chinese Diaspora?
Gendered analysis:
3. What marriage patterns, according to official and non-official data sources, occurred
in the North Queensland Chinese communities?
4. Who made up the Chinese Family Landscape associated with the Overseas Chinese
across North Queensland and when did it start to form?
Chinese Family Landscape:
5. Where did Chinese families live in North Queensland and why did this settlement
occur in these places?
6. What influence did the presence or absence of Chinese families have on the
longevity of a Chinese community in North Queensland and why?
***
Findings
Major findings attest that there were 1095 identified women and primary families associated
with Chinese men, 1847-1920, across the colony of Queensland. Of the families where the
location was discovered during the course of research, 45% of them or 315 women and families
4
were found to have lived in North Queensland. This figure far outstrips Chinese family
formation in Brisbane (21 %), Central Region (19 %) and Southern Region (15%). Not only do
these figures firmly position North Queensland as the most densely populated Chinese Family
Landscape within the colony of Queensland throughout the 19th century, but it highlights the
importance of North Queensland as an overseas host destination for the Chinese Diaspora.
Through the identification of the ethnic background of women living with Chinese men, White,
Chinese and Aboriginal women, it has emerged that White wives made up the largest proportion
of women at 84% for the whole of the colony and 66% in North Queensland alone. Chinese
migrant women on the other hand were more likely to join husbands in North Queensland than
the rest of Queensland, making up 27% of the Chinese Family Landscape in the north when
compared to only 13 % of the total relationship pool across the whole colony. Aboriginal women
remained statistically low across the colony accounting for only 3%, rising a few minor points to
6% of the Chinese Family Landscape in North Queensland alone. The small number of other
women who formed relationships with Chinese men remained numerically insignificant both
across the colony and in North Queensland, accounting for 1% or less of the marriage population
which included Japanese, Torres Strait Islander, and South Sea Islander women.
North Queensland’s Chinese Family Landscape was found to be aligned to three key industries:
pastoralism, mining, agriculture, as well as provisioning centres such as port towns. These
industries influenced which type of family formed and the geographical location where they
were found across the north. The vast majority of families were formed along the east coast and
were represented by mixed marriages of Chinese-White couples and China born couples,
whereas rural and remote areas, dominated by mining and pastoralism, were more likely to have
mixed heritage Chinese-White couples and Chinese-Aboriginal couples. When it came to
Aboriginal wives, geographical location was found to be an important element in family
formation. Despite the identification of a number of Aboriginal women and families associated
with Chinese men, this type of family remains the least statistically researched by scholars and it
is hoped that this thesis will provide the basis for future scholarly investigation.
This research has found that the number of White women who partnered with Chinese men in
the colony of Queensland was comparable to partnering experiences in both New South Wales
(NSW) and Victoria (Vic), where similar population trends emerged for the same period.
However South Australia, Western Australia and Tasmania developed much smaller mixed
5
heritage relationships for the same period. This trend was also true for China born women who
were found to be located in the three major eastern colonies. Between the years 1847-1920,
Queensland attracted one quarter or 25% of all Chinese women to all colonies of Australia. New
South Wales attracted the most Chinese women at 32 %, with Victoria not far behind at 29%.
The Northern Territory (then administered by South Australia) accounted for only 11 % of the
national total. However, Port Darwin or Palmerston/Darwin as it is also interchangeably known,
and the broader Pine Creek/ Brocks Creek region slightly south, developed Chinese communities
and infrastructure which were very similar to North Queensland with both regions sharing
family networks across Northern Australia.
When Queensland and North Queensland were compared with other British colonies such as
British Columbia (BC) and the British West Indies, or emerging Western democracies such as
the United States of America (US) and Hawaii, significantly different population trends start to
emerge. Both the US and Hawaii attracted high populations of China born women as part of the
Chinese female Diaspora, accounting for a combined 84% of the countries surveyed. In
comparison, both British Columbia and Queensland attracted only a low 5% and 6%
respectively. The large population of Chinese women in the U.S. can be attributed to the
operation of syndicates which trafficked young women from China and Hong Kong to
California and San Francisco where they were sold as wives, servant mui tsai or “prostitutes” to
the male community. This practice did not take off in Queensland or any other colonies of
Australia, which suggests that the close proximity between China and Australasia was sufficient
to enable men to return to their primary wives on a more regular basis.
Another factor which separated the U.S. from the Queensland colonial experience when it came
to the management of a Chinese Family Landscape, was that the U.S. implemented antimiscegenation
legislation. This prohibited White women from marrying Black men, which
initiated a racial line which extended by default to White women partnering with Chinese men
despite no legislation preventing it. Established informally across many U.S. states, this Act
provided an efficient deterrent to prevent mixed heritage marriages or union between the two
groups. As very few studies have been undertaken in the US to explore the actual prevalence of
interracial marriage and marriage-like relationships between Chinese men and White women, a
true statistical comparison could not be made. However, preliminary evidence suggests that U.S.
Chinese-White marriage numbers were far below the figures discovered in Queensland and other
6
colonies of Australia. This makes Australia unique when considering Chinese-White mixed
marriages within the Chinese Family Landscape and overseas Chinese Diaspora experience.
This thesis has demonstrated that women and families in settlements and communities
contributed positively to the social, gender and age diversity of Chinatowns and cultural
precincts which enabled communities to grow and renew in ways which otherwise may not have
occurred had they remained “married bachelor” societies.2 Women and family provided
numerous benefits to community through the subtle application of “soft economics” which
played out from the private quarters of the family home, while their presence in the community
“normalized” society, increased status for husbands and enhanced kinship and commercial
relationships when strategic marriages were arranged between Australian born daughters and
migrant older Chinese men. Furthermore, networks and relationships formed between women in
the private sphere, providing support and friendship for women and safe passage for babies,
particularly as many White wives acted as midwives within the community. While women were
able to apply influence from the family quarters to husbands and children, they also provided a
significant role in looking after their husbands’ interests for the extended transnational family
upon his death.
With over 28 different North Queensland communities scrutinised and mapped, including 18
Chinatowns and 17cultural precincts, it has been found that women and families were involved
across the spectrum of settlements. North Queensland’s Chinese community did not develop as
a homogenous, “married bachelor” society, but as gender integrated network of communities
where “family” underpinned relationships, decision making and community renewal. This
increased the chance of longevity of the overseas community and reinforced links back to the
ancestral home in China.
***
Logistics
Covering a sixty-year period, 1860 to 1920, this thesis reflects the expansion, development and
settlement of North Queensland through the platform of the three major economic drivers:
pastoralism, mining and agriculture. These industries provide the historical backdrop to Chinese
settlement and in particular, Chinese family settlement over a three generational period. By
scrutinising three generations of families, marriage and migration patterns, an accurate picture
2 Yuen-Fong Woon, “The Voluntary Sojourner among the Overseas Chinese: Myth or Reality?” Pacific Affairs Vol. 56. No. 4
(Winter , 1983-1984): 673-690
7
emerges which clearly indicates where families were living, the types of settlement which
attracted Chinese communities, and potential for physical evidence which may remain.
This thesis is geographically located within North Queensland but is not an exhaustive study of
the region. I scrutinise Chinese families residing in key towns and communities along the east
coast from Mackay, through the major ports of Townsville, Cairns and Cooktown and up to the
most northern point at Thursday Island. I look at families in towns and communities beyond the
coastal hinterland to the pastoral towns of the central west including Winton, Hughenden, and
Richmond, and the research area geographically takes in the remote dry tropics of Cloncurry
through to Camooweal near the Northern Territory border. I compare communities in the port
towns of the North West Gulf region including Burketown and Normanton to port towns along
the lush eastern sea board and scrutinise districts dominated by mining such as the Croydon,
Etheridge, Hodgkinson and Palmer River goldfields. (See Fig. 1.) The choice of communities is
representative of the regions’ development through the expansion of certain key industries,
targeting a range of towns and settlements within those regions.
While trying to isolate North Queensland statistics so that a statistical analysis could be made, it
was found impossible to isolate a North Queensland Chinese family presence from the rest of the
colony/State. A broader net needed to be cast so that numbers and location could be established.
As a result, it can be confidently stated that the majority of Chinese families within the whole of
Queensland have also been identified and scrutinised. For the purposes of this study the State has
been divided up into four geographical regions: Brisbane, the Southern Region excluding
Brisbane, the Central Region and the Northern Region. This was chosen to reflect general
historical and statistical boundaries to ensure that statistical comparisons could be drawn
between the regions, and analyses developed for the North.
The thesis does not favour any particular theoretical approach but is guided by what may be
considered a gendered framework whereby women and families are the core loci when
considering the hypothesis and questions which frame the historical investigation. I would prefer
to think that I take a gender, age and race neutral approach to this thesis, with the intention to
provide an integrated approach to the questions where multiple considerations and perspectives
are required. This is important so that the complexities of diverse cultural backgrounds, White,
Chinese and Aboriginal interactions are all considered and presented in a cohesive, respectful
and culturally appropriate manner.
8
***
Methodology
The methodology used in this thesis conforms to standard historical research practice by
incorporating quantitative and qualitative research methods. The theoretical underpinning
provided by literature on transnationalism is supplemented by analysis of primary and secondary
sources, including newspapers, diaries, maps and historical surveys, cultural heritage sites and
oral history. The strength of this format relies on its wide and multi-layered approach, and
analysis of official primary documents including Births, Deaths and Marriages, Justice Records,
Police records, Commonwealth Immigration records, Alien Registration records and War
records as the major statistical framework in which to develop findings about location and social
fabric. The official data from various sources has been cross referenced and counter matched
with family history, newspaper accounts, local burial records and local government records to
ensure the most accurate family data can be obtained.
The capture of every single marriage, union or family within Queensland for the study period, is
a huge task, particularly when attention turns to the first and second generation Queensland born
marriages/unions and families. To ensure that the statistical evaluation of the thesis remains
controllable, an emphasis is placed on the first married/ union couple associated with settlement
in Queensland with only passing, example specific reference, made to subsequent Australian
born Chinese children. The first known couple will be referred to as the “primary” couple or
family with their children referred to as the “first” generation born in Queensland/ Australian
born children of Chinese. In turn, children born from the union of first generation Australian
born Chinese (ABC) will be referred to as “second” generation ABC and so forth. This thesis is
limited for most part to “primary” families only.
All care has been taken to identify as many names of women who are known to have been
married or living with a Chinese man in whatever form of relationship within the study period. A
very large database has been developed from a range of primary and secondary sources to
identify women who lived with Chinese men; married or not.3 Official marriages identified
through the Births, Deaths and Marriages Queensland register (BDM), Church registers, or
sighted marriage certificates, have been entered into a database known as “Marriages”. A second
data set forms the basis for statistics of “Co-habitative relationships” or “unions”, de-facto,
3 The “Robb Database: Marriages and Unions: 1848-1920” is made up from two data sets: couples legally registered under the
Marriage Act 1864 and couples identified as living together in defacto or casual intimate relations and catagorised as a “union”.
9
casual intimate relations or otherwise, which also occurred at the time. This data set is extracted
from unions identified through a variety of sources such as registers of births and deaths, police
and justice records, marriage ledgers in church records for unions not registered in the BDM
registers, Chinese marriages which occurred within China but which were not officially recorded
in Queensland, and articles contained in newspapers and books. For the purpose of this thesis, all
women living with a Chinese man for this period are referred to as ‘wife’, including de facto or
co-dependent unions unless specified.
However, it is acknowledged that there are some irregularities within my data set “Robb
Database: Marriages and Unions, 1848-1920”, due to a range of issues including data entry and
the information itself. For example: variations in men’s and women’s names has led to doubled
entries; White women remarrying another Chinese man after the death of her first husband, have
been mistaken as a first generation Australian born Chinese daughter of a primary couple;
Aboriginal women partnering which Chinese men are not captured in Births, Deaths and
Marriages or when they are, have multiple names for the one person such as Maggie/ Annie/
Topsy; and lastly, Chinese women’s names may have originally been inaccurately recorded at
the time of marriage, births or deaths, if recorded at all, leading to the potential for a data entry
mistake to occur. These issues have contributed to a small margin of error. However, over the
years of compilation, and due to digitization of resources such as Queensland’s Births, Deaths
and Marriage which have been put online, and historical newspapers made available at TROVE
through the National Library of Australia, I am confident that much of the irregularity has been
corrected. This will improve further as new information comes to light. I am confident that the
statistics presented in this thesis have about a 2% data error at this point in time for overall
numbers of couples identified, and I doubt that substantial numbers of couples will emerge in the
future to dramatically change the overall figures to affect the findings of this thesis.
The quantitative data has been verified and enhanced by a collection of personal
communications and a small amount of oral history interviews. This part of the research has
drawn on 50 + previous interviews undertaken as part of my honours thesis, “Wives of Chinese
men: Strategies for Survival” undertaken in 2002, and in a private consultancy project on the
Cairns Chinese community in 2004. Oral history provides a social context to the statistical
information and clarifies location of family in a geographical landscape. In addition, a limited
number of interviews and personal communications have since been undertaken with both male
and female descendants of Chinese families or members of the broader community. This
10
material is highly subjective and based on a combination of accurate account, memory and in
some cases family myth. However, this in no way detracts from the content which is
acknowledged as an individual’s “Truth”. As this is a social geographical thesis based largely
on quantitative statistics and locational mapping, the qualitative aspect of research provides a
valuable grounding and support to the quantitative findings.
There are several limitations to the research and writing of this thesis. Firstly, not only is it a
large topic, but primary information relating to Chinese settlers and their families throughout
North Queensland is often hidden deep in primary source records located at either the State or
Commonwealth archives, requiring time to find, patience to cross match data, and resources to
undertake. This is even before couples are identified and entered into the data base or
descendants linked to the correct family before interviews with these descendants can take place.
This has led to the locations of some families unintentionally having been apportioned the wrong
location.
Secondly, when this thesis was commenced, Queensland’s official Births, Deaths and Marriage
information was located on microfiche sheets – four different sets. It is possible that couples may
have been missed when trawling through the sets of Births Deaths and Marriage microfiche late
at night, and I have not had time to cross reference now that they are digitized and some data
made available online. As painful as this process was at the time, this methodology has remained
the most reliable one because despite digitization, there are names in my dataset from the
microfiche which do not come up on the online repository.4 In addition, technological advances
and digitization programs by some repositories over the course of the thesis, such as the
Commonwealth Immigration Records (Certificate of Exemption to the Dictation Test – CEDT)
not only opened up new lines of enquiry, but led to a natural incorporation of information in
order to keep up with relevant to the thesis. While this alleviated some of the logistical
difficulties of accessing information, it also meant additional time was needed to access, collate
and cross reference data. However, technological advancement and digitization also brought its
joys, as photos of women and families became available. These have been sometimes the first
images families have seen of their ancestors who lived in North Queensland.
4 Without knowing the names of people to search in the first place, the BDM online cannot be interrogated successfully and
therefore is limited in its ability to reveal all of the names of couples or couples who had children.
11
Thirdly, the geographical area outlined in the thesis is very large and subject to the seasonal
vagaries of the Wet and Dry seasons; both hazards for the survival of paper records. Records
pertaining to local councils such as Rates and Valuations, Council Minutes or Sanitary Registers
for example are kept in a range of repositories and conditions with many records in rural and
remote local council areas damaged by flood, eaten by book worm, silverfish or termites, thrown
down mine shafts or too fragile for use due to the conditions they have been stored in. I have
spent years in my holidays from work tracking down, negotiating access, and travelling vast
distances to view and record these valuable resources so that I could scrutinise the information at
home. They have been retrieved from unusual places and viewed in unsuitable conditions, and I
have provided my services to assess their value, catalogue and store them in more appropriate
places. In some cases, it took two years before I was given access to the records. As a result, I
would say that building relationships and reciprocity in rural and regional communities became
an essential part of the process and success to research in Central and North Western
Queensland.
Lastly, it is my observation that in towns, particularly in the North West and North Western
Gulf areas, residents are completely unaware of their Chinese settler history or the important role
Chinese settlers and their families played in the development and health of the community. In
addition, there are many contemporary families of mixed heritage background who are unaware
of their heritage or have only recently learned of a Chinese ancestor. This has led to confusion in
identity and rifts in families as descendants struggle to come to terms with what seems to be a
long-kept secret, but to the aging keepers has been a method of protection from prejudice in the
wider community. Either way, loss of collective community and/or family memory has resulted
in early Chinese sites being forgotten and knowledge of their location lost over time.
In the course of researching the question of who were the couples and families, where did they
live and how important were women to Chinatowns and cultural precincts throughout North
Queensland, some additional research areas emerged which remain outside the scope of this
thesis but which are worth mentioning. There were a number of dark themes concerning
individuals, couples, men, women and families which were not explored including incidences of
suicide, unlawful activities, verbal and physical violence, domestic violence, and abandonment.
In addition, the full range of women’s experiences were not explored such as some women/
wives working as prostitutes, ended up destitute, or were interned in benevolent asylums such as
Dunwich Benevolent Asylum. Likewise, children’s experiences remain unexplored, particularly
12
those of mixed heritage children who were sometimes forcibly removed from a Chinese father or
taken away from a White mother who had been charged with “vagrancy”. These children
become caught up in colonial orphanages, consigned to the reformatory system, or farmed out as
cheap labour. Some were abandoned, some were sold and some went into a life of crime
suffering from anti-social behaviour, difficulties with the law, and dislocation from community. I
predict these will be new research areas of the future.
***
Chapter Outline
There are ten chapters in this thesis which are sectioned off after the literature review into three
components aligned to the research questions. Chapter 1, Introduction, outlines the aims,
research questions, methodology and perimeters of the thesis while Chapter 2 undertakes a
comprehensive Literature Review of contemporary interpretations of the study of Chinese
families in the Chinese Diaspora. This provides an overarching context as to where this body of
work lies within national and international scholarly studies of the overseas Chinese. Chapter 3,
Historical settlement of Chinese families in North Queensland, provides the first chapter to
address research questions through a broad contextual history of the Chinese settlement across
North Queensland, highlighting the key economic influences which drove settlement expansion.
This is followed by Chapter 4, Chinatowns and Cultural precincts, a chapter aimed at exploring
the urban and built environment associated with overseas Chinese settlement. I have felt it is
important to draw upon other scholarly work in this chapter, in particular the work of Chuenyan
Lai5 from Canada, in order to position Queensland’s pattern of urban development. It is also a
very useful framework to insert gender and age considerations it on Chinatown and precinct
environments. Hopefully this demonstrates the physical development of North Queensland’s
Chinese settlement types and provides enough scope for my new theory of String Communities
to emerge.
The second section to address some of the research questions and relates to family and family
formation commences with Chapter 5: Overview: Families Associated with Chinese men in
North Queensland. As it implies, this chapter provides an overview of the type of families
associated with Chinese men across Queensland and North Queensland. It takes a quantitative
approach to demonstrate the complex range of partnerships entered into by Chinese men in order
to create families in their host land. This chapter identifies the three main types of wives and
5 David Chuenyan Lai, Chinatowns: Town within cities in Canada, (University of British Columbia Press, 1988).
13
lovers associated with the Chinese Family Landscape and North Queensland’s statistics are
compared to the rest of the State to highlight the significant part North Queensland played in the
overseas Chinese story. Queensland trends are also compared to other colonial statistics where
known or undertaken by other researchers, but much more is needed in this area to draw out any
conclusive family trends.
Chapters 6, 7 and 8 introduce the three main ethnic types of woman identified as wives and
partners of Chinese men. All three chapters rely on quantitative data which has been compiled as
part of my statistical dataset to reflect, with a reliable degree of accuracy, the numbers of
marriages and relationships Chinese men entered into across Queensland in the nineteenth and
twentieth centuries. Chapter 6, “A good yellow man is better than a bad white one”: White
women and Chinese men, sets out and analyses the statistics surrounding marriage and
partnering of White women to Chinese men in North Queensland while also comparing and
contrasting this information with known figures from around Australia as well as other host
countries around the globe. Chapter 7, “Number four wife catchem boy…”: Chinese Female
Diaspora, sets out and analyses the Chinese Female Diaspora of the nineteenth and early
twentieth centuries to North Queensland and compares and contrast these statistics with known
figures from around Australia as well as other destination countries around the globe. Lastly,
Chapter 8, “Co-habitating with his Aboriginal Paramour”: Aboriginal women and Chinese
men, sets out and analyses the statistics surrounding marriage and partnering of Aboriginal
women to Chinese men across North Queensland where information is available. It also
compares and contrasts this information with known figures from around Australia as well as
other host countries around the globe. These three chapters, together, present key findings about
each group of women.
Chapter 9, The Chinese Family Landscape, presents all information together: the ideas and
theories behind formation of Chinatowns and precinct, the statistical mapping of couples, and
the context of three key industries in determining settlement patterns with the visual mapping of
physical locations where couples, women and families lived. Through the methodological
integration of statistics and spatial mapping, a recalibration of narrative associated with the
Chinese Diaspora can occur, using North Queensland as a case study. It shows that no longer can
the Diaspora be represented as a male only activity, or that Chinatowns and cultural precincts
were bachelor societies. Instead communities were age and gender diverse and complex in social
and physical structure. Women and families were very present in each community and their
14
existence increased the likelihood of community longevity through the Queensland generated
renewal process. Key findings and observations are summed up and restated in Chapter 10, the
Conclusion. This chapter will also outline research areas which have emerged during the course
of research but which are not explored as they fall outside the scope of this thesis.
***
Conclusion
To aid the understanding of the thesis and its integrated historical/ heritage approach some key
definitions are required to be explained to ensure that the reader is conversant with particular
terms. These definitions are located in the Glossary and are set out in alphabetical order to assist
a fast reference to particular terms which may be used throughout the thesis. Some may be used
interchangeably and this also will be explained in the Glossary.6
This thesis will provide a greater understanding of Queensland’s Chinese Australian history and
contribute to the broader understanding of Chinese settlement within Australia. Through the
development of a quantitative framework supported by qualitative data, women and families
associated with the Chinese Diaspora to North Queensland are revealed such that they can no
longer be ignored. This information can be used as a guide to inform future historical research
and as well as cultural heritage surveys. I am confident that it will contribute to meaningful
development of appropriate and accurate interpretation of sites which are associated with
Chinese settlement and Chinese families throughout North Queensland as well as contribute to
comparative studies at national and international level pertaining to the Chinese Diaspora.
6 For definitions of terminology, refer to Glossary Definitions
15
Fig. 1. Map of Queensland showing North Queensland region of study7
7 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regions_of_Queensland#/media/File:Queensland_roads.svg
16
C h a p t e r 2
LITERATURE REVIEW
Introduction
Studies which use an integrated gendered and age approach to historical research concerning
Chinese communities across North Queensland, have been absent from histories of the broader
settlement experience. Prior to the 1970s, very little attention was paid to Chinese settlement
history across Australia at all, and what was written focused on a colonial response to Chinese
migration and degrees of assimilation from a White Australian position rather from a Chinese
response to emigration and settlement in a foreign land. In the 1980s, academic focus shifted,
and alternative historical perspectives began to be explored and emerge. This positioned Chinese
migrants and settlers at the centre of race relations, settlement patterns, and matters relating to
the larger experience of Chinese Diaspora. Driven by a push for revisionist perspectives and
enhanced from within the Chinese community itself, studies since the mid-1990s emphasised the
rich textures of political, migrant, and social organisation history. This approach was
consolidated ten years later as recognition for an interdisciplinary and multi-disciplinary
approach to Chinese settlement emerged as a means to frame the diverse experiences. Taking in
major contributions from historical, anthropological, archaeological, sociological, and
psychological approaches, themes of cultural and transnational identity, cultural pluralism and
displacement theory were able to be explored. Despite a number of decades of historiographical
development, analysis of scholarly literature across the nation reveals that only a handful of
dedicated researchers have focused solely on women, families and the private sphere in recent
times, despite a rise from within the Chinese Australian community to investigate and document
family histories.
It is ironic that for much of the time, the construction of narrative relating to the Chinese
Diaspora remains as a male-only experience when in reality, migration was based on the very
bedrock of traditional “family” structure, which naturally included women. Through clan and
kinship relations, Tongs, chain migration and marriage relations, as well as the presence of non-
Chinese women and children in host settlement communities, family was clearly at the centre of
migration and settlement experiences rather than separate to it. This literature review will
investigate the integration of gender and women into the Chinese Diaspora experience in order
to emplace North Queensland experiences in the literature. The first part includes a critique of
scholarly works about Chinese settlement, women and families in North Queensland and
17
Queensland, which will be compared against scholarly contributions at national level. This
critique will be expanded to review material undertaken at international level with particular
emphasis on the United States of America but also including British Columbia, and South
America. It will also take in a short analysis of works written about the South Pacific and Trans-
Tasman regional areas to firmly place the study of women and families associated with Chinese
men in North Queensland in a regional and tropical context where family and trade linkages/
competition were present between North Queensland and countries such as New Zealand, Papua
New Guinea, and Fiji. The critique is intended to position this thesis within current global
Diaspora research trends.
***
Part 1:
North Queensland and Queensland
Investigation of Chinese immigration and settlement to Queensland commenced in the late
1950s with an Honours thesis at the University of Queensland (Tan, 1958)8. Challenging
traditional historical perspectives and arguing that Chinese exclusion was based on racism rather
than labour protection, Tan failed in his effort to excite scholars to explore, challenge and
reposition Chinese settlement history into a more integrated and inclusive model. It wasn’t until
the 1970s that a departure from traditional White-dominant history emerged when a small
number of emerging scholars commenced investigation into Chinese settlement in Queensland
notably Cronin9; May10; Brown11; and Kirkman12. By re-positioning Chinese immigration and
settlement at the locus of historical discussion rather than using a traditional model13 used by
previous historians such as Jones14 and Bolton15, May, Cronin, and the work of Holmes, Jack
and Kerr on Ah Toy’s garden on the Palmer Goldfield, have emerged as important contributions
to reposition scholarly directions. In particular two seminal works influenced scholarly focus
when it came to North Queensland Chinese history: May’s seminal book Topsawyers: the
8 Robert Tan, The Chinese Question in Queensland during the nineteenth century: a Brief History of Racial conflict. A dissertation
for Third year Honours Course in History, University of Queensland, 1958.
9 Kathryn Cronin, The Chinese Question in Queensland in the Nineteenth Century – a study of Interaction, Bachelor of Arts
Honours Thesis, University of Queensland, 1970
10 Cathie May, “Chinese European Relations in Cairns during the Eighteen Eighties”, Lectures on North Queensland History- Series
1, (James Cook University, 1979): 121 -138.
11 R. B. Brown, “Chinese on the Gilbert River” in Lectures on North Queensland History – Series 3, (James Cook University,1979):
169-180
12 Kirkman, The Palmer Goldfield, B.A. (Hons) thesis, James Cook University, 1984.
13 The traditional model, while acknowledging a Chinese presence in the settlement story, interpreted and positioned Chinese
history from the dominant host society perspective or probably more accurately from a male Anglo-centric point of view.
14 Dorothy Jones, The Cardwell Story, Published for the Cardwell Shire Council, (Jacaranda Press, 1961); Dorothy Jones,
Hurricane Lamps and Blue Umbrellas: a history of the Shire of Johnstone to 1973, (G. K. Bolton Printers, 1973); Dorothy Jones,
Trinity Phoenix: a History of Cairns, Cairns and District Centenary Committee, (Cairns, Queensland, 1997).
15 G, C., Bolton, A Thousand Miles Away: a History of North Queensland to 1920, (Australian National University Press, 1972).
18
Chinese in Cairns, 1870-192016, and Jack, Holmes and Kerrs’ article on Ah Toys Garden17.
May’s book emerged to become the most widely referenced historical book for Queensland,
taking in themes of economics and race relations as a lens to view settlement patterns in North
Queensland. “Ah Toy’s Garden” has inspired many archaeologists and North Queensland
historians as the first archaeological survey of a Chinese heritage site in Queensland.
However, despite setting up a benchmark study, May’s work falls short of providing an
integrated approach to Chinese settlement studies, with its focus on the male experience only
and a demeaning of White wives through general references such as “European Wife” rather
than by an individuals’ names as is done with the male protagonists.
Robb took up the challenge to investigate, acknowledge and provide context to May’s
anonymous wives of Chinese men in the Cairns and surrounding districts. The preliminary paper
for an Honours thesis revealed women and families associated with Chinese men in Far North
Queensland helped to form a large and diverse community consisting of Caucasian, Chinese and
Aboriginal women married or living with Chinese men. This broadened into a dominant line of
enquiry through an Honours thesis resulting in an expanded geographical area and statistical
analysis project, forming a pilot study for this PhD thesis.18
Literature on women associated with Chinese men remained inhibited for two main reasons.
Firstly, feminist historians in Queensland concentrated their enquiries on readdressing the gender
imbalance in mainstream historical studies rather than ethnic groups. Queensland historians
Cahir19; Wegner20; Spearritt21; and Henningham22 concentrated scholarly efforts on themes of
settlement, industry, marriage and sexual economics as a means to insert women’s settlement
16 Cathie, May, Topsawyers: the Chinese in Cairns, 1870-1920, (James Cook University, Townsville, 1984).
17 Ian Jack, Kate Holmes and Ruth Kerr, “Ah Toy's Garden: A Chinese Market-Garden On the Palmer River Goldfield, North
Queensland”, Australian Historical Archaeology, 2, (1984): 5 -58
18 Sandi, Robb, “Discovering the Dragon; Revealing the Phoenix Within”, preliminary paper, (unpublished, 2001). and Sandi Robb,
Out of Sight, Out of Mind: Wives of Chinese men in North Queensland: Strategies for Survival, 1875-1935, Hons Thesis in
History, James Cook University, 2002; Sandi Robb, “European wives of Chinese men." Cairns Historical Society Bulletin
(2002); Sandi Robb, "Myths, Lies and Invisible Lives: European women and Chinese men in North Queensland 1870-1900",
Lilith: A Feminist History Journal, 12 (2003); Sandi Robb, "Houses of ill fame in Cairns Chinatown." Cairns Historical Society
Bulletin, (2004).
19 P., Cahir, “Women in North Queensland”, in B.J. Dalton (ed.), Lectures in North Queensland History, Second Series (History
Department, James Cook University, Townsville, 1975).
20 Janice Wegner, “Women on the North Queensland Mining Frontier, 1864-1919,” in Thorpe, R; Putt, Rand Thomson, J., (eds.),
Women in Isolation, collected papers, ANZAAS Congress, Women’s Studies, (James Cook University, Townsville, 1982).
andJanice Wegner, The Etheridge, Studies in North Queensland History No. 13 (Department of History and Politics, James Cook
University, 1990).
21 Katie Spearritt, “The Market for Marriage in Colonial Queensland”, Hecate, 16, 1 and 2 (1990): 23-38
22 Nikki Henningham, “‘Hats off, Gentlemen, to Our Australian Mothers!’: Representations of White Femininity in North
Queensland in the Early Twentieth Century”, Australian Historical Studies, 117 (October 2001): 311-21.
19
experiences into the general narrative. While a more inclusive gender approach was developing,
it did not include investigation of women where race or racial identity were present or
challenged through marriage choices such as White women marrying Chinese men. Secondly,
scholars from within the Chinese community remained silent. Chinese Queensland family
history had not developed, and there were few records left by women married or living with a
Chinese man from which to draw upon. As such, the mood to write about women and families
living with Chinese men was slow to develop, remaining secondary to broader questions raised
concerning elements associated with the dominant male experience including migration,
economics and race relations.
Since 2000 the interest in the Chinese Diaspora has increased dramatically, leading to a number
of academic scholars, heritage professionals and members of the Chinese community collecting,
writing and contributing to the understanding of Chinese settlement throughout North
Queensland and Queensland. Academic works within the broader Queensland context fall into
two categories: those with a primary focus on Chinese or Asian related history, and those who
insert Chinese contributions into the broader Anglo-centric settlement story. Whether works
were undertaken at Masters or Doctoral level, or published by established historians, the rise in
Chinese specific enquiry has been influenced by an accelerated interest at both national and
international level in the Chinese Diaspora. Chinese settlement related studies in Queensland
included topics of self-representation (Ling23), race relations (Reynolds24; Ganter25, Griffiths26,
Richards27); immigration and legislation (Wong Hoy28); or law, order, the judicial system and
policing, (Gouglas and Weaver29; Finnane30) as well as Queensland born Chinese participation in
23 Chek Ling, Plantings in a new land: Stories of Survival, Endurance and Emancipation, (Society of Chinese Australian
Academics of Queensland and Cathay Club Ltd, Queensland, 2001).
24 Henry Reynolds, North of Capricorn: the untold Story of Australia’s North, (Allen and Unwin, Sydney, 2003).
25 Regina Ganter, Mixed Relations: Asian Aboriginal contact in North Australia, (University of Western Australian Press, Crawley,
Perth, 2006).
26 Philip Gavin Griffiths, The making of White Australia: Ruling class Agendas, 1876-1888,PhD thesis, Australian National
University, 2006; Phil. Griffiths, “From Humiliation to Triumph: Sir Henry Parkes, the Squatters and the Anti-Chinese
Movement, 1877-1878”, Journal of Australian Colonial History, 12 (2010): 143-170; Phil Griffith, “The Strategic Fears of the
Ruling Class: The Construction of Queensland’s Chinese Immigration Regulation Act of 1877,” Australian Journal of Politics
and History, 58, 1 (2012): 1-19.
27 Mathew Daniel McCormack Richards, Race around Cairns: representations, perceptions and realities of race in the Trinity Bay
district 1876-1908, PhD thesis, James Cook University, 2010.
28 Kevin Wong Hoy, “Thursday Island 'en route' to citizenship and the Queensland goldfields: Chinese aliens and naturalised British
subjects, 1879-1903”, Journal of Australian Colonial History, 6: Active voices, hidden histories: the Chinese in Colonial
Australia, (2004): 159-174; Kevin Fredric Wong Hoy, Becoming British Subjects 1879-1903: Chinese in north Queensland,
M.A. thesis, Latrobe University, Victoria, 2006.
29 Sean Gouglas and John C. Weaver, “A post colonial Understanding of Law and Society: Exploring Criminal Trials in Colonial
Queensland”, Australian Journal of Legal History, 7, 2 (2003): 231-253
30 Mark Finnane, “Law as Politics: Chinese Litigants in late colonial Court Rooms”, Griffith University, paper presented at the 13th
International Conference of Australian Studies in China, Chengdu, July 2012.
20
the Australian Defence Forces (Kennedy31; Hamilton32). However, the inclusion of women and
families within Chinese Queensland research and analysis remains sporadic, with few scholars
engaging with the topic using a gender inclusive approach.33
An example of an integrated approach to Chinese settlement studies is Wong Hoy’s Master’s
thesis, ‘Becoming British subjects 1879-1903: Chinese in north Queensland’. This thesis
illustrates the value of a gender integrated approach to demonstrate the impact of legislative
restrictions of the White Australia policy and the effects on community and community
formation within a Queensland context. However, this approach is not shared by all emerging
scholars, with those who remain committed to writing race relations still doing so from a
traditional perspective. As such, the absence of a gender inclusive approach inhibits the
discussion of race relations and represents a lost opportunity to present the multi-faceted aspects
of race relations including how women were discriminated against through legislation and social
behavior in an effort to contain and control Chinese male immigration. Failure to explore
beyond gender stereotypes or traditional model norms is not confined to academics alone.
One continued issue for Chinese Diaspora studies is that an unconscious bias remains prevalent
at both local and State level, where historical researchers suffer from settlement amnesia. For
example, in the 21st century, it is disappointing to note that “big picture” publications undertaken
by professional historians including Evans34, Fitzgerald, and Megarrity and Symonds35, fail to
explore alternative settlement narratives or gendered voices within their revisionist
interpretations. Instead popular themes continue to be presented as an Anglo male response to
settlement, with limited exploration or integration of alternative perspectives.
Thematic or topic-based research and publications have provided a more apt platform for
researchers to explore Chinese settlement themes with studies into agriculture and health
showing clear improvements in the integration of new perspectives. Griggs’ Global Industry,
31Alastair Kennedy, Chinese-Australians Families in the Australian Defence Forces, paper delivered at China Inc conference, Cairns
2005; and Alastair Kennedy, “Chinese-Australians in the Australian Defence Forces before 1914”, Sabretache, 53, 2 (June 2012):
4-9.
32 John Hamilton, Gallipoli Sniper: the life of Billy Sing, (Pan Macmillan Australia, Sydney, 2008)
33 The same principle applies to the acknowledgement and insertion of Aboriginal perspectives into research and analysis. However,
failure to do so perpetuates the “us and them” divide and inhibits full discussion of issues faced by Aboriginal families which may
have synergies with White and Chinese women.
34 Raymond Evans, A History of Queensland, (Cambridge University Press, 2007).
35 Ross Fitzgerald, Lyndon Megarrityand David Symonds, Made in Queensland: A New History, (University of Queensland Press,
2009).
21
Local Innovation: the history of cane sugar production in Australia, 1820-1995,36 includes a
well-integrated racial approach to the sugar industry, acknowledging contributions from a range
of non-White settlers with an emphasis on Chinese sugar industry participation. Another
important agricultural study is the PhD thesis by Gilmore37 which dedicates a chapter to Chinese
agriculture on the Atherton Tablelands, while Ree38 provides a comprehensive analysis of the
state of public health and its relation to Chinese in his thesis.
Broader local histories also are slowly becoming more inclusive with recent publications across
North Queensland incorporating some Chinese settlement perspectives, such as Douglas39; Shay
and Shay40; Forrest and Forrest41; and Hanson, Megarrity, Menghetti).42 However, any gains in
this area have been hampered by some researchers continuing to write from a traditional
perspective.43 This has inhibited an inclusive narrative from emerging. While unconscious bias
towards White settlement is particularly true in rural and remote areas of North Queensland, it is
not the only amnesia maintained for cultural advantage. “Cuckoo-ing” or ousting of a former
migrant group by a later migrant group, is evident in at least one local history, the Lower
Herbert region, where the district’s substantial Chinese history is forgotten and replaced by a
later Italian one (Vidonja Balanzategui, 2011; Vidonja Balanzategui, 2015).44As a result, it is a
revelation to contemporary residents that the region supported a sizable Chinese population in
the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, despite the fact that there are many Chinese
descendants in the community today.
***
36 Peter D. Griggs, Global Industry, Local Innovation: the history of cane sugar production in Australia, 1820-1995. (Peter Lang,
Bern, Switerland 2011)
37 Marjorie Anne Gilmore, Kill, cure or strangle: The history of government intervention in three key agricultural industries on the
Atherton Tablelands, 1895 – 2005. PhD thesis, James Cook University, 2005.
38 Gerald Hugo Ree, Policing Public Health in Queensland, 1859-1919, PhD Thesis, Griffith University, 2010.
39 Douglas Barrie, Minding my Business: The History of Bemerside and Lower Herbert River District (S and D Barrie, Ingham,
2003).
40 Bev and John Shay, The Chinese on the Goldfields (The Cooktown and District Historical Society, 199-)
41 Peter and Sheila Forrest, Vision Splendid: A history of the Winton District, Western Queensland, (Winton Shire Council and
Winton District Historical Society and Museum Inc., 2005).
42 Geoff Hanson, Lyndon Megarrity, Diane Menghetti, Goldfields that Made Townsville: Cape River, Ravenswood, Charters
Towers, North Queensland History Series No. 8, North Queensland History Preservation Society, (Townsville Museum and
Historical Society 2018).
43 When discussing with an author in Hughenden the possibility of including the settlement story of the Chinese market gardeners in
her much-anticipated local Shire history, her response was amazement that the notion would even be considered, despite the fact
that they kept the town, stations and district supplied with vegetables and fruit for approximately 70 years.
44 Bianka Vidonja Balanzategui, The Herbert River Story (Hinchinbrook Shire Council, 2011); Bianka Vidonja Balanzategui,
Gentlemen of the Flashing Blade (Department of History and Politics, James Cook University, 1990). This is despite an earlier
study which incorporated the Chinese: Janice Wegner, Hinchinbrook: the Hinchinbrook Shire Council, 1879-1979, M.A. thesis in
History, James Cook University, 1984.
22
Gender and the Diaspora
Research into women and families associated with Chinese men has remained slow to develop,
and largely absent from discussion (e.g. Fitzgerald45). It has been neglected as an addition to the
male experience (e.g. May46) and stereotyped in an offensive manner (e.g. Beattie47). Since
1970 only four researchers have addressed this gap in knowledge in Queensland, commencing
with an unpublished thesis on the history of the Chinese on the Darling Downs by Fischer in the
mid-1990s.48 Fischer’s work is important for its sensitive acknowledgement of individual
women (White) married to Chinese men, and through its documentation of the contribution of
families to the Darling Downs and South East Queensland region. However, the work falls short
through its limitation of marriages to interracial marriages between Chinese men and White
women only. By omitting other relationships such as Chinese and Aboriginal wives, lovers, defacto,
and casual unions and absent families, the full diversity of families, and meaning of
families, in this early settlement phase remains underrepresented.
In 2004/2005 further research was undertaken in South-east Queensland through the works of
two researchers who sought to redress this imbalance. Focusing on the Chinatown community of
Brisbane and associated urban landscapes, both Tan49 and Fisher50 provide excellent historical
research into the Chinese community driven from two different angles. On the one hand, Tan
provides an important critique written from a Chinese perspective which gives voice to the
difficulties faced by many individuals and families as they strove to be accepted as equal to
White Australians and legitimate citizens. She reminds the reader that the process of
racialization that Chinese Australians went through on account of their “Chineseness” meant that
historically, Chinese settlers were cast outside the scope of nation building identity through the
promotion of “Chineseness” and “Australianness” as mutually exclusive. This positions “the
Chinese’ as the perpetual “other”, cast away as either foreign or outside the Australian nation
45 Ross Fitzgerald, “The Chinese in Queensland” , Quadrant, 34, 5 (May 1990): 34-39
46 May, Topsawyers, Appendix O. Appendix O records the names of prominent Chinese individuals and business firms (all male).
While a synopsis is provided about the individuals, the women are referred to in a dismissive manner that he is “married to a
European/Chinese woman”. As the woman is not identified by her name other than her race, she remains nameless, voiceless and
invisible in the settlement story.
47 George Beattie, The settlement and integration of the Chinese in Brisbane, PhD Thesis, University of Queensland, 1986.Beattie’s
work is particularly offensive for a lack of critique of sources, a perpetuation of myths and stereotypes, and its subjective
portrayal of women and families in sentences such as “As the first Commonwealth Census taken in 1911 shows that only 801
married Chinese men in the country were living with their wives, including those who had married Chinese women, this suggests
that a good many of Australia’s half –Chinese children up till then were probably born out of wedlock. It seems little doubt that
the isolation and loneliness experienced by some Chinese men drove them to seek the companionship of a European or
Aboriginal woman with no thought of binding the relationship.” (p. 129)
48 Anne M. Fischer, The Forgotten Pioneers: The Chinese in Southern Inland Queensland (1848 to circa 1914), M.A. in Asian
Studies, University of Southern Queensland, 1995.
49 Carol Ann Tan, Chinese Inscriptions': Australian-born Chinese lives, PhD thesis, University of Queensland 2004.
50 Joan Fisher, The Brisbane Overseas Chinese Community, 1860s to 1970s: Enigma or conformity, PhD Thesis, University of
Queensland, 2005.
23
psyche. This left a mark on a personal sense of self and belonging. As Tan notes it described a
cultural barrier when it came to being Australian and inscribes the notion of ‘Chineseness’
whether individuals felt ‘Chinese’ or not.51
On the other hand, Fisher provides an overview of women and family inserted into the broader
themes of social structures, organisations, religious practices and occupations. Fisher’s work
provides a valuable comparison between the Brisbane Chinese community and the Cairns and
North Queensland communities as outlined by May in 1984. However, Fisher’s thesis
incorporates limited discussion about the social impact of the introduction of women and family
to the Brisbane communities, and the census figures consulted were not broad enough to provide
an accurate picture. As a result, women are underrepresented statistically and do not indicate the
full range of women in the Chinese community. In contrast, researchers in North Queensland
have been documenting the range of women associated with the Chinese Diaspora and analyzing
them using two different discipline approaches.
Taking an anthropological approach to Chinese family relations in a Queensland environment,
Ramsay52 set about researching and recording Aboriginal women and Chinese men’s interracial
marriages, using self-perception, cultural identity and cross racial relationships, to explore
alternative themes of marginalised race relations from an Aboriginal perspective. Challenging
racial narratives of White versus minority, or White versus Aboriginal, he draws out the complex
framework of group relations and bi-cultural identity formation which developed, focusing on
Aboriginal- Chinese relations juxtaposed against a White dominant background. However,
despite his work being innovative in the field of Chinese Diaspora studies, his approach fails to
integrate these experiences within a broader Diaspora context whereby Chinese men sought
“family” as overseas settlers. Nor does he explore the importance of these families to the
Chinese men and constraints faced by them in choosing families such as the risk of separation
through prohibitive legislation with wives and children separated from the men, or
Commonwealth rejection of requests to take Aboriginal-Chinese children home to China to fulfil
filial and cultural obligations. Ramsay also does not acknowledge that Chinese men had
51 Tan, “Chinese Inscriptions': Australian-born Chinese lives.”
52 Guy Ramsay, “The Family and Cultural Identity in Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders of Chinese Ancestry : A Rural- Urban
divide”Journal of Family Studies, Vol. 6, No 2, (October 2000): 199-213 and Guy, Ramsay, “Myth Moment and the Challenge
of Identities: Stories from Australians of Indigenous and Chinese Ancestry”, Journal of Intercultural Studies, Vol, 22, No. 3,
(2001); Guy Ramsay, “Cherbourgs’s Chinatown: Creating an identity of Place on Australian Aboriginal settlement”, Journal of
Historical Geography, 29,1 (2003): 109-122; Guy, Ramsay, Chapter 3, “The Chinese Diaspora in Torres Strait Cross Cultural
Connections and Contentions on Thursday Island”, in Shnukal, Anna ; Nagata, Yuriko and Ramsay, Guy (Eds) Navigating
Boundaries : The Asian Diaspora in Torres Strait, (Canberra, Australia, 2004): 53-74
24
relationships with a range of women partners, of which Aboriginal women were only one partner
type.
The area of Chinese-Aboriginal relationships has had a slow uptake in interest for historians
with the discipline of anthropology taking the lead into investigations. More recent
investigations have been made by anthropologists in families in the remote North West
Burketown region, North Queensland. Work undertaken by Trigger, Martin, and McLean in
201453 and Maclean, Trigger and Martin in 201654 outline the intricate and interwoven familial
kinship pattern associated with Aboriginal Chinese families. This work has provided excellent
reference for developing a historical understanding for the timing of interracial unions: a really
important aspect when traditional customary law is taken into account regarding Aboriginal
women’s choice of marriage partners. However, it remains easy for broader Queensland scholars
to simply note that there were “many” Chinese – Aboriginal partnerships during the early phase
of settlement.
Slocombe in her book on the Burnet and Wide Bay districts55 notes that there were “many”
informal marriages between Chinese men and Aboriginal women without statistical evidence to
back up the claim as to what constitutes ‘many’. This is where the problem lies: assertions about
White- Chinese and Aboriginal- Chinese relationships in Queensland are often based on
historical assumptions and not verified through evidence-based research. As a result, Chinese-
Aboriginal partnering experiences remain classified as “many”, when in fact, they may have
been few. What remains is that on a State or Colonial level, they are not well understood, nor
their cultural context from an Aboriginal point of view.
What is now not disputed, due to the work of Rains, Robb, and Wong Hoy,56 is that Northern
Australia, in particular, Northern Queensland, was an important regional and national part of the
Chinese Diaspora to Australia in the 19th and early 20th centuries. This was confirmed at the
inaugural Chinese Heritage in Northern Australia Incorporated (CHINA Inc.) conference in
53 David Trigger, Richard Martin and Hilda McLean, “Researching Mixed Ancestries in Northern Australia’s Gulf Country: the
politics of identity, indigeneity and race”, paper delivered to Chinese Heritage in North Australia (CHINA Inc ) conference, 22-24
February 2014, Cairns.
54 Hilda Maclean, David Trigger and Richard Martin, “Chinese - Aboriginal Identity, Indigeneity and Diaspora in Northern
Australia”, paper presented at the 9th International Conference of the International Society of Chinese Overseas (ISSCO), at
University of British Columbia 2016.
55 Margaret Slocomb, Among Australia's Pioneers: Chinese indentured pastoral workers on the Northern Frontier 1848 to c.1880
(Balboa press, Bloomington, 2014).
56 In 2005, at a conference in Bendigo, Kevin Rains, Sandi Robb and Kevin Wong Hoy decided to start a northern Australian
platform to research, write and present the importance of Northern Australia to the national narrative of Chinese Diaspora studies.
As a result. Chinese Heritage in Northern Australia Inc was formed and conferences held every two years in Northern Australia.
25
Cairns in 2006, and through speakers at subsequent conferences and articles in published
proceedings: Grimwade57, Rains58, Dunk59and historians McGregor60, Wong Hoy61, Robb62,
Wegner63 Couchman64, Gapps65 and Richards66, local and family historians Low Choy67,
Volkmar68, Timmerman69, Ellams and Kahabka70 and Ingham Family History Society
Incorporated,71 as well as from the Chinese community itself: Hayward72, Leong,73 and the
Cairns and District Chinese Association Incorporated – CADCAI.74 The last group of
researchers in particular offer an important interface to understand the Chinese Diaspora as they
speak with personal authority from within the community.
Family histories
It is well accepted that self-representation of Chinese voice, and self-actualisation of the Chinese
Australian family, is a vital part in the pursuit of meaningful scholarly research. While the use of
57 Gordon Grimwade, “The Hou Wang Temple, Atherton”, paper presented at the Rediscovered Past: Chinese Tropical Australia
conference February 11-12, 2012 for CHINA INC, Cairns, 2012.
58 Kevin Rains, “Chinese involvement in the Beche-de-mer and Pearling Industries of North Queensland”, paper presented at the
Rediscovered Past: Chinese Tropical Australia conference February 11-12, 2012 for CHINA INC, Cairns, 2012.
59 Melissa Dunk, “Rediscovering material culture: An insight into the overseas Chinese in Atherton Chinatown,
Queensland 1880-1920”, paper presented at the Rediscovered Past: Chinese Tropical Australia conference February 11-12, 2012 for
CHINA INC, Cairns, 2012.
60 Paul Macgregor, “Was Melbourne’s Lowe Kong Meng a pioneer of tropical Australia?”, paper presented at the Rediscovered
Past: Chinese Tropical Australia conference February 11-12, 2012 for CHINA INC, Cairns, 2012.
61 Kevin Wong Hoy, “Far from the glory of heaven: Joseph Tear Tack (1857-1901), a Methodist minister in nineteenth century
Australia”, paper presented at the Rediscovered Past: Chinese Tropical Australia conference February 11-12, 2012 for CHINA
INC, Cairns, 2012.; and Kevin Wong Hoy, “Cheon of the Never Never: Cooking with flair in the Northern Territory, 1902-
1919”, paper presented at the Rediscovered Past: Chinese Tropical Australia conference February 11-12, 2012 for CHINA INC,
Cairns, 2012.
62 Sandi Robb, “Chinese marriage and families: a statistical look at the pattern of settlement across Queensland: 1850-1920”, paper
presented at The 9th ISSCO International Conference held in Vancouver on July 6-8, 2016.
63 Janice Wegner and Sandi Robb,”Chinese in the Sugar: a case study from the Ingham district.” In Robb, Sandi and Rains, K, (Eds)
Northern Links: Chinese in Tropical Australia, Chinese Heritage in Northern Australia, 2014: publication from 2012 conference,
Chinese Heritage in Northern Australia (CHINA INC), 2014.
64 Sophie Couchman, “Souveniring Chinese in the Northern Territory”, paper presented at the Rediscovered Past: Chinese Tropical
Australia conference February 11-12, 2012 for CHINA INC, Cairns, 2012.
65 Stephen Gapps, “Chinese Boat Building in Northern Australia”, paper presented at the Rediscovered Past: Chinese Tropical
Australia, Chinese Heritage in Northern Australia (CHINA INC), conference February 11-12, (2013).
66 Jonathon Richards, “Chinese Exhumations”, paper presented at the Rediscovered Past: Chinese Tropical Australia, Chinese
Heritage in Northern Australia (CHINA INC), conference February 11-12, (2013).
67 Darryl Low Choy, “Sojourners, Settlers, Selectors and Subjects: Interpreting a family history through a palimpsest approach”,
paper presented at the Rediscovered Past: Chinese Tropical Australia conference February 11-12, 2012 for CHINA INC, Cairns,
2012.
68 Julia Volkmar, “A Company of his Countrymen: Refining the Hop Wah story, a work in progress”, paper presented at the
Rediscovered Past: Chinese Tropical Australia conference February 11-12, 2012 for CHINA INC, Cairns, 2012.
69 Myra Timmerman, “Possibly both a ‘whiteman’ and a Chinese: a work-in-progress on James Ah Ching”, paper presented at the
Rediscovered Past: Chinese Tropical Australia conference February 11-12, 2012 for CHINA INC, Cairns, 2012
70 Helen Ellems and Jana Kahabka, “My ‘Half Full Lations’: Unravelling the threads”, paper presented at the Rediscovered Past:
Chinese Tropical Australia conference February 11-12, 2012 for CHINA INC, Cairns, 2012
71 The Ingham Family History Society Incorporated in conjunction with Sandi Robb are researching and designing an exhibition on
the Chinese in the Lower Herbert Region to be held on the 2-18 February 2018.
72 Sim Hayward, Keynote address, “Chinese Cuisine”, paper presented at the Rediscovered Past: Chinese Tropical Australia
conference February 11-12, 2012 for CHINA INC, Cairns, 2012.
73 Sandi Robb and Dr Joe Leong, Robb, Sandi, and Leong, Joe “Casting seeds to the wind: my journey to North Queensland.” In:
Grimwade, Gordon, Rains, Kevin, and Dunk, Melissa, (eds.) Rediscovered Past: Chinese networks. Chinese Heritage in North
Australia Incorporated, East Ipswich, QLD, Australia, (2016) pp. 1-6.
74 CADCAI, “Lit Sung Goong Temple Collection” paper presented at the Rediscovered Past: Chinese Tropical Australia conference
February 11-12, 2012 for CHINA INC, Cairns, 2012.
26
oral history is an integral part of the research process, it cannot provide the depth and breadth of
family experience better than the “voice” contained in personal autobiographical or family
biographical accounts. Autobiographical and biographical works in Queensland remain
historically scant with few published. For the most part, Chinese Queensland experiences remain
in private family collections as unpublished family documents or, given the recent rise in interest
since 2005, remain works in progress.
Two of the earliest and most famous autobiographical accounts from Queensland’s early
Chinese settlers include the published work of Taam Sze Pui75 and unpublished manuscript of
Tam Sie76 in the mid-1920s. However, it was not until the 1970s that family historians began to
document family history for future generations. Between 1970 and the mid-2000s families
throughout North Queensland have quietly been recording family histories with assorted papers
and manuscripts providing a rich and personal texture to any academic enquiry. With the
exception of a handful of writers such as Lin Foy, 197077; King Koi, 199378; Low Choy, 200179;
Wong Hoy, 201080; and Rains, 2011,81 whose works are all publically available as published
works, there are a number of unpublished papers and manuscripts which remain in private
family collections: Forday82, Ching83, Bow84, Keong85, Field86, O’Neil87, Shang88, and Morris.89
In addition many more works are in progress: Ellams,90 Dooley91, Volkmar92, and Timmerman.93
75 Taam, Sze Pui. My Life and Work (Hong Kong, 1926).
76 Tam Sie, Memoirs 1875-1925, unpublished typescript, Mitchell Library, ML DOC 1532
77 Amy Lin Foy, “The Pangs and the Lin Foys”, Cairns Historical Society Bulletin, No. 136 (1970).
78 Norma King Koi, “Discovering my heritage: an oral history of my maternal family: the Ah Moons of Townsville 1888-1945”, in
Paul Macgregor, (ed.), Histories of the Chinese in Australia and the South Pacific, Proceedings of an international public
conference held at the Museum of Chinese Australian History, Melbourne, (Museum of Chinese Australian History, 1993): 287-
299.
79 Darryl Low Choy, “The Quintessentially Assimilated: Darryl Low Choy’s Story”.in Ling, Chek (ed), Plantings in a new land:
Stories of Survival, Endurance and Emancipation (Society of Chinese Australian Academics of Queensland and Cathay Club
Ltd, Queensland, 2001)
80 K. Wong Hoy (Ed.), Miscellany: a further collection of stories by descendants of the Yet Foy family of Queensland (Kevin Wong
Hoy, North Melbourne, 2010).
81 Kevin Rains, Cedars of the west: the Ah Foo family story (Chinese Heritage in Northern Australia Inc, North Melbourne, 2011).
82W. Forday, Obituary, Rockhampton Morning Bulletin, Tuesday 22 July 1969, BIOGRAPHY in papers held at John Oxley Library
file “Chinese in Queensland”.
83 Henry Ching, date unknown, Neither East nor West: A Historical account of a Family Compiled and Edited by Henry Ching,
private family history document, pp. 1-21
84 Edmund Lee Wah Bow, My Memories of Times in Places I call Home-Shekki, Cairns and Hong Kong, China, unpublished
manuscript, date unknown; and Edmund Lee Wah Bow, The Lee’s Family Tree of LarmHar Village, Lundo, Zhongshan, China,
unpublished manuscript, date unknown.
85 Steven Keong, Keong Family Records, assorted papers in possession of Steven Keong, Queensland.
86 Emily Field, Lum So San Family Saga, private document, date unknown, Cairns.
87 Allen O’Neil, Bowman Family Records, Assorted Papers regarding Northern Territory and Northern Queensland.
88 Keith Shang, Hing Family Records”, Assorted Papers, Cairns/ Innisfail
89 Pers Comm. Glenda Morris, re ancestors in Herberton and Ayr Districts including Chinese-Aboriginal - Goon Goo, 2014.
90 Helen Ellems and Jana Kahabka, My ‘Half Full Lations’. Helen Ellems is researching her Aboriginal Chinese ancestors, the Bing
Chew family at Croydon.
91 Pers Comm., Ray Poon re Brisbane Diamond Lum, (Brisbane, 2014); and Pers Comm., Marilyn Dooley. re ancestor Kong Dee
from the Gladstone District, Sydney, 2013.
27
Some have made it into limited edition family publications, such as Faulkner94 and Tim So,95
while others are published as part of conference proceedings.96
***
National:
Literature outlining the history of Chinese settlement within Australia has substantially
progressed since the mid-1960s with Chinese Australian history developing into a thriving
academic field from the early1980s onwards. Early scholars Mackay97, Palfreman98 and Oddie99
wrote about the Chinese settlement experience from a dominant Western perspective which
serves to remind contemporary scholars just how far Chinese Australian studies have come and
how broadly concepts of immigration, settlement and race relations have developed. Oddie’s
work, indicative of the times, offered a traditional approach to the study of Chinese in Victoria
from a Western dominant point of view. The only discussion about women associated with
Chinese men (as families were not mentioned at all) was directed towards women who were
labelled as “prostitutes”. Oddie made no attempt to explore individual circumstances, even
when citing the mixed heritage marriage of Mrs. Hui Yung.100 In 1968, A.T. Yarwood101 made
a serious attempt to address broader immigration and race relations, investigating racial attitudes
towards non-White immigrants within the context of exclusionary legislation: the White
Australia Policy. However, he continued to present Chinese migrants and settlers as passive
participants within a White social order.
Chinese immigrants continued to be portrayed as passive within the prescribed male Anglocentric
framework where citizenship was based on the degree or willingness to assimilate.
92 Julia Volkmar, A Company of his Countrymen: Refining the Hop Wah story, paper presented at the Rediscovered Past: Chinese
Tropical Australia conference February 11-12, 2012 for CHINA INC, Cairns, 2012 Julie is researching the family history of
Andrew Leon and Mary Piggott in Cairns.
93 Myra Timmerman is researching her ancestors, the James Ah Ching family and English migant Sarah Hadley.
94 Claire Faulkner, Conquest: an inside story: the integration of a colonial Chinese-Australian family cluster, Claire Veronica
Faulkner (Ayr, Queensland, 2013) Faulkner researched her ancestors from the Central goldfields - Young Sing and wife Emma.
95 Wilf Tim So, Louie Tim So: The Journey So Far (self-published family history, 2012, Sydney).
96 Brother L.B.F. Howard (Howard Le Couteur), “Alderman James Chiam: Creating a Chinese Settler Identity in 1860s
Queensland.” paper presented at the Australian Historians Association Conference, Sydney, 2015.
97 D. F. Mackay, The Rocky River goldfield, 1851-1867. Master of Arts Thesis, University of Melbourne, 1953.
98 A. C., Palfreeman, “The End of the Dictation Test”, Australian Quarterly, 30, 1 (March 1958): 43-50.
99 G.A Oddie, The Chinese in Victoria, 1870-1890. Masters by Research thesis, Dept of History, University of Melbourne, 1959,
and G. Oddie, “The Lower Class Chinese and the Merchant Elite in Victoria, 1870-1890”, Historical Studies, 10, 37 (November
1961):65-69.
100 Oddie, “The Lower Class Chinese”: 144
101 A.T. Yarwood, Asian Migration to Australia: the Background to Exclusion, 1896-1923 (Melbourne University Press,
Melbourne, 1964) and A. T, Yarwood, Attitudes to Non –European Immigration: problems in Australian History (Cassell
Australia Limited, 1968).
28
Scholars Inglis102 and Huck103 continued to support a colonial historiographical view, namely
that “assimilation” did not successfully occur when discussing Chinese settlement patterns.
However, in the late 1970s, Choi104 and Yong105 presented alternative interpretations of Chinese
migration and settlement history and in doing so challenged others such as Markus106 to follow.
The seminal work of Choi particularly influenced changes to research analysis when he
examined the influence of Chinese cultural background and traditional modes of kinship in
relation to migration and settlement patterns. Drawing upon key documents including census
data, documents indicating numerical intensity of immigration, and settlement patterns he
statistically identifies key data, much of which remains current today. On the other hand, C.F.
Yong explored the social and economic activities of Chinese immigrants from the merchant
class in Sydney and Melbourne to provide a snapshot of urban Chinese communities and, like
Inglis and Huck, continued to use an assimilation model as the basis for understanding inclusion
in or separation from the broader White community. All works mentioned to this point barely
acknowledge women associated with Chinese men and there is little discussion, if any, exploring
the contribution women and families made to the formation of Chinese communities.
From the early 1980s feminist historians began to agitate for the gender imbalance to be
addressed to provide voice and enrichment to women’s history. Feminist writers Tankey107,
Loh108, Ryan109, and Atkinson,110 challenged scholars to acknowledge and insert women
associated with Chinse men into the new interpretative models which were rapidly developing.
In New South Wales, Monica Tankey in particular called for a “Blueprint for Action”
102 Christine Inglis, “Notes on the Assimilation of the Darwin Chinese”, The Australian and New Zealand Journal of Sociology, 4, 1
(April 1968).
103 A. Huck, The Assimilation of the Chinese in Australia, Thirteenth George Morrison Lecture in Ethnography, 1969, (Australian
National University Press, Canberra, 1972).
104 C.Y, Choi, Chinese Migration and Settlement in Australia (Sydney University Press, 1975).
105 C. F. Yong, (ChingFatt), The New Gold Mountain: the Chinese in Australia 1901-1921, (Raphael Arts, Richmond, South
Australia, 1977).
106 Andrew Markus, Fear and Hatred: Purifying Australia and California 1850-1901 (Hale and Iremonger, Sydney, 1979). In one
of the first books to explore and critique the rise of cultural identity known as White Australia, he argues it is symbolic that the
first major legislative issue dealt with by the new Commonwealth parliament after Federation, the Immigration Restriction Bill in
1901, suggests the importance of "racial purity" as the symbol of national identity and White Australia.
107 Monica E. Tankey, ‘A Blueprint for Action’, The Australian Journal of Chinese Affairs 6 (July 1981): 189-195.
108 Morag Loh, “'You're my diamond, mum!': Some thoughts on women married to immigrants from China in Victoria from the
1850s to the 1920s” [online]. Oral History Association of Australia Journal 6 (1984): 3-10; Morag Loh and C. Ramsay, Survival
and Celebration: an insight into the Lives of Chinese Immigrant women, European Women Married to Chinese and their Female
children in Australia from 1856-1986 (Melbourne, 1986): 3-7; Morag Loh and Judy Winternitz, Dinki Di: the contribution of
Chinese Immigrants and Australians of Chinese Descent to Australia’s defence forces and war efforts 1899-1988 (Australian
Govt. Pub. Service, Canberra, 1989).
109 Jan Ryan, “‘She lives with a Chinaman’: Orient-ing ‘White Women’ in the Courts of Law”, Journal of Australian Studies, 60
(1990); Jan. Ryan, “No man's land: re-orienting identities for Chinese Malaysian women in Australia”, Studies in Western
Australian History, 21 (2000): 75-88; Jan Ryan, Ancestors: Chinese in colonial Australia (Fremantle Arts Centre Fremantle,
W.A., 1995); Jan Ryan, Chinese Women and the Global Village (University of Queensland Press, St. Lucia, 2003).
110 Ann Atkinson, Chinese labour and Capital in Western Australia 1847-1947, PhD thesis, Murdoch University, 1991 and Anne
Atkinson, “Placing restrictions upon them: controlling 'free' Chinese immigrants and capital in Western Australia”, Studies in
Western Australian History, 16 (1995): 69-88. Atkinson’s PhD thesis is an excellent thesis in every other way except that it limits
the depth of discussion by adopting an approach which is not gender integrated.
29
challenging historians to provide a “voice” for women and families and contest stereotypes
about the Chinese community to address the imbalance in the literature. Using her own personal
ancestry as an example, Tankey exemplifies herself as a prime example of the complex
relationships negotiated between immigrant Chinese men and White women during the early
settlement phase.111 Her call for action was the first time this inequity had been raised as an
issue and she argued for a concerted response from historians to redress the paucity of
information. This challenge was taken up by Morag Loh who researched and documented
Chinese and White wives of Chinese men in Victoria, providing a concise community history
with statistical evidence to substantiate female settlement patterns.112
Academic and non-academic literature outlining the history of Chinese settlement between 1860
and 1920 within Australia has substantially progressed over the last 50 years with a rapid rise in
diverse areas of interest since the 1990s. Thematic ranges of scholarly work undertaken include
works in race relations, (Inglis, Huck, Choi, Markus, Cronin, O Neill, Brawley, Ganter,
Reynolds)113; exclusionary legislation and the White Australia policy ( Griffiths, Jones,
Fitzgerald)114 ; immigration ( Yarwood, Yu, Williams115 ) ; trade and labour ( Atkinson, Darnell,
Frost, Martinez, Haskins, Balint116); law and order ( Ryan, Presland, Noonan, Holst,
Mountford)117; defence (Kennedy, Khoo and Noonan, Hopper)118; mining ( Mountford, Reeves,
McGowan, Mayne, Ngai)119; trans-nationalism (Lake, Ryan, Williams, Fitzgerald)120; religion
(Welsh, Penny)121; State histories (Jones, Moore)122; temples (Macgregor, Grimwade, Finch,
Robb)123; social organisation and identity (Wang, Chan, Shen, Kok, Doggett, Rasmussen, Ting,
Doggett, Bowen, Khoo, Kuo)124; market gardens ( Kwok, McGowan, Robb, McLean)125;
111 Descended from a mixed heritage union, married in a Catholic service at a Catholic Cathedral as one of the earliest unions in
NSW to an indentured labourer from Amoy, Tankey proudly detailed her family history and called for a Blueprint for Action to
be developed to incorporate women and families into mainstream historical lines of enquiry.
112 While starting out as a journal paper, her research led to two successful books and a exhibition focusing on women and family
earning her a reputation as a progressive advocate for Chinese families.
113 See works of Christine Inglis, Arthur Huck, C.F.Choi, Andrew Markus, Kathryn Cronin, Alan O’Neill, Sean Brawley, Regina
Ganter and Henry Reynolds listed in the Bibliography.
114 See works of Phil Griffiths, Paul Jones and John Fitzgerald as listed in the Bibliography.
115 See works of A.T. Yarwood, Ouyang Yu and Michael Williams listed in the Bibliography.
116 See works of Ann Atkinson, Maxine Darnell, Warwick Frost, Julia Martinez, Victoria Haskins and Ruth Baliant as listed in the
Bibliography.
117 See works of Jan Ryan, Gary Presland, Heather Holst, Jane Noonan, and Benjamin Mountford as per Bibliography.
118 See works of Alastair Kennedy, Tseen Khoo, Jane Noonan and Peter Hopper listed in the Bibliography.
119 See works of Benjamin Mountford, Keir Reeves, Barry McGowan, and Alan Mayne listed in the Bibliography.
120 See works of Marilyn Lake, Jan Ryan, Michael Williams, and John Fitzgerald listed in the Bibliography.
121 See works of Jonathon Welsh and Benjamin Penny (in Bibliography).
122 See works of Paul Jones and Clive Moore (in Bibliography)
123 See works of Paul Macgregor, Gordon Grimwade, Ely Finch and Sandi Robb (in Bibliography)
124 See works of Singwu Wang, Henry Chan, Yuanfan Shen, Hu Jin Kok, Amanda Rassmussen, Zheng-Ting, Anne Doggett,
Alastair Bowen, Tseen Khoo and Mei Fen Kuo (in Bibliography).
125 See works of Barry McGowan, Juanita Kwok, Sandi Robb and Hilda McLean (listed in the Bibliography).
30
Chinatowns (Lyndon, Stone and Steele, Christie, Yu, Chua, Fitzgerald, Dimond, Giese)126.
However, amid all of these scholarly works, a natural integration of gender, female perspectives,
women, families or age-related differences, has remained sporadic at best and absent for most of
the time.
In Western Australia in 1990, Jan Ryan adopted an alternative approach when she explored the
cultural identity, Whiteness and cultural construction of women associated with Chinese men. In
her paper “‘She lives with a Chinaman’: Orient-ing ‘White Women’ in the Courts of Law”,
Ryan concentrates on the West Australian judicial system in relation to gender and judicial
fairness, and argued that White women who lived with a Chinese man had their ‘whiteness’
reconstructed or “Orientalised”, that is, repositioned by others to outside the social norm and
therefore not eligible for the social and moral benefits usually assigned to the role of wife,
mother and homemaker within the community. This placed women outside the rule of law and
vulnerable to charges and public shame though labelling as a moral degenerate. Ryan
highlighted the discrimination experienced by White women who were outcast from their
primary community and repositioned as ‘the other’. At the time Ryan’s arguments were
innovative and exposed the hidden aspect of Chinese history associated with the private sphere.
However, Ann Atkinson chose a more traditional model of interpretation, and inserted the
presence of women and families adjunct to broader themes with many similarities in the weight
apportioned to the male Chinese immigrant experience between the work of Atkinson in
Western Australia and May in Queensland. Both scholars were progressive in the
acknowledgment of women and families associated with Chinese men but with limited
discussion, or inserted them as adjunct to broader historical themes.
Until this point, the majority of scholars positioned Chinese participants as secondary passive
subjects, within a “big picture” with women associated with the Chinese Diaspora as hidden
participants. Loh127 and Chan128sought to challenge researchers to combine qualitative and
quantitative work to ensure the best voice for Chinese Australian experiences could be heard. On
one hand, Loh encouraged more biographical accounts from within Chinese communities to
ensure the voice radiated out to the broader community, while on the other, Chan directly called
126 See works of Jane Lyndon, M.F. Christie, Shane Stone and Roger Steele, Ouyang Yu, McAndrew Chua, Shirley Fitzgerald and
Glenys Dimond, and Diane Giese as listed in the Bibliography.
127 Kok-Wah Francis, Loh “The Chinese in Australia: An overview”, in P. Hawks and A. Perry (eds), The Chinese in Australia,
papers from the conference held on 19 March 1988.
128 H.D. Min-hsi Chan, “Community Culture and Commerce: new Approaches to the history of the Chinese in Australia” in Jan
Ryan (ed.), Chinese in Australia and New Zealand: A Multidisciplinary Approach (Wiley Western, New Delhi, 1995): 59-66.
31
for the scope of academic enquiry to be reviewed and include a range of topic areas which had,
until that point, failed to attract academic attention. Over the next ten years, not content with just
talking about the theory behind cultural identity, Chan pushed the boundaries to challenge
popular conceptions of Australian culture and encouraged researchers to reflect upon the
WASPish (White Anglo-Saxon male) perspectives which remained pervasive. Chan continued
to vehemently argue that Chinese family and relationships, particularly Anglo- Chinese and
Aboriginal-Chinese relationships, had remained a hidden element of Chinese Diaspora history
and that this deficit needed to be rectified.129
Chinese historical enquiry began to depart from traditional models of enquiry to develop a more
targeted approach after the publication of MacGregor’s Histories of the Chinese in Australia and
the South Pacific, which was compiled from proceedings of an international conference held at
the Museum of Chinese Australian History in Melbourne in 1993. It was clear that a vigorous
interest in Chinese Australian history was evolving which took a multidisciplinary approach to
the subject. A range of new research trajectories was being developed including the voice from
within known as “family history”.130 Norma King Koi’s paper of maternal family history,
“Discovering my heritage: an oral history of my maternal family-the Ah Moons of Townsville
1888-1945” encapsulated not only a Chinese perspective on history but positioned women at the
centre of the discussion and acknowledged conditions which were less than optimal for them,
including some of the difficulties mothers faced concerning poverty, isolation and
intergenerational cultural change. King Koi131, like Tankey fifteen years earlier, voiced the
frustration felt by present generations regarding the suppression and loss of cultural identity
experienced by families in order to “fit in”. Two years later, another sort of “fitting in” was
inadvertently captured in an interview with prominent Darwin resident Nellie (Shu Ack Chan)
Fong by Rees.132 Rees’ work encapsulated, without clarification, the badge of survival called
“fitting in” where only positive aspects of family and kinship relations were explored and
recollected and negative aspects, including racial terrorism133, deliberately omitted and kept from
the interviewer.
129 Henry Chan, “The Identity of the Chinese in Australian History”, Queensland Review, 6, 2 (1999): 1-23.
130 Paul Macgregor (ed.), Histories of the Chinese in Australia and the South Pacific.
131 King Koi, in Macgregor, (ed.) Histories of the Chinese in Australia and the South Pacific: 287-299.
132 Mary Rees, “Nellie (Shu Ack Chan) Fong: 'it's been a good life!'” . Journal of Northern Territory History, 6 (1995): 45-51.
133 Sean Brawley, “Racial Terrorism: Recalibrating the Chinese Experience in Colonial Australia”, in Robyn Lincoln and Shirleen
Robinson (eds) Crime over Time: Temporal perspectives on Crime and Punishment in Australia, (Cambridge Scholars
Publishing, 2010): 83-109. Brawley provides interesting alternative language and ideas to describe the use of intimidation, racism
and violence by one group against another. He introduces new ways of reading events through the introduction of new definitions
which provides greater freedom in which to think though racism and race relations antagonism.
32
Whereas Rees was unable to interpret background history underpinning the difficulties
experienced by Chinese Australians to contextualise the interview, historians Giese134,
Fitzgerald135, Diamond136 and Wilton137 were able to utilise oral history interviewing techniques
to deftly and sensitively traverse and explore a range of themes, couple them with documentary
sources, and draw out diverse opinions and feelings concerning racism, marginalisation and
cultural suppression. Oral history began to form an important research tool utilized by historians.
Since 2000 scholars researching and documenting women and families associated with Chinese
men in Australia have actively combined both a qualitative and a quantitative approach in an
effort to uncover new information and promote and encourage new lines of enquiry, most
notably Williams138; Couchman139; Bagnell140; and Hales141. Michael Williams adopted a
transnational approach, researching both China and Australia, to uncover new aspects of
migration patterns, reveal the prevalence of kinship linkages and provide a statistical analysis of
women and families from the Southern Pearl Delta Region, Guangdong province through
studying families who migrated. On the other hand, Couchman, Bagnell and Hales actively
challenge and address popular stereotypes which have historically castigated women married to
a Chinese man, as either poor Irish, drunk, victims, prostitutes and opium addicts rather than free
agents making informed choices.
In particular, Bagnell and Hales take care to interrogate these stereotypes as depicted by popular
secondary sources and newspapers to present a counter image of women as resilient and
proficient at raising families with stability and competence in a hostile and exclusionary
environment. Both Bagnall and Hales provide direct reference to individual women as primary
134 Diane Giese, Beyond Chinatown: Changing Perceptions on the Top End Chinese Experience, (National Library of Australia,
Canberra, 1995); Diane Giese, Astronauts, Lost Souls and Dragons: Conversations with Chinese Australians, (University of
Queensland Press, St Lucia, 1997).
135 Shirley Fitzgerald, Red Tape, Gold Scissors: The Story of Sydney's Chinese (Halstead Press, Sydney, 2008).
136 Glenys Dimond (ed.), Sweet and Sour: Experiences of Chinese families in the Northern Territory (Museum and Art Gallery of
the Northern Territory, Darwin, 1996).
137 Janis Wilton, Chinese Voices, Australian Lives: Oral History and the Chinese contribution to Glen Innes, Inverall, Tenterfield
and surrounding districts during the first half of the twentieth century, PhD thesis, University of New England, August 1996
138 Michael Williams, Sojourn in your Native Land, M. Lit. Thesis, University of New England, October 1998. This has recently
been published as Returning Home with Glory: Chinese Villagers around the Pacific, 1849 to 1949 (Hong Kong University
Press, January 2018). See also Michael Williams, Chinese Settlement in NSW: a thematic history, a report for the NSW Heritage
Office of NSW, 1999; Michael Williams, Destination Qiaoxiang: Pearl River Delta Village and Pacific Ports,1849-1949, PhD
thesis, University of Hong Kong, 2002.
139 Sophie Couchman (ed.), Secrets, Silences and Sources: Five Chinese Australian family histories (Chinese Australian Family
Historians of Victoria, Latrobe Asian Studies papers research series 7, 2005); and Sophie Couchman, In and out of focus: Chinese
and photography in Australia, 1870s-1940s, PhD Thesis, La Trobe University, Melbourne 2009.
140 Kate Bagnall, Golden Shadows on a White Land: an Exploration of the lives of white women who partnered Chinese men and
their children in Southern Australia, PhD thesis, University of Sydney, 2006.
141 Dinah Hales, Across the Cultural Divide: Chinese European families of Central Western New South Wales, 1850-1880, Honours
Thesis, University of New England, 2002; Dinah. Hales, “Lost histories: Chinese-European families of Central Western New
South Wales, 1850-80”. Special Issue: Active Voices, Hidden Histories: The Chinese in Colonial Australia, Journal of Australian
Colonial History, 6 (2004): 93-112.
33
subjects through the use of the women’s names, which is a departure from previous mainstream
efforts. Bagnall and Hales build on previous scholarly works of Loh, (Victoria), Ryan (Western
Australia), and Wilton (New South Wales) and complement the work of Tan, King Koi, Ramsay
and Robb (Queensland). More recent scholars contributing to gendered Chinese Australian
history include Rule142 on Irish- Chinese unions in Victoria, and Lovejoy143 and Rasmussen144
looking at different social and relationship aspects in rural Victoria gold towns. This is
complemented by Boileau145 in her book Families of Fortune: Chinese People in the Tweed,
which investigates a rural community in northern New South Wales. However, over the last five
years further growth and innovation in alternative interpretations of Chinese Australian
settlement have emerged.
The works of Sophie Loy Wilson in labour and migration;146 Claire Lowrie in domestic service
and the Chinese in the Asia Pacific Rim;147 Peter Gibson, about Chinese furniture makers;148
Juanita Kwok on market gardeners in the Bathurst region; and Barry McGowan writing thematic
local histories of the NSW Central and Western Region, have provided a more nuanced picture,
showing readers occupations and customary traditions which evolved in Australian conditions.
McGowan was prodigious in his determination to record local history in rural and remote New
South Wales, and was a game changer in his integrative approach to history, using a
methodology of inclusivity to flesh out aspects of both gender and race within settlement
narratives.149 He is one of the few historical scholars who have gone down the path of
automatically including women and Aboriginal families in his writings rather than taking a
targeted approach. Other scholars such as Fred Cahir 150 for Victoria, Haskins151 and Balint152 for
142 Pauline Rule, “Women and marriage in the Irish diaspora in nineteenth-century Victoria”, Australasian Journal of Irish Studies,
.8,(2008-2009): 48-66. In her journal article, Rule outlines the social conditions for Irish girls marrying a range of partners
including Chinese partners. She combines hard census data to frame the numerical prevalence of unions against a backdrop of
personal stories to drive home her arguments.
143 Valerie Lovejoy, “Falling leaves: Chinese family and community in Nineteenth Century Bendigo”, in Charles Fahey and Alan
Mayne (eds), Gold Tailings, forgotton histories of Family and community on the Central Victorian Gold fields (Australian
Scholarly Publishing Pty Ltd, 2010): 95-111; Valerie Lovejoy, “Chinese in late nineteenth-century Bendigo: their local and
translocal lives in this 'strangers' country'”, Australian Historical Studies, 42, 1 (March 2011): 45-61.
144 Amanda Rasmussen, “Networks and negotiations: Bendigo's Chinese and the Easter Fair”, Special Issue: Active Voices, Hidden
Histories: The Chinese in Colonial Australia, Journal of Australian Colonial History, 6 (2004): 79-92.
145 Joanna Boileau, Families of Fortune: Chinese People In The Tweed, (Tweed River Regional Museum, 2010).
146 Sophie Loy-Wilson, “White cargo: Australian residents, trade and colonialism in Shanghai between the wars”, History Australia,
9, 3 (December 2012): 154-177.
147 Claire Lowrie, Masters and Servants: Cultures of Empire in the Tropics, (Manchester University Press, Manchester, 2016).
148 Peter Gibson, “Australia's Bankrupt Chinese Furniture Manufacturers, 1880–1930”, Australian Economic History Review,
58, 1 (March 2018): 87-10.
149 Barry McGowan, “Thematic History of the Bathurst – Orange Region”, unpublished report 2018
150 Fred Cahir, Black gold: Aboriginal people on the goldfields of Victoria 1850-1870, (ANU E-Press and Aboriginal History
Incorporated 2012).
151 Victoria Haskins, “'The privilege of employing natives': the Quan Sing affair and Chinese-Aboriginal employment in Western
Australia, 1889-1934”, Aboriginal History, 35 (2011): 145-160.
152 Ruth Balint, “Aboriginal Women and Asian Men: A Maritime History of Color in White Australia”, Signs 37, 3 (Spring 2012):
544-554.
34
W.A., and Martinez153 for the N.T. have focused instead on race relations, sexual economies and
invisible divisions perpetrated by White authorities.
While writing a decade apart, both Martinez154 and Haskins focus on labour relations and
enforcement of the White Australia policy in North Australia. However, whereas Martinez (Qld
and N.T.) extensively investigate attitudes in north Australia toward White workers, Aboriginal
and Asian labour, and the stevedoring and pearling industry, Haskins (W.A.) critically analyses
Chinese legal rights to Aboriginal labour despite the fact it was considered a “privilege” to
employ Aboriginal people based on a hierarchy of race under which only Whites were
eligible.155 Haskins demonstrates that challenges were made by Australian Born Chinese which
were considered problematic for bureaucrats, who attempted to maintain the Commonwealth
edict of a White Australian policy which deliberately disadvantaged non-Whites.156
However, Balint on the other hand takes a cultural approach to sexual relations, which comes
closer to the focus of this thesis. Like anthropologists Marie Reay writing on NSW157 and Guy
Ramsay on Queensland,158 who investigate the cultural identity of mixed Aboriginal/Asian
families, Balint drills down to explore the contribution and sexual economy of Aboriginal
women to the pearling industry in Broome, W.A. Balint argues that Aboriginal women’s
contribution, through childbearing with Asian men, led to the creation of a distinct pearling
economy and culture that blurred racial boundaries. Departing from the dominant White
patriarchal analysis that the pearling industry was a White and male industry, Balint repositions
Aboriginal women at the centre of the pearling industry rather than on the periphery, noting that
Aboriginal women’s contribution of labour faded into the background as soon as Asian male
immigrants arrived. However, despite this, Aboriginal women maintained a continuous labour
role as inshore collectors of pearl shells, shell sorters, domestic servant and sex workers to
support the industry, but were denied inclusion or citizenship based on gender and race. By
Balint’s positioning of Aboriginal women at the centre of historical enquiry including areas such
153 Julia Mart􆦴nez, Plural Australia: Aboriginal and Asian labour in tropical White Australia, Darwin, 1911-1940, PhD Thesis,
University of Woolongong, 1999.
154 Julia Martinez, “Asian Workers in Pre-war Port Darwin: Exclusion and Exemption”, Maritime Studies, 109 (Nov/Dec 1999): 19-
28.
155 Chinese settlers, deemed inferior to Whites and therefore not eligible for the privilege, felt disadvantaged by the policy when
illegally administered by enforcement officers.
156 By using the example an Australian Born Chinese female employer (an Australian citizen), the issues of Aboriginal
protection, the meaning of citizenship, who was accepted as a citizen and under what terms, are explored to reveal a complex
construction of fluid interpretations of inclusion and exclusion based on racial background.
157 Marie Olive Reay, “A half-caste Aboriginal community in north-western New South Wales”, Oceania, 15, 4 (1944-45): 296-
323.
158 Guy Ramsay, “The Family and Cultural Identity in Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders of Chinese Ancestry: A Rural- Urban
divide”, Journal of Family Studies, 6, 2 (October 2000): 199-213.
35
as family relations, cultural identity formation, cultural maintenance, race relations, labour
relations and legislative exclusions, new interpretations will continue to develop and provide
new narratives.
New perspectives of scholarly research have enabled the whole framework of historiography to
explode with fresh interpretations. Firstly, there is an increased interest in using alternative
sources as a means to reveal new narratives about Chinese settlement and family formation. This
is demonstrated by Valerie Lovejoy in her article “Falling leaves: Chinese family and
community in Nineteenth Century Bendigo”.159 She takes an innovative approach to explore the
meaning of family, who makes up a family, and constructions of family based on kinship
relationships through the analysis of coronial inquests on suicide and death. These records
challenge the popular view that Chinese men were lonely and lacking in family. Instead they
reveal many men who immigrated travelled with “family”, that is a father, a brother or an uncle.
In many cases immigrants were already married before they left China, with their wives
remaining behind. Rather than being depraved and immoral due to their single status, Chinese
men developed close male relationships based on kinship and mutual benefit obligations with
each other, which resonates with the famous Australian White male settler identity of mateship.
Lovejoy challenges scholars to think abstractly about the meaning of family beyond the
stereotypical construction of a husband, wife, children, and grandparents to include extended
family or constructed family through kinship and mutual obligation societies.
Secondly, there has been a huge impact – including self-analysis regarding Australian Identity
formation - arising out of the book Big White Lie by eminent academic, political commentator
and scholar, John Fitzgerald.160 The influence on Chinese studies in Australia from this book
cannot be overstated and is comparable to the works of Yarwood, Choi and Chan. Big White Lie
provides a comprehensive alternative and revisionist view of the settlement by Chinese in
Australia, providing a “renovated” Australian history. Incorporating a gender and class inclusive,
revisionist interpretation of Chinese Australian immigration, Fitzgerald engages a general
audience to reflect on the meaning of citizenship and cultural inclusiveness. Set out using
previously hidden aspects of Chinese Australian History including secret societies, nationalist
political exclusion, Christian evangelism, community organisation and interstate connections,
Fitzgerald does what Loh, Chan and feminist historians have been asking for since the 1980s: he
159 Valerie Lovejoy, “Falling leaves”.
160 John Fitzgerald, Big White Lie: Chinese Australians in White Australia, (UNSW Press, Sydney, 2007).
36
inserts women and families into the big picture as integral participants of history, providing
enhanced opportunities for new interpretations and lines of enquiry to develop. Fitzgerald
remains one of the handful of male historical writers who write without gender bias and for this
reason his book is a remarkable piece of scholarly work.
The last historical perspective which is slow to emerge is the view of family from within.
Perceptions of Australian cultural identity are beginning to be articulated by fourth, fifth, and
sixth generation Chinese Australians to provide a rich narrative for non-Chinese scholars to
digest. The journey of self-discovery and drive to understand cultural roots is clearly articulated
by forerunner Helene Chung, in her article “Ching Chong China Girl: from white to
multicultural Australia”.161 Her wrestling with the complexity of a Chinese identity in a White
world, in the 1970s and 1980s, resonate in the work of Christopher Cheng,162 who, although a
couple of generations later, picks up on Chung’s identity quandary as he negotiates straddling
the Chinese / Western divide. This is area which should gain more attention as younger
generations seek to express themselves in what is now regarded as a multicultural society.
In conclusion, investigation of national scholarly works which include research about women
and families as a normal part of their area of interest, has found through analysis of 199 papers163
that only 25% of all work employs a meaningful reference to women and families or integrated
gendered approach. This means approximately 75% of historical literature has a male gender
bias, and lacks any meaningful acknowledgement of women and families. This is indeed an
irony, given that it is for “family” i.e. ancestral benefit that migration occurred in the first place.
It was through family and family hardship that settlement in a foreign land could occur, as
women at home looked after their husband’s property and interests, and women married in
Australia were able to further a man’s opportunities.
***
Part 2. International Literature:
The history of Chinese Diaspora, settlement and family formation across the globe has been a
matter of interest for scholars for decades, and explored through analysis of diverse global
destinations such as the United States of America; Canada; South America (Peru, Mexico, the
161 Helene Chung, “Ching Chong China Girl: from white to multicultural Australia”, Historic Environment, 24, 1 (2012): 17-25.
162 Christopher Cheng, “Journey of Discovery”, Paper presented at CHINA INC 5th No Fuss conference Cairns, 2014 and
published in Grimwade, G. Rains, K. & Dunk, M., Rediscovered Past: Chinese Networks publication from 2014 conference, pp.
41-50, Chinese Heritage in Northern Australia (CHINA INC), 2016.
163 At this time excluding all material about Queensland.
37
former British Guiana and Cuba); the West Indies (Trinidad); South Africa; Europe (England
and the Netherlands); the Asia Pacific region (Indonesia, Borneo, Malaysia, Papua New
Guinea); Eastern Melanesian countries (Solomon Islands, Samoa, Fiji and Tahiti), as well as
across the Tasman (New Zealand). A consistent enquiry into Chinese female immigration has
been most prevalent in America compared to other countries, covering aspects such as
immigration, Chinese female prostitution, exclusion and social history. Other countries have
remained focused on race relations, labour and immigration. New and innovative interpretation
methodologies have continued to develop but the research focus has remained confined to
experiences of Chinese women only, with other types of marriages and unions unexplored. The
U.S.A., Canada and Mexico as well as the West Indies, and South American countries remain
well represented in scholarly works as do countries in the Asia Pacific region closest to
Queensland. However, only a small number of researchers are engaged in Europe and Africa for
any Chinese diaspora studies with most scholarly works in all countries (with exception of the
U.S.A.), lacking in any meaningful reflection or acknowledgement of Chinese female
immigration or woman and families associated with Chinese men.
***
America, British Columbia and Mexico
From the time sociologist Rose Hum Lee164 examined and wrote about the Chinese community
in the Rocky Mountains in 1947, scholars have taken an interest in Chinese immigration to the
U.S.A. However, it took a further 30 years to gain momentum as a distinct historical line of
enquiry, commencing in the late 1970s with three researchers, Rhoades,165 Wang Sing Wu166
and Wang Gungwu.167 Subsequent studies in Chinese immigration and settlement history until
the present time remain focused on either the study of immigration and diaspora or the study of
communities such as Chinatowns. It is fair to say that the seminal work of Wang Sing Wu’s The
Organisation of Chinese Emigration 1848-1888, with special reference to Chinese Emigration
to Australia, not only influenced but provided encouragement for other scholars to pursue
enquiry into Chinese immigration, race relations, and labour history. Undertaken as his Master
of Arts in 1969, his work developed theoretical understanding into transnational and
transoceanic enquiry. The study of Chinatowns and Chinese cultural precincts has remained a
164 Rose Hum Lee. The Growth and Decline of Chinese Communities in the Rocky Mountain Region. (University of Chicago,
1947).
165 Edward J. M. Rhoads, “The Chinese in Texas”, The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, 81, 1 (July, 1977): 1-36.
166 Sing Wu Wang, The Organisation of Chinese Emigration 1848-1888, with special reference to Chinese Emigration to
Australia, Chinese Materials and Research Aides Services Centre Inc., Occasional Series, No. 25, (San Francisco, 1978).
167 Gungwu Wang, Community and Nation: China, South East Asia and Australia (Allen and Unwin in association with the Asian
Studies Association of Australia, Sydney, 1981).
38
steady line of enquiry across all major Chinese communities and is reflected in the works of
Hune,168 Anderson169, Lai170 and Curtis171, Voss172, Chen,173 Markus and Chen174, and Hu-
Dehart175.
However, from 1993 onwards interest in Chinese female immigration to America began to
attract the interest of scholars Takaki176, Wegars177 and Yung178. Whereas Takaki compared the
experiences of Japanese and Chinese women migrating to the U.S.A. and Hawaii, it was the
works of archaeologist Wegars, interpreting the presence of women on Chinese sites, and
historian Yung, who utilized a range of oral and documentary sources, who elevated the study of
women associated with Chinese men into the wider academic arena. Focusing on the
immigration, historical presence and social history of female Chinese immigrants, their work
evoked change to historical enquiry and initiated other researchers into providing a fresh
interpretation of immigrant Chinese women, such as Huping Ling179, McCunn180 and later,
Elizabeth Sinn.181
Through the investigation of female marriage experience Ling identifies a broad range of
relationships associated with the Chinese community including polyandry182. McCunn on the
other hand paints an intimate portrait of the life of an individual Chinese woman including her
background, marriage and life experiences in a small frontier area. Both scholars provide
168 Shirley Hune, Asian Americans: Comparative and Global Perspectives, Washington State University Press, 1991& Shirley
Hune, & Gail M. Nomura, Asian/Pacific Islander American Women: A Historical Anthology, NYU Press, 2003. Hune was
among the first to explore women and gender in Diaspora studies.
169 K. Anderson, “The Idea of Chinatown: The Power of Place and Institutional Practice in the Making of a Racial Category”,
Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 77, 4 (1987): 580-598.
170 David Chuenyan Lai, Chinatowns: Town within cities in Canada, (University of British Columbia Press, Vancouver, 1988).
171 James R. Curtis, “Mexicali's Chinatown”, Geographical Review, 85, 3 (July, 1995): 335-348.
172 Barbara L. Voss, “World Archaeology”, Historical Archaeology 37, 3 (September, 2005): 424-439.
173 X. Chen, “Chinese Immigration and its Implications on Urban Management in Los Angeles”, Theoretical and Empirical
Researches in Urban Management, 13 (2009): 42-58.
174 Kenneth H. Marcus and Yong Chen, “Inside and Outside Chinatown: Chinese Elites in Exclusion Era California”, Pacific
Historical Review 80, 3 (August 2011): 369-400.
175 Evelyn Hu-DeHart, “Chinatowns and Borderlands: Inter Asian encounters in the diaspora”, Modern Asian Studies, 46 (2012):
425- 451.
176 Ronald Takaki, “They Also Came: The Migration of Chinese and Japanese Women to Hawaii and the Continental United
States”, Chinese America: History and Perspectives (1990): 3-19.
177 Priscilla Wegars, “Besides Polly Bemis: Historical and Artifactual Evidence for Chinese Women in the West, 1848-1930," in
Priscilla Wegars (ed.), Hidden Heritage: Historical Archaeology of the Overseas Chinese (Amityville, Baywood, 1993): 229-254.
178 Manying Ip, "Unbound Feet: A Social History of Chinese Women in San Francisco", Journal of American History 83,2
(1996): 632; J. Yung, "’It is hard to be born a woman but hopeless to be born a Chinese’: The life and times of Flora Belle Jan”,
Frontiers 18, 3 (1997): 66-91; J. Yung, “Giving voice to Chinese American women”, Frontiers, 19, 3 (1998): 130-156; J. Yung,
"’A bowlful of tears’ revisited: The full story of Lee Puey You's immigration experience at Angel Island”, Frontiers, 25, 1
(2004): 1-22.
179 Huping Ling, Surviving on the Gold Mountain: a history of Chinese American women and their lives, (State University of
New York Press, 1988).
180 Ruthanne Lum McCunn, “Reclaiming Polly Bemis: China's daughter, Idaho's legendary pioneer”, Frontiers - A Journal of
Women's Studies 24,1 (January 2003): 76.
181 Elizabeth Sinn, Pacific Crossing: California Gold, Chinese Migration and the Making of Hong Kong, (Hong Kong Press,
2012).
182 This is where one woman lives with a number of men as wife – a shared wife.
39
valuable comparative research material when considering Chinese women married in
Queensland during the early settlement period. However, unlike the rise in Australian academic
interest in mixed heritage marriages and unions, Ling limits her focus to relationships
concerning Chinese women, cultural identity and immigration, only briefly identifying the
presence of African-American, White and First Nations women as partners.183 The trend to focus
primarily on Chinese women exclusively has remained consistent across America with very few
U.S. scholars exploring mixed heritage unions and relationships.
New interpretations show that far from passive participants in their immigration experience,
Chinese women were resourceful individuals with agency and license, despite experiences of
oppression, discrimination and exploitation. Ling departs from a mono-national focus on one
community, to explore multiple communities in a transnational environment. Through adopting
a transnational methodology, she was able to analyse newly available Government resources and
immigration files from the Immigration and Naturalisation Service (INS) which specifically
applied to Chinese immigrant women. These new resources were brought to scholarly attention
by Peggy184 and Chao.185 The development of supplementary sources and information literacy
for scholars and family researchers enabled new lines of enquiry to be developed including
analysis and interrogation of the Exclusion Laws and legislation.
The scrutiny of newly available case files from the National Archives enabled a range of
scholars to explore the implication of American Exclusion Laws following two main streams of
interest: immigration / deportation provisions, and sexual economics/ prostitution. First, works
undertaken by McKeown,186 Lee Sung187, Lee188, Calavita, 189 Abrams190 and Yamin191
183 H. Ling, “Family and marriage of late-nineteenth and early-twentieth century Chinese immigrant women”, Journal of
American Ethnic History, 19, 2 (2000): 43-63.
184 S. C. Peggy, “An archival resource: INS case files on Chinese women in the American midwest”, Journal of Women's History,
10, 3 (1998): 155-170. Peggy directed the resources towards academic researchers whereas Chao provided archival pathways
accessible to academic and non-academic researchers in a clear, concise manner to enhance understanding of Chinese family lines
and Chinese documentary evidence.
185 S. J. Chao, “Tracing their roots: genealogical sources for Chinese immigrants to the United States”, Collection Building, 27, 2
(2008): 74-88.
186 Adam McKeown, “Conceptualizing Chinese Diasporas, 1842 to 1949”, The Journal of Asian Studies, 58, 2 (May, 1999): 306-
337; A. McKeown, “Transnational Chinese families and Chinese exclusion, 1875-1943”, Journal of American Ethnic History, 18,
2 (1999): 73-110; Adam McKeown, “Ritualization of Regulation: The Enforcement of Chinese Exclusion in the United States
and China”, The American Historical Review, 108, 2 (April 2003): 377-403; Adam McKeown, “Global Migration, 1846-1940,
Journal of World History, 15, 2 (June, 2004): 155-189.
187 Betty Lee Sung, review of Pfeffer, “If They Don't Bring Their Women Here: Chinese Female Immigration Before Exclusion”
The International Migration Review 35, 1 (Spring 2001): 334-336.
188 C.N. Wing and Erika Lee, “At America's Gates: Chinese Immigration during the Exclusion Era, 1882-1943”, The Journal of
Asian Studies, 64, 1 (2005): 159-161. Unlike the Australian and Queensland colonial experience, the Exclusion Laws of America
including the Page Law of 1875 and 1877 Special Committee on Chinese Immigration, were deliberately drawn up to curb the
influx of Chinese women into the USA, usually through major port towns along the West Coast, imported by syndicates to work
as sex workers/ slaves.
40
concentrated on Chinese diaspora, immigration and use of immigration itself as a means of
controlling population trends. Focusing on Exclusion Laws within the context of
transnationalism, McKeown provides a holistic overview of the Chinese diaspora through a
transnational and transoceanic perspective, to challenge academic discourse to revisit Exclusion
Laws in the framework of global mitigating factors which were driving Chinese female
immigration. He argued that a broad understanding of global push-pull factors underpinning
female migration was essential to shift the emphasis away from a lineal model associated with
the Chinese male diaspora. On the other hand, Lee restricts analysis to the mono-national level,
to conclude that while the legislation was exclusionary in itself as a policy, it did not come into
its own as the tipping point, that is where America shifted from being a country welcoming of
immigrants to a gate keeping nation, until it was rigorously applied by suspicious, racist or
ignorant enforcement officers in regional ports such as San Francisco.
Taking this argument forward, through a legal analysis of legislation, Calavita builds upon Lee’s
work to argue that while enforcement officers may have been racist and suspicious when
administering the policy, many were also ill equipped to interpret the conflicting sections of the
legislation especially in regards to immigrant Chinese women. Continuing with a legal approach
to historical interrogation, Abrams takes the initiative of stepping back from the subject matter to
look more broadly at immigration law before 1875, broadening the line of enquiry to include
“settlement history”, that is, White settlers within a Western-constructed territory. This approach
provides a more integrated analysis to the interrogation of emerging law and policy because it
includes a full range of immigrants across class, occupation and race. Abrams argues that
exclusionary immigration laws are situated as part of a set of legal strategies used to produce,
shape and maintain populations. All three arguments are useful to a Queensland and Australian
context to understand the development of legal structures and application of exclusionary
policies to maintain desired population trends leading up to the White Australia policy.
Secondly, scrutiny of the Exclusion Laws commencing with the Page Law of 1875 as a way of
controlling the sexual economy of young Chinese immigrant women brought in as sex workers/
189 Kitty Calavita, “Collisions at the Intersection of Gender, Race, and Class: Enforcing the Chinese Exclusion Laws”, Law and
Society Review, 40, 2 (June, 2006): 249-281.
190 K. Abrams, “The Hidden Dimension of Nineteenth-Century Immigration Law”, Vanderbilt Law Review, 62,5 (2009): 13-14
191 P. Yamin, “The search for marital order: Civic membership and the politics of marriage in the progressive era”, Polity, 41, 1
(2009): 86-112. Yamin argues that marriage became the link to community cohesion which reflected the public interests of the
state who demanded it as a requirement for citizenship. Suspicions about the legitimacy of marriage as a vehicle to immigration
and inclusion, was always cast onto Chinese women who it was believed were using the contract of marriage as a vehicle to gain
access into the United States.
41
“prostitutes”/ wives, has been the other area which has generated the most interest amongst
American scholars. Scholars such as Stevens192, Matsubara193, Yung194, Moloney195, Lui196 and
Cho197 directly investigate the immigration of Chinese women as part of the sexual economy
within community formation and the ways in which authorities drafted and applied compliance
to legislation to legitimize the deportation of Chinese females. There have been detailed and
innovative approaches to the investigation and interpretation of information, including microbiographical
analysis of one Chinese woman’s experience at a deportation centre (Yung),
restrictions and criteria for entry based on class and the regulations enforced to deport them
(Stevens, Moloney), scrutiny of legislation formation and transnational influences (Matsubara198)
and analysis of prostitution (Moloney, Liu).
For most part the sexual politics of the organised importation of Chinese women to service the
needs of the male population outlines several aspects of Chinese women’s journey to another
country. All scholars address the inability for a Chinese woman, through cultural, physical and
emotional reasons, to walk towards her own destiny; the difficulty of entry into a host country
and humiliation experienced upon entry; her sexual vulnerability and dependency on the male
community, and the official castigation of her as the perpetrator of illegal activity rather than a
pawn of Western and Chinese paternal culture. This makes the work of Moloney and Lui useful
for comparable studies with Queensland concerning women who did not become wives but lived
within the Chinese community. Moloney highlights the restrictions placed on immigrant women
of all nations based on ideas of correct sexual conduct. She explores notions of women’s
economic vulnerability and dependency on male wage earners with particular reference to
Chinese women. Lui, on the other hand, explores social perceptions of White women living with
a Chinese man through analysis of the political and Christian motives of the suffragette
movement. Lui encourages researchers to reflect upon moral views of the time about sex
workers, the political and Christian agenda used to exploit “prostitutes” to further their cause,
192 Todd Stevens, “Tender Ties: Husbands' Rights and Racial Exclusion in Chinese Marriage Cases, 1882-1924”, Law and Social
Inquiry, 27, 2 (Spring, 2002): 271-305.
193 Hiroyuki Matsubara, “Stratified whiteness and sexualized Chinese immigrants in San Francisco: The report of the California
Special Committee on Chinese Immigration in 1876”, American Studies International, 41, 3 (October 2003): 32
194 J. Yung, "A bowlful of tears":1-22.
195 Deidre M. Moloney, “Women, Sexual Morality, and Economic Dependency in Early US Deportation Policy”, Journal of
Women’s History, 18, 2 (Summer, 2006): 95-123.
196 Mary Ting Yi Lui, “Saving Young girls for Chinatown: White Slavery and Women Suffrage, 1910-1920”, Journal of the
History of Sexuality, 18, 3 (September 2009): 393-417.
197 Yu-Fang Cho, “’Yellow Slavery,’ Narratives of rescue, and Sui Sin Far/ Edith Maude Eaton’s ‘Lin John’ (1899)”, Journal of
Asian American Studies, 12, 1 (2009): 35-63.
198 Matsubara, “Stratified whiteness”, 32-59.
42
and the lives of women who lived with a Chinese man, pressured by unsolicited external forces
to conform to broader social expectations.
By 2010, a number of American scholars including Pegler-Gordon199, Kuo200, Pfsaelzer201,
Marcus and Chen202 and Cronin and Huntzicker, 203 were researching a range of non-traditional
aspects of Chinese American history including photograph interpretation, modernity, class
hierarchy, and racial representations. However, it is the work of Elizabeth Sinn who, like John
Fitzgerald in Australia displays the most gender neutral approach to writing.
Sinn has emerged as a highly regarded academic, scholar and commentator after the success and
publication of her thesis Power and Charity which studied a charity hospital in Hong Kong, the
Tung Wah Hospital.204 However, it took her 2013 publication on the migration movement of
people to and from Hong Kong in the 19th century, Pacific Crossing: California Gold, Chinese
Migration and the Making of Hong Kong, to cement her status as one of the foremost
contemporary Chinese Diaspora writers in America alongside Wang Gungwu. Her book takes a
gender integrated approach to her subject, and represents women not just as the stereotypical
passive migrant and sex slave, but in contrast, as determined entrepreneurial women who
strategically invested in their lives and made considerable gains in America. By positioning
women as strong-minded individuals rather than passive recipients of fate, she reminds the
reader that personal agency is achievable. Her focus, however, remains on Chinese women, and
like most American studies excludes White and Native American women from the narrative.
This is an area in American Chinese studies which needs to be addressed by scholars.
Recent scholars who attempt to include alternative marriage partners, arrangements, individuals
and marriage laws are Bronson and Ho in Coming Home in Gold Brocade: Chinese in Early
North West America.205 Taking a social history approach, their work is brief, (only 1.2% of the
total book), general in approach, yet insightful in the absence of any evidence from other
199Anna Pegler-Gordon, “Chinese Exclusion, Photography, and the Development of U.S. Immigration Policy,” American
Quarterly, 58, 1 (March, 2006): 51
200 Jen-Feng Kuo, Chinese American women in the early twentieth century and the question of modernity/coloniality, PhD thesis,
State University of New York at Binghamton, 2010.
201 J. Pfaelzer, “Hanging out: A research methodology”, Legacy, 27, 1 (2010): 140-159.
202 Kenneth H. Marcus, and Yong Chen, “Inside and Outside Chinatown: Chinese Elites in Exclusion Era California”, Pacific
Historical Review 80, 3 (August, 2011): 369-400.
203 M.M. Cronin and W.E. Huntzicker, “Popular Chinese Images and "The Coming Man" of 1870: Racial Representations of
Chinese”, Journalism History, 38, 2 (2012): 86-99.
204 Elizabeth Sinn, “Bound For California; The Emigration of Chinese Women”, Chapter 6 in Sinn, Pacific Crossing: California
Gold, Chinese Migration, and the Making of Hong Kong, (Hong Kong University Press, 2013).
205 Bennet Bronson and Chuimei Ho, Coming Home in Gold Brocade: Chinese in Early Northwest America (Seattle: Chinese in
Northwest America Research Committee, 2015): 198-201.
43
sources. What is important about this book is that the authors acknowledge that other marriages
and relationships existed, present them respectfully and with examples, and provide the evidence
that Chinese partnering in America was more diverse than has been previously discussed.
Works like this build upon the seminal contribution by key scholars further north in former
British Columbia, including the prolific Yuen-Fong Woon and Henry Yu and Jean Barman.
Woon from the late 1990s onwards took a gendered approach to migration patterns, her focus
being understanding family separation and exclusion. Her work is the most relevant to this
thesis. In addition, she challenges scholars to think about their work and the assumptions which
have been made using terms such as “voluntary sojourner”206, “patriarchal oppression”207 and
“excluded wife”.208 Not only does she explore the legislative restrictions on women migrating to
British Columbia, she explores the social and cultural impact of migration from a Chinese
female perspective including wives, bonded servants (Mui tsai), tea house girls and prostitutes.
In addition, she explores and explains the cultural and social impact of restrictions on migration
on women from the village: “excluded wives” who remained in the village to attend to their
husbands’ families, and second wives or concubines purchased specifically for migration
purposes, which she describes bluntly as vessels for marriage sex. Woon provides a valuable
reference for any international studies on a gendered approach to the Chinese Diaspora. 209
Yu on the other hand takes a broad approach to understanding British Columbian Chinese
settlement history. While having an established reputation for transnational and globalised
thinking when it comes to migration and settlement patterns relating to Canada in “Global
Migrants and the New Pacific Canada”, 210 and having worked extensively on the Chinese Head
Tax, Yu has contributed to scholars thinking outside the “norm” when it comes to family
representation, race and gender. This he does by challenging his own sense of “belonging” to
British Columbia and raises awareness of what it means to be a Chinese Canadian: to scrutinise
and understand the legacies passed down from grandfathers to families over the period where
family intimacy was denied. More recently in the last few years he has turned his attention to
206 Yuen-Fong, Woon, “The Voluntary Sojourner”: 673-690.
207 Yuen-Fong Woon, “Between South China and British Columbia: Life trajectories of Chinese women”, British Coumbia
Studies 156/157 (Winter 2007):83-107.
208 Yuen-Fong Woon, The Excluded Wife (McGill-Queens University Press, 1998). Woon refers to the married women back in
the village, who were unable to migrate due to legislative barriers, as the “Excluded Wife”.
209See also Yuen-Fong Woon, “Review of Tan Chee-Beng, Colin Storey and Julia Zimmerman (eds), Chinese Overseas:
Migration, Research and Documentation”, Pacific Affairs 81, 2 (Summer 2008): 266-267.
210 Henry Yu, “Global Migrants and the New Pacific Canada”, International Journal 64, 4 (December, 2009): 1011-1026.
44
highlight First Nations people and Chinese migrant interactions.211 In his dialogue with
Musqueum Nations people, Vancouver, he advocates that scholars “break the silences and speak
the truth” about the past; to understand indigenous family perspectives, interracial relations and
displacement.212 For this thesis, his article “Nurturing Dialogues between First Nations, Urban
Aboriginal, and Immigrant Communities in Vancouver” is most relevant when it comes to
understanding Aboriginal- Chinese marriage relations and women’s decision making.
Jean Barmen provides an influential comparative analysis regarding the work undertaken on
intimacy and relationships between First Nations women and Chinese men in early British
Columbia. Her work “Beyond Chinatown: Chinese men and Indigenous Women in Early British
Columbia”, provides an excellent framework to position Australian Aboriginal women’s
interaction with Chinese men.213 However, it remains ironic that Chinese migrants partnered and
raised families with First Nations women, yet paradoxically may also have been responsible for
the displacement of First Nations people and demise of access to country as new settlers. This
suggests that parallels between British Columbia and North Queensland should be explored
further.
At the southern end of America, integrated historical experiences specifically associated with the
borders of the U.S.A. and Mexico have emerged, providing new interpretations of
transnationalism through “Borderland” histories. Academic scholars such Camacho214,
Delargo215, Romaro216 and more recently Hu-Dehart217 have explored the complexities of
borderland histories including aspects of economic, family, and community patterns associated
with migratory and seasonal patterns as families moved between host destination towns across
the border. But while Delargo and Romaro only briefly mention family relationships as they
explore commercial networks, trade, labour recruitment and human trafficking, it is the work of
211 Henry Yu, “Afterword” in Brandy Worral, Tracing Routes: Chinese Canadian Family Stories (Chinese Canadian Historical
Society of British Columbia, Vancouver, 2006): 73-82.
212 Henry Yu, “Nurturing Dialogues between First Nations, Urban Aboriginal, and Immigrant Communities in Vancouver”,
in Cultivating Canada: Reconciliation through the Lens of Cultural Diversity, A. Mathur, J. Dewar, and M. DeGagne (eds),
(Aboriginal Healing Foundation, Ottawa, 2011):300-308. [p.307]
213 Jean Barman, “Beyond Chinatown: Chinese men and Indigenous Women in Early British Columbia”, BC Studies, Vancouver,
Iss. 177(Spring 2013):39-47
214 Julia Mar􆦴a Schiavone Camacho, “Crossing Boundaries, Claiming a Homeland: The Mexican Chinese Transpacific Journey to
Becoming Mexican, 1930s–1960s” , Pacific Historical Review Vol. 78, No. 4 (November 2009): 545-577
215 Grace Pena Delgado, “Neighbors by nature: Relationships, border crossings, and transnational communities in the Chinese
exclusion era”. Pacific Historical Review, 80(3) (2011): 401-429.
216 E. Lee, [Review] The Chinese in Mexico, 1882–1940. By Robert Chao Romero. (Tucson, University of Arizona Press), in
Pacific Historical Review, 80(4), (2010): 644-644.
217 Hu-Dehart, “Chinatowns and borderlands”, 425- 451.
45
Camacho which provides insight into the social cohesion or lack of cohesion which underpinned
Mexican/Chinese relations.
Primarily investigating the early 20th century and interwar period, Camacho offers a valuable
reflection on the difficulties faced by mixed heritage families who were rejected as citizens by a
number of nations (Mexico, America and China) Relegated to a category neither Mexican nor
Chinese, mixed heritage families experienced personal difficulties when faced with “identity
prejudice” when Mexico forcibly deported Chinese settlers with Mexican wives and families in
the early 1930s. Repositioned as borderless citizens, mixed heritage families were forced to
accept a hybridized identity shaping their strength of character as they faced a cultural identity
crisis. Camacho explores the value of new constructions of family and community to provide
cohesion when faced with adversity. There are many parallels which can be drawn between the
cultural identity formation of family and displacement experiences of Chinese/Mexican families
of the 1920-30s and Chinese/ Aboriginal families of North Queensland for the same period.
***
West Indies, Caribbean and South America
Since the early 1990s investigations into the “Coolie trade” associated with the West Indies,
Caribbean and South American countries have remained steady with several researchers
investigating the sugar plantation and guano mining regions of the former British West Indies,
Cuba, Jamaica, Trinidad, British Guiana, Mexico and Peru. With an emphasis on the indentured
Chinese labour trade for sugar plantations after the emancipation of African slaves, scholars such
as Look Lai218, Lee Loy219, Bohr220, Jung221, Lopez and Meagher222, Lutz223, and Navaez224
provided documentation and analysis of Chinese coolie labour following familiar streams of
investigation including race relations, immigration and labour protection. Of the 16 articles
218 W. Look Lai, “Sugar plantations and indentured labor: migrations from China and India to the British West Indies, 1838-
1918”, PhD Thesis, New York University, 1990): 631.
219 Anne-Marie Lee-Loy, “‘...The Chinese are preferred to all others': nineteenth-century representations of the Chinese in
Trinidad and British Guiana”, Asian Studies Review, 27, 2 (June, 2003): 205-225 [205].
220 Aaron Chang Bohr, “Identity in Transition: Chinese Community Association in Jamaica”, Caribbean Quarterly 50, 2 (June
2004): 44-73.
221 Moon Ho Jung, Coolies and Cane: Race Labour and Sugar in the Age of Emancipation, (John Hopkins University Press,
Baltimore, 2006).
222 Kathleen Lopez, “Review of Arnold J. Meagher, The Coolie Trade: The Traffic in Chinese Laborers to Latin America 1847-
1874, Labour History, 97 (November, 2009): 208-209. Between 1847 and 1874 over 250,000 Chinese indentured labourers
were kidnapped, bullied or coerced into signing contracts to work in Cuba and Peru on sugar plantations or in guano beds. This
constituted an involuntary migration pattern.
223 Jessie G. Lutz, “Chinese Emigrants, Indentured workers and Christianity in the West Indies, British Guiana and Hawaii”,
Caribbean Studies 37, 2 (July - December 2009): 133-154.
224 B. N. Narvaez, Chinese Coolies in Cuba and Peru: Race, labor, and immigration, 1839-1886, PhD Thesis, University of Texas
at Austin, 2010.
46
reviewed about Latin America and West Indies/Caribbean Chinese migration experiences, only
two writers, Lee Loy and Lutz, include any acknowledgement or discussion of women and
families associated with Chinese men. This was limited to acknowledgment of the historical
presence of wives rather than any meaningful analysis and only one mentions the diversity of
Chinese family relations which included Chinese men living or married to African, Indigenous
or White women. It is true in some countries that restrictive legislation was drafted by White
colonists to prevent marriages and unions between African and Indigenous women and Chinese
men. However, it is also clear that some unions persisted leaving many questions unanswered.
***
Pacific Rim
The contribution of South East Asia and regional Pacific studies investigating the Chinese
diaspora and immigration patterns has been significant since the early 1950s. Important works
taking an anthropological or sociological approach to social structures and race relations have
covered most countries associated with the Chinese diaspora including the Asia Pacific region
(Indonesia225; Sarawak, Malaysia226; and Papua New Guinea227); Eastern Melanesian countries
(Solomon Islands228, Samoa, Fiji 229, Tahiti230 and Vanuatu231 ) and New Zealand. However,
despite early scholarly enquiry from T’ien232, Laracy233, and Tom234, it is the combined works of
Bill Willmot235which really provide tangible comparative investigation into Chinese settlement
225 Bill Willmott, The Chinese of Semarang: a Changing Minority in Indonesia (Cornell University Press, Ithaca, New York,
1960).
226 Jan Ryan, “No man's land: re-orienting identities for Chinese Malaysian women in Australia”, Studies in Western Australian
History, 21 (2000): 75-88.
227 David Yeh Ho Wu, The Chinese in Papua New Guinea (The Chinese University Press, Hong Kong, 1982).
228 Hugh Laracy, “Unwelcome Guests: The Solomons’ Chinese”, New Guinea and Australia, the Pacific and South-East Asia, 8,
4 (1974): 27-37.
229 Bessie Ng Kumlin Ali, Chinese in Fiji. Suva, (Institute of Pacific Studies, University of the South Pacific, 2002).
230 Bill Willmot, “The South Pacific: Fiji, Nauru, New Caledonia, the Solomon Islands, Tahiti, Tonga, Vanuatu, Western Samoa”,
in Lynn Pan (ed.), The Encyclopedia of the Chinese Overseas Singapore, (Archipelago Press and Landmark Books, 1998): 292-
296, 299-303.
231 Bill Willmot, “Early History of the Chinese in Vanuatu 1844-1944”, in Brian Moloughney and Jim Ng (eds), Chinese in
Australasia and the Pacific: Old and New Migrations and Cultural Change, Proceedings of New Zealand Conference of the
Association for the Study of Chinese and their Descendants in Australasia and the Pacific Islands, Department of History,
University of Otago, Dunedin, 20-21 November 1998 (1999): 241-249.
232 T’ien, 1953, “The Chinese of Sarawak: A study of social structure”, cited in David Yeh Ho Wu, The Chinese in Papua New
Guinea.
233 Hugh Laracy, “Unwelcome Guests”, 27-37.
234 Nancy Y. W. Tom, The Chinese in Western Samoa, 1875-1985: The Dragon Came from Afar (Western Samoa Historical and
Cultural Trust, Apia, 1986).
235 Bill Willmot, “Origins of the Chinese in the South Pacific” in P. McGregor (ed.), Histories of the Chinese in Australasia and
the South Pacific (Melbourne: Museum of Chinese Australian History,1995): 129-140. ; Bill. Willmot, “Economic Role and
Cultural Identity of Chinese in Pacific Island Countries” in Xiao Xiaoqin and Li Dingguo (eds), Studies of Ethnic Chinese
Economy, (Shantou University Press, Shantou, 1996): 504-511; Bill Willmot,“Chinese Community in Fiji and Tahiti” in Zhuang
Guotu (ed.), Ethnic Chinese at the Turn of the Century, Volume 2 (Fujian Provincial People’s Publishing House, Xiamen,1996):
291-310; Bill Willmot, “The South Pacific”; Bill Willmot, “Early History of the Chinese in Vanuatu”; Bill Willmot, A History of
the Chinese Communities in Eastern Melanesia: Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, New Caledonia, Working Paper 12 (Macmillan
Brown Centre for Pacific Studies, University of Canterbury, Christchurch, 2005).
47
throughout the Asia Pacific rim which has direct relevance to the pattern of settlement within
northern Australia and north Queensland.
However, while Willmot investigates race relations, immigration and economic transnationalism
between countries, he fails to provide a social and historical analysis of women and family
associated with Chinese men, leaving a noticeable gap in history – a trend replicated by Featuna'i
Liua'ana236 when discussing Chinese settlement in Samoa. Not all scholars are remiss in this
area, as Yeh Ho Wu 237 makes some attempt to address this imbalance in The Chinese in Papua
New Guinea 1880 – 1980 where he investigates the immigration, economic history and pattern
of settlement by Chinese men and the effect of external global influences including World War
Two leading to the evacuation and resettlement of Chinese Papua New Guinea families in
Australia. New Zealand scholars Ip238, Whitehead239, Bradshaw 240 and Lee241 provide the best
analysis of Chinese settler families in New Zealand through their investigation and
documentation of family relationships, providing the closest comparable information in shared
regional history, transoceanic linkages both familial and economic between the New Zealand
and Australia, and analysis of families formed. In particular, New Zealand scholar Manying Ip
has been an influential academic contributor to the history and understanding of New Zealand
Chinese family relations, being the first to introduce this discourse into mainstream historical
investigation and by writing about the full range of relationships including White relationships as
well as Chinese Maori unions. Research into Chinese Aboriginal unions in North Queensland
will yield information useful to trans-Tasman studies on First Nations peoples, family
relationships and cultural identity.
Britain and Europe
Large scale Chinese immigration to Europe including the British Isles and European continent
did not reach the levels experienced within the Americas, the South Asia Pacific nor the trans-
236 Ben Featuna'iLiua'ana, “Dragons in little paradise: Chinese (Mis) Fortunes in Samoa, 1900–1950” , The Journal of Pacific
History, 32, 1 (1997): 29-48
237 Wu, The Chinese in Papua New Guinea 1880 – 1980.
238Manying Ip, “From ‘Gold Mountain Women’ to ‘Astronauts wives’: Challenges to New Zealand Chinese Women”, in Paul
MacGregor (ed.), Histories of the Chinese in Australia and the South Pacific, 299-305.
239Sarah Whitehead, "Being Maori Chinese: Mixed Identities", The Journal of Pacific History 44,1 (2009): 110; Manying Ip,
“Chinese New Zealanders: Old Settlers and New Immigrants” in Stuart W. Grief (ed.), Immigration and National Identity in New
Zealand: One People, Two Peoples, Many Peoples? (Dunmore Press, Palmerston North, 1995): 161-199; Manying Ip, “Maori –
Chinese Encounters: Indigine-Immigrant interaction in New Zealand”, Asian Studies Review, 27, 2 (2003): 227-252; Manying Ip
and Nigel Murphy, Aliens at my table: Asians as New Zealanders see them; Tong zhuoyike: Niu Xi Lan renkanyayi (Penguin Books
Auckland, N.Z., 2005).
240Julia Bradshaw, Golden Prospects: Chinese on the West Coast of New Zealand, Shantytown (West Coast Historical and
Mechanical Society Inc., Greymouth, 2009)
241Lee Murray, “A Tale of Two Cultures”, Heritage Matters: The Magazine for New Zealanders Restoring, Preserving and
Enjoying Our Heritage, 22 (Autumn, 2010): 50-52.
48
Tasman region with immigration to these areas associated with colonial expansion in
conjunction with the opening up of Chinese ports in the late 1840s. Studies undertaken in
England and Europe remain slim in number and difficult to obtain. English scholars Seed242 and
Benton and Gomez243 focus on the transitory migration patterns of Chinese sailors resulting in
the formation of Chinatowns as lodging areas and interface districts where race relations was
played out with the broader community. Seed, through analysis of the Limehouse Chinatown on
the London docks, interweaves the complexities of Victorian literary images about Chinese,
together with statistical data from the census to critically analyse the accuracy of census data
collection to construct a picture of the Chinatown district. While inclusive of women and
families associated with Chinese men, he none-the-less resorts to a standardized approach when
referencing the women, using the term “English Born Wife” rather than acknowledging the
woman’s actual name.
Gregor Benton is a prolific scholar and editor. He has written several books on the Chinese
Diaspora and explored migration to Britain and across the Channel to many countries in
Europe.244 His latest book, edited with Hong Liu, enjoys a prestigious foreword by Gungwu
Wang. Dear China: Emigrant Letters and Remittances, 1820–1980, explores the economy of
remittance trade in letters and remittances to and from communities and individuals in
destination countries and village families.
However, Dutch blogger Manya Koetse245 unpacks the construction of community within the
Netherlands, taking in historical “Chinatown” around the Nieuwmarkt and Binen
Bantammerstraat docks where boarding houses for Chinese seamen were established in the early
20th century. Respectful of the history, she raises the worrying trend for a new “orientalising” of
districts. She argues that a “Disneyfication” of Chinatown is now occurring through modern
interpretation practices to manufacture places to suit an external (tourist) market in a way which
conforms to the Western perception of what the place ought to be (imagined) rather than based
on historical reconstruction. This is a position which directly resonates with Australia’s Anna
242John Seed, “’Limehouse Blues’: Looking for Chinatown in the London Docks, 1900- 1940”, History Workshop Journal, 62
(2006): 58-85.
243 Gregor Benton and Edmund Terence Gomez, The Chinese in Britain, 1800 - Present: Economy, Transnationalism, Identity,
(Palgrave Macmillan, 2007).
244Gregor Benton and Frank N. Pieke (eds) The Chinese in Europe (Palgrave McMillan, 1998); Gregor Benton, Chinese Migrants
and Internationalism: Forgotten Histories, 1917- 1945, (Routledge, 2011); Gregor Benton and Hong Liu (with foreword by
Gungwu Wang), Dear China: Emigrant Letters and Remittances, 1820–1980, (University of California Press, July 2018).
245 Manya Koetse, Blog: “The Imagined Space of Chinatown: an Amsterdam Case Study”, posted 5 February 2010,
http://manyapan.wordpress.com/2010/02/05/the-imagined-space-of-chinatown-an-amsterdam-case-study
(Koetse is a Dutch graduate student of Literary Studies, Japanese Studies and Chinese Studies, and a fresh MPhil graduate in Asian
Studies (Chinese track)).
49
Lisa Mak246 who critiques the artificial construction of Sydney’s Chinatown through popular
myths to “create” a Chinatown from an imagined external Western perception rather than based
on historical fact as a quarter similar to other ethnic areas within the city.
In Queensland, the illusionary “Chinatown” has also emerged, however rather than a renewal
and rebranded version as outlined by David Chen Lai in his theoretical understanding of
Chinatowns, it is purposely constructed Chinatowns in places where one never existed before.
This was evident in the 2016 constructed Gold Coast Chinatown precinct with its three arches,
substantial financial ties involving three sister cities in China, and approximately 100,000
Chinese visitors gracing its streets per annum. 247 These environments are imagined and
constructed to suit an external (and increasingly Chinese) tourist market: to incorporate a
“Chinese streetscape and real street life imagery”.248 No longer are they actual places where
Chinese migrant workers lived in the 19th century, built on brotherhood and kinship unity, chain
migration and filial obligations. They are now commercialised shopping and holiday
experiences, occupied by accommodation outlets, tourist shops and food outlets. Commodified
Chinatowns and fake Asian places are the historical places of the future for scholars to ruminate
about. The 21st century “oriental” landscape complete with constructed counterfeit enclaves,
threatens to overwhelm the historical Cantonese narrative unless scholars continue to write about
it. The irony has not gone unnoticed. 249
Clive Hamilton in Silent Invasion: How China is Turning Australia into a Puppet State250
explores the relationship between China as a single-party state and its increasing influence upon
Australia. While not a book about colonial migration patterns associated with the Chinese
Diaspora, and also not a book on historical Chinatowns and communities within, Hamilton’s
work is included because has hit a raw nerve among Australian scholars and split the current
Australian academic community who undertake research into the Chinese Diaspora. Some
246 Anna-Lisa Mak, “Negotiating Identity: Ethnicity, Tourism and Chinatown” [online]. Journal of Australian Studies, 77 (2003):
93-100.
247 https://www.destinationgoldcoast.com/places-to-see/gold-coast/events/chinatown-street-markets
The Gold Coast Chinatown precinct includes Three Paifang gates, and incorporated donations and infrastructure from three sister
cities in China. An additional 100,000 Chinese mainland tourists visited the Goldcoast Chinatown making their presence nearly a
third of the annual tourism market. https://www.goldcoastbulletin.com.au/business/an-extra-100000
248 Ibid.
249 Nick McKenzie, Chris Uhlmann, Richard Baker, Daniel Flitton, SashkaKoloff, “ASIO investigation targets Communist Party links to
Australian political system”, A joint Four Corners-Fairfax investigation, ABC, Four Corners, 6 June 2017. This is undertaken as a
means to secure ties between the Peoples Republic of China and local government authorities. This has led to cries of political
interference right up to key figures in both political parties at the national level.
250Clive Hamilton, Silent Invasion: How China is Turning Australia into a Puppet State (Hardie Grant Publishing, 2018). This book
looks at the financial ties between the three tiers of Australian government, urban development and donations from Chinese
organisations with links to the Chinese Communist Party.
50
scholar’s express apprehension when it comes to China “managing” its Overseas Chinese
narrative, particularly when it comes to 19th and early 20th century political commentary, while
others condemn this premise as the emergence of a new type of anti-Chinese sentiment, not
dissimilar to 19th century newspaper propaganda. Either way, its presence must be acknowledged
as the “elephant in the room” and it threatens innovative ways of analyzing overseas Chinese,
such as the normalisation of gender integration in scholarly works, through its power as a
distraction.
The history of Chinese Diaspora and settlement around the world has been documented in a
number of countries and tackled from a range of perspectives. Yet few countries with the
exception of the U.S.A. and New Zealand have taken a direct interest in, or made any attempt to
integrate, the history of women and families associated with Chinese men within the broader
settlement experience. Scholarly leaders in the U.S.A. have produced a number of works
dedicated solely to the investigation of legislation and immigration of Chinese women, and
American researchers utilize innovative ways to interrogate historical data. In contrast to
Australia, where works are usually written by non-Chinese academics, it is also significant to
note that American Chinese scholars are most prevalent as authors. However, the primary focus
for enquiry into women associated with Chinese men in the U.S.A. rests solely with
investigation of Chinese wives with little investigation extended to women from White
backgrounds, Native American backgrounds or African-American backgrounds. This thesis will
enable comparisons to be made of the statistical incidence of the full range of marriages and
unions between the U.S.A. and Australia. In a broader global context, countries associated with
comparable labour-attracting industries such as sugar, and indentured labour to North
Queensland and Australia, including the Latin American and West Indies/ Caribbean nations,
have very little research or documentation of Chinese family formation which leaves a large gap
in historical understanding. Figure 1. Global Literature Comparison – Gender focused Scholarly
Review, (p. 53) provides a clear visual reminder as to why an integrated gender, (and I would
argue age) approach is required to fully understand the Chinese Diaspora.
Contribution to Scholarship
Since 2002, I have researched and written approximately 20% of the literature within
Queensland regarding women and families associated with Chinese men. This demonstrates the
ongoing contribution I make to the study of women and families associated with Chinese men
and heritage site interpretation within Queensland and the contribution to comparative history
51
and cultural heritage within a national and international framework. Scholarly investigation
solely concentrating on the statistical evidence behind the incidence of marriage and marriagelike
unions between Chinese men and a range of women in North Queensland, as well as family
relations, is a new aspect of research in Queensland and it has the potential to contribute
substantially to national and international investigations. This thesis complements the works of
May, Tan, Fischer, Fisher and Ramsay (Qld), Bagnall, Wilton, Hales and Williams (NSW),
Couchman, Rule, Keir and Lovejoy (Vic), Ryan (WA), and Baliant and Martinez (NT). By
teasing out the definition of what Chinese settler “family” actually means, including family
formation and geographical constraints faced by Chinese men when looking for family
opportunities in north Queensland, new and alternative perspectives can be developed in regards
to community and community formation and the role women and families made to their success.
Conclusion
The history of the Chinese Diaspora and settlement within Australia and around the world has
been documented through a number of academic disciplines, utilising a range of traditional and
innovative methodologies as well as introducing new perspectives and interpretations. Yet it is
clear that few countries have taken a direct interest or made any attempt to integrate to any
degree the history of women and families associated with Chinese men within the broader
settlement experience, leaving large gaps in knowledge and producing incomplete historical
narratives where only half the story is presented for academic and non-academic consumption.
Of the 357 international, national and State journal articles, books, theses, and key family history
works, more than two-thirds had a gender bias towards the male Chinese Diaspora experience
only. This indicates a need for new approaches to be adopted to fully comprehend what was
historically happening at mono-national and transnational levels. The research into Queensland
Chinese family experiences is consistent with international trends but when broken down to the
types of families investigated, Queensland as a case study provides the most integrated approach
to acknowledging relationships formed by Chinese men, covering as it does Chinese, White and
Aboriginal marriages and unions as well as separated families. When viewed from a national
perspective, Australia remains active in its academic interest in the Chinese diaspora and
Chinese family relations, but has some way to go to provide a fully integrated gender research
approach useful to a global context.
At an international level, the U.S. and New Zealand provide the most scholarly work in relation
to the immigration of women and formation of families associated with Chinese men.
52
Researchers have utilized innovative ways to interrogate historical data, and Chinese American
scholars contribute the most works compared to Australian scholars, who do not necessarily
identify with a Chinese ancestry. However, despite a large volume of female orientated scholarly
works associated with the Chinese diaspora to America, very little investigation has been
undertaken regarding non-Chinese wives and mixed heritage unions. Countries in the Trans-
Tasman region lead in this regard. This is a research area which requires attention. In countries
associated with labour attracting industries comparable to north Queensland and Australia, such
as sugar, including the Latin American and West Indies/ Caribbean nations, little research has
been undertaken into Chinese family formation. This leaves a gap in historical understanding of
family formation in a tropical region for which this thesis contributes.
Fig. 1. Global Literature Comparison – Gender focused Scholarly Review.
53
C h a p t e r 3
CHINESE SETTLEMENT IN NORTH QUEENSLAND
Introduction: Overview of Chinese Settlement
Chinese settlement in Queensland began in the late 1840s when Chinese men commenced work
as indentured labour on pastoral stations on the rapidly expanding White settlement districts of
Darling Downs and Burnett. However, from the early 1860s when north Queensland began to
open up to colonisation, Chinese men headed north or arrived directly from China to participate
in new and emerging opportunities which settlement expansion brought with it. Three key
industries emerged and drove settlement expansion across North Queensland: pastoralism,
mining and agriculture. Chinese men were attracted to each industry and found a number of
ways to participate in all.
Pastoral expansion paved the way for settlers to push north, occupy the land and introduce herds
of sheep and cattle, many of which were shepherded by Chinese men who had experience from
the Darling Downs. However, with pastoralism came the discovery of gold. Alluvial gold and
tin mining attracted many Overseas Chinese, which arrived directly from China. Mineral
discoveries came at a point in time when Chinese men were heading overseas to host countries
around the globe. However, as mining declined in some areas from the late 1880s, it was the
alternative industry of agriculture which attracted the most stable and long-term Chinese
migrant. In rural and remote towns Chinese men set up market gardens and small shop keeping
businesses while along the east coast, in provisioning centres and large port towns, Chinese men
participated as labourers and lessees of farms in sugar, bananas and maize production, settling
into and stable and long-term residency. The Chinese Diaspora to Queensland and north
Queensland, and the broader community response to it, gave rise to communities, cultural
precincts and Chinatowns, and it is women in these communities which the next few chapters
will address.
From 1848, Chinese men were present in the northernmost regions of the NSW colony, brought
in as a ready and cheap source of labour for pastoralists. Chinese labour was obtained by agents
in Singapore and Fukien Province (most notably the port of Amoy), with agents acting for
54
prominent colonial pastoralists.251 The first sixty-two indentured Chinese workers to be
employed as shepherds, hut keepers and sheep washers arrived in 1848 to the Moreton Bay
district on the ship Nimrod as part of a larger shipload of indentured labourers intended for
Sydney. Four months later the barque London brought a further fifty-odd labourers, one third of
a shipment of workers bound for pastoral stations. 252 Indentured for a period of five years, and
living in remote, isolated and dangerous conditions, Chinese men served out their contract under
the NSW Masters and Servant Act 1845 with varying degrees of success. Some ran away to
escape the harsh and lonely conditions,253 some committed suicide, while other persisted with
their employment, married White women, and moved on to other opportunities when they arose.
Between 1847 and 1859, twenty Chinese men had either married or entered a relationship with a
Caucasian woman, living either in Brisbane, on the Darling Downs or in the Wide Bay and
Burnett region. One of the first relationships recorded was William and Esther Wing in 1847
with the birth of their son Robert. Located primarily at Drayton, Dalby and Roma, Chinese
husbands from Amoy, China were usually married to immigrant women from Scotland, Ireland
and England or colonial born Caucasian girls. Most weddings were according to Wesleyan or
Church of England rites. Married while the colony was the northern most point of New South
Wales, most families opted to remain in the southern districts. However, by 1860 news of the
potential for opportunities further north had begun to reach the Brisbane, Darling Downs and
Wide Bay communities, precipitating a move for some families.254
As early as 1839-40, pastoralists speculated about the river systems in north Queensland as a
region with great commercial potential and an area ripe for further pastoral expansion. This
view was enhanced after 1844-5 when Ludwig Leichhardt made his journey to Port Essington in
N.T. from Jimbour Station, passing through the Burdekin region, including the rich pastoral area
of the Valley of Lagoons, and north through the Western Gulf country.255 Leichhardt gave
favourable descriptions of the land, river systems and flora, which stimulated speculation that
251Kathryn Cronin, Colonial Casualties: Chinese in Early Victoria, (Melbourne University Press, Melbourne, 1982): 4-6.
Queensland was proclaimed a separate colony in 1861.
252 Maxine Darnell, The Chinese Labour Trade to New South Wales 1783-1853, PhD Thesis, University of New England, 1997:
111-113; Fischer, “The Forgotten Pioneers”, 19. They were advertised in the Moreton Bay Courier on arrival as ready for
engagement, which was attractive to pastoralists on the Darling Downs who were actively seeking labour. “Indentured” means
under a binding agreement to serve for a specified term. Between 1848 and 1853 a large number of Chinese indentured labourers
entered New South Wales with approximately 227 working on the Darling Downs, representing 29% of all Chinese males in the
colony.
253 Queensland State Archives: (QSA): A/4870 Court of Petty Sessions Record Book, Gayndah, 1850-1857.
254 Robb Database Marriages and Unions: 1847-1920.
255 Bolton, A Thousand Miles Away, 11-14. It was argued that a permanent route between New South Wales and Port Essington
could be sustained by establishing new pastoral holdings in north Queensland along the major northern river systems in an effort to
develop a major export industry and secure the commercial interest of India and other parts of Asia.
55
pastoral routes could be secured through to a northern port to provide export opportunities. His
descriptions inspired further exploration parties, both Government and private, with other
notable expeditions including Edmund Kennedy (1848), and A. F. and F. T. Gregory (1856) and
George Elphinstone Dalrymple (1859).256 Concurrent with inland exploration, an exploration by
sea for a suitable port north of Rockhampton was also conducted. In 1859 Captain Henry Daniel
Sinclair reported a suitable bay which he named Port Denison, later Bowen, the north’s first port.
With the reports of Kennedy, Gregory and Dalrymple, combined with Sinclair’s report of the
discovery of a bay suitable for a port, preparations began to be made in earnest for the further
settlement of North Queensland.
***
Settlement Drivers: Three Key Industries
Between 1860 and 1886, the industries of pastoralism and mining were critical to the rapid
growth which occurred across north Queensland and from 1886 onwards growth was sustained
by the development of agriculture through sugar production. A pastoral push commenced with
the Kennedy district being opened up for selection as the first pastoral district in north
Queensland officially, with Bowen providing the only port to service this very large area. From
the beginning vast distances and lack of transport routes to pastoral stations inhibited expansion
for selectors. Alternative closer ports were sought and more suitable options explored, both north
and south, culminating in three new ports proclaimed over as many years: Mackay (1862),
Cardwell (1863), and Townsville (1864).257 These ports developed into mercantile centres
offering export/ import facilities as well as goods, services and labour for the expanding region.
However, it was not until after 1861 that northwestern Queensland was thrown open for
selection.258 The districts of Flinders, Cook and Burke were established, with Normanton and
Burketown established as ports in the Gulf of Carpentaria. The Queensland government
established a supply depot at Landsborough’s 1862 camp on the banks of the Albert River, and
the township of Burketown was surveyed in 1865. Normanton, while first settled in 1864, was not
256 However, enterprising pastoralists such as Christopher Allingham, (c1851-2), William Kilman (1854) and W.H Gaden (c 1856-
7) also followed Leichhardt’s footsteps in the hope of securing new runs, although little documentary evidence surrounding these
private ventures has yet come to light.
257 Fitzgerald, Megarrity and Symons, Made in Queensland, 21
258 Bolton, Thousand Miles Away, 9. Settlement did not occur until after separate search parties for the ill-fated Burke and Wills
expedition, including Frederick Walker’s exploration of the Flinders and Hughenden district, William Landsborough’s traverse of
the Hughenden district and investigation of the Gulf and inland rivers system, and J. McKinlay’s accounts of the eastern basalt
country crossed as he returned to Port Denison (Bowen) published their findings about the north.
56
declared a town until 1868 owing to an outbreak of fever at Burketown so that its residents
eventually abandoned the town and moved to Normanton in 1867.259
As pastoralists took up stations in the districts, families and workers moved out with them. Runs
were initially stocked with sheep but sheep proved unsuitable in the Gulf Country and selectors
quickly changed to cattle. Unlike the development of the Darling Downs, which relied on
Chinese labour, the extent of Chinese shepherds, hut keepers, shearers and sheep washers in the
north and north-west of north Queensland has yet to be fully understood. Station records
including those detailing rations and provisions, pay ledgers and agreements exist but have not
been analysed in detail to date. However, bank entries which indicate a Chinese presence
associated with the development of many early towns and settlements throughout the region
provide a glimpse into station employment activities.
Pastoralism:
The employment of Chinese labour on pastoral stations was sporadic around the region.
Occupations ranged from shepherds, shearers and fencers to cooks and station gardeners.
Considered industrious as well as thrifty, Chinese cooks and gardeners were valuable members
of the stations and were employed on the majority of stations throughout western and northwestern
Queensland. While initially two men may have been employed to carry out the role of
station cook and gardener, difficulties attracting labour to remote positions meant that, in many
cases, one Chinese man was charged with both positions. The role required the cultivation of
vital fruit and vegetables, raising and maintaining poultry, and creating meals on a daily basis for
the manager and his family, domestic staff and station hands. In some instances, the cook
/gardener was also the unofficial protector, aiding a White mistress when the husband was away,
often resulting in strong bonds forming between the two. While the length of time a Chinese
cook or gardener stayed with a pastoral station varied from station to station, usually 1-3 years,
there are some instances where the Chinese employee remained for longer. Go Foon Young was
one such worker, employed as a cook at Donaldson Station near Aramac for over 28 years.260
Chinese workers moved around the north-west and Gulf stations south west to Boulia and south
259 McIntyres Last Letter.’ Border Watch, 1 August 1866, p. 3.
260 Queensland National Bank Register: Signature Book, QNB Cloncurry Branch, 1884-1945, item held at Cloncurry Historical
Society, Cloncurry.
57
east to Winton and Muttaburra regularly, with periods spent between station employments used
to catch up with kinsmen or bank wages in district towns.261
Chinese workers enjoyed occupational flexibility, commencing as shepherds on stations,
relocating to other stations as cooks, or commencing as cooks and moving into market
gardening. From market gardening many Chinese men progressed into storekeeping, goods and
services including occupations such as hoteliers and lodging house keepers, butchers, bakers,
carriers, and carter licenses.
By 1883 north-western Queensland was established as a major producer of cattle with stock
routes as well as a rail networks to facilitate transport, with the rail head located at Hughenden.
Far western regions, beyond the railway, were accessed by Cobb and Co, packers, and carriers,
with pastoralists overlanding livestock between Brunette Downs and the Northern Territory
through the Barkley Tablelands to the port at Burketown in the Gulf of Carpentaria. This led to
the establishment of Camooweal in 1884. Croydon, in the central north-west, was surveyed two
years later in 1886. The gold rich reefs of Croydon rose to considerable prominence in the region
and were accessed by a network of transport links which extended from Burketown and
Normanton through to the east coast via the Einasleigh uplands and Herberton tin fields.262
Concurrent to the rapid expansion in the north and central regions of the colony, the colonial
government developed administrative systems to manage growth throughout Queensland with
laws set down to regulate settlement in new towns. Under the auspices of The Divisional Boards
Act of 1879, structure, stability and service provision were outlined for local governments
including an ability to collect rates and make valuations on properties. This enabled growth from
an administrative level in towns through returns on all rateable properties including owners,
tenants, special leases, market gardens, tailings areas, and pastoral holdings.
Gardens sprang up along stock and transport routes and were quickly established in mining
areas, particularly where reef mining was present, such as at Charters Towers, Ravenswood and
261 Queensland National Bank: QNB Cloncurry Branch, 1884-1945, held at Cloncurry Historical Society, Cloncurry; Bank of NSW,
Cloncurry : 1905-1911, held at Cloncurry Historical Society, Cloncurry; Queensland National Bank: QNB register Winton, 1881-
1890, held at Winton Historical Society, Winton; Queensland National Bank: QNB register Winton, 1890-1898, held at Winton
Historical Society, Winton; Queensland National Bank: QNB register Winton, 1898-1912, held at Winton Historical Society,
Winton; Queensland National Bank: QNB register Winton, 1916-1923, held at Winton Historical Society, Winton; Queensland
National Bank: QNB Signature Register: Hughenden, 1884-1888, held at Hughenden Genealogical Society, Hughenden;
Queensland National Bank: QNB Signature Register: Hughenden, 1880-1883, held at Hughenden Genealogical Society,
Hughenden.
262 Chinese settlers were excluded from the tin fields, and instead turned to small storekeeping businesses such as Go Sam in
Herberton or commenced activities tolerable to the broader White community such as wood carting or charcoal burning.
58
Croydon, or anywhere where bulk vegetables were required.263Chinese gardeners dominated the
supply of fruit and vegetables and were begrudgingly tolerated within the community for the
essential service they offered the community. Gardening was a profitable occupation. Not only
was it relatively stable, with little or no competition from other ethnic groups, it was flexible as
leases could be abandoned and new ones taken up as settlements waned. In particular it was
quickly recognised by the broader community that a stable supply of food was integral to the
successful development of any settlement and this sentiment was articulated in Ravenswood
when one commentator noted
The Chinese will probably settle down to their legitimate calling as gardeners, and as a means of
increasing and cheapening the supply of vegetables, we shall all join in the welcoming the influx
of the Chinese population.264
Mining
Despite the premature announcement that gold had been discovered near Bowen by Dalrymple
within months of its settling, gold mining in north Queensland did not commence in earnest until
the discovery of gold in 1866 on the Cape and later Gilbert Rivers.265 This was followed closely
by copper at Cloncurry (1867) and gold at Ravenswood (1868).266 Within three months of its
opening, Cape River was occupied by miners including a number of Chinese hotel licensees.267
The Etheridge followed in 1870 and in 1872, gold was discovered first at Charters Towers and
later that year further north on the Palmer River. By November 1873, Chinese men were alluvial
mining at the Palmer and busy establishing market gardens, even before the official goldfield
administration had arrived. The following year miners and families, including some Chinese,
had moved north from Charters Towers and the Etheridge fields to the Palmer River district.
(Refer Chapter 9.) This marked the beginning of a significant Chinese presence on the far
northern gold field.
263 QSA: 11 CHA/N3, Charters Towers Municipal Council Valuation Register 1885-1887; QSA: MWO 11/15; PRV10576 - 1 – 2:
Postage Book and Registration of Applications for Market Gardens – Ravenswood 1881-1882; QSA: MWO14A/69 Mining,
Warden, Index to register of applications for market garden and tailings areas - Mining Warden, Etheridge and Croydon, 1886-
1911; QSA: MWO/14B/40, Mining Warden Georgetown, Register of applications various; market garden areas 1887-1890; QSA :
MWO/14B/41 PRV10316, Mining Warden Etheridge, Register of applications various; market garden areas 1880-1912
264 'Northern News.', Rockhampton Bulletin and Central Queensland Advertiser, 21 September1871, p. 3. Small market gardens,
usually between 3-5 acres (1-2 hectares), provided fresh food.
265 John Kerr, Black Snow and Liquid Gold, Burdekin Shire Council, (National Library of Australia 1994): 47.
266 'Bowen.', Warwick Examiner and Times, 21 November 1868, p. 2.
267The Cleveland Bay Express, Saturday April 17, 1869. At Cape River at one court sitting up to six Chinaman’s Town residents
applied for liquor licences. This includes Hock Johnson for the Canton Hotel; Jimmy Ah Kin for the Chinaman’s Friend Hotel; Sin
Yan Long for The Pekin Hotel; Ah Teak for the Royal Charter Hotel; Ah Ching for the Hong Kong Hotel and James Kin Long for
the Diggers Friend Hotel.
59
The Palmer River goldfield attracted the largest influx of Chinese migrants in the shortest period
of time to Queensland, specifically north Queensland. From 1873, Chinese men migrated direct
from China to north Queensland to the port of Cooktown, newly established to service the
goldfield. The Palmer River goldfield had an estimated Chinese population of 1500 by the end of
1874. This number increased to 9,000 by the end of 1875.268 Chinese miners proved diligent and
industrious and were well organised in their ventures. Unlike the experience of the Chinese
indentured labourers, new migrants arrived directly from the Southern Pearl Delta region of
Guangdong, taking in several provinces as well as from the nearby island of Macao. By 1877, it
was estimated that over 18,000 Chinese migrants were on the goldfield including those in the
towns of Maytown and Byerstown. New Chinese hopefuls were arriving regularly on Chinese
shipping lines as well as British owned fleets, which plied their maritime services directly
between southern China and Cooktown.269
Chinese arrivals took advantage of a lack of infrastructure in emerging settlements and the need
for goods and services. Shop keeping, specialist trades, lodging houses and food production
flourished and these Chinese-dominated industries also developed in response to the general
widespread sentiment against Chinese gold miners. From 1877, a rise in mining license fees
aimed at inhibiting Chinese activities was further exacerbated by the introduction of the
Goldfields Amendment Act 1878. This legislation excluded Chinese miners from working new
fields for three years unless they had made the discovery, and led to alternative occupations
developing, giving rise to a high incidence of Chinese storekeeping, service licenses (including
licenses for hotels, carriers and butchers) and market gardening. In particular small-scale
agriculture such as market gardening developed from then on as a nearly exclusive Chinese
enterprise.
Cooktown developed as the major centre of Chinese settlement in north Queensland. Its nearest
competition as a port came from Townsville some 400miles (643 klms) by sea. The Port of
Cooktown was proclaimed in 1874, but the town was not declared a municipality until April
1876. By 1877, the Chinese community had grown to 1350.270 From the early 1880s a downturn
of alluvial mining on the Palmer River goldfield meant that the region began to contract. Miners
and shopkeepers began to move to other areas which were beginning to open up. Alternative
268 Kirkman, The Palmer Goldfield, 171.
269 Kirkman, The Palmer Goldfield, 172
270 Queensland Votes and Proceedings (QVP), 1878, Volume II, Report of the Registrar-General, Table 60 Showing Birthplaces
Minors and Adults Males and Females in Census Districts, p. 505.
60
industries provided a source of income as Chinese settlers turned their attention to the beche–demer
industry and exporting sandalwood. The construction of the railway line between Cooktown
and Laura facilitated a surge in agricultural pursuits, and market gardens expanded and citrus
orchards were established along the line. In addition, rice was grown along the rivers and
swamps.271 However, by 1886, while the populations of both the Palmer River goldfield and
Cooktown were still vibrant, they had begun to decline.272
Vulnerable to new discoveries, Cooktown suffered a downturn in population when the
Hodgkinson goldfield was discovered in 1876 some 170 miles (270 klms) south east of the
Palmer River. The discovery of tin at Cannibal Creek (near the Palmer River) in 1878273
afforded some respite from the exodus but by then people were moving to the new provisioning
centres which were established between Cooktown and Townsville along the lush and fertile
northern coast.
The ports of both Cairns and Port Douglas were established to service the Hodgkinson field in
1876 and 1877 respectively, and competition for hinterland trade was fierce.274 Both ports
provided an alternative to Cooktown for the entrepreneurial settler to establish a business to
provide goods and services to the Hodgkinson miners. The discovery of tin around the Wild
River, and settlement of Herberton in 1880, further encouraged Chinese settlement to the
hinterland districts between the Hodgkinson goldfields and the coast. Among those seeking to
capitalise on the new settlement were several Chinese men. Although initially prevented from
landing in Cairns by vigilante White men, Chinese businessmen including Cooktown’s Andrew
Leon (Leong Chong) were among the first to arrive in the fledgling centre. Chinese men such as
Leon and Sun Chong Lee, another Chinese storekeeper from Cooktown, quickly set up stores in
what was emerging as the main street through the scrub.275 The shift to ports further south
diminished Cooktown’s dominance as a provisioning centre, and shifted the Chinese migrant
gaze to other lucrative industries.
271 S. E Stephens, “The Endeavour River and Cooktown”, Queensland Heritage, 2, 2 (May 1970): 24.
272 Kevin Rains, Intersections: The Overseas Chinese Social Landscape of Cooktown, 1873-1935, PhD thesis, University of
Queensland, 2005:177. As noted by Rains, “A sequence of local, regional and global crises ensued from the 1890s onwards which
had a major impact on the town’s business community. By the early decades of the 20th century the town was only a shell of its
former self.”
273 'Mining Notes.’ The Queenslander, 4 May1878, p. 150.
274 W.T. Johnston, “The Men who Blazed the Track: From the Hodgkinson Goldfield to Trinity Inlet”, Cairns Historical Society
Bulletin, 105 (1968).
275 The Cooktown Herald, 21 February 1877, p. 2.
61
The fertile corridor of the wet tropical northern coast provided ideal conditions to experiment with
large scale agricultural pursuits. Successes further south with sugar cane cultivation were soon
built upon in the northern district. Large scale sugar cultivation had been underway in the Mackay
district since 1868, where sugar cane had been successfully grown on a number of coastal
selections resulting in up to twenty sugar mills in operation by the early 1880s.276 This was
followed closely by cane growing in the Burdekin districts and the Halifax/Ingham district. Large
scale agriculture evolved as the dominant industry on the coast in the wet tropics with agriculture
providing the third major industry to attract Chinese migration.
Agriculture
Sugar
Along the fertile and tropical east coast, large scale agricultural pursuits including sugar
production, banana plantations and maize growing provided attractive alternative industries for
Chinese migrants who found themselves frustrated or disillusioned by the unstable nature of
mining. A new wave of Chinese migrants began to arrive from the mid-1880s to work on sugar
plantations or to undertake labouring tasks which met the needs of the broader White selector
community. Attitudes towards Chinese migration were mixed yet promising. This was because
of three reasons. Firstly, the majority of Chinese immigrants were exploited by White selectors
because of a Chinese desire to cultivate land and continue agricultural occupations familiar to
many of them. Many took up this economic avenue because unless they became naturalised,
Chinese men were unable to own land. It was advantageous for White selectors to lease to
Chinese settler men in order to fulfil land selection conditions set by the government, where
selectors were required to clear a percentage of the land per annum and ‘improve’ it in order to
hold the selection.
Secondly, by leasing virgin scrub to Chinese men, selectors were able to outsource the
tremendous physical labour required to clear dense scrub and forest, and at an economical rate.
At £1-£3 per acre or £80 per annum, Chinese workers cleared acres of land by hand held
implements.277 Many entered lease terms whereby they leased land for five years, including
clearing, with the first year free and afterwards a payment per acre. By undertaking wholesale
clearing, while leaving the stumps in situ, the land was cultivated for crops. Once the stumps
276 ‘The Sketcher', The Queenslander, 20 May 1882, p. 621.
277Maryborough Chronicle, Wide Bay and Burnett Advertiser, Tuesday 17 February 1880, p. 4; Maryborough Chronicle, Wide Bay
and Burnett Advertiser, Thursday 25 August 1887, p. 3.
62
rotted away (around five to six years), White selectors resumed the improved and cleared land
for sugar cultivation. Only then could European farming technology using horses and ploughs be
applied. This was considered suitable for White labour to undertake. It was a win-win situation:
selectors were able to meet their land selection conditions and clear the land, while unnaturalised
Chinese men were able to lease tracts of land to grow produce and earn a living.
Thirdly, behind the use of Chinese labour to clear the scrub was a dominant colonial theory that
White men were considered racially unsuitable for hard physical labour in tropical conditions.
Attracting White labour and getting them to carry out their work contracts any more than a week
in districts north of Mackay usually failed. Chinese labour along with South Sea Island labour
was regarded as a cheap and suitable alternative for sugar plantations, even though southern
China is more climatically similar to Brisbane than north Queensland.278
Sugar cultivation was a labour intensive industry requiring on average 2000 workers per
plantation for field, mill and transport work. In official acknowledgement of the deficit of White
workers throughout the colony, and consistent with colonial sentiment regarding White labour in
the tropics, legislation was passed to allow the recruitment of overseas “coolie” labour. The
Asian Labour Coolie Act 1862 allowed employers to directly recruit a range of labour including
South Sea Islander (“Kanaka”) labour as well as Chinese, Japanese, Malays (South-east Asians),
Javanese, and Cinghalese (Sri Lankans). The need for a large and cost-effective workforce was
acknowledged at a meeting in Mackay in 1883 when a petition was signed by 300 plantation
owners to import labourers directly from southern China. It was intended that indentured
contract labourers, accompanied by an interpreter, would be sought to work in cutting and
planting the cane.279
In the Burdekin, the Kalamia plantation had been established with Chinese teams grubbing out
tree stumps and planting cane while other Chinese growers took up leases, including early
notable men Ah Han,280 Chock Man and Ching Do. Further north in the Lower Herbert district
of Halifax /Ingham, successful use of Chinese labour saw 350 Chinese workers engaged in
Colonial Sugar Refinery’s Victoria Plantation, employed alongside a workforce of 200
Europeans and 300 Melanesians. By 1883 an estimated 2000 Chinese were engaged on northern
278QVP 1889, Vol. IV,“Royal Commission on the Sugar Industry, Report, Together with Minutes of Evidence and the Proceedings
of the Commission and Appendices, 1888”, pp. 31-37.
279 'The Labour Question at Mackay.’ The Queenslander, 24 March 1883, p. 469.
280 Kerr, Black Snow and Liquid Gold, 73.
63
plantations.281 Engaged at 16 shillings a week with rations or 24 shillings without, Chinese
workers undertook a range of work including clearing land and cutting drains, field work
(chipping weeds, ‘trashing’ cane, cutting cane) as well as mill work including working the
centrifugal.282 New arrivals and former miners from the Palmer River were recruited from
Cooktown and brought south; others were imported directly from China.283
Chinese labour gangs required men with entrepreneurial skills to liaise between their
countrymen and the planter. However, before long Chinese entrepreneurs struck out on their
own to become hirers and land owners themselves in key sugar growing districts. Chinese
landowners (such as Ching Do near Brandon) cultivated large holdings of land and actively
sought, eased and supported the immigration process for new arrivals, thus smoothing the
transition for many of their countrymen as they settled in north Queensland. In return they made
capital gains on their investment and benefitted from a large, accessible workforce which was
eager to migrate.284
In Cairns by 1886 the Chinese population attracted to the region by large scale agriculture, had
grown to account for 60% of all farmers and 90% of all gardeners across the district including
the Redlynch valley with 795 cultivators and gardeners alone.285 Andrew Leon emerged as a
leading entrepreneur, one who immediately invested in the developing Cairns along with
compatriot James Ah Ching. Together they purchased multiple selections and experimented with
a range of crops including cotton, tobacco, coffee, rice, sugar, and bananas. Leon was
instrumental in the establishment of sugar cane cultivation in the Cairns region and formed a
consortium of Chinese investors in 1881 to erect and manage the first sugar plantation and mill
for Cairns, the Hap Wah Mill.286 Run entirely as a Chinese co-operative, with the exception of
the engineer, it crushed the first sugar cane in the district in 1882.287 By 1885, an area of 2528
acres (1023 ha) was under cultivation, but despite efforts by the syndicate to maintain
production, the venture could not be sustained and it failed due to a combination of falling sugar
281 Queenslander, 8 December 1883, p. 923.
282 "Local and General." The North Queensland Register, 14 November 1898, p.18.
283 Diana Shogren, The Politics and Administration of the Queensland Sugar Industry to 1930, PhD thesis, University of
Queensland, 1980: 51, and Brisbane Courier, 29 January 1879, p. 5. Labour contracted directly from China to the lower Herbert
cost £20 each to planters but was considered a failure as most of the men ran away after they arrived. Chinese labour was employed
in hoeing and weeding as well as planting at a rate approx 26 shillings a week no rations.
284North Queensland Register, 16 January 1905, p. 48. Ching Do employed many Chinese men on his farm and supported a number
of others applications to come out to work from China.
285 May, Topsawyers, 112-113
286Sandi Robb, Cairns Chinatown: Heritage Study. (Cairns and District Chinese Association Inc. Cairns, 2012): 3-4
287He went on to become an outstanding and well-respected community leader, who ensured the continuation of Chinese culture by
providing land and funds for the erection of the Lit Sung Goong Temple, and acted as an interpreter between the Chinese and
broader European community.
64
prices and lack of capital.288 In 1886 it was forced to close. The machinery and the land were
sold at auction the following year.289 Despite this failure, Chinese settlers continued to expand
their commercial interests in large scale agriculture north at the Mowbray valley near Port
Douglas, and south in the Johnstone River district, near Geraldton (later Innisfail).290
Chinese growers who had invested heavily in sugarcane from Mackay to Mossman were
increasingly hampered by the introduction of Government legislation designed to frustrate and
restrict Chinese agricultural activity in the north. Driven by a desire to populate north
Queensland with White settlers, the Government used legislation as a convenient lever to wedge
Chinese interests out, fueled by the shift in colonial attitudes to White settlement in the tropics.
Previously, imported “coloured races”, South Sea Islanders as well as “Asiatic” labour, were
considered preferable to work in the oppressive tropical environment, and South Sea Island
labour had been utilized throughout the industry. However, increased scrutiny of the South Sea
Islander labour trade combined with the post-Federation emphasis on White Australia meant a
shift in the attitude towards Melanesians, changing to one of exclusion. In a move to protect
White labour interests, Queensland legislation was passed to abolish the South Sea Islander
labour trade in 1890 and reinforced by one of the first Commonwealth acts passed after
Federation in 1901, the Pacific Island Labourers Act, resulting in the labour trade ending in 1904
and the majority of South Sea Islanders departing by 1906.291
To offset concern expressed by many plantations and growers in north Queensland, the
departure of South Sea Islander labour in 1906 was offset by a rebate which provided
preferential treatment to White labour. Introduced in 1905, The Sugar Bounty Act rewarded
sugarcane growers with six shillings per ton to those growers who replaced South Sea Islander
labour with Caucasians. Under the Sugar Bounty Act 1905, Chinese were excluded from
receiving the bounty on the basis of race, regardless of whether they employed Chinese labour or
were Chinese land owners themselves. Between 1911 and 1921, single White male labourers
steadily increased, representing 43% of contract cane cutting gangs.292 The legislation openly
discriminated against one sector, on the basis of race, to the benefit of another, with Chinese
288Queensland Royal Commission into the Sugar Industry 1888, 31
289 'Advertising', Cairns Post, 18 May 1887, p. 3.
290 Queensland Royal Commission into the Sugar Industry 1888, 37
291 Kerr, Black Snow and Liquid Gold, 68-72
292 Timothy Bottoms, A History of Cairns, PhD Thesis, University of Queensland, 2003: 347. In 1911 the White population had
been 5193, increasing to 7455 by 1921.
65
growers placed at a financial disadvantage. The legislation also deterred White growers from
employing Chinese labour and there was much uncertainty as to whom it applied.293
The effect of the Sugar Bounty Act was heightened by a tightening of Commonwealth
immigration laws, making it increasingly difficult for Chinese immigrants to obtain Entry
Permits. This resulted in naturalised Chinese growers (such as Ching Do in Brandon and Jan See
Chin in Cairns) supporting a number of applications from relatives and kinsmen in China to
work on their farms in the production of sugar cane.294 Ching Do epitomized Chinese
perseverance and diversification in his approach to farming. In 1907 he harvested 1300 tonnes
of sugarcane averaging 26 tons to the acre, and also experimented in banana cultivation trialing
25,000 plants later that year.295 He constructed a tramway siding during the year, financing the
construction at a time when only the local Council would fund the construction of tramways
throughout the district.296 However despite best efforts by Chinese growers, over the next decade
Chinese participation in the sugar industry of north Queensland waned considerably due to
increased pressure from another piece of legislation, The Leases to Aliens Act, passed in 1911.
By 1912 both the newly formed Australian Workers Association and Australian Workers Union
gained membership amongst the sugar workers. Their protectionist views regarding White
labour reflected the change in opinion: that White men could work in the tropics. Two Acts, The
Sugar Works Act, 1911 and The Sugar Cultivation Act, 1913,297 both provided protection of
White labour interests. In particular the Sugar Cultivation Act, 1913, S.4, stated that certain
persons not having first passed a dictation test could not be employed in the sugar industry.
Those who had passed the test or who had proved they were already employed in the sugar
industry before the Acts were passed were given exemption certificates. The Cairns branch of the
A.W.U., unhappy that the Acts did not go far enough to protect European workers, kept a
constant eye on Chinese labour in the district to ensure that breaches of the Act, especially in
293 National Archives of Australia (NAA): 3058167 J2773; correspondence, William LAM PAN re Sugar Bounty.
The extent and implications of the Act were tested through questions raised by growers. In 1910 Mr McCallister from the Burdekin
wrote to seek clarification on his eligibility for the Sugar Bonus because his daughter-in-law’s young brother, a Queensland born
Chinese lad age 14, William Lam Pan, had joined his sister on McCallisters farm at Ayr. Even though the boy was Australian born,
he was still considered “Chinese”, but due to his age and providing he did not work on the farm, it was considered his presence
would not affect eligibility for Mr McCallister.
294Queensland State Archives (QSA): CRS/156/36/3661 Brown vs SEE CHIN, Cairns, 1922
295Townsville Daily Bulletin, 19 November 1908, p. 4
296 Kerr, Black Snow and Liquid Gold: 106 and "Ayr Tramway Board." Townsville Daily Bulletin, 12 July 1907, p.2.
So successful was Ching Do Siding as it was known, that the Divisional Board refunded his money. Ching Do siding was renamed
Poopoonbah in 1917 to mollify anti-Chinese sentiment in the district. This is despite the fact that Ching Do, his wife Annie Leeds
and six children were well respected Church of England members and community participants.
297The Sugar Works Act, 1911 set a minimum wage for sugar workers in order to exclude “alien” labour. It worked on the basis that
given the choice between an “alien” or white worker a employer would choose a white worker. The Sugar Cultivation Act 1913
excluded anyone from the sugar industry, which failed a dictation test.
66
regards to exemption certificates, did not occur. 298 This vigilante attitude may have been later
responsible for allegations against Jan See Chin, which eventually saw the police acting which
resulted in a Supreme Court case with See Chin, for breaches of Section 4 of The Sugar
Cultivation Act 1913.299 This obstructionist attitude may have contributed to Jan See Chin and
his family abandoning the area to live in Hong Kong.300
Despite a reasonable number of Chinese men engaged in the sugar growing district of the
Burdekin their presence had been reduced significantly by 1919. Only forty-six Certificate of
Exemption to the Dictation Test (CEDT) permits were issued to Chinese at Ayr in 1919, with a
further fifty-eight issued at nearby Brandon, mainly working on the Pioneer Plantation.301 This
represented a steady decline of a third of the region’s Chinese workers from the district since
1909 and contrasted starkly with the increase of another “Alien” workforce arriving directly
from Italy.
Since the mid-1890s a steady migration of Italian workers had flowed into north Queensland,
most notably the Lower Herbert district, but despite being regarded as more suitable for tropical
agriculture than workers of British origin, they did not pose a significant threat to Chinese labour
interests because they were not numerically significant enough to compete as a viable alternative
workforce. However, after 1915 newly arrived Italian sugar cane workers became a direct labour
threat to Chinese workers as they were not only competitive, but were highly organised, able to
provide a ready and willing alternative workforce which fitted the official definition of ‘White’
and were considered reliable hard workers. The “Italian invasion” provoked considerable
debate as they were not seen to be the “right” type of White settlers for the north.302 With
contracts allowing in single men, couples or couples with children, this represented a policy
departure from the Chinese immigration experience where wives were unable to immigrate. The
competing Italian immigration impacted directly on the already vulnerable and aging Chinese
workforce throughout the Burdekin, Lower Herbert and Innisfail districts and accelerated the
population decline.
298May, Topsawyers: 177
299 QSA: CRS 156, Police versus See Chin, 15 December 1922. The Sugar Cultivation Act 1913, Section 4 states that certain
persons not having first passed the dictation test cannot be employed in the sugar industry.
300 Interview with Greta Yin Foo, Cairns, 2002; NAA BP384/9, Birth Certificate Register - Chinese Book 2. Jan See Chin took his
wife Maud Ah Young and large family back to Hong Kong to conduct business there. See also QSA CRS/156/36/3661 Brown vs
SEE CHIN.
301 Kerr, Black Snow and Liquid Gold, 185
302 "Italian Invasion", The Northern Herald, 11 August 1926, p. 20.
67
Bananas
Chinese migrant settlers to Geraldton, while first engaged on sugar plantations, quickly moved
to the more lucrative industry of banana cultivation. Banana plantations quickly developed into a
very large-scale industry which, at its peak, spanned from Tully to Mossman including the
Aloomba and Greenhills area near Cairns.303 In particular transport of produce to Geraldton was
serviced through Chinese initiated and constructed infrastructure including a canal and
kilometers of tramways which connected to a small wharf at Maria Creek. Owned and operated
by Chinese immigrants and settlers, the banana industry was well organised. Key individuals,
including the prominent businessman Tam Sie, managed the trade using their commercial and
kinship links within and between the northern communities, as well as with other colonial
centres in Sydney and Melbourne.304 In 1891 banana exports from Cairns worth £25,585 were
sent to southern ports in New South Wales and Victoria. The industry was recognized as vital to
the growth of the region and many vocalized fears of disastrous results for the local economy if
the banana industry failed.305 A substantial decline was halted in the mid-1890s when a cyclone
wiped out the main export competition, located at Fiji. By 1898 bumper harvests in the Cairns
and Geraldton district were recorded. This included a harvest of 37,771,462 dozen bunches in
1898.306 By the end of the first decade of the new century, the banana industry throughout
Queensland was estimated to be worth £150,000 per annum and stretched from Port Douglas to
Brisbane, with over 550 growers, nearly half who were Chinese.307
As Cathie May notes, banana cultivation, undertaken by Chinese settlers, became the mainstay
in both Cairns and Geraldton (Innisfail) during the 1890s and contributed substantially to the
expansion of the Chinese population throughout the district.308 Concurrent with the development
and expansion of the region’s banana and sugar industries, new Chinese arrivals and settlers
were clearing land and planting maize in the Cairns hinterland at Tolga, and Atherton near
Herberton. Much of the agricultural industry in North Queensland was initiated or dominated by
Chinese men who introduced and experimented with crops and technologies. Chinese driven
agricultural industries included crops such as bananas, maize, pineapples, and rice as well as
fruit trees including oranges, lemons, mangoes and limes.309 In addition Chinese growers
303 As part of the general agricultural expansion under The Sugar Works Guarantee Act of 1893.
304 May, Topsawyers, 21- 35
305 Ibid. 196-197.
306 Ibid. 25.
307Telegraph, 5 August 1911, p. 2.
308 May, Topsawyers, 12, 21-35.
309Queensland Royal Commission into the Sugar Industry 1888, 31.
68
experimented with tobacco, coffee, and lychees with the earliest lychee orchard planted by
Wong Wah Day near Greenhills, which still remains in production.310
Unlike small scale agriculturalists such as market gardeners who carefully cultivated gardens
using traditional and sustainable farming techniques, large scale banana farmers cropped heavily
until the soil was exhausted before moving onto new areas. Cultivation exhaustion, fruit fly, and
decimation of the Cairns and Geraldton crops from a cyclone in 1906 brought the banana
industry to a steady and inevitable decline. Chinatown’s merchants had been working with the
Cairns Chamber of Commerce for at least a decade to maximize benefits from the booming
banana industry. However, restrictions imposed by the southern states due to fruit fly meant that
exports of bananas from Cairns were rapidly decreasing despite constant attempts to find
practical solutions to satisfy southern fruit fly regulations.311 By 1908, exports of bananas from
north Queensland to Victoria had fallen by 75%. Chinatown merchants again asked the Chamber
of Commerce to look into the reason for the decline in the banana industry and a Cairns
delegation without a Chinese member went to the Minister for Agriculture, without result. Fruit
fly restrictions, plus direct imports of bananas from Fiji, directly affected the industry.312
Despondency over the future of the industry was growing as Chinese growers lamented that the
harsh regulations were crushing the industry.313 The broader economic implications of the loss of
the industry for the Mossman, Cairns, Innisfail and Tully districts were strong, with one
commentator noting that the “prosperity of Cairns had been materially affected by the extinction
of a once flourishing industry.”314 By 1911 the banana industry had all but collapsed. The
following year The Leases to Aliens Act prohibited Chinese from leasing more than five acres
each which ended any chance of resuscitation for the Chinese dominated industry.315 While the
region maintained a constant, yet much reduced export of bananas to southern states over the
next few years, a massive cyclone in 1918 destroyed the town of Innisfail including Chinatown,
and decimated crops between Cairns and Innisfail. The industry never recovered and by 1920
large scale Chinese grown banana cultivation had all but ceased.
310 Interview, George Wah Day, Green Hills, 2002.
311Cairns Post, 19 May 1908, p. 5.. Another banana regulation was introduced this time: bananas had to be packed in cases which
were rat proof. Ten leading Chinese merchants met with Commissioner for Health along with Fruit Inspector, representatives from
the shipping company and the Shire Clerk to protest this.
312Cairns Post, 28 November 1908.
313Cairns Post, 15 May 1909.
314Cairns Post, 21 July 1909.
315 May, Topsawyers, 29.
69
Maize
Whereas the Chinese sugar industry was co-located with White growers along the eastern sea
board, the large and thriving maize industry was mainly driven by Chinese growers and
contracted to the Atherton Tablelands because its success meant it could undercut maize
growing areas elsewhere. The maize industry had sustained consistent returns for Chinese
settlers around Atherton and Tolga since 1900, spurred on by a growing demand for maize by
the dairy industry as well as demand from poultry keepers and horse teamsters. In 1901 Atherton
recorded a Chinese population of 481. Indicating ongoing support for a stable Chinese
population, a new temple was constructed at Atherton Chinatown: the Hou Wang Temple in
1904.316 By 1909 Atherton’s Chinese population had swelled to an estimated 993, with 948
adults and 45 children who had been born in Queensland since 1901. Atherton and district’s
population represented 23% of the Chinese population throughout the north followed by the
banana district of Geraldton at 16% of the population and Cairns sustaining 10% of the
population.317 Two years later, in 1912, the maize industry on the Tablelands was reaching
record production in both acreage and output.318 In 1913 Tam Sie, one of the foremost Chinese
merchants in Innisfail, estimated that over a thousand banana growers had moved to the
Tablelands to grow corn.319 Chinese growers dominated cultivation of maize on the Tablelands
until a similar move to curb and suppress Chinese activities was brought into effect through the
Discharged Soldier Settlement Act of 1917.
The Atherton Tablelands was an ideal place for a Soldier Settlement Scheme. Not only was it
fertile and comparatively cool, suited to dairying which was considered a good industry for
small selectors, it had been substantially cleared by Chinese tenant farmers. Once their leases
expired, the land was resumed for the returning soldiers, with the scheme orchestrated as a
solution to resolve two problems. It provided land for the returning soldiers as a reward for their
war effort, and it enabled the government to legitimately divest the area of Chinese farmers.320
From 1918, the exodus of maize farmers from Atherton and Tolga down to the coast provided
temporary growth for both Innisfail and Cairns Chinese communities. However, as the
possibilities for Chinese in the sugar and banana industries were all but exhausted, it was not
long before aging Chinese workers retired or returned to China. By 1920, the Chinese population
316 'Local and General', The North Queensland Register, 8 February 1904, p. 23.
317 QSA: POL/J2 Police Department Commissioners Office Miscellaneous Correspondence Report 1898 (Number of Chinese in
districts).
318Cairns Post, 31 May 1912.
319 May, Topsawyers, 14.
320Edmund Lee Wah Bow, “The Lee’s Family Tree of Larm Har Village, Lundo, Zhongshan, China”, unpublished manuscript, date
unknown, pp. 21 and 22.
70
consisted of aging Chinese men with very few new immigrants below 30. Most had arrived
before, or at the turn of, the century and while some of their Queensland born children had
followed them into agriculture, in most cases the younger generation were more engaged in
commercial enterprise rather than agriculture. With no large-scale agricultural industry to
provide work and sustain a large rotating immigrant population, coastal Chinatowns and cultural
precincts contracted in size as the next generation concentrated on storekeeping, goods and
services.
***
Population Trends
Chinese population trends in major towns across North Queensland indicate a correlation
between migration patterns and key industry trends. Chinese population figures across north
Queensland in 1886 clearly reflect the pattern of settlement of the three key industries,
pastoralism, mining and agriculture. Port towns on the other hand including Cooktown, Cairns,
Townsville, and Mackay, also enjoyed large Chinese populations but were dependent as
provisioning centres on the major industries which they serviced. Figures for pastoral districts of
the central west and north Gulf districts reflected the smaller and more scattered communities
across larger areas.
Fig.2. Chinese Population in Key Census Districts, 1886 321
By 1901 the mood amongst north Queensland Chinese was optimistic. In 1901, Cairns had
become the largest Chinese community outside Brisbane, exceeding the number in any other
part of the State.322 Cairns with a population of 2078 Chinese, outclassed both Townsville with
321 QVP, 1887, “Register-General Queensland Census, 1886” Vol. II
322 May, Topsawyers: 12
71
a population of 636, which serviced the sugar towns of Ayr, Home Hill and Giru in the Burdekin
and mining towns of Ravenswood and Charters Towers, and Atherton on the Tablelands, which
took in Herberton, Atherton and Kairi/ Tolga which only had 481 Chinese settlers. The sugar,
banana and maize growing districts around Cairns, Atherton and Mackay provided an attractive
and lucrative option for new arrivals, and it is evident by the population figures that the east
coast was preferred over the hinterland and inland districts.
Mining districts on the other hand, including Palmer River, Charters Towers and Croydon, still
remained attractive to Chinese settlers with populations exceeding 250 in all places. However, a
decline was beginning to become evident as populations in mining regions such as the Palmer
River, the Etheridge and Cloncurry with up to two thirds or more of the population recorded as
having moved. The populations of Chinese in Ravenswood, Thornborough and Herberton
further reinforce this. Chinese men headed to the more profitable districts of the east coast which
also accelerated the decline of port towns servicing mining fields such as Cooktown, Port
Douglas and Townsville.323 Port Douglas suffered the swiftest downward trend after the
completion of the Cairns to Mareeba railway line in the early 1890s which removed the
hinterland trade to Cairns. Port Douglas and the Mowbray valley suffered a gradual decline
which was exacerbated by seasonal floods and cyclones. The Atherton Tablelands by this stage
was emerging as an important maize growing region which prompted many to move. Those
who remained behind followed quickly after March 1911 when a cyclone destroyed every
building in Port Douglas including the Temple.324
Chinese settlement in pastoral communities in the west and north-west had diminished even
more, by half, throughout the 1890s. Chinese station workers, cooks, gardeners, shearers and
station hands were dismissed from stations as anti-Chinese sentiment worsened, as both the
Shearers Union and the United Pastoralists Association fought for freedom of contract rights
during the 1891 and 1893 Shearers’ Strikes.325 Many Chinese men, discouraged from working
on stations, turned their attention instead to gardening and storekeeping in and around rural
323 Rains, Intersections, 185. As noted by Rains: “The majority of Chinatown occupants were transients, few living there for more
than a decade and many only appear in rates records for one or two years. Rates and burial records indicate that the majority of
residents were the non-elite and consisted of petty storekeepers, fruiterers, fishermen, hawkers, labourers, artisans such as basket
makers, cooks, gamblers and temple staff.... A small number of shops and cottages provided living and work space for the
storekeepers and their extended families of relatives, employees and associates. The most aged and destitute members of society
found hospice either with these storekeepers or at the temple.”
324 Daniel M. Connolly, Chronicles of Mowbray and Port Douglas and the Pioneering Saga of the Reynolds and Connolly Families,
D.M. Connolly Qld, Cairns, Qld, 1984: 25 and 'Labour Troubles.', The Northern Miner, 7 March 1891, p. 3. On the 6 March 1891
it was reported the United Pastoralists Association on Queensland agreed to a Sydney resolution regarding Freedom of Contracts
held this morning, “was not intended to include Chinese, Polynesians or Asiatic labor, and we earnestly recommend the members of
our various associations to discontinue the further employment of this kind of labor.”
325 ‘Chinese Cooks Dismissed”, Queensland Times, Ipswich Herald and General Advertiser, 7 March 1891, p. 5.
72
towns and communities. Even then they were not safe with many gardens trashed and robbed by
union shearers on strike.326
By the end of the century the Chinese population across Queensland was officially estimated at
10,076 persons including 93 Chinese women.327 By 1900, Chinese settlers represented less than
2% of the general population despite growing fears and claims by some anti- Chinese agitators
which were never realized when the figures are considered.328 Occupations ranged from
speculative entrepreneurs to street hawkers, miners to jewelers, opium house keepers and
boarding house keepers to merchants. Other niche occupations such as carpentry and boat
building serviced both Chinese and non-Chinese interests.329 With an industrious nature and
keen eye for opportunity, Chinese settlers were noted by one observer as
… a very industrious race and will make a living where the ordinary white man would
starve. They are also intelligent and saving, and soon start businesses on their own
account.330
Fig. 3. Chinese Population in Key Towns, 1901331
326Brisbane Courier, 20 May 1891, p. 5.
327 Queensland Parliamentary Papers (QPP) 1900, Vol. IV, “Census figures for Population Queensland”, p. 1329.
328John Potts, One year of Anti-Chinese Work in Queensland with incidents of Travel, (Davidson and Metcalf, Brisbane, 1888): 5-8.
329Capricornian, 16 March 1878, p. 7. And Cairns Post, 9 November 1889, p. 3. Beche de Mer and banana production gave rise to
another industry: boat building. A fleet of Chinese junks was constructed in Cooktown where there were boat yards, as well as at
Cairns. A smaller venture constructing banana punts occurred along the Tully River.
330 Extract from Diary of Arthur Neame, 1870-1897, p. 111 cited in Wegner and Robb, “Chinese in the Sugar”, 7.
73
Rapid growth and expansion of the maize industry on the Atherton Tablelands created a thriving
Chinese community located at Atherton as well as smaller satellite centres at Carrington, Tolga
and Kairi. As the Tablelands population expanded, other regional centres including Port
Douglas, Cairns and Geraldton contracted. While natural elements wiped out Port Douglas in
1911, the Chinese populations of Cairns and Geraldton (now known as Innisfail) had suffered
from a slow and steadily decline since the 1890s and newly arrived migrants preferred to move
to the hinterland of the Atherton Tablelands rather than stay on the coast. By that time a number
of aging Chinese men, those who had arrived seeking gold in the 1870s-1880s, were also
beginning to return home to China.
The importance of the maize industry as a source of income for Overseas Chinese is evident in a
population of nearly 1000 Chinese people across the Atherton Tablelands in 1909, which had
exceeded that of the banana driven economy of Geraldton and the stability and prosperity of
Cairns. However, from 1910 onwards due to ever-increasing restrictions placed on the Chinese
population through legislation and the White Australia policy, populations continued to decline
across the State at a rapid pace. In 1910 the population of Chinese across Queensland was
recorded as 9313 Chinese. This figure dropped two and a half thousand to 6714 by the end of
1911.332
Fig.4. Chinese Population in Key Towns, 1909 333
331 Compilation of Queensland Parliamentary Papers (QPP) Vol. IV (1900) “Statistics of Queensland, Table XVI”, p 909 & QPP.
Vol. III (1901) “Census of Queensland, Table XLVI”, p 110
332Daily Mercury, Saturday 13 January 1912, p. 4.
333 QSA: POL/J1 Return of Chinese in Several Police Districts of Queensland April-May 1909 (Via Circular Memorandum No.
534)
74
So, how do the industries stack up against one another as attractants for migration associated
with the Chinese Diaspora? By the end of the first decade of the 20th century approximately 65
% of the Chinese population were living or occupied on the eastern sea-board in large scale
agriculture, 20 % were engaged in goods and service industries servicing mining towns, 10%
were living in major service centres and were occupied with commercial enterprise, and the
remaining 5% were associated with pastoral towns. While some overlap between industries
occurs, such as small-scale agriculture (market gardening) on the coast as well as in a pastoral or
mining context, it is fair to say that the earlier focus of mining as a driving influence for
migration in the mid-1880s had turned significantly to large scale agriculture between 1886 and
1910. This shift in focus influenced the subsequent pattern and location of settlement across
north Queensland which had further implications for the Chinese Family Landscape which
developed. In addition, population migration and large-scale agricultural industries along the east
coast followed completely different trends to the pattern of settlement and industry which
dominated inland rural and remote districts. This affected the occupations and population trends
across these districts which were reliant on either the fickle economies in mining districts or the
limited employment across the pastoral districts. Both industries attracted populations of
individuals and small syndicates of Chinese bachelor men in shop keeping and gardening
occupations which were unified in their experience with their coastal contemporaries by social
impositions, colonial restrictions, and Commonwealth exclusions.
75
Fig.5. Chinese population in Key Towns, 1909, by percentage 334
Fig. 6. Chinese Population in Key Towns, 1909, Industry identified
334POL/J1 Return of Chinese in Several Police Districts of Queensland April-May 1909 (Via Circular Memorandum No. 534)
76
***
Restrictive legislation
From as early as 1867, the Queensland colonial government sought multiple legislative ways to
control the number of Chinese immigrants arriving and settling in the colony. A series of
restrictive and prohibitive Acts were passed commencing with The Aliens Act 1867 (31. Vic. No.
28) which excluded any Chinese or African aliens from applying for a certificate of
naturalisation for British subject status unless married and a resident of Queensland for three
years. In other words, they were not entitled to full citizenship rights as were other races of non-
British subjects, who were eligible. Trends adopted from overseas in the U.S.A., Canada and
New Zealand saw further immigration restrictions introduced in 1877 with Queensland passing
The Chinese Immigration Regulation Act (41 Vic., No. 8) in response to the influx of Chinese
onto the northern goldfields. This Act authorized a £10 poll tax to be paid by the ship’s master
on each Chinese immigrant. Its effectiveness was questioned and was replaced after much
debate by The Chinese Immigrants Regulation Amendment Act of 1884. The poll tax was raised
to £30 per Chinese immigrant and the intake of Chinese set at a limit of one immigrant per fifty
tons of the vessel’s tonnage.
In 1888 an inter-colonial conference was held in Sydney to debate the Chinese Question. All
colonies except for Tasmania 335 voted to tighten restrictions placed upon Chinese immigrants.336
This facilitated an abandonment of the poll tax and strengthened the limit to one “Chinaman” per
500 tons burden of the vessel. In addition, those who illegally entered Queensland from the
Northern Territory would be subjected to a pecuniary penalty and gaol sentence as well as
cutting off of their queue (pigtail) as a measure of further humiliation.337
In 1901, the new Federal government introduced The Immigration Restriction Act (No.17 of
1901) which was designed to exclude Chinese immigration into the Commonwealth. Known
colloquially as the White Australia Policy, this legislation and its regulations were based on a
Commonwealth objective to create and maintain a White society. It was the most important and
lasting policy to exclude Chinese immigrants and it fueled a broader racist ideology. The White
335 Queensland Parliamentary Debates (QPD), 1888, First Session, 10th Parliament, Vol. LV, pp. 237, 717, 741 and Maryborough
Chronicle, Wide Bay and Burnett Advertiser, 31 May 1888, p. 2. Tasmania lobbied for a relaxing of conditions to attract labour and
met with much condemnation from the other colonies.
336QPD, 1888, First Session, 10th Parliament, Vol. LV, p. 239. Queensland’s representative Samuel Griffith remarked that “It is
satisfactory to know that this is a subject on which all parties in the House are agreed, that is to say we are all agreed as to the
common objective in view—namely the exclusion of the Chinese from Australasia as far as practical”.
337Ibid. p.745. The Chinese Immigration Restriction Act (53 Vic. No 22), although formulated in 1888 at the height of anti-Chinese
hysteria, was not passed until 1890 due to refusal of Royal assent and was superseded by The Chinese Immigration Restriction
Amendment Act (54 Vic. No. 29) of 1890. Until the 1911 Revolution, no Chinese man was re-admitted to China without a queue.
77
Australia Policy was fed by a belief that immigrant Chinese labour would undermine wage
levels, work conditions and standards of living for White men, and went so far as to suggest that
the presence of a great number of Chinese immigrants would destabilise social harmony if racial
integration were allowed and create a subordinate class of citizens. It was feared that social
division, potential conflict and moral depravity would descend upon the civilized community,
creating chaos fed by communicable diseases and vice.
After the “White Australia” policy emerged, racial divisions which had previously been relaxed
in some towns were re-established and the Chinese population was controlled more strictly; a
task made easier in northern areas which benefitted from State legislation including the
Aboriginals Protection and Restriction of the Sale of Opium Amendment Act 1901, the Sugar
Bounty Act 1905, The Leases to Aliens Act 1911 and The Sugar Cultivation Act 1913. The
negative effect of legislative restrictions upon Chinese men who had settled in north Queensland
was palpable and it was the last straw for some such a prominent sugar grower Jan See Chin of
Cairns who as noted earlier packed his large family up and moved to Hong Kong.338 Legislative
restrictions along with the soldier settlement scheme, aging population and rise of White labour
rights effectively stifled the Chinese population across Queensland, drawbacks from which it
was unable to recover until many decades later with the Dictation Test abolished in 1958,
restrictions subsequently relaxed gradually, and White Australia Policy officially killed off by
the Labor government in 1973.
Conclusion
Chinese settlement across north Queensland commenced with the migration of ex-indentured
employees from the Darling Downs venturing north to make the most of opportunities after
1860. As the region developed, three key industries emerged, pastoralism, mining and
agriculture, to dominate the pattern of settlement until the end of the century. While Chinese
migrants were associated with all three industries across the north it was the last two, mining and
agriculture, which substantially influenced migration trends and patterns of settlement across
north Queensland giving rise to at least two industry led migration influxes: one associated with
the early mining discoveries, and the other with large scale agriculture such as sugar. In
particular it was the opportunities in agriculture which provided the most stability to the east
coast communities and led to two Chinese dominated crops: bananas and maize. However, after
338 Interview: Greta Yin Foo, Cairns, 27 February 2002. As Peter Prince notes, legislative discrimination occurred despite many
Chinese actually being British subjects, having migrated from other British colonies such as Hong Kong and Singapore, and therefore
lawfully exempt. Peter Prince, “The Chinese always belonged”, History Australia 15,3 (September 2018): 475-498.
78
Federation and the implementation of the White Australia policy, combined with an increased
anti- Chinese sentiment across the north, Chinese populations declined as Chinese men were
limited in their ability to migrate to Queensland for any length of time, while those who
remained were frustrated with legislative restrictions imposed upon them and their families. By
1920 many old men who had been in the first wave of migration to North Queensland in the
early 1870s, had either returned home, had become indigent old men or had died, leaving the
community a former shadow of itself and reliant instead on the Chinese Family Landscape to
continue a Chinese presence in North Queensland.
79
C h a p t e r 4
CHINATOWNS AND CULTURAL PRECINCTS
Introduction
Chinatowns and Chinese cultural precincts were the most populated, talked about and policed
section of any town across north Queensland in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Usually located
on the edge of town, and confined to designated boundaries, they provided a place for Chinese
men to live, work and relax relatively unimpeded while in the host colony. Drawn together by
kinship, cultural familiarity and security, Chinatown communities developed all around the
globe as self-contained communities, catering to all needs of the Chinese population: both the
living and dead. Male dominated in population, Chinatowns’ economic and social structures
were based on transplanted political, kinship affiliations where mutual benefit obligations aided
the development of strong inter- and extended community networks. However, there were also
hidden elements in the community which developed over time, behind closed doors in the
private quarters of shops, dwellings, rented rooms, lean-tos and market garden areas. These
elements involved relationships conducted with women in the community as wives, lovers,
workers and daughters. These relationships enabled north Queensland Chinatowns and cultural
precincts to renew and grow in ways which otherwise may not have occurred. It also led to the
development of String Communities. However, before it can be understood just how the
presence of women and families contributed to the development of community across North
Queensland, a broader understanding Chinatowns, cultural precincts and String Communities
must first be explored.
Part 1: The meaning of ‘Chinatown’
“Chinatown” is a complex abstract term used to describe a physical place where migrant Chinese
men lived in host colonies and countries such as Queensland, and it has been constructed,
deconstructed and reconstructed by social commentators and scholars over the last 150 years.
Until the first few decades of the 20th century, ‘Chinatown’ was constructed by White observers
as an unsanitary, overcrowded and morally dubious place, with very little commentary
suggesting otherwise. “Chinatown”, and every White imposed derivative: “Chinese quarter”;
80
“China camp”; “Hong Kong”,339 were established across the globe in cities, major towns and
smaller communities: anywhere where large populations of Chinese men were associated.340 The
majority of White social commentators, governing authorities and members of the public viewed
“Chinatown” as places to be contained, managed and avoided in order to limit the Chinese
population from integrating into the broader community. It was also a place used as a means of
exercising moral and behavioural control over the broader White population (specifically
women), as a social demarcation for “respectability” with those who entered “Chinatown” at risk
of being pilloried by their social peers. More recently anthropologists, sociologists, historians
and archaeologists have reinterpreted “Chinatown” by exploring alternative theories of
transplanted territories341 and social construction342 while scholars in tourism and commerce
romanticize their existence as an “oriental” imagining in order to re-invent Chinatown as an
exciting visitor experience.343
Deep cultural values at the core of the British Empire shaped colonial attitudes towards Chinese
migrants and the places they lived. “Chinatown” commenced as a physical manifestation for
“the Other” by British colonial authorities, based on long held and deep-seated xenophobia
towards other races. Chinese migrants were not the first “Others” to be marginalized based on
culture or race. British authorities systematically demonstrated a determined approach to isolate
certain groups of people even prior to colonial settlement, commencing with the dismissal of
Aboriginal rights via the proclamation of the continent as a place of terra nullius; ill treatment of
convicts and later colonial Irish settlers who lived in “Irishtowns”; until focus shifted to a new
racial group, the Chinese, when the monopoly of resources by Whites came under threat.344
However, in seeking to impose racial segregation on the Chinese community, through the
confinement of the population to select streets and on the fringes of towns, effective
management of the population was abrogated. As a result, overcrowding and activities of “vice”,
339 'Severe Storm at Normanton', Townsville Daily Bulletin, 6 January 1909, p. 6 (re: ‘Chinese Quarters’) and "The Mongolian at
Cooktown", The Brisbane Courier, 19 February 1879, p. 5. (re: ‘Hong Kong’)
340 Lai, Chinatowns, 3.
341 Adam McKeown, “Conceptualizing Chinese Diasporas”, 306-308.
342 See Kay J. Anderson, “The Idea of Chinatown: The Power of Place and Institutional Practice in the Making of a Racial Category”,
Annals of the Association of American Geographers,77, 4 (December 1987):580-598 and Hu-DeHart, “Chinatowns and borderlands”,
425-451
343 J. Henderson, “Attracting tourists to Singapore’s Chinatown: a case study in conservation and promotion”, Tourism Management,
21 (2000): 525-534, and Carla Almeida Santos, YanivBelhassen, and Kellee Caton, “Reimagining Chinatown: an Analysis of tourism
discourse”, Tourism Management, 29 (2008): 1002-1012.
344 Pers. Comm., Alice Robb, 2000, Sandford. For example, the Irish were persecuted as an underclass community in early colonial
times and as a result formed Irish-only camps and cultural precincts, giving rise to the name “Irishtown.” In the rural western
district town of Sandford, Victoria, a portion of the town across the river away from what was once the central business district, was
and still remains known as “Irishtown”. This was originally settled by Irish immigrants in the 1860s in what was predominantly an
Anglo-Saxon settlement. Similarly, German immigrant settlements were sometimes referred to as “Germantowns” or “German
Quarters” or in the case of Townsville, north Queensland, “German Gardens”.
81
which White authorities were so anxious about, were able to occur due to the community
developing as a closed community.
The formation of a “Chinatown” meant that a community could function as a self-contained
urban enclave; a community within a community, which provided protection to those within and
remained forever “foreign” to those who lived on the outside looking in. As a result, the
Chinatown community was viewed with suspicion, mistrust and disdain, as an impenetrable
community by those on the outside who were obsessed with maintaining cultural divides. Evelyn
Hu DeHart, when reflecting on the formation of Chinatowns across the U.S., notes that the
formation of Chinese communities enabled the pattern of sojourning to break. This was the one
thing authorities wished to avoid.345
Blinded by a deeply embedded cultural value of “White” superiority and by positioning Chinese
racially as “the Other”346, colonial authorities managed to turn the blame upon the Chinese
community for failing to assimilate, despite a Chinese inability to work, live or take an equal
social position within the broader community. The physical presence of a Chinatown was
steeped with alien characteristics in the Western imagination and resulted in a skewed
interpretation. As Kay Anderson notes, “Chinatown” developed as a “social and cultural history
and tradition of imagery and institutional practice giving it a cognitive and material reality in and
for the West.” The fact that Chinese people congregated together, provided a natural impetus for
the dominant culture to use the term to describe the place, despite other races living there. 347
In an attempt to seek answers and identify patterns based on culturally based motivations, US
scholars Crissman348 and McKeown349 argue that Chinatowns were derived from established
patterns indigenous to China rather than self-imposed cultural enclaves united against White
racism. They argue “Chinatown” provided a natural response to factors associated with the
transplantation of culture from one country to the next, with the Diaspora providing an initiative
for the complex stratification of kinsmen to develop as they grouped together for mutual support.
Even the term “Chinatown” itself is an extension of the Chinese term for place. 350
“Chinatowns” were organised using established kin, clan and village structures which provided a
345 Hu-DeHart, “Chinatowns and borderlands”, 426.
346See the writings of Polish writer Ryszard Kapuściński, The Other, (Verso Books, 2008).
347 Anderson, “The Idea of Chinatown”, 582.
348Lawrence Crissman, "The Segmentary Structure of Urban Overseas Chinese Communities", Man, New Series, 2, 2 (1967):200.
349McKeown, “Conceptualizing Chinese Diasporas”, 306-337.
350 Lai, Chinatowns, 3 and Guy Ramsay, “Cherbourg's Chinatown”, 110. ‘Tángrénjiē’/ `Tong jangaai’ / Tong Yan Gai literally
means “Streets of the Tang Chinese”. Chinese: 唐人街; pinyin: Tángrénjiē; Jyutping: tong jangaai, Tong Yen Gai, Cantonese.
82
familiar social order including tongs, mutual benefit societies, meeting halls and temples. These
networks interlinked the Chinese Diaspora communities across the globe and enhanced social
and commercial links between host countries and village communities.351 The ensuing complex
and multilateral transnational relationships had their roots in the village political, family and
cultural structures and it was this familiarity which enabled the Chinese community to survive as
‘protected’ enclaves well into the 20th century.352
However, it is through Canadian scholar, David Chuenyan Lai that the clearest definition can be
found as the best model to interrogate the role of women in a “Chinatown” formation. Lai
describes “Chinatown” as “a self-contained urban enclave where nearly all Chinese people, their
businesses and social institutions were confined.”353 As a descriptor, this covers the physicality
of a “Chinatown” which is most relevant to this thesis, but falls short of including women and
families. In the context of Queensland, specifically north Queensland, I propose to amend and
expand this description as a means to better reflect gender diversity within the community. In a
Queensland context I suggest that “Chinatown” describes a community within a community,
where Chinese people, their businesses, social institutions and families were confined, which
developed as gender diverse, self-sufficient and inter-generational societies, tolerated only to the
extent that the host colony allowed it to exist.
“Chinatowns” arose specifically out of a necessity by Chinese migrants, in response to the need
for community support in a strange environment, and as a means to manage the migration
experience as a collective, while responding to external pressures exerted by the broader White
community. They were located on the fringes of town or well away from the central commercial
districts. They were universally confined to one or more town section blocks and developed to
form a “unique component of the urban fabric.”354 In countries such as the United States, they
were often located near a transport terminus or hub,355 whereas in Queensland and in particular
north Queensland, “Chinatowns” were located wherever major industry interests such as mining
or sugar production were active. “Chinatowns” were not homogenous in demographics or in
their response to the broader community. While Chinatowns in the United States and British
Columbia have been historically portrayed as male only “bachelor” societies, controlled by the
351 Yong Chen, [Review article] “Chinatown, City and Nation State: Toward a new Understanding of Asian American Urbanity”,
Journal of Urban History, 30, 4 (May 2004): 606- 608.
352 Koetse, “The Imagined Space of Amsterdam”, blog, 2010.
353 Lai, Chinatowns, 6
354 Lai cited in Anderson, “The Idea of Chinatown”, 582; Cairns Post, 17 March 1888, p. 2.
355 Rhoads, “The Chinese in Texas”, 14, footnote 24 re Boston Chinatowns.
83
wealthy and merchant class,356 “Chinatowns” in the colony of Queensland developed as gender
inclusive communities involving women and families as well as marginalised women such as
“prostitutes”. However, it could be said that key elements of the physical aspects of
“Chinatown”: the look, smell, high population density, poor sanitation and location of
populations were similar.
“Chinatown”: Architecture and Layout
Across the globe the architectural and planning development of Chinese communities was ad
hoc and opportunistic at best and permanently in crisis, as merchants and entrepreneurs sought
innovative solutions to accommodate the requirements of both the permanent and transient
residents of “Chinatown”. Confined to one or two streets yet teeming with people, some
“Chinatowns” developed distinctive architectural elements in response to need.
In Singapore and around Malacca, Chinatown shops utilized the ground floor and street frontage
as commercial space, while the rears of the shop, corridors or upper levels were private quarters.
Labourers shared the same sleeping space in cubicles in lodging houses.357 Places constructed
across northern Australia showed similar characteristics. Merchant houses and key stores in Port
Darwin as well as places in northern Queensland developed along the same lines to provide a
dual service to the community: goods and lodging services. Merchant houses were usually two
storied with a ground floor commercial area and an upper level for private use. Class was
clearly articulated by building structures with the merchant stores usually two storied timber and
tin structures and general shopkeepers confined to a low set shop with accommodation. Not only
were merchants able to provide commodious living quarters for their usually China born wives
and families, but they were able to rise above the smells and dirt of the streetscape and enjoy a
cool vantage point. This style of architecture was applied across north Australia with
characteristics described as a Fujian style of architecture which was popular across the Asia-
Pacific Rim area.358
356 See Yuen-Fong Woon, “The Voluntary Sojourner”, 673-690. Yuen-Fong Woon challenges the concept of the bachelor society and
advocates for a better term such as “married bachelor” society. This articulates the marital status of the majority of settler men and
acknowledges the wife at home and role of family and kinship relations in the Diaspora. To date, gender inclusive studies into
Chinatowns across the United States and British Columbia (Canada) are few. I am not convinced that this leads to an accurate
portrayal of Chinatowns. Women (Chinese. White and Indigenous women) have not been sufficiently studied or inserted into the
historical narrative. American historical newspapers demonstrate that White women, Chinese women, children, “prostitutes” and
Native American women are associated with Chinese men in Chinatown areas and cultural precincts but not represented in settlement
narratives.
357 Henderson, “Attracting tourists to Singapore’s Chinatown”, 526
358 Ibid.
84
On the other hand, ordinary storekeepers were limited to single story shops built directly on or
close to the ground with commercial rooms accessed directly from the street. Private quarters
were located at the rear and in some instances a mezzanine level was installed at the back of the
shop to accommodate lodgers.359 Others utilized the cavity under the roof with access provided
in the ceiling, or constructed makeshift lean-to accommodation out the back.360 All available
space on the allotment was used and if not used for human occupation, was given over to ducks
and chickens and out-house.361 Because of the high density construction of lodging houses,
laundries, gambling shops and opium shops at the rear of the allotments, small access laneways
were formed. Every available small or narrow space was blocked in with tin or timber and
rented out as living quarters.362 Chinatowns were noted for their intensely populated
communities housed in cramped conditions which continued well into the 20th century.363
Entire allotments groaned under the weight of the population which led to infrastructure and
sanitation failure, attracting unfavourable commentary in the press.364 In 1876, San Francisco
was described as “…a cesspool of filth; such a hell of vice and crime, such poverty, misery,
squalor, filth and disease is to be found nowhere else upon the American Continent.”365 Across
the Pacific, Cooktown’s “Chinatown” was described in 1885 as “filthy beyond description”366
while Cairns was described five years later as a place for “stinks and other abominations …”
with the additional outrage that Chinese men were “frequently to be seen on their back premise
in a state of nudity”.367 Twenty- five years later, attitudes had hardly changed. Cairns
“Chinatown” was described as a “seething, filthy, rotten hole comprised largely of brothels,
gambling dens and sly grog shops”.368 Other colonies fared no better. In 1904, “Chinatown” in
Sydney was described as the “stinking purlieu of Sydney”.369 With the combined forces of
public health, moral respectability and racism arrayed against them, Chinese communities rarely
lasted into the second half of the 20th century.
359 Robb, Cairns Chinatown, p. 33
360“The Chinese Quarters”, Queensland Figaro, 28 April 1883, p. 9; Cairns Post, 12 February 1929, p. 4.
361 Robb, Cairns Chinatown. See Maps.
362 North Queensland Register, 4 May 1903, p. 3. One man, a Cingalese (Sri Lankan), lived in a space under a building which was
lined by hessian and measured 3ft by 7 ft.
363Cairns Post, 12 February 1929, p. 4.
364 Lai, Chinatowns, 5.
365 "The Chinese In California", Maryborough Chronicle, Wide Bay and Burnett Advertiser, 26 August 1876, p. 4.
366 'Queensland', The Age, 23 December1885, p. 6.
367"Correspondence", Cairns Post, 26 Nov 1890, p. 3. They were bathing themselves al fresco.
368Cairns Post, 15 November 1916, p. 4.
369 "Why the Chinaman is Cheap", The Worker, 22 October 1904, p. 5.
85
“Chinatown”: Life cycle
The rise and decline of north Queensland’s “Chinatowns” is usefully scrutinized using the
framework provided by Lai. In his comprehensive study in 1988, up to 12 Chinatowns across
British Columbia were interrogated in order to develop his theory. Lai build up a map of each
“Chinatown’s” life, which led to new ways of interpreting spatial longevity, immigration and
demographics. While he does not explore the presence or influence of gender in his work, he
none the less provides a starting point to evaluate the effects of the introduction, presence and
occupations of women and families on the formation and lifespan of a “Chinatown” in north
Queensland. Of the 12 “Chinatowns” in Lai’s study between 1890 and 1930, half become extinct
and disappeared, while the other half were able to revive and readapt. In addition, he found that
only 6 were associated with immigration prior to 1900, all associated with mining, and 3 of those
survived until the 1930s. However, the majority entered their peak period only after 1910 and
all began to fade away after 1930 until only a few remained.370
To provide a framework for his analysis Lai formulated that a “Chinatown” has four
morphological stages in its lifetime.371 His model analysed the waxing and waning of the
community in both its population levels as well as built elements. The four stages of longevity,
otherwise known as the lifespan of a “Chinatown”, commence with a budding or emerging
stage, followed by a blooming or booming stage, before it contracted and went through a
withering or declining state to be left with one of two alternatives: die or revive. The last stage, if
revived and readapted, enabled the community to be reinvented, providing a sense of place
through the emergence of new geopopulation trend based on historical and exotic orientalised
tourism.372
From the commencement of a definitive Chinese urban cultural precinct, the budding stage took
in the initial formation of settlement where Chinese men came together, formed a community,
constructed the physical infrastructure and developed social cohesiveness to become selfcontained.
The budding stage is characterised not only by urban development, but by human
endeavour when men seized opportunities and worked hard to assert their commercial and
entrepreneurial skills with a view to acquiring wealth and status. The budding stage can be
applied to the early “Chinatowns” in California; the railroad communities of Texas;
“Chinatowns” across British Columbia; Chinatowns in the colonies of Victoria and New South
370 Lai, Chinatowns, 6-20.
371 Ibid. 6.
372 Ibid.
86
Wales; and lastly, Queensland. The budding or emerging stage is consistent with the Chinese
experience across north Queensland where “Chinatowns” started to develop from the early
1870s onwards as Chinese men responded to the rapidly developing mining and port towns.
Historical perceptions arising from the budding stage have entrenched the experience as a male
only experience leading to many communities labelled as “bachelor” societies. For example, in
Texas, the Chinatown communities have been characterized as remote “bachelor” only societies
despite clear familial and kinship interconnections within the community and the presence of a
few women. 373 Huping Ling challenges this concept when she brings to light the development
of urban communities complete with Chinese women and families who lived at the back of
stores and shops.374 This is consistent with the experience in Australia’s colonial Chinatown
environment with women and children present in Queensland’s colonial “Chinatowns” from the
commencement of the budding stage.
As “Chinatowns” across British Columbia entered a blooming or booming stage between the
1890s and 1915, the community developed integrated Chinese social structures which
formalized financial gains made. Fully self-contained and self-supporting communities displayed
social infrastructure such as Chinese associations, temples, schools and other institutions. The
blooming stage was characterized by a thriving community which encouraged recreational,
spiritual and extended family opportunities, as transnational families negotiated marriages,
family unity and wealth creation and distribution between the host country and the clan village.
“Chinatowns” across British Columbia in this stage reflected both the merchant and labouring
classes and were expanding in population and commercial growth. Family migration reflected
male familial, kin and village relationships such as father, son, brother, uncle, cousin or brother
in law. In contrast, the “Chinatowns” of colonial Queensland, while suffering family migration
restrictions under the White Australia policy in the 20th century, still managed to attract women
to the community and put down roots. This was largely made possible by intergenerational
growth within the community as Australian born mixed heritage and Chinese daughters and sons
373 Rhoads, “Chinese in Texas”, 7 and 22 ; Edward C. M. Chen and Fred R. Von Der Mehden, History of Houston's Chinatown,
Online web resource, http://chinatownconnection.com/houston_chinatown_history.htm At least one woman, Mrs Mrs. Anna Wah
Yuan (a White woman) and her son Lincoln Yuan have been identified and acknowledged in Houston, Texas, 1880. It suggests that
more women may be found if they were looked for in the first place. Chinatowns in Texas were predominantly bachelor societies with
only El Paso developing a Chinatown comprising of a population in 1916 of 239 men over 21 years, and only 4 women or male
minors.
374 Huping Ling, “Family and Marriage of Late-Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Century Chinese Immigrant Women”, Journal of
American Ethnic History, 19, 2 (Winter 2000): 47 and inverview, Estelle Kingsley, Cairns, 2 May 2001, Tape 1. In some cases the
women also worked alongside their husbands in shops or managed his business affairs in his absence in addition to household duties.
87
married back into the Australian and China born community. Queensland’s pattern of
intergenerational growth during the blooming stage reflected many of the elements outlined in
the blooming stage of British Columbia’s experience, including that restrictive legislation made
family unification itself prohibitive. Lai concludes that this leads to a contraction.375
At the time of the First World War through to the 1930s, British Columbia experienced a distinct
pattern of withering and decline across all of its “Chinatowns”. This reflected an overall decline
in Chinese communities in both British Columbia and across the United States as noted by Lai
(Canada) and Rhoads (U.S.).376 Lai observed that individuals who remained behind in British
Columbia’s “Chinatowns” were left in a community which began to unravel. The declining
population had dropped to such an unsustainable level that the social and physical ties which
bound the community could not be maintained. Shops and dwellings were increasingly
abandoned, and fell into such a state that they were condemned or demolished.377 This pattern
was also repeated across the United States. Edward Rhoads confirms that the combination of
aging Chinese men dying with a drop in permanent population, impacted on the core elements of
the community. No longer able to maintain mutual benevolent societies and social infrastructure,
“Chinatowns” across Texas simply disappeared by the end of the 1940s.378 This pattern
resonates with the withering phase of north Queensland’s major “Chinatown” communities
including Mackay, Cairns, Lower Herbert, Innisfail, and Atherton. Nearly all north Queensland
Chinatowns entered a period of contraction from 1915 onwards, entering an accelerated decline
in the 1920s to near extinction in the early 1930s. This impetus was attributed to similar
pressures from within the community such as population decline, assimilation into the wider
community and from external pressures from local authorities.379
From the 1930s local authorities across the globe stepped up attempts to purge themselves of
their Chinese communities and the withering turned to a slow death for communities.
Demolition of buildings provided a permanent solution to the perceived problem in their midst.
The departure or death of a local Chinese person from the community initiated the removal of
buildings and shops, and vacant buildings and land were re-occupied or filled with new
buildings which were occupied by arriving Greek and Italian immigrants. Efforts by city
375 This aspect remains speculative as Lai did not explore the female population in the community, including the presence of non-
Chinese women as wives. It is unknown if it would change his framework if the study was done again as gender-inclusive.
376 Lai, Chinatowns, 85 and Rhoads, “Chinese in Texas”, 18.
377 “Chinatown in Mackay”, The Queenslander, 28 June 1934, p. 5; “About Sachs Street”, Cairns Post, 2 February 1929, p. 4.
378 Rhoads, “Chinese in Texas”, 18.
379 'Bubonic Plague', The Northern Herald, 26 October 1921, p. 8; ‘Innisfail Dead House', Cairns Post, 21 July 1925, p. 11.
88
administrations targeting Chinese quarters were not isolated to British Columbia or Queensland
during this period. In England380 and across the channel in Holland, local authorities forcibly
repatriated Chinese men to China, with the Dutch repatriating more than 1000 Chinese seamen
in the 1930s. 381 At the same time, an anti-Chinese movement had moved to Mexicali on the U.S.
- Mexican border and lands formerly belonging to Chinese settlers were resumed and men
forced back to China.382 Lai estimated in British Columbia that by second half of the 20th century
only three late 19th century “Chinatowns” had managed to survive. Their renewal became
dependent on the transformative qualities bestowed on them through two alternative pathways:
either renewed through a change of immigration policy which initiated a revitalization and
brought in a new wave of Chinese investor immigrants, or through the more recent constructed
imagery of the romantic orient which attracted nostalgia buffs seeking a piece of the “old
Chinatown”.383
From the 1930s generational change accelerated the withering, decline and subsequent death of
north Queensland’s Chinatowns which led to a near collapse of all communities. Between 1920 -
1940, second, third and even fourth generation “Chinatown” residents were unable or unwilling
to sustain “Chinatown” as a community. Efforts to maintain established infrastructure such as
the hospital or Tong associations, entered a decline, and they eventually shut their doors due to a
lack of patronage and difficulty with new tax laws. Old and indigent Chinese men were at the
mercy of the community and authorities.384 Some were assisted by the State to return to China as
this was considered less of a financial burden than the upkeep of a Chinese man in a Benevolent
Asylum. Others were provided for within the Chinese community. Accommodation was offered
in the temple halls where many ‘Ah Bucks’ lived until they died. This practice was undertaken
in Cooktown, Cairns and Innisfail, with Innisfail being the last community to make provision for
their aging male population when they constructed a cyclone proof concrete Temple in 1940.385
In Cairns, the largest Chinatown outside Brisbane, efforts were invested into community
festivals and social gatherings such as the Bar-Lun Sui-Yee Wui or Barron River Memorial
Festival, commemorating the deaths of a crew when their boat capsized in the river. Other
cultural calendar events such as Ch’ing Ming were also observed and the temple used until
380 Seed, “Limehouse blues”, 58-85.
381 Koetse, “The Imagined Space of Amsterdam”, blog, 2010.
382 Curtis, “Mexicali’s Chinatown”, 335-348
383 Lai, Chinatowns, 9- 11
384‘Indigent Chinese', Cairns Post, 23 July 1930, p. 13
385Townsville Daily Bulletin, 22 October 1940, p. 3.
89
1965.386 By World War II, Australian born Chinese families were nearly all integrated into
suburban living, leaving only one or two families in “Chinatown”. Only Cairns and Innisfail
were supporting Chinese communities with a reasonable sized population, whereas Atherton,
Cooktown, Charters Towers, Halifax and Mackay had already faltered. For those who remained,
political changes in China drove a wedge into the community. Younger and progressive
members of the community aligned with the Chinese Nationalist or Kuomintang movement
which pushed a reformist agenda. This was in contrast to the older traditional masons, who
relied upon Confucian principles to provide social cohesion and promote structure to
community.387
Having effected control over the Chinese community through the use of restrictive laws, local
authorities renewed efforts to condemn, remove and erase Chinatowns from north
Queensland.388 In 1936 in an effort to reinvent the area, Cairns Municipal Council went so far as
to rename the main street of “Chinatown” from Sachs Street to Grafton,389 and the aldermen
congratulated themselves for making the Chinese quarters disappear.390 North Queensland’s
withering, decline and subsequent death of all Chinatowns commenced in the 1920s and was
complete by 1940 with only the two “Chinatowns” noted above remaining: Cairns and Innisfail.
Both places received a small reprieve during the 1940s, due to American and Australian soldiers
availing themselves of the recreational pursuits of gambling and whoring in Innisfail and Cairns
Chinatowns while stationed in those places.391 However this was only a weak reprieve and did
not signal a revival. By 1950 prostitution and gambling were pushed out into the suburbs and
Innisfail’s and Cairns’ “Chinatowns” met their ultimate end. Very little infrastructure remained
to indicate that a self-contained Chinese community had existed in the towns as all the signature
characteristics which made it a “Chinatown” had been removed.
***
386 Robb, Cairns Chinatown, 96.
387May, Topsawyers, 80-83 and Mei-fen Kuo and Judith Brett, Unlocking the History of the Australasian Kuo Min Tang, 1911-2013
(Australian Scholarly Publishing, North Melbourne, 2013): 40-42. By the end of 1916, thirteen Kuomintang (KMT) branches were
established throughout Australasia, seven of which were situated in Queensland and 5 in north Queensland. These included Atherton,
Townsville, Ayr, Bowen, Mackay, Rockhampton and Brisbane.
388 “A Clean up, Cairns Chinatown Disgusting Condition”, The Week, 10 January 1934, p. 29; “ ‘Chinatown” in Mackay”,
Queenslander, 28 June 1934, p. 5.
389 Bottoms, A History of Cairns, 224-225 and 505. While it was allegedly proposed that the street be named in honour of Alderman
Hoare, the city aldermen passed over the pun in favour of the more prudent Grafton Street.
390Cairns Post, 8 June 1936, p.3
391 Robb, Cairns Chinatown, 111-113.
90
Other types of community: Cultural precincts and String communities
“Cultural precinct”
Cultural precincts and String communities provide useful alternative models by which to
understand the diversity of community type which formed outside full scale “Chinatowns”: both
of which were associated with the Chinese family landscape. Both Cultural precincts and String
communities formed as smaller communities which failed to develop into a “Chinatown”,
usually through lack of population, location, or lack of industry to attract large numbers of
migrants to the region. However, they differ in a number of ways to each other. Whereas a
cultural precinct developed as a community with more than one individual, element or industry
constructed in close proximity to each other within an area or town, a string community was
more linear, and individuals within it were connected through kin and commerce associations
over one or more towns involving one or two individuals in each town as singular nodes linking
the linear community.
Huping Ling in her article “Reconceptualising Chinese American Community in St Louis from
Chinatown to Cultural Community” suggests that it is important to re-conceptualize the terms
for the Chinese communities in order to fully understand the range of Chinese settlement
experiences and resulting types of community formation.392 Ling argues that rather than restrict
analysis to Chinatowns alone, that smaller communities also provide an important means to
understand the Chinese Diaspora and as such, warrant attention. She describes the term “cultural
community” as a place which is socially defined by the common cultural practices and beliefs of
its community but which is somewhat integrated into the broader community through economic
or social activities. She suggests that cultural communities are more likely to be found in the
hinterland and remote areas of America where the “transnational economy has limited
penetration”. In other words, the networks which were maintained between Chinatowns across
America and the village clans and families in China, were unable to be maintained due to the
rural and remote location of smaller communities and as a result networks were broken down or
never able to develop in the first place. In particular, she argues that the term ‘cultural
community’ provides a good model to define Chinese populations in areas which were not large
enough to constitute a physical Chinatown but which were substantial enough to form social
communities even though not defined by physical boundaries. 393
392 Ling, “Reconceptualising”, 65-101.
393Ibid. 67-68.
91
Ling’s model is useful to apply to smaller towns and market garden cultural precinct areas on the
fringe of towns across north Queensland where economic integration was important to both
communities. However, I prefer the term “cultural precinct” to describe an area where two or
more Chinese commercial interests or households were located over a period of time. This term
more accurately encompasses both the social development within the town of more than one
cultural community, while making provision for the physical footprint of place within an urban
environment. By referring to these smaller communities as cultural precincts, they can be
mapped as cultural precincts within an urban landscape to delineate between the larger
Chinatowns and smaller groupings of people, as well as in line with cultural heritage definitions
for an area with more than one element in close proximity to each other.
Cultural precinct longevity lies not with the size of the community or its capacity to form a
“Chinatown”, but through an ability of the Chinese settlers to find economic niches enhanced by
business acumen and/or hard work. Cultural precincts are not categorized by one type of
building or activity; instead a cultural precinct can include a cluster of commercial buildings, or
produce gardens, or houses, and can be located within a town as well as further afield, such as a
group of gardens. Chinese gardeners were experts in capitalizing on traditional utilitarian skills
which led them to dominate food production in remote western towns and settlements. The
health of a community depended on a constant ready source of fresh fruit and vegetables and so
demand drove a need for constant supply. In rural and remote communities where, Chinese food
production was a valued contribution to a town’s survival, market gardens and associated
garden/ shop cultural precincts were able to remain viable until the 1950s by which time the
majority of the old men had died out. However, across Western Queensland there is one
exception to this and that is in Winton, where Willie Mar junior carried on a shop and garden
business inherited from his father until 2007.394
String Communities:
String communities on the other hand are the tangible and intangible elements of small nodal
communities which developed across rural and remote regions in a lineal trajectory in a response
to family or kin chain migration. Chain network migration takes in the act of migration and
settlement where one or more members from one village or family, such as brothers, all migrate
at the same time and lead to the migration of other village or family members to the same host
394 Sandi Robb, “Mar and Mar: A Tale of Two Chinese Gardeners, Winton”, in Kevin Wong Hoy and Kevin Rains (eds),
Rediscovered Past: valuing Chinese across the north (CHINA Inc., North Melbourne, 2012), p. 36
92
country region once the first arrivals are established. This is the case for the Pang clan in north
Queensland where three brothers, Pang Muen Young, Pang Ah Way and Pang Ah Cum all
migrated together in 1874 and settled in the Cairns and Port Douglas districts.395
String communities developed as a lineal community which stretched out over distance as a
series of individual units or “beads”, interconnected by kinship and /or commercial relationships.
In each town, they are too small to be described as a cultural precinct, although cultural precincts
may exist in the string, and they cannot form a Chinatown because they are usually confined to
singular businesses and/or families at each “bead”. Yet these communities are important in the
context of the Diaspora as a means to understand more obscure interconnections within the
Chinese family landscape. They provide a useful tool to explore the Chinese settler response to
father/ son /brother/uncle/kinship connections and the maintenance of connection through family
business and guanxi connections.396 Highly dependent on the strength of these relationships,
string communities have been described by Hu-DeHart as “Borderland” communities in
Mexico/America, where one Chinese settler and his family on one side of the border have
kinship, commercial and generational ties with a brother and family on the other side,397 and as
an extension of kinship relationships across Diaspora countries in South East Asia where the
forces of guanxi are applied, usually through the local wife’s family.398
String communities occurred within North Queensland in response to chain migration to
accommodate lineal relationships which developed through the long-distance settlement of
multiple kin and family members including fathers and sons, sets of brothers, uncles and
nephews, and kinship cousins. These extended family, village and kinship relationships
connected individual “units” across western Queensland linking individuals, businesses and
families through informal guanxi or direct commercial transactions where both parties
experienced mutual benefit. This is evident through the provision of initial "startup" support, and
business agreements between two parties located in different towns; provision of practical
logistics such as a point of contact for correspondence and acting as couriers for remittances and
messages sent when family members return to the village, as well as through the provision of
395 Lin Foy, “The Pangs and the Lin Foys”.
396 With no other term found to describe this type of small lineal community, I have developed the term “String Communities” to
describe the phenomena of individual units or family “beads” in one town as a single unit who are connected through kinship, village
or family connections to another individual family “bead” in another. I liken these communities to pearl beads held together by a
string which connects them all.
397 Hu-DeHart, “Chinatowns and borderlands”, 442.
398 Barbara Watson Andaya and Bernard Y. Andaya, A History of Early Modern South East Asia, 1400-1830, (Cambridge University
Press, 2015): 153
93
courier services for unaccompanied minors back to the primary wife in China for education.399
(See Fig.10. String Communities: Lineal Relations)
Fig.7. String Communities: Lineal Relations: Townsville to Richmond.
The String Community model provides a useful means to understand the contribution women
and the Chinese family landscape made to smaller Chinese settlement experiences. An example
of the extent of relationships in a String Community is demonstrated in the commercial, legal
and marriage linkages of one family which extended inland from the port town of Townsville to
the rural and remote town of Richmond in western Queensland. The “Leong String” sets out the
interlinking of nodal relationships through kinship and marriage of the Leong family from
Caobian village in the district of Liang Du. This String Community also highlights the mutually
beneficial guanxi which developed to the benefit of individuals and commercial businesses
culminating in a key family group – the “Leong Lum Sing” family.
399 NAA: BP342/1, 9857/299/1903. A four-year-old child, Margaret Ah Foo, the daughter of Caroline Tups and James Ah Foo of
Townsville, was taken to China by her uncle Lee Foo where she remained until she was 17 years old. Chen Quing Boo, an older
Chinese man living in Queensland as a storekeeper in Cairns, was acquainted with Lee Foo who informed Chen Quing Boo that the
child was "1/2 caste" and born in Townsville. Quing Boo approached Lee Foo to arrange a marriage to Margaret but as she was only
11 years old, Lee Foo said she was too young. Chen Quing Boo then left for Queensland with the arrangement that when Margaret
was seventeen years old, Lee Foo was to write to Chen Quing Boo and send her out to him. In the meantime, he considered himself
betrothed to her. Chen Quing Boo wrote to Lee Foo and sent passage money to China for Margaret so that she would be sent to
Queensland for marriage. Upon her arrival she was married to Chen Quing Boo on 14 September 1903 in a Methodist ceremony in
Cairns.
94
The Leong String took in complex commercial, legal and private relationships between Leong
Jew who eventually managed the Tie Hop and Co.’s shop, Hughenden, and the Leong Lum Sing
family who eventually lived in Richmond. (See Fig. 8. A Leong String) When the parents died,
the extent of complex legal relationships emerged to support the remaining daughters including
arranging a marriage to an appropriate man from Townsville. The Leong String Community
from Caobian village is only one String which has been surface explored with many other lineal
string communities expected to become apparent when more information comes to light.
Fig. 8. A Leong String: Lineal Family Connections or String Community
Part 2:
North Queensland “Chinatowns”
Across North Queensland at least 18 “Chinatown” areas developed from the mid to late 19th
century as self-contained communities, the most numerous for a region in Queensland. The
development of “Chinatowns” across Queensland encapsulated all of the theoretical modelling
discussed in the previous section. Not only were they places where Chinese men were relegated
to for the protection of both Chinese and White interests, but they were constructed and
reconstructed in the imagination of the broader community. Chinese migrants lived as “the
Other” and were used as a demarcation of moral values to maintain respectability and standards
of the White (especially female) community. There is only one example to the contrary of
95
previously discussed theoretical understanding of “Chinatown”, and a view which appears to be
a uniquely Australian/ Queensland response to identity.
“Chinatown” was appropriated as a word and used by a third party in response to maintaining a
tribal identity within an imposed community near Eidsvold, Central Queensland.400 Cherbourg
“Chinatown” remains unique for its label because it is an Aboriginal, not Chinese, construct.
The term was used as a identifier by Princy Carlo, an Aboriginal woman of “Asian”, largely
presumed to be Chinese heritage, to describe “her place” when she was moved to the reserve.
This enabled family identity to be maintained and separated from the other family groups at the
Government administered Aboriginal settlement of Barambah.401 It is not known if this new type
of “Chinatown” was established by other First Nation or Indigenous groups to demarcate family
group in places which suffered from colonisation elsewhere.
‘Chinatown” communities began to emerge first in regions which were opened up through gold
mining discoveries such as Cape River (1866), Gilberton (1866), Ravenswood (1869),
Georgetown (1871), Charters Towers (1872), the Palmer River (1873) and Hodgkinson (1877).
Boats and steamers which began to arrive directly from China provided a rapid expansion of the
Chinese population which accelerated cultural precincts into self-contained “Chinatown”
communities. Early arrivals quickly set up lodging services to cater to the incoming transient
Chinese population while others set up provisioning stores to cater to miners on their way to
goldfields. “Chinatowns” quickly formed in Cooktown (1874), Cairns (1876) and Port Douglas
(1876), with Cooktown and Cairns especially adapting quickly to cater to Chinese social
organisation. The emergence of large-scale agriculture associated with sugar production,
bananas and maize also contributed to new districts opening up and “Chinatowns” formed in
Mackay (1883), Geraldton (later Innisfail) (1884), in the Lower Herbert River valley including
Halifax and Ingham (c. mid 1880s) and on the Atherton and Evelyn Tablelands at Herberton and
Atherton (1886). The natural propensity for Chinese to live together for familiarity meant that
“Chinatowns” existed in nearly every major town wherever Chinese men settled in any great
number, with the exception of Townsville.
400 Ramsay, “Cherbourg's Chinatown”,110-111
401 Ibid. 111-113.
96
Fig. 9. Cooktown Chinatown. C.1887402 Fig. 10. Cairns Chinatown. 1895403
Fig. 11. Chinatown on the lower Palmer.404 Fig. 12. Chinatown Geraldton. 1910405
Some “Chinatowns” had limited longevity, thriving for only a short period. Cape River
“Chinatown” is one such example, while on the other hand others were large and organised,
operating went well into the 20th century. Cairns “Chinatown” for example enjoyed a lifespan of
approximately 70 years. As north Queensland is a large and remote area of Queensland, it is not
surprising that the majority of “Chinatowns” were located on the east coast and close hinterland
region near the main distribution ports, with only five “Chinatowns” located inland, all in mining
towns: Cape River, Gilberton, Georgetown, Croydon and Cloncurry.
The decline of more prominent Chinese communities commenced when industry began to wane.
This occurred at Croydon and Georgetown when gold production waned; in Cairns, Atherton
and Innisfail when the maize and banana industry collapsed and when the sugar industry was
made impossible to produce or work in due to anti-Chinese legislation. Furthermore, by the
second decade of the 20th century, aging men who had arrived in the century before simply died,
402JOL Neg. 38755 Cooktown circ 1887, crop image
403 Cairns Historical Society, P03743, 1895
404 State Library of Victoria Image mp004690: 1876
405The Week, Friday 14 January 1910 page 24 & Photograph, oai:espace.library.uq.edu.au:UQ:375190
97
returned to China, or become old indigent men who were reliant on a few members of the
community who took it upon themselves to look after them. Unable to sustain Chinatown due to
a decline in population and unable to sustain social services such as benevolent societies,
hospitals or temple functions, the “Chinatowns” died a slow death from the mid-1920s onwards
until they were demolished or sanitised by the White community who were glad to be rid of the
stain on their localities. 406
However, while north Queensland had similar patterns of settlement, not every town developed a
“Chinatown” despite consistent, fair sized and stable Chinese populations. Townsville, while a
major port town providing goods and services to the mining towns of Ravenswood, Charters
Towers and Cape River, neither formed a “Chinatown” nor erected social infrastructure such as
a Temple or community hall, unlike comparable port towns such as Mackay, Cooktown, Cairns
and Geraldton/Innisfail.407 Two reasons for this have been identified. Firstly, the social and
mercantile development of Townsville as a whole community, developed as an extremely
diverse community, which attracted direct migration from many overseas countries and acted as
the first port of entry to the North.408 As a result of the multi-ethnic melting pot, Townsville
quickly developed a more tolerant approach to the Chinese population, which by the mid-1870s
included a large merchant and storekeeper component. This is evidenced though the Chinese
merchant community interspersed with White businesses in the main commercial district, with
smaller Chinese storekeepers positioned alongside other White storekeepers along the business
fringe.409
Secondly, the district surrounding Townsville was dry and arid and unable to support the
development of sugarcane or banana plantations. This meant that unlike the communities of
Mackay, the Lower Herbert, Cairns and Geraldton districts, which attracted sizable Chinese
populations in sugar production or banana farming, Townsville was unable to attract Chinese
plantation workers or farmers. Instead what emerged was a “Chinese Quarter” sufficient in size
to service the needs of the local population as well as the small number of market gardeners
from outlying areas. There remains no evidence that the key indicator of a Chinatown, a “joss
406 Interview: Estelle Kingsley, Cairns, 2 May 2001, Tape 1. See also John Fitzgerald, Big White Lie and Mei-fen Kuo and Judith
Brett, Unlocking the History of the Australasian Kuo Min Tang.
407 Robb Database: Temples, Halls and Kongsis: 1848-1950, based on information contained in Rates and Valuations, newspapers,
books and oral history records.
408 QVP, 1872, Vol. I, “Register-General Queensland: Census”, Part VII, Table XXIX, p. 1167. In 1871 there were over 14
nationalities represented in Townsville.
409 Rates and Valuations Registers, various years, Townsville Municipal Council held at the Townsville City Library Local History
collection.
98
house” or temple, was constructed between 1860 and 1920, leaving the community to rely on
alternative means for spiritual needs. Some may have utilized domestic private altars,410 while
others attended the Chinese Christian Mission Church.411 Without a community hall to meet in,
members of the community met in shops, merchant firms’ premises or rented rooms attached to
reputable hotels.412
Fig. 13. Chinese Consul’s visit to Townsville: 1913413
***
“Chinatown”: elements and characteristics
Across North Queensland, the footprint of “Chinatowns” is laid out in Municipal Council
records, historical surveys, newspaper commentary and court records. “Chinatowns” developed
to take in both physical characteristics and social infrastructure which was unique to Chinese
societies. Individual allotments were intensively occupied, from the front street to the back
fence, incorporating shops, houses, makeshift dwellings and “humpies” as well as outhouses,
and fowl houses with ducks and chickens. As “Chinatowns” have been mapped from a variety of
primary sources, five key characteristics have emerged to show the deeper gender and cultural
interactions which occurred within the community. These include ethnicity, family, recreation,
goods and services and spiritual/ social organisational services.
410The Brisbane Courier, 24 March 1887, p. 6.
411 Townsville City Council CityLibraries, St. James Cathedral, Rectory and Chinese Church after Cyclone Leonta, Townsville, 1903.
The building is reputed to have been dismantled and removed to St Johns Church precinct, South Townsville. This has not been
verified.
412 Townsville Daily Bulletin, 9 May 1929, p. 10 notes that the visiting Chinese Consul-General was entertained at the ‘Roof Garden’
of the Council buildings and later met residents at the Kuomintang rooms.
413TCC Image number 303144, Reception to honour the Chinese Consul in Townsville, 1913
99
Firstly, “Chinatowns” across north Queensland were not ethnically homogenous communities or
“bachelor societies” – men living together as separate and non-related individuals. The
community was made up of diverse races of both genders, including married Chinese men with
wives back in China, White women (as wives or “prostitutes”), Chinese women (as wives or
servants), Japanese men (shopkeepers), Japanese women (as wives or “prostitutes”), and in the
20th century, immigrant Greek and Italian men. This first characteristic was reflected across all
north Queensland “Chinatowns” with no exception. Ethnic cultural precincts were not confined
to Chinese migrant settlers alone, but could also form towns for the Malay, Javanese and South
Sea Islander migrant communities with none of them mixing well due to tensions between the
groups.414 Indentured labourer groups such as Javanese, South Sea Islanders and Japanese
workers associated with the sugar industry did not interact in “Chinatown” and lived for most
part on plantations.
Aboriginal people were not allowed to live in “Chinatown” due to restrictive legislation which
prohibited them from cohabitating or fraternizing with a Chinese person. The further west and
north-west that the community was, and the more isolated it was from authorities, the more
likely it was that the community included Aboriginal women and children. They formed the
basis of Chinese families in most of those districts, which is demonstrated in towns such as
Boulia, Camooweal and Burketown in the far western and Gulf region of Queensland. In
addition the only western remote “Chinatown” community of Cloncurry reflected a very
different type of ethnic diversity including Chinese men, Aboriginal women, White women, and
their families as well as Japanese and Punjabi men (‘Afghans’) all living in the “Chinatown”
area on Coppermine Creek on the outskirts of town.415 The location and interracial diversity of
the Coppermine Creek community reflected both the shared collective disenfranchisement from
the White community as well as its relegation to the fringe of society.
Secondly, unlike the “bachelor” societies of the America, Nauru, South Africa and Banaba
Island communities, north Queensland “Chinatown” communities reflected diverse gender, age
and family status incorporating White wives, Chinese wives, Aboriginal wives, Japanese
women, first generation Australian born children, and extended families such as fathers/
brothers/ uncles/ sons/ cousins. For example, Cooktown “Chinatown” had, by the early 1880s,
Chinese women who had migrated as wives, Chinese girls who had migrated as child servants,
414 The Queenslander, 2 April 1936, page 4
415 Cloncurry Shire Council, Valuation Register and Rate Book, 1913; Valuation Register and Rate Book 1916-1918; Valuation
Register and Rate Book 1918-1919; Valuation Register and Rate Book 1920-1922.
100
White wives, and White women living in the community and working as “prostitutes”.416 The
broader community also interacted with Chinatown. White women and men visited Chinatown
for the purchase of goods and services, or for curiosity. Chinese New Year was shared with
prominent White members of the community, and Chinese hawkers from shops went door-todoor
selling wares to White housewives whose families were dependent on them for fresh food.
While it was a self-sufficient community, it did not exist in isolation from the broader
community. These relationships maintained Confucian societal and kinship family structures and
created new alliances with external individuals, which resonated throughout the north.
Thirdly, “Chinatown” provided a recreational centre for labouring men from the surrounding
area to come and enjoy their day off. Chinese men would stay at boarding houses, spend their
money gambling, sit back and smoke opium, socialize, enjoy music or seek intimacy with a
woman. Whether legal or illegal, recreational pursuits undertaken in “Chinatown” attracted both
Chinese and non-Chinese customers (usually male) and the community’s reputation became
synonymous with vice. Attitudes towards recreational pursuits were divided. Bored, lonely and
missing village life, Chinese settler men sought entertainment such as gambling and opium
smoking which, had they remained in the village, they may otherwise have avoided. The White
community on the other hand, viewed these activities as proof of moral corruption: evidence that
they were morally superior. This outrage was reinforced through regular reporting in daily
newspapers of fines against Chinese men, with offences brought to Court ranging from lottery
ticket selling, gambling, selling liquor after hours, or opium related offences. However,
gambling in Chinatown was also a popular pursuit by White men as well. As a result, gambling
games changed over time, commencing with Chinese games such as Pie Gow, Gee Far, Pak-APu
and Mah Jong to more western forms of gambling such as cards, billiards and horseracing.417
“Chinatowns”, as high density urban cultural precincts, provided goods and services to the local
community and reflected diverse occupations undertaken by both men and women. Occupations
in “Chinatown” included merchants, storekeepers, money lenders, financial brokers, book
keepers, hoteliers, grocers, fruiterers, bakers, cooks, boarding house keepers, opium
shopkeepers, croupiers, bankers, gambling house proprietors, butchers, carriers, and errand boys.
Trades included blacksmiths, watchmakers, tailors, barbers, jewellers, priests, musicians and
Chinese doctors and herbalists. Female occupations owned and run by women included boarding
416 Rains, Intersections, 106 -112
417 See Changes over time in Robb, Chinatown Heritage Study.
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house keepers, hoteliers, cleaners, washerwomen, seamstresses, pearl shell buyers and midwives,
but there were also other women in the community, not related to Chinese men, who worked as
sex workers or “prostitutes” referred to at the time as “women of ill fame” or “fallen women”.
Gender division in occupations was no different to occupational difference in the broader
community, with women engaged in occupations such as sewing, cleaning and midwifery.
However, others engaged in commercial enterprises as bakers, hoteliers, boarding house keepers,
and pearl shell buyers,418 with women carving out their niche or stepping into the breach to run
businesses where necessity such as the death or absence of a husband required.419 One aspect of
the Queensland colonial “Chinatown” which was different to other parts of Australasia, the
United States or Great Britain was that there were no Chinese laundries associated with Chinese
occupations across north Queensland. Where a laundry was present, in towns such as Cairns,
Townsville, Hughenden and Cloncurry420, they were instead owned and operated by Japanese
men or couples.421
Fig.14. Cooktown “Chinatown”: Recreational and Social Activities: 1884422
418 Interview with Mrs. Mabel Garvey, Cairns, 26 June 2002
419 Brisbane Truth, 20 July 1902, p. 7. This is the case for Mrs Mary Sang on Thursday Island who successfully operated her bakery
for more than 20 years after her baker husband died.
420 Robb Database: Rates and Valuations: 1882-1940. Database compiled over 10 years data entry taken from local Council records
for north Queensland towns of Townsville, Ravenswood, Charters Towers, Hughenden, Winton, Richmond, Cloncurry, Normanton,
Croydon, Georgetown, Cairns, and Innisfail.
421Wyangerie Shire Council, Water Authority Minute Book 1913-1915; Cloncurry Shire Council, Valuation Register and Rate Book
1916-1918.
422Town and Country Journal, Saturday 2 August 1884, p. 27
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Transplanted communities
North Queensland’s “Chinatown” communities were culturally furnished with transplanted
village social and spiritual order as a collective means to manage and organise a coherent selfcontained
society. Infrastructure such as benevolent societies, political organisations, community
hospitals, meeting halls and temples were installed or built to enable the community to maintain
separation from, and eliminate the need for interaction with, the broader community beyond
what was necessary. Based on traditional Chinese village and clan structures, key pieces of
social and physical infrastructure enabled overseas communities to quickly create social order:
an ancestral meeting hall, a temple, and private altars in the shop and family home – the first two
being the most obvious and the last exerting a more subtle influence on community
obligations.423 The temple, meeting hall and private altars in overseas environments, provided a
crucial means to reinforce social and structural organisation of the community, provide a space
for the community to meet for discussion and arbitration, and ensure spiritual and ancestral
obligations could be attended to.424
Back in the ancestral village, the temple was a place where villagers could pay respects to their
ancestors and commune with the chosen god in the search for fortune, good seasons or good
health. Both the temple and associated meeting hall were important physical elements of the
village Chinese family landscape and formed part of the public sphere associated with ceremony,
calendar events and clan requirements. Most temples were publicly accessible, while some
villages had clan halls as well. Each played a role in matters regarding life and death and were
associated with honouring the dead, filial obligations, and events associated with Ching Ming or
“tomb sweeping day” as well as Chinese New Year.
The most prominent cultural marker of North Queensland “Chinatowns” was the Temple. Built
in nearly every North Queensland “Chinatown”,425 they adhered to stylised architectural
principles and served a variety of function for the community. To a colonial onlooker, any
structure or room with a shrine, altar, incense, deity or altar-ware such as candlesticks or incense
423 Raymond Seid, 2016, Notes on The Ancestral Village of Changsha in Xinhui County, China........a Photo
Essay, Presentation by Raymond Seid at Chinese Genealogy Workshop, Las Vegas, Nevada, January 10-14, 2016. These three
elements helped to weave the social fabric of the village together.
424 “The Wonderland of the Month”, The Queenslander30 December 1899, p. 1291.
425With the exception of Capeville, Chinatown on the Cape River goldfield.
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burners was automatically rendered a “joss” house,426 regardless of whether it was a private altar,
a meeting hall or a temple.427
Throughout north Queensland, 26 Temples have been recorded in this study with a further 8
temples located elsewhere in Queensland.428 As more evidence comes to light more temples may
be discovered.429 Using the current figures of places identified to date, 26 temples or 79 % of all
constructed temples across Queensland were located in north Queensland. Two temples or 12 %
were located in Southern Queensland, four temples or 6 % in Central Queensland, and only 1
temple representing only 3%, in the metropolitan area at Breakfast Creek, Brisbane. The 26
temples located across North Queensland were constructed across 15 locations: Mackay,
Ravenswood, Charters Towers, Gilberton, Georgetown, Mt Hogan, Croydon, Palmer River,
Cooktown, Port Douglas, Cairns, Herberton, Thornborough, Innisfail, and Halifax. Some towns
had more than one temple at the same time such as Cairns and Charters Towers, while other
communities had to reconstruct due to pest, fire or cyclone damage including Cooktown,
Atherton, Innisfail, and Georgetown. Only two temples remain standing in present times out of
the 26 built in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. These are the Hou Wang Miao in Atherton,
the second temple constructed in 1904, and the Innisfail Lit Sung Goong, the third and last
temple constructed in Innisfail and Queensland in 1940.430
426The Wonderland of the Month, The Queenslander, 30 December 1899, p. 1291..To the White observer, the ““joss house” was the
church of the Chinese. Exotic and full of bright colors and smells, the “joss house” was a source of wonder and often described as
such. In the Queenslander in 1899 one was described: “Far away in Atherton they have in their colony a “joss” house, gorgeous
with scarlet and purple, and with many devices of strangely carved and gilded woods. Beneath the Idols incense is perpetually
burning, and in a vessel of oil a light is kept night and day. A strange barbaric drum, carved and lettered, hangs upon the wall, and
so beneath an alien sky, and in a foreign land, the Chinese keep the faith of their forefathers.”
427 Paul Macgregor, “‘Joss’ houses of colonial Bendigo and Victoria”, in Mike Butcher (ed.), An Angel by the Water: Essays in
honour of Dennis Reginald O’Hoy, (Holland House Publishing for the Bendigo Trust, Bendigo Australia, 2015): 104.
Paul Macgregor provides an excellent and succinct description of the complexities of understanding what a “joss house” exactly
is. MacGregor writes, “The term ‘“joss” house’ was very widely used in 19th century English-language accounts of such buildings
in Australia, although occasionally the words ‘temple’, ‘club-house’ or ‘masonic hall’ are used. …The Chinese themselves, when
speaking in Cantonese, used the terms ui-koon (also written as huiguan or wiukoon, meeting-hall), kongsi (company or society),
mew (miao, temple), sitong (citang, ancestral hall). There is no collective term in Chinese for all of these types of buildings, but in
colonial Australia, ‘“joss” house’ in fact serves that purpose in English.”
428 These further 8 include Brisbane, Killarney, Stanthorpe, Texas, Gympie, Maryborough, Boldercombe and Rockhampton as well as
a hospital at Gayndah and a Meeting Hall at Condamine.
429 TROVE is the National Library of Australia’s digital repository of resources relating to Australia. TROVE provides a search
engine which brings together content from libraries, museums, archives and the community.
430 The first Cooktown Temple was burnt down and the first two temples in Innisfail were severely damaged by cyclones.
104
Fig.15. Temple distribution: Queensland
Fig.16. Queensland Temple distribution: 1870-1940431
The number of temples constructed in Queensland is slightly below, but still consistent with, the
colonies of New South Wales and Victoria. Among all three colonies, Victoria has the most
temples with 52 recorded or 36%; followed by New South Wales with 47 recorded or 33%, and
lastly Queensland with 32 recorded or 22%. Other colonies including Tasmania and South
Australia, including the Northern Territory, have 5% and 4% respectively and Western Australia
had none. At this point, these figures remain approximate as it is a developing field and
Macgregor predicts that more may be discovered as local newspapers are digitized.432
What remains outstanding is the dominance of the east coast in the construction of temples in the
19th and early 20th centuries compared to other colonies, along with the figures emerging as
remarkably parallel to the marriage figures between White women and Chinese men for the
same period. It also indicates that the east coast colonies were a dominant and favoured
destination in the Chinese Diaspora. 433
431 Robb Database: Temples, Halls and Kongsi’s: 1848-1950; Pers
432 Pers. Comm. Paul Macgregor, Monday 26 October @ 12.30pm (Email).
433 These statistics are a compilation of my research as well as discussion with both Paul MacGregor and Gordon Grimwade. In
addition see Paul MacGregor in An Angel by the Water and Jack Foster Waltham, Chinese Temples in Australia, Unpublished report
for Undergraduate subject in Archaeology, Flinders University, July 2014: 1-22.
105
Across the colonies of Australia so far 143 temples have been identified as either constructed or
having existed (given that some “joss houses” in Victoria were just calico tents).434 This can be
compared to only two Chinatowns, Round Hill and Lawrence, having a Chinese temple in New
Zealand;435 an estimate of 63 temples in the U.S. in 1906; and at least 16 in British Columbia.436
A full study of all host places across the globe associated with the Chinese Diaspora where
temples were constructed, has not been undertaken and remains outside the scope of this thesis.
Graphs indicate a preliminary investigation.
Fig. 17. Colonial Temple distribution: 1850-1930437
Fig. 18. Comparison Temple Western Host Countries: 1850-1910438
Across north Queensland, Chinese settlers set out to construct, transplant and take care of their
own, making provision for the past, present and future filial and spiritual welfare of their
kinsmen. This meant that temples and their associated meeting halls, kitchens, accommodation
rooms and pig ovens were built in order to carry out this obligation. Unable to cater for clan
usage specific to one or two family groups, north Queensland’s temples were built to
accommodate the needs of broader regional areas such as Toishan or Chungshan. This is
demonstrated in the construction of two temples in Cairns: one for Sze Yap and Sam Yap
434 Argus, 28 May 1858, p. 7
435 Neville A. Ritchie, “Traces of the Past: Archaeological Insights into the New Zealand Chinese Experience in Southern New
Zealand”, in Manying Ip (ed.) Unfolding History, Evolving Identity: The Chinese in New Zealand, (Auckland University Press, 2003):
34.
436 “The Chinese have 63 “joss” houses across America”, The World News, 11 August 1906, p. 32
437 Robb Database: Temples, Halls and Kongsi’s: 1848-1950; Pers Comm. Paul MacGregor various conversations 2014-2018; Pers
Comm. Gordon Grimwade, various years 2012-2015; Jack Foster Waltham, “Chinese Temples in Australia” Archaeology graduate
topic in the Department of Archaeology, Flinders University, 2014.
438 Neville. “Traces of the Past” in Manying Ip (ed) p. 34’; “The Chinese have 63 “joss” houses across America.” The World News, 11
August 1906, p. 32; Robb Database: Temples, Halls and Kongsi’s: 1848-1950; Pers Comm. Paul MacGregor various conversations
2014-2018; Pers Comm. Gordon Grimwade, various years 2012-2015; Waltham, “Chinese Temples in Australia”, 2014.
106
speaking migrants (Toishan) while the other was for those from Lung Du and Liang Du, two
small regions in Chungshan, neither of which could understand each other’s dialect so Cantonese
was adopted as the preferred communication method. In what was perhaps a pragmatic
approach to diversity in the migrant population, community temples or Lit Sung Goong temples
("hall of various gods or sages") were constructed in Cooktown, Cairns, and Innisfail,
incorporating the three major spiritual traditions of China, Buddhism, Taoism and Confucianism,
all under the one roof.439 This provided a practical solution to community organisation and
enabled the whole Chinese community to minister to their filial obligations.
The Halifax and Mackay Temples on the other hand, are presumed to be single community
focused with the Halifax temple being a Buk Ti or Pak Ti temple and the Mackay Temple
attributed to a Sze Yap community. This is the only temple in North Queensland so far to have
been identified as erected by and dedicated to Sze Yap speaking people.440
Fig. 19. Interior of Mackay Temple, 1908441
Temples constructed across north Queensland were built to serve a community: to guide and aid
men to work hard in their new environments, act as good citizens and maintain their filial
439 http://www.cadcai.org/pages/cairns-lit-sung-goong-collection
440Pers Comm. Paul Macgregor, 4 March 2018, Townsville.
441 “Our Illustrations”, North Queensland Herald, 4 April 1908, page 7
Couplet on either
side of altar
Couplet on either
side of altar
107
connections back home to the ancestral village. They served a number of purposes as spaces and
were built with little variance in style. Utilitarian in form and constructed using timber and tin,
they were fitted out with elaborate furniture and fittings imported from China.442 They were
ornate and colourful in contrast to White urban interiors, and imbued comfort to any Chinese
person who stepped inside through their familiar cultural style which played out through
elaborate carving, motif symbolism, furniture style and general décor which were the only
architectural reminders of the ancestral village. In addition, donor boards and Temple couplets
(poems) reinforced community bonds and provided words of inspiration and fortification to
Chinese men. This is evident in the couplets found either side of the main altar at the Sze Yap
temple in Mackay, opened in 1903. The couplets implored the “god(s) or person(s) to whom the
temple was dedicated, to ever receive the people's offerings, to act and be an example, to guide
the people” presumably in their daily lives.443 (See Fig. 23, Interior of Mackay Temple, 1908).
Far from being passive spaces, temple accoutrements in the form of couplets, temple furniture,
fixtures and fittings also demanded protection, with temples furnished with weapons and
bamboo sticks used periodically to defend the community from White troublemakers.444
Adjoining the temple were community halls, constructed with accommodation at the rear for the
temple caretaker who also acted as a temple official when required.
In China, the village ancestral hall provided a place for reverence; a place where the village men
were honoured on name placards, and clan meetings were held to make village decisions. In
addition, the ancestral meeting hall provided a place where the village clan genealogy could be
deposited such as zupu books and ancestral tablets.445 Temples and ancestral halls were integral
to village life and this relationship was transplanted to Queensland. However, through the act of
migration, a utilitarian architectural and philosophical decision was made to amalgamate the two
distinct village structures into one, nearly with every temple incorporating a meeting hall in its
design. However, while all temples had a meeting hall, not all meeting halls appeared to be
attached to temples. In at least two places across Queensland, stand-alone meeting halls were
provided where a temple was absent: in Townsville on the upper floor of merchant store Hook
Wah Jang and Co., later known as Tin Yuen’s, and in the Southern Region at Condamine on the
442 Rains, Intersections, 179-180
443Pers comm. Ely Finch, email correspondence regarding translation of Mackay Temple couplets, 22 October 2015.
444Queensland Times, Ipswich Herald and General Advertiser, 8 March 1888, p. 3; Warwick Examiner and Times, 16 May 1888, p. 2;
Toowoomba Chronicle and Darling Downs General Advertiser, 8 July 1897, p.5.
445“Guide to Chinese-Australian Family Research”, Chinese Museum, Melbourne Victoria,
http://www.chinesemuseum.com.au/wp-content/uploads/Guide-to-Chinese-Australian-Research.pdf Zupu is an official
clan genealogical record maintained by ancestral village elders for a single surname. Families also had Jiapu books家譜 which is the
family ancestral genealogy tree.
108
Darling Downs.446 Further west from Condamine, Texas had a structure locally referred to as a
“Kongsi”. Whether this Kongsi was a temple or a meeting place remains unknown.447 To the
broader community it was regarded as a temple but the name “Kongsi” suggests that it was a
clan meeting hall instead.
Meeting halls constructed across North Queensland were typically, free standing buildings on
one side of the temple and accessed through a front or side door in the small corridor between
the two buildings. The meeting hall provided a venue to maintain social cohesion, as a space in
which to arbitrate and resolve community disputes, record members of the community, and
provide a collection point for community fines. This was the case in Cairns when shipments of
bananas were infected with fruit fly, with those caught selling infected fruit receiving a fine
which they had to pay to the Temple.448 The hall was used in the 19th century as temporary
overnight accommodation for out of town men, which transitioned into permanent
accommodation in the 20th century for the aging indigent men to live out their days.449 In one
instance, an indigent White woman sought shelter in the dilapidated and disused Buk Ti Goong
temple in Cairns, indicating that gender was not as important as need.450
Together the temple and community hall provided a multipurpose place constructed to balance
the “chi” energy force, or flow of harmony, throughout the Chinatown community, as well as
ensure more earthly matters were attended to in the immediate environment. Temples not only
provided a sacred space for worship, a place to make community decisions and arbitrate on
matters of dispute, but a central location to store regalia such as banners, used for public
celebrations or to prepare food such as roast pig for celebrations such as births, Chinese New
Year, the Harvest Festival and Ching Ming. 451 In addition, both the temple and community hall
provided a controlled environment to entertain Western visitors in, on occasions when the
Chinese community played host to the broader community. For example, Governor General
Lord and Lady Hopetoun in 1901452 and Lord and Lady Chermside in 1903, were entertained in
446Condamine had a meeting hall constructed very early on for Chinese indentured workers and it is still in existence, and now
converted into a house.
447Interview, Merleen Freedman, Miles, 2004
448 May, Topsawyers, 72
449 Interview: George Wah Day, Cairns, 5 April 2001 and Pers Comm. Merle Douglas, Townsville, 2009
450 Cairns Post, 12 February 1929, p. 4
451 Large cylindrical above ground ovens were usually constructed within walking distance of the hall and caretaker’s cottage and
utilised to roast a pig whole. Pigs were vertically lowered into the oven after preparation where they slowly cooked over coals. Pig
ovens have been found near temples on the Palmer goldfield, at Thornborough, Croydon, Ravenswood and at the Hou Wang
Miao, Atherton. There was also a pig oven located at the rear of the Lit Sung Goong temple, Cairns.
452 Cairns Post, 17 September 1901. When news of his arrival reached Chinatown, residents rang the tocsin to summon the
community to get ready for the procession. They presented a magnificent processional display in traditional celebratory costumes with
some carrying flags and banners. Others carried halberd shafts from the Temple. Following tradition, a deputation presented an
109
the Lit Sung Goong temple in Cairns by the civic leaders of the Chinese community including
their wives.453
Importantly, the function of the temple was to keep a record of the community, who was in it,
who had returned back to China and who had died and was buried on foreign soil.454 Temple
caretakers played a significant role in facilitating the process of application for exhumation by
identifying deceased men and keeping a record of each man’s village and family. They along
with community leaders made representations to the Queensland government on behalf of the
community or family to exhume deceased Chinese men, in order to have the bones prepared and
sent back to China to fulfil kinship and ancestral obligations. This is evident in a letter from Lam
Pan, secretary of the Kung Shin On society, temple caretaker, herbalist Doctor, storekeeper, and
civic leader, who wrote in 1899 to the Home Secretary for approval to exhume the bones of up
to 50 deceased Chinese men from the Chinese cemetery near Millchester at Charters Towers,
with a view to sending them back to their villages in China.455
Returning deceased men’s bones back to the ancestral village was considered a necessary
function and a community obligation of the overseas community. The balance and harmony
between the living and the dead, so important in China to fulfil ancestral obligations, was under
pressure from the complex logistics of trying to do so in an overseas environment. Maintaining
filial obligations was made difficult by distance, transportation of remains and cultural ignorance
by White authorities when it came to the process of exhumation and transportation. Exhumation
required an application to be made to authorities accompanied by a fee of £1. Making an
application for exhumation of Chinese bones to be sent back to China was quite frequent in the
late 19th and early 20th centuries and estimated at over 660 requests for exhumation submitted
over the whole of Queensland.456 Of this number, 654 were in relation to men, with only 4
applications made for Chinese women including one White woman, Jane Mah, the wife of
address to the Governor General proclaiming loyalty to His Majesty and wishing Lord Hopetoun a long and well life. The speech was
signed and presented by 40 prominent Chinese merchants and shopkeepers.
453 Cairns Post, 5 June 1903. About 100 Chinatown residents, dressed in traditional bright silk clothing, met the Governor General and
his wife at the Railway Station. They accompanied both Lady and Lord Chermside to Sachs Street and entertained them in the back of
the Lit Sung GoongTemple, which had been decorated especially for the occasion. The reception included fireworks and afternoon
tea.
454 Paul Macgregor, 2015, “’Joss’ houses of colonial Bendigo and Victoria”, 104.
455 QSA: HOM/A22/04405/29 Police, Charters Towers, Letter from Lam Pan to Home Secretary. Because he was requesting such a
large number of exhumations, Lam Pan made enquiry as to whether a discount could be made as the community found the application
fee of £1 per exhumation difficult to meet.
456 Robb Database: Exhumations, 1848-1950 The number of exhumations and statistics comes from the compilation of official records
including the Colonial Secretary and Home Secretary files, Burial registers, and newspaper reports. The data could not have been
researched without the generous help of Jonathan Richards who shared his database with me so that I could combine data.
110
Willie Mah from Cunnamulla457 and Wah Quey and baby Mary, the wife and child of Ah Ming,
Townsville.458 Exhumation applications were made for the north Queensland towns of Charters
Towers, Cooktown, Croydon, Georgetown, Herberton, Ingham, Maytown, Millchester,
Ravenswood and Townsville, with approximately 88 exhumations applied for, but this number
remains an estimate only as not all exhumations have been accounted for in official records.459
While the temple and hall were public examples of transplanted infrastructure, an equally
important element, small private altars, were set up in stores and private quarters to remind
individuals of their filial obligations and to provide a place for requests for special blessings.460
As William Lakos observes, “Of crucial importance and significance to Chinese (religious)
family life and Chinese culture was the worship of ancestors, a fact indicated by the almost
universal keeping of family altars”.461 Private altars in shops and family quarters included names
or images of deceased kinsmen and favoured gods, flanked by incense and offerings. Based on
village practice, occupants wished the unseen energy force of harmony “chi”, encapsulated
within filial observance, be enabled to flow seamlessly from the public elements of the meeting
hall, temple and graveside memorial, through and into the private space of the family home; this
harmonious hierarchy underpinned the very model of Confucian fundamentals for the proper
ordering of Chinese society.462 By constructing temples, halls and funerary burners in the public
sphere and small altars in the private sphere, order to the social realm of family and kinship was
provided in a foreign land, enabling the world of the living to transcend with the spirit world of
the dead.
While Chinese women had access to “Chinatown” temples, it remains unknown just how much
interaction they had with them for filial purposes in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Instead,
it is more likely that China born wives who migrated to north Queensland, engaged more with
the private family altar with their duty including to ensure offerings were made to the ancestors
and later, her deceased husband on behalf of the immediate and extended family. The prevalence
of private altars in stores and family homes remains an overlooked aspect of cultural
transplantation.
457 QSA HOM /J72529/5208: ID848344 Exhumation Jane Mar, 1929, Cunnamulla
458 QSA COL/A435/85/6540 Ah Ming.
459 Robb Database: Exhumations: 1848-1950
460 'The Mongolian at Cooktown', Brisbane Courier, 19 February 1879, p. 5.
461 William Lakos, ChineseAncestor Worship: A Practice and Ritual Oriented Approach to Understanding Chinese Culture,
(Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 13September 2010): 68 -69.
462 Ronald G. Knapp, China's living houses: folk beliefs, symbols, and household ornamentation, (University of Hawaii Press, 1999):
11-12.
111
Fig. 20. Identified Temples across North Queensland463
463 Robb Database: Temples, Halls and Kongsi’s: 1848-1950
Temples in North Queensland
LOCATION DATE RANGE STRUCTURE IMAGE
Cooktown
3X Temples with
meeting halls
Two different
kinship communities
Lit Sung Goong
1874
May1875- Oct 1875
1877-?
1892-1930s
1 Private Altar
Timber and Tin
? reconstructions 1875
destroyed by fire
1877 - ? Lit Sung Goong 1892-1930s
Palmer River
Goldfields
2-3 Temples
c.1874 -?
c1875- ?
c.1875-?
1X 1874 Palmerville
1 X1878 Byers town
1X Uhrs camp?
1 1878 Maytown
Maytown 1878 - ?
Port Douglas
2-3 Temples; 2 rebuilt
1888- 1899
1899 - 1911
2X reconstructions
Destroyed by 1911 cyclone
Image unavailable
Cairns
Two different
kinship communities
Lit Sung Goong
1886-1964
Buk Ti Goong c1898 -
1934
2 Temples with Halls
Timber and tin with timber
cladding
Lit Sung Goong 1886 - 1964 Buk Ti Goong c.1898-1927
Atherton
2 X Temples
1 rebuilt
Hou Wang Miau
1899- 190?
1904- existing
2X Temples with halls
1X rebuild
Timber with tin cladding
Hou Wang Miau 1904- existing
Herberton
1X temple
? - 1932 1 Temple,
hall unknown
Image unavailable
Geraldton / Innisfail
3X temple 2 rebuilt
Lit Sing Gung
1891 – 1918
1932 – 1930s
1939-existing
3 Temples
2X Timber and tin
1 rebuild timber and tin
post 1918
1X Rebuild concrete
1920-1938
Lit Sing Gung Temple 1891- 1918 , 1939- existing
Etheridge
Goldfields
Possible two different
kinship groups
1882-c.1896
1905-1950s
c1888- 1896
3 Temples with hall
2 X Georgetown Different
locations-
1X Mt Hogan
Georgetown Temple 1905-1950
Gilberton Goldfield
1X Temple
1870 - ? 1 X temple description
unknown
Image unavailable
Croydon Goldfields
2X temples
rebuilt
1888- ?
1897 - 1939
2 temples with meeting hall
Timber and tin
1X rebuild
Croydon Temple 1897 – c1939
Halifax
1X temple
Buk Ti Goong
c1900- c.1927
1 X Temple with meeting
Hall
Charters Towers &
Millchester
2X temples
Two different
kinship communities
1873Millchester
c.1877 -
Queenton
c 1891- ?
c1889- ?
3 temples with hall
2 X Bluff Road Queenton)
rebuild
1XMillchester
Millchester
Ravenswood 1874- c1882
1882- ?1915/20
2 Temple with hall
Timber and tin.
1X rebuild
Ravenswood Temple 1882 – c 1915/20
Thornborough
1X temple
c.1898-? 1 Temple Image unavailable
Mackay
1X temple
1903- c1935
Sze Yup
1 Temple with hall
Mackay Temple and Hall 1908 – c1935
112
The transplantation and maintenance of Confucian practice, as seen from the number of temples
and meeting halls constructed, cultural practices concerning the dead, attention to exhumation
rites and presence of small altars in shops and private quarters, ensured the philosophy of life
force and flow of harmony was able to be introduced, maintained and managed in north
Queensland’s “Chinatown” environments to the benefit of the community. However, while
“Chinatowns” were a distinct feature of larger settlements, so too were the “Cultural precincts”
which developed in rural and remote north Queensland.
***
“Cultural precincts”: North Queensland
Across north Queensland, Chinese “Cultural precincts”464 were associated with nearly every
small town and settlement with the exception of those on the Cape York Peninsula, where
Chinese settlement never really took off in the very remote districts. Chinese “Cultural
precincts” have been identified in over 17 locations across north Queensland, adjoining
prominent towns and settlements. This figure represents a sample of the “Cultural precincts”
which existed across the north but which were not explored in detail as part of this thesis.465
(See Fig.21) Chinese “Cultural precinct’s” emerged when one or more Chinese settlers lived
and worked in an outlying street of a town, along a nearby watercourse or on land deemed
unsuitable for occupation such as areas prone to flood. In many cases Chinese settlers took out
leases from the Crown on “Special Lease” which adjoined the Town Common or stock route,
but invariably it was situated away from the main White population.466 “Cultural precincts”
are associated with market garden areas and small business district in rural towns and to a
smaller extent some areas associated with the pastoral stations. They provide a means to
understand the Chinese settlement patterns, and in particular interaction with the Chinese
Family Landscape. Two key areas, market gardening and small business cultural precincts will
be explored. Chinese “Cultural precincts” emerged when one or more Chinese settlers lived and
worked in an outlying street of a town, along a nearby watercourse or on land deemed unsuitable
for residences such as areas prone to flood. In many cases Chinese settlers took out “Special
464 The term “Cultural precinct” describes the smaller communities of Chinese settlers, some with families, who lived and worked near
each other but who were otherwise engaged in singular occupations as market gardeners, bakers, butchers and storekeepers in rural
and remote environments. As small populations of Chinese settlers, they were never large enough in population to form a
“Chinatown”, yet developed community cohesion with mutual benefit as a small community.
465 Towns such as Prairie, Pentland, Muttaburra, Aramac, Boulia, Julia Creek, Mareeba and many smaller settlements in more
remote locations were not researched or mapped as part of this thesis.
466 Robb Database: Rates and Valuations: 1882-1940 Database compiled over 10 years data entry taken from Local Council Records
for North Queensland towns of Townsville, Ravenswood, Charters Towers, Hughenden, Winton, Richmond, Cloncurry, Normanton,
Croydon, Georgetown, Cairns, & Innisfail
113
leases” from the Crown which adjoined the Town Common or stock route, invariably situated
away from the main White population.467 “Cultural precincts” are associated with market garden
areas and small business districts in rural towns and to a smaller extent, some areas associated
with the pastoral stations. They provide a means to understand Chinese settlement patterns, and
in particular interaction with the Chinese Family Landscape. Two key areas, market gardens and
small business cultural precincts, will be explored.
Distribution
of
“precincts”
in QLD
Fig.21. “Cultural precincts”: Queensland: 1860-1920
Market Garden Areas
Market gardening developed as a profitable occupation across north and north-western
Queensland. It was low cost to set up and stable, thanks to the constant demand for fresh food and
lack of competition, so it suited the highly mobile and resourceful Chinese migrant of the 19th
century. It allowed mobility around the region when new opportunities arose, and was used as a
467 Robb Database: Rates and Valuations: 1882-1940, database compiled over 10 years data entry taken from local Council records
for North Queensland towns of Townsville, Ravenswood, Charters Towers, Hughenden, Winton, Richmond, Cloncurry, Normanton,
Croydon, Georgetown, Cairns, and Innisfail.
114
retirement occupation in the absence of an aged pension.468 Initially Chinese men opted to work
near mining districts, taking up market garden leases on every mining field across north
Queensland. However, for some, this proved unworkable and gardens were abandoned after a
matter of weeks. This was the case for a number of small garden areas on the Etheridge and
Gilbert gold fields in the 1880s. However, more successful gardeners stuck to it with a number
staying between six to ten years before they transferred their market garden leases to a kinsman.
In the same district, at least three gardeners worked their gardens on the Delaney River for
twenty-six years.469
Others opted for more permanent returns and took out leases on watercourses near new
settlements which developed into permanent towns. In many instances, at towns such as
Hughenden, Camooweal, Cloncurry, Richmond and Winton, a number of kinsmen formed
syndicates and worked the gardens together. Important for these “Cultural precincts” was the
renewal of labour through gardening syndicates, which experienced a regular turnover of
members as some departed to larger centres such as Townsville or were replaced by younger
men. Even as late as the 1940s there is evidence that intergenerational chain migration was still
occurring to north Queensland with the arrival of Mar Yen Shoo in Winton to learn the market
garden trade from his father Mar Way.470
Examples of major Chinese market garden “Cultural precincts” associated with regional north
Queensland towns include the gardens at Camooweal along the Georgina River, the garden area
at Cloncurry along the Coppermine Creek, garden areas at Georgetown along the Etheridge
River, garden areas near Winton at Pelican waterhole and Mistake Creek, Lee See’s and Ah
Hon’s syndicate gardens at Hughenden along the Flinders River, Woods Lake near Burketown
and a large garden area at Lawn Hill Station (see Chapter 9). Other small garden areas which
could be noted as dedicated cultural precincts include Ah Toy’s garden on the Palmer
468 Queensland National Bank: QNB register Winton, 1881-1890; QNB register Winton, 1890-1898; QNB register Winton, 1898-
1912; QNB register Winton, 1916-1923. For example, a Chinese migrant could commence his working life in western Queensland as a
cook on one station only to retire as the gardener on another. This is the case for Ah Bow, who is noted as a cook on Llanrheidol station
in 1892 but ended up 29 years later on Ayrshire Downs as the gardener. Others started their working life on pastoral stations as the cook/
gardener but moved into towns when they had saved enough to become storekeepers.
469 QSA MWO/14B/40, Mining Warden Georgetown, Register of applications for market garden areas 1887-1890
470 Robb, “Mar and Mar”, 21-30.
115
Goldfield471, Market Garden 31 at Georgetown on the Etheridge River,472 and the shop and
garden complex associated with Willie Mar Senior and Willie Mar Junior at Winton.473
Fig.22 Chinese garden, Normanton, 1935474 Fig.23 Chinese orchards, Charters Towers 475
Business districts
Despite much mobility by Chinese men across rural districts in the 19th century, a great number
set up business in small towns. Some commenced work on pastoral stations first, as cooks or
gardeners, before gravitating to nearby towns when enough funds were saved. Once there, they
opened grocery stores, fruit stores and bakeries while others worked as butchers, carriers or hotel
cooks.476 The relationship between a town’s market garden community and the town
storekeeping community was a mutually beneficial one. Many towns developed a commercial
relationship between the town gardeners and storekeepers. This is evident at Winton and
Hughenden where the garden syndicates, See Lee’s at Hughenden and Pelican Waterhole
gardens, Winton provided the town’s Chinese grocers and fruiterers with fresh produce to sell. In
return the store provided not only a commercial outlet for the garden but provided additional
distribution benefits via door to door delivery in addition to sales at the garden gate.
Despite the inability to benefit from “Chinatowns”, with their broader transplanted societal
elements such as benevolent societies, temple/hall complexes, and Chinese hospitals, rural and
remote Chinese men were able to remain socially organised though kinship connections and took
471 Jack, Holmes and Kerr, “Ah Toys’s Garden”, 51-58.
472 QSA MWO/14B/40, Mining Warden Georgetown, Register of applications for market garden areas 1887-1890. MG 31 was
worked continuously from 1881 until at least 1911. In that period, it had six market gardener leases with the longest, Meu Lin and Ah
Fory, occupying the lease for over 20 years.
473 Sandi Robb, Heritage Assessment, Chinese Market Garden, Dwelling and Shop Cultural precinct, Consultancy Report to
Winton District Historical Society and Museum Inc. (WDHSandMI), 2009: 6-14.
474 JOL Image: APE-074-0001-0013, former ID picqld-2006-05-18-14-30: Hon. J. Mullan visiting Chinese market gardens in
Normanton, 1935
475 Source: JCU Library Image: 11263: Charters Towers
476 Information compiled from Winton Burial Register, Commonwealth Exemption to the Dictation Test, QNB Records and
Commonwealth Alien Registration Certificates.
116
advantage of mutually beneficial relationships between each other, providing a bed to sleep on, a
place to enjoy recreation, or an economic opportunity should someone wish to return home for a
couple of years.477 In addition, some storekeepers in rural and remote areas acted as “gobetweens”
for the exhumation and repatriation of deceased’s’ bones back to China.478 “Cultural
precincts” in rural and remote areas lasted well into the 20th century and adapted in towns to
changing circumstances such as aging men. As the 20th century unfolded, a number of Chinese
storekeepers moved into expanding their stores to create a shop/ garden complex as old
gardeners relinquished their leases and retired, unable to work, or returned to China. It could be
said that that Western Queensland towns were nourished by the market gardeners and Chinese
“cultural precincts”. Prominent north Queensland towns with “Cultural precincts” include
Normanton, Cloncurry, Croydon, Winton, Hughenden, and Richmond as well as places such as
railway sidings including Black Bull near Normanton, and coastal towns such as Bowen.479
Fig.24. Chinese Gardener, Bowen480Fig. 25. Chinese Garden, Hughenden, c.1915481
Conclusion
In many respects, Chinatowns and cultural precincts across north Queensland developed in a
similar way to other settlement communities associated with the Chinese Diaspora around the
globe. David Chuenyan Lai’s seminal study of the development of ethnographic enclaves in
destination countries such as British Columbia provided a useful framework to scrutinise the
477 'Hughenden Chronicles.', The Evening Telegraph, 18 April 1908, p. 5. Mutual assistance was offered to overlanding Chinese men
in the form of temporary lodging, food and work, and individual shopkeepers such as Leong Jew from Tie Hop and Co. in Hughenden
and Charlie Ah Foo of Sun Kum Wah of Winton provided a similar service, as key merchant firms in larger centres. A number were
charged for their involvement with recreational pursuits such as gambling offences while others were charged with selling opium
charcoal or alcohol to Aborigines.
478 QSA: COL/B36 Letter 6/7/96 3881 Away, Item 8728, King Nam Merchant Firm, Thursday Island.
479 Pers Comm. Jack Smeardon, Normanton, 2 October 2007.
480 Source: JCU Library Image: 15892
481E. J. Brady, Australia Unlimited, G. Robertson and Company, Melbourne, c.1918, pp. 462-463
It should be noted that “cultural precinct’s” also occurred as a cluster of shops or shop/ house areas in larger towns such as Cairns,
Ingham, Townsville and South Johnstone. These were largely associated with the movement of Chinese families outside
Chinatown areas in the early 20th century.
117
pattern of settlement across Queensland. However, while it is useful to examine stages of
community growth and decline, it remained essentially a patriarchal approach to the subject and
ignored the deeper role of the transnational family, the contribution of women, and their
important role in the renewal process by sending sons and daughters to put down family tap
roots into the host country. Fong-Yuen Woon more clearly articulates that a broader net should
be cast when thinking about community. She challenged the popular notion of “bachelor”
communities to better reflect the reality of “married bachelor” communities so prevalent in
places such as the United States, British Columbia and colony of Queensland. Huping Ling
argues that a broader reconceptualising of the settlement experience needs to be undertaken to
insert something “more” which is overlooked: it is apparent that two Chinese settler experiences
might have developed, one without women and children locally, resulting in the seemingly
‘bachelor’ communities, and the Queensland experience with its inclusion of women and
families at the local level. Both British Columbia and Queensland saw the development of the
“two primary wife family” which was also present in places such as Peru and Hawaii.
While many similarities are identified between the Queensland and British Columbia
experience, particularly in the physical structural development of Chinatowns, the theoretical
understanding of the social development of a Chinatown in all cases remains lacking and falls
short of an integrated mode of enquiry which is what is required to understand the Chinese
Family Landscape.
118
C h a p t e r 5
OVERVIEW: FAMILIES ASSOCIATED WITH CHINESE MEN IN NORTH
QUEENSLAND
Introduction
North Queensland’s Chinese Family Landscape had its roots firmly established by a prior pattern
of mixed marriages between Chinese men and White women on the Darling Downs and in the
Wide Bay and Burnett districts. As settlement extended northward after 1860, three distinct
marriage patterns concerning types of couples began to emerge: Chinese men and White women,
and Chinese men and China born women; and from the 1890s, Chinese men with Aboriginal
women. These marriages formed Queensland’s Chinese Family Landscape. This chapter will
provide an overview to Queensland colonial Chinese relationship trends including marriage type,
ethnic background and settlement patterns. By looking at overall colonial and State statistics
regarding Chinese relationships, regional variations between Brisbane, Southern, Central and
Northern region can be clearly delineated. This information reveals north Queensland’s position
in the Chinese Family Landscape as an important settlement region associated with the Chinese
Diaspora to Queensland. This chapter also provides the base for the next three chapters, where
each family type across north Queensland is discussed in detail and compared to national and
international family formation trends.
For the purpose of this thesis, the term “primary family” refers to the first couple or family
recorded in Queensland where the Chinese husband is the migrant settler. It includes couples
where Chinese men have settled with women of different racial background such as White,
Indigenous, Japanese, or South Sea Islander women as well as Chinese women who migrated to
Queensland to join their husbands. It may at times also refer to couples who were separated,
such as a Chinese settler husband living in north Queensland and his First wife and her children
in the natal village in China. Where this happens, it will be spelt out clearly for the reader.
Children born to a primary based couple are referred to as First Generation Australian Born
Chinese and after they marry, their children are referred to as Second Generation Australian
Born Chinese; and so forth.
Couples and families may be referred to as couples identified and verified as having undertaken
a legal marriage, or co-habitative couples who live in long term de-facto relationships, or those
119
in short term intimate liaisons. In order to understand the part north Queensland played in the
Chinese Family Landscape, graphs will usually refer first to the whole of the colony or State
statistics, followed by north Queensland statistics. Graphs will outline the racial background of
women associated with Chinese men, location of marriages and unions across the colony, and
geographical distribution of Chinese families where percentages of unknown locations are
removed. In addition, the pattern of marriage over the whole time frame on a decade by decade
basis is presented in a visual format to analyse the peak periods of marriage for each region,
which when combined with statistics on the prevalence of marriages versus other unions
provides the most comprehensive study so far into marriage and relationships associated with the
Overseas Chinese to Queensland and north Queensland.
***
Statistical Trends: Queensland vs. north Queensland
To understand the Colonial Chinese Family Landscape and in particular north Queensland’s
Chinese Family Landscape, a firm understanding of just who was marrying Chinese men is
required, followed by what types of couples, where they were located, and why these
relationships occurred. The following section will answer these questions and compare them
across the colony to identify important regional differences.
To delineate north Queensland’s population data from the rest of the colony, Queensland has
been divided up into four geographical regions: Brisbane, Southern Region, Central Region and
Northern Region. This makes population figures easy to identify for comparative purposes, and
mirrors the historical pattern of expansion and settlement of the colony in order to compare
regional variances and industry factors driving settlement which might affect the rate of marriage
or migration patterns.
Ethnicity:
Queensland
Across Queensland 1095482 Chinese men actively sought family and intimacy with women
throughout the 19th century, entering into marriage and marriage-like unions with White,
482 Robb Database: Marriages and Unions, 1848-1920.
120
Chinese and Aboriginal women as well as South Sea Islander and Japanese women.483
Distinct patterns of marriage trends emerged from analysis of the primary database indicating
that marriage to White women was the most prevalent in Queensland for Overseas Chinese
settler men. Across the colony of Queensland, women associated with Chinese men 1847-1920
either married (under The Marriage Act 1864) or in a co-habitative union (de-facto marriage or
short-term liaison resulting in the birth of a child) were statistically quantified as 84% White
women, 13% Chinese women and 3% women of Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander heritage.
So far, identified Aboriginal / Chinese families are confined to north Queensland with the
exception of one union in Central Region in the 1880s. Out of all of the marriages and unions
recorded in the database, only three women did not fit the majority ethnicities: two Japanese
women and one South Sea Islander. As the numbers of these two groups was so small, they did
not rate a percentage for Queensland.
Fig. 26. Cultural Background Women: Queensland: 1847 – 1920
Fig. 27: Cultural Background Women: North Queensland: 1860 - 1920
North Queensland
Across north Queensland figures of mixed heritage marriages and unions including Chinese men
married to Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal women make up 73% of all relationships. Of these
relationships, 66% are between White women and Chinese men, 6% between Aboriginal women
and Chinese men, and 1% between women of other races, such as Japanese, and Chinese men.
While these figures indicate a lower proportion of White mixed heritage families when
compared to whole of Queensland, northern percentages reflect the influence a larger presence
483 While more women and couples may be identified as new information comes to light, this database compiled through the process
of this thesis forms the most comprehensive numerical study into Chinese family relations in Queensland in the 19th century to
date. See Introduction – Methodology for an explanation of how this was achieved.
121
of Chinese migrant women living in north Queensland (27%) when compared to the rest of the
colony/State (13%). This means that nearly one third of Chinese settler families living across
north Queensland were families where both parents migrated from China. Similarly, the
percentage of Aboriginal marriages/ unions across north Queensland was double that of the
overall Queensland figures. The larger number of Chinese/ Aboriginal families located in north
Queensland is attributed to cattle stations on rural and remote western and Gulf Country
communities where many Aboriginal families were located, relatively safe from the reach of the
Protector of Aborigines and the draconian provisions in the Aborigines Protection Act regarding
marriage.
Intimate relations:
Legal Marriage versus co-habitative relationships
It is difficult to accurately analyse the percentage of legal marriages under The Marriage Act
1864 versus cohabitative or de-facto relationships for partners and wives associated with
Queensland’s Chinese settler population. While many marriages are entered in the Births,
Deaths and Marriage registers, there are many which are not. Extensive scrutiny of the registers
has not accurately quantified the number of intimate relationships, casual affairs or paid sexual
services. Therefore, correct numbers of de facto or casual intimate liaisons and short-term
unions resulting in the birth of a child born outside of legal marriage under the Act remain fluid
and difficult to verify.484 The current figure projected in this thesis for non-legal unions is an
estimate only as even legal marriages at the time of writing could not be verified.
This is because there is the potential for bona fide “marriages” to be inadvertently captured in the
“informal union” data set. It is to be noted that at this time, analysis for this thesis takes in all
known marriages I have found to date but does not include a thorough cross- referencing with
the official digital database online, which was uploaded late in the thesis research process.
However, it is predicted that digital Queensland Births Deaths and Marriages verification and
cross referencing of all couples may reveal that legal marriage was the preferred status for
couples. Only when the location of every family is known and verified will the analysis showing
legal and non-legal marriages and relationships be 100% correct. However, with over 50% of
the total database identified already as ‘legally married’, it can be asserted that marriage under
The Marriage Act 1864 was the most prevalent form of relationship between Chinese men and
484 The information comes from registers of births and deaths, police and justice records, marriage ledgers in church records not sent
in, and secondary sources such as newspapers and books outside the official marriage register under the Act.
122
women across colonial Queensland, which suggests that not only was the law obeyed by the
majority of migrant men and women, but that the advantages for Chinese men to partner with a
White woman or marry in the host country were quickly understood by them.
Marriage: The Marriage Act 1864
Between 1847 and 1920, 584 legal marriages, under the Marriage Act 1864, were identified in
the official register for Births Deaths and Marriages (BDM). These figures can be broken down
further which indicate that 88 families or 15% lived in or around Brisbane; 48 families or 8%
lived in the Southern Region including the Darling Downs; 60 families or 10% lived across the
Central Region; and 151 families or 26% have been identified as married and living across north
Queensland. There are a further 237 couples who married in the colony but their location is
unknown at this stage. However, by removing this 41% of unknown couples from the figures, it
is clear that nearly half of all couples, 44%, who were legally married under The Marriage Act
1864, were living in towns and settlements across north Queensland. The next largest group
lived in the Brisbane and surrounding South-east Regions.
Fig. 28. Percentage Primary Marriages by District: 1848-1920
Fig. 29. Percentage Marriages: Location known: 1848-1920
Population Geography of Families:
Queensland
Between 1847- 1920, over 1000 primary marriages and unions occurred between Chinese men
and White, Chinese, and Aboriginal women across the colony of Queensland. When combined
with the figures relating to marriage of early first generation Australian Born Chinese children in
the 19th century, which began to emerge in the early 1880s, this figure increases by a further
123
quarter to a figure of approximately 1245. As new couples are identified in the first and second
generations of Australian born Chinese, this figure will increase.485
Based on the statistical data collected for this thesis, across Queensland 1095 primary families
and couples associated with Chinese settlement have been identified as living in Queensland
over a seventy-year period. Of those families and couples, 150 families (14%) lived in the city
area of Brisbane; 108 families (10%) in Southern Region; 133 families were in Central Region
(12%) and 315 across north Queensland. There are a further 355 couples or families for whom I
have not been able to identify locations despite years of compilation of database sets. This
means that the exact location of every family has not been identified in the thesis, leaving 35%
of families still unaccounted for.486
Despite Southern Region being the first area to attract Chinese settler men as indentured labour,
it remained a small area statistically throughout the study period and reflects its early pastoral
settlement experience. Central Region, while having industries aligned with Chinese migration
patterns, failed to attract large numbers of migrant men while Northern Region, with its close
proximity to Hong Kong, China and shipping routes of the Pacific, emerged as the district which
was able to attract the most Overseas Chinese. In summary, just under one third of the total
population of Chinese setter families for the period 1847 to 1920, were living in north
Queensland with the other two thirds either located in the other three districts combined or have
yet to have their location identified.487
The removal of the percentage of families and couples where location remains unknown from
the statistics provides an unambiguous picture of colony-wide variances. From this, it is very
clear that north Queensland played a significant role in attracting Chinese settlement to
Queensland and that the Chinese Family Landscape was most prominent in this region.
485 The figure 1245 was correct as the time of thesis production. New families are added when information comes to light and the
number is slowly increasing.
486 These percentages are based on current knowledge at this point in time and will be subject to change when new information
comes to light.
487 Statistical database compiled by author and formatted in Excel spreadsheet covering the period 1847-1950, compiled from Births
Deaths and Marriages, church marriages, baptism and death records, police and justice records, Commonwealth records,
newspapers, family histories, oral history and secondary sources.
124
Fig.30. Total Marriages and Unions by District: Queensland 1848-1920
Fig 31. Total Marriages and Unions where location known 1847-1920
North Queensland
North Queensland’s ability to attract Chinese settler couples can be more clearly viewed in the
data when the number of families whose location is unknown is removed from the analysis.
North Queensland, from Mackay up to the Torres Straits and across the Gulf country, out to the
Northern Territory border and down to the south-central Shire of Winton, accounted for 45% of
all known primary couples associated with Chinese settlement in Queensland. In comparison,
families and couples living in Brisbane were less than half the percentage of northern couples, at
21%; Central Region had even fewer, at 19%; and Southern Region had 15%.
The pattern of settlement for the Chinese Family Landscape in 19th and early 20th century
Queensland was directly related to the expansion of both geographic spread of settlement and the
emergence of key industries which drove economic development. These two reasons alone
supported the emergence of economically stable communities and attracted and sustained the
Chinese Family Landscape from their inception until well into the 20th century.
Settlement Patterns:
Queensland
Queensland’s Chinese Family Landscape, over a seventy-year period, mirrored the growth, rise
and decline of three key industries: pastoralism, mining and agriculture. On a decade by decade
basis the number of marriages and unions recorded, when weighed against this expansion, reveal
a synergy between the period of emergence of key industries and the incidence of marriage. This
125
is particularly evident in north Queensland where patterns quickly emerge concerning the
number of couples, the ethnicity of female partners and key periods of economic growth. North
Queensland’s Chinese family landscape fits in with international expansion trends associated
with mining and large-scale production, but with the exception of Chinese settlers diversifying
as specialist labour for pastoral interests. Chinese shepherds, hut keepers, shearers, station
gardeners and cooks appear to be a colonial Australian/Queensland category rather than one
associated with more usual global industries attracting Chinese involvement such as mining or
sugar production.
Queensland’s Chinese Family Landscape indicates a direct relationship of the growth and
expansion of the colony to the Chinese Diaspora and family experience. Teasing this out a bit
further, decade by decade, it is clear that the majority of Chinese settler marriages occurred in
the thirty-year period 1870 – 1910, which reflects the peak period for the expansion and
settlement of Queensland and its three key industries. This period also reflects assisted female
migration programs from England and the increasing incidence of women arriving direct from
China.
Fig. 32. Total Marriages and Unions per decade district by district-1920
Queensland’s colonial Chinese marriage and union trends commenced in 1847 at a time when
the northern districts remained part of New South Wales. Chinese indentured workers from
Fukien and Amoy districts of China, contracted for a period of five years to newly settled
126
pastoralists, began to form relationships with White women with whom they came in contact,
making them among the first marriages to be recorded in the colony. Between 1847 to1859,
twenty Chinese men had either married or entered a relationship with a White woman, living
either in Brisbane, on the Darling Downs, or in the Wide Bay and Burnett region.488(See Table
2). Located primarily at Drayton, Dalby and Roma, Chinese husbands were married to migrant
women from Scotland, Ireland and England or colonial born White girls. Most weddings were
undertaken according to Wesleyan or Church of England rites at a time when the colony
remained the most northern districts of New South Wales.489 By 1860, news of pastoral rich
lands further north began to reach the Southern and Brisbane communities which precipitated
a move for some families.
C ombined C hines e Marriag e & Unions :
1839-1859
6
9
1
4
B R IS B ANE DAR L ING DOWNS WIDE B AY &
BURNE TT DIS TR IC T
LOC ATION NOT
VE R IF IE D
B R IS B ANE DAR L ING DOWNS WIDE B AY &
BURNE TT DIS TR IC T
LOC ATION NOT VE R IF IE D
Fig. 33. Combined Chinese Marriages and Unions: 1839-1859 by District.
Over the next twenty years, Chinese men migrated, married and were located across
Queensland in consistent numbers across all four regions. By 1870, however, marriages in
Southern Region began to decline in comparison to other regions, with numbers in Brisbane,
Central and Northern Region seeming to reflect the increasing populations in port towns from
488 Robb Database: Marriages and Unions, 1848-1920
489Among the first couples to be recorded in colonial Queensland records was Ester (surname unknown) and William Wing whose
son Robert was born on 11 June 1847 at a time when Queensland was the northern part of the New South Wales colony. Their three
sons were baptized in a rural church a number of years later, location unknown, but they remain registered in official Queensland
registry of births.
127
both active migration programs from the British Isles and the discovery of gold. Port towns
such as Brisbane, Maryborough, Rockhampton, Mackay, Townsville and Cooktown began to
flourish. However, the discovery of gold at the Palmer River and other major goldfields in the
north combined with the emergence of large-scale agriculture in places such as Cairns, the
Herbert River and Mackay, meant that from the 1880s it was north Queensland which emerged
as the place where most marriages and unions were located.
North Queensland
From 1860-1869, the Chinese Family Landscape began to emerge in north Queensland. While
small in number at first and geographically confined to the newly emerging port towns and
surrounding districts, at least 18 families were identified in Northern Region in this decade,
making up 15% of the total of 120 families throughout the colony. The discovery of gold at
Cape River and Ravenswood in the late 1860s precipitated a migration north of Chinese men
from the southern goldfields, and therefore some Chinese couples and families. The opening
up of more gold fields in north Queensland led to the mass migration of Chinese miners, both
internally from southern districts as well as directly from China.490 The largest influx to
Queensland and north Queensland in a limited amount of time was the initial gold rush to the
Palmer goldfield in the early 1870s.
The Palmer goldfield and emerging port town of Cooktown saw several arrivals of Chinese
migrant women for the first time in Queensland. The arrival of these Chinese women, as well
as increased marriages between Chinese men and White women, began to form a pattern,
which as the decades rolled on saw the north emerge as a preferred destination by Chinese
settlers, including China-born women. Between 1870- 1879 the Chinese Family Landscape in
North Queensland nearly doubled, hosting a population of 31 Chinese families including 7
China born migrant wives who had travelled to live with their husbands. The discovery of gold
in the north provided the initial impetus for an increase in families in the north, either through
direct association with mining or as husbands took up businesses such as shopkeeping. This
trend continued in the next decade.
490Rockhampton Bulletin and Central Queensland Advertiser, 1 June 1871, p. 2; Queensland Times, Ipswich Herald and General
Advertiser, 29 May 1875, p. 2; Rockhampton Bulletin and Central Queensland Advertiser, 12 January 1867, p. 3; Maryborough
Chronicle, Wide Bay and Burnett Advertiser, 6 January 1872, p. 2; Mackay Mercury and South Kennedy Advertiser, 1 February
1873, p. 3.
128
From 1880 until 1899, a surge in family formation saw 146 marriages registered and 107
unions identified for the period. This included 29 families where the couple were both China
born. North Queensland alone accounted for 81 families, both mixed heritage and full
Chinese, meaning that approximately 32% of all known families were now residing in the
north of the colony, which reflected the expanding mining interests and emerging large-scale
agricultural interests such as sugar, along with the Chinese driven banana and Atherton
Tableland maize industries. On one hand, the spike could be attributed to the combination of
huge numbers of immigrant Chinese men arriving in Queensland from the mid-1870s who were
now moving around the north as the region’s economy grew. However, it could also be argued
that the upturn in marriages and unions was also due to an increased preference for Chinese
partners by colonial and passage-assisted immigrant White women, who were making informed
choices in husband/ partner selection. Chinese men with their sober habits and reputation as
good providers were an attractive source of partners in a settlement environment which was
dominated by European male alcohol abuse and violence. The influx of Chinese men concurrent
with the mining boom and direct immigration of women to regional northern ports precipitated
an increase of unions between Chinese men and White women, as new arrivals were less likely
to be imbued with colonial prejudice against Chinese. This trend continued into the new century.
In the twenty-year period, 1890-1910, primary Chinese settler marriages and unions across
north Queensland outperformed Southern, Central and Brisbane Region counterparts,
continuing the trend over the previous three decades.
The development of Chinatowns and precincts large and small, and the presence of women
and children, established the realm of private, domestic “soft economics” which played out
through husband/ wife relationships, social interactions and female friendships. This hidden
“force” contributed to community stability, and provided an avenue for regeneration through
the birth of children, maintenance of cultural traditions, including cultural literacy, and
creation of marriageable partners from within the community: the benefits of which played out
in Chinatowns, precincts, business interactions and String communities. The maintenance of
cultural family traditions, particularly Chinese female traditions, was bolstered by an increased
number of Chinese women coming direct from China after 1901.491 This increase was most
evident in the jump in Chinese marriages and unions between 1901 and 1905 at a time of peak
economic prosperity for the local Chinese driven banana and maize industries. The relaxed
491QPP, Vol. I, 1902, “Register-Genera Queensland: Census, for 1901” and “Queensland’s Vital Statistics”; QPP 1903 Vol. II,
“Registrar- General’s Report – Vital Statistics, 1902”, and Table XIX, Parentage to Population of District” in “Census of
Queensland, 1902”; QPP, 1907, Vol. I, Registrar-General’s Report, “Statistics of Colony for 1906”.
129
immigration legislation, arrival of young Chinese women and booming Chinese economy
encouraged community growth, and Cairns emerged as the largest Chinatown outside
Brisbane.
The introduction of Commonwealth legislation in 1901, which relaxed immigration laws,
enabled many young Chinese wives to join their husbands. The Commonwealth immigration
legislation which replaced earlier restrictive Queensland colonial acts was relatively generous
for female Chinese immigrants, and this helped to cause the statistical spike occurring in the
north regarding marriages and unions between 1901 and 1903. Chinese women were able to
enter the Commonwealth as wives, usually of merchants, under the Immigration Restriction
Act 1901.492 This came at a time when White/ Chinese marriages were on the decline and
Australian born first and second-generation mixed heritage daughters were the major source of
marriage partners for the Chinese male community. However, what happened next is not just
statistically measurable, but undeniably catastrophic in its effect on the family landscape. The
suspension of clause 3m in the legislation, which had allowed the immigration of wives, and
subsequent repeal of these clauses in 1905 meant that Chinese female arrivals to north
Queensland plummeted. Restrictions on the entry of Chinese women, combined with a
requirement that exemptions be granted for only limited periods of six month thereafter,
inhibited the growth of Chinese communities and cemented the fate of the “separated family”.
It can be concluded that the legislative barrier, intended to deter Chinese female immigration
and prevent two Chinese parent family formation, was successful.
Between 1910 and 1920, north Queensland’s Chinese community contracted as it struggled to
cope with change. Not only were few Chinese women able to migrate to form new settler
families, those who had previously arrived were returning to China; some for good.493 Mixed
heritage daughters were preferred as marriage partners to White women and only a few
Chinese-White primary marriages were recorded for this decade.494 Men who married or
partnered with Aboriginal women faced the likelihood of their Aboriginal women and mixed
heritage children being removed in an effort to prevent miscegenation by the Government, as
it exerted increasing control over the Aboriginal population under the notorious 1897
Aborigines Protection and Restriction of the Sale of Opium Act. (See Chapter 8.)
492 Commonwealth Immigration Restriction Act 1901, s.3(m).
493 NAA: J2483 185/57 HOP WHO SING Family 1912; NAA: 2483 105/23 HOP WHO SING Family; NAA: J3115 81 TAI YET
HING Family; NAA: J2483 18/94 TAI YET HING Family; NAA: J3136 1906/251 TAI YET HING Family.
494 The reduced number of White / Chinese marriages may also have been due to the Births Deaths and Marriage records only going
to 1914 at the time the database was compiled.
130
Across the north there was increased mobility of families as the mining and Chinese
agriculture sectors declined. Couples and families consisting of at least one or even both
parents as first or second generation Australian born, moved to larger and more stable towns
located along the east coast in search of work. This generation often became small mixed
business owners, such as bakers and storekeepers, or clerks and labourers in other Chinese
stores.495 By 1920, marriage patterns within the Chinese community across north Queensland
consisted of first and second generation marriages as well as the emergence of third generation
marriages. In contrast, the few Chinese women and families who managed to arrive after 1920,
came instead under temporary exemption provisions to join their husbands, or were Australian
born British subjects who had been living in China from childhood and were seeking to return.
Due to a number of factors, the Chinese family landscape was unable to sustain itself as a
separate community and as a result Chinatowns declined. As noted earlier, across north
Queensland many Councils acted in the 1930s to remove the Chinese ‘taint’ from their
communities in a systematic effort to raze, remove and rename their Chinatowns, thus forcing
many families to move out.
Conclusion:
Across Queensland between 1860 and 1920, north Queensland emerged as the region which
supported the most couples and families associated with the Chinese Family Landscape. With an
estimated 1095 marriages and unions recorded in a 70-year period, the generalisation that
Chinese men were sojourners, or that there were not many families, cannot hold. Over half of
these relationships have been verified as legal marriages suggesting a note of permanency and
commitment which when combined with de-facto relationships, short term unions and casual
intimate relations, it is evident that the Chinese Family Landscape was not only present but
distributed throughout the colony.
Women associated with Chinese men were predominantly White women, Chinese women and
Aboriginal women with only three women identified in the whole study as of other ethnicities.
White women were the dominant marriage partner across Queensland from the beginning of the
Chinese Family Landscape until such as time as communities became self-sufficient through a
process of renewal with the marriage of daughters back into the community. Chinese women,
495 Beryl Mulcahy, “Reminiscences of William and Florence Yet Foy” in Wong Hoy, Miscellany, (Family Publication): 23;
Robb, “Out of Sight, Out of Mind”, 102.
131
not surprisingly became the second most prevalent choice of wife. This is reflected throughout
the colony but is most notable across north Queensland which experienced an increased
incidence of China born couples from the mid-1880s. The same is true for Aboriginal wives
which are more than for the state average.
Historical settlement patterns across Queensland and industries such as pastoralism, mining and
agriculture not only drove expansion but clearly impacted on Chinese marriage patterns
throughout the decades. As a result, it is evident that north Queensland can be observed, through
rising numbers of marriages and unions across the decades when compared with the other
regions, as a popular place for families through its association with all three major industries.
The stability and importance of Brisbane as the capital of the colony can also be measured in its
ability to secure the second highest rate of marriage couples when compared to the larger but
economically variable Southern and Central Regions.
This chapter has aimed to set out the big picture or whole of colony overview of the Chinese
Family Landscape. Through the use of statistics, analysing of data and drawing comparisons to
each four regions, patterns and trends have emerged. Northern Region clearly emerged as the
place which attracted the most Chinese couples and families in the 19th and early 20th centuries
and enjoyed the largest and longest-lived regional population of Chinese settlers outside any
major east coast Queensland city, including Brisbane. Information contained in this chapter will
be expanded in the following chapters, with the first three chapters focusing on ethnicity of
marriage partners, and location and community in the final chapter by place and town.
132
Fig. 34.Geographic Location and Ethnic Background: Queensland Population: Chinese Family Landscape: 1847-1920
133
Fig. 35. Cultural Background: North Queensland Chinese Family Landscape showing period when Commonwealth Legislation introduced.
134
C h a p t e r 6
“…A GOOD YELLOW MAN IS BETTER THAN A BAD WHITE ONE…”496:
WHITE WOMEN AND CHINESE MEN
Introduction:
Throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries, White women took advantage of active
immigration schemes to escape poverty across Great Britain and Europe in order to begin new
lives. On settling in their new lands, they soon became aware of the abundant partnering
prospects available to them, including men from different cultures who they had never
considered before, including Chinese men. In some colonies and countries, prohibitive
legislation was enacted to prevent interracial marriage from occurring between White women
and non-White men. However, in Australia, colonial governments in New South Wales, Victoria
and Queensland took a more relaxed approach and left it up to class and social pressure to
provide the disincentive to marry outside their own ethnic group. Legally free to do what they
wanted in a fledgling society, a number of White women turned to Chinese men for marriage
and intimate relations. This was so much so, that overall the colonies of Australia have emerged
as the place where the most Chinese-White marriages occurred over 1860-1920, for anywhere
around the globe. The colony of Queensland itself displays unique statistical characteristics
which set it apart from other global colonies such as British Columbia and New Zealand, with
north Queensland proving to be an exceptional place for interracial marriage between White
women and Chinese men.
This chapter will trace the migration of White women to colonial countries around the globe;
discuss the prevalence and reasons underpinning their partnering with Chinese men, and
compare known figures of such partnering’s from around the globe with statistics of
Queensland. This information will be then compared specifically to the settlement and marriage
patterns across north Queensland to reveal the true extent of the Chinese –White Family
Landscape.
***
496Darling Downs Gazette and General Advertiser, Saturday 18 May 1878, page 3
135
Part 1: Exodus
From the early 19th century, women across the British Isles journeyed to new and emerging
colonies to seek better prospects for themselves. Due to a shift in traditional women’s
occupations brought on by technological and social changes, women in England found access to
work competitive, unemployment high and poverty and recession prevalent. Across the channel,
Ireland fared no better with political unrest, crop failure and famine affecting many communities.
By 1881 England was experiencing a large gender imbalance with the population consisting of
over one million more women than men. Marriage, while still considered the principal means of
assuring a safe economic future for women, remained unlikely for many. These conditions
encouraged women to seek more hopeful futures overseas.497 Faced with limited opportunities at
home and persuaded by reports of better possibilities abroad, over one million more women than
men left England and Ireland in search of a new life.498Between 1853 and 1913, around 23 million
emigrants left the British Isles499 with most emigrants journeying to one of four global
destinations: the United States of America, British North America (including British Columbia),
South Africa, and “Australasia” (Australia and New Zealand combined).500
Fig. 36. White Female migration to other colonies and countries: 19th Century.
497 Edna Ryan and Anne Conlon, Gentle Invaders: Australian Women at Work, 1788 -1974 (New Century Press, Sydney 2000): 8.
498 Elizabeth Roberts, Women’s Work 1840-1940, Studies in Economic and Social History (Macmillan Education, Hampshire 1988):
15
499 Figures taken from Donald Harman Akenson, The Dutch Diaspora: A Primer (Belfast, 1996), cited in Lindsay Proudfoot and
Dianne Hall, “Points of Departure: Remittance Emigration from South West Ulster to New South Wales in Later Nineteenth Century”,
IRSH 50 (2005): 241-242 DOI: 10.1017/Soo2o859oo5oo1951 Internationaal Instituut voor Sociale Geschiedenis.
500 Timothy J. Hatton, “Emigration from the UK, 1879-1913 and 1950-1998”, European Review of Economic History 8 (2004): 149-
150. At the time, statistical figures of emigration to Australia and New Zealand were counted together as one under the label
“Australasia” by the Board of Trade statistics.
136
Up to 62 % of the gross outflow of emigrant men and women from Britain and Ireland went to
America, which was favoured through an established transport route with faster travel times. Of
these, the colonies of America and British Columbia attracted an estimated 6 million Irish settlers
between them, with the United States receiving the majority of migrants.501 In comparison, it is
estimated that only 1.6 million British and Irish immigrants settled in Australia, of which one third
were Irish. Over the forty year period 1870-1913, immigration peaked in three distinct phases: the
mid-1870s, the early 1880s, and between 1910 and 1913.502 These periods correlate to political
and social push factors within the United Kingdom and incentive schemes offered by colonial
governments abroad. The first two peak phases of female migration from the British Isles can be
linked to peaks in White-Chinese marriage patterns in north Queensland, particularly 1872-1893
when the majority of such marriages occurred. (See Figure Below)
Fig. 37. UK Migration to United States, Canada Australia and New Zealand 1870-1913503
Immigration of female British and Irish subjects was influenced by both push factors from within
the United Kingdom, and pull factors from within the colonies themselves. Colonial
administrators, tasked with managing Empire standards, were faced with a range of issues which
required the presence of White women in order to control, manage and maintain the burgeoning
colonial populations. By their presence, White women were thought to transform society, and
501 Ibid., 150
502Ibid. Ryan and Conlon, Gentle Invaders, 23; Proudfoot and Hall, “Points of Departure”, 242.
503 Hatton, “Emigration from the UK”, 152,
137
steer men towards an acceptable level of masculine behaviour thus providing a passive moral
regulator to communities. Through their presence, women propelled settlements to maturity, from
raw pastoral and mining communities to robust societies appropriate to British Empire
expectations.504White women also provided an instrument by which racial purity could be
maintained, and their presence strengthened White racial dominance over the land, Indigenous
people and environment. While the expectation invested in White women was that they would
settle and breed in the colonies, their use as domestic labour was equally valued in order to free up
White men to undertake masculine pursuits such as exploration, prospecting, mining and farming.
With these goals in mind, colonial governments supported immigration schemes to attract women
from the United Kingdom to fulfil all of these goals.505Immigration schemes to colonial places
commenced in the early 1820s, first to British Columbia and to New Zealand from the 1840s, with
Australian colonial immigration schemes introduced in New South Wales from 1848, South
Australia in 1852; Victoria, 1852; and Queensland in 1860.506 While poverty provided an excellent
push factor for many women to leave Great Britain, the promise of employment and better life
prospects provided a strong pull factor, especially the ability to attain financial security.
A shortage of female workers, in particular domestic servant labour, provided an incentive for
young women to immigrate to the colonies of Australia. It is estimated that approximately 89% of
emigrant women from the United Kingdom and Ireland were domestic servants, but through
concurrent philanthropic schemes available for middle class women, other positions than the
domestic were also offered.507In Queensland, domestic labour was the main occupation women
could enter into, encompassing a wide range of occupations including cooks, barmaids,
laundresses, general servants, housemaids, nursemaids, dairywomen, and farmhouse servants.508
The scarcity of paid employment in Britain combined with a perception of endless opportunities
for work overseas ensured that women viewed emigration favourably, with many women having
the additional advantage of being of marriageable age.509
504 Jan Gothard, “Review of Lisa Chilton, Agents of the British Empire: British Female Migration to Canada and Australia , 1860s to
1930s (University of Toronto Press, Toronto, 2007)”, Victorian Studies 50, 3 (Spring 2008): 524-526.
505 Kate Mathew, “The Female Middle-Class emigration society governesses in Australia: a failed vision?” Journal of Australian
Colonial History, 14 (2012):108. Colonial sponsored schemes were intended to structure and encourage female emigration. These
schemes worked in conjunction with British philanthropic societies and offered either free or subsidized passage to women who
otherwise may not have had the means or connections to do so. Schemes were funded by the sale of land in the Colonies or funded by
colonists themselves to bring out extended family members. The intended results were twofold: they acted as a growth mechanism for
the population to expand via family reunification or prospective marriage partners, and introduced a domestic labour force to the
colonies to service the growing demand for servants and capable wives.
506 Proudfoot and Hall, “Points of Departure”, 248-253
507Ibid., 252-253
508The most common occupation of the bride on Chinese-White marriage certificates was “domestic servant”.
509 “Schedule 1”, Queensland Times, Ipswich Herald and General Advertiser, 23 September1869, p. 4.
138
Marriage, it seems in colonial environments, could offer unexpected rewards for women both
horizontally, due to the large number of men for women to choose husbands and lovers from, and
vertically in terms of ability to move up the ladder in social status. However, these choices also
resulted in one unintended consequence for White female emigration, and one obviously not
considered by the patriarchal authorities. This was the prospect and occurrence of marriage
between White women and Chinese men.
***
Interracial marriage patterns: Global Trends
Interracial marriage developed as an unexpected consequence of White female emigration. Having
first taken the risk of leaving England and Ireland, White women were faced with freedom of
choice with a large range in occupation and quality of the opposite sex, and freedom from family
constraints as they considered prospective partners. Unencumbered by social norms or difficult
social, economic and environmental conditions, women were able to focus on the quality of the
man and what he could offer her when it came to the selection of a husband. This enabled some
women to step outside tradition when it came to marriage and intimate relations.510 In response, to
women making free marriage choices with non-White men, colonial men sought ways to protect
their rightful conjugal interests.
The partnering of White women with men from other racial backgrounds, particularly Chinese
men, astounded and outraged White men in every colonial environment for a number of reasons: it
challenged White masculinity, provoked competition for a scarce resource, and disrupted the
traditional paternalistic social order which had privileged White (and particularly British) men for
centuries.511 Depending on the colony or country, it was uniformly met with negative social
pressure exerted on the White women (by both White men and women), racial prejudice exerted
on Chinese men (including violence and bullying), and official pressure through administrative
restrictions by the passing of State laws to inhibit and prohibit partnering of White women with
non-White men. Legislative measures in the form of anti –miscegenation laws were introduced in
the U.S., while discriminatory legislation attached to national rights was imposed on women in the
United Kingdom.
510 The largest racial group of men in the British colonies other than White men were men from Asia including China, Japan and
Malaysia. In British West Indies and parts of the U.S., it also included those of black African descent or Mulattos (a person of mixed
White and Black ancestry).
511 Victor Jew, “‘Chinese Demons’: The Violent Articulation of Chinese Otherness and Interracial Sexuality in the US Midwest, 1885-
1889,” Journal of Social History, 37, 2 (Winter, 2003): 389-410; Delgado, “Neighbours by nature”, 401-429; Seed, “Limehouse
blues”, 58-85.
139
United States
While Chinese men and White women were the target of laws to prevent interracial marriage in
the United States throughout the mid-19th century, laws to prevent miscegenation had been
enacted long before in 1664 as a measure to control White English women marrying “Negro”
slaves in Maryland.512 As the United States developed, the law extended to other states and by
1857, places such as New Mexico had expanded the law to include any woman of the White
race and any “Negro” or “Mulatto”.513 By the mid-1850s Chinese men, as the largest non-White
immigrant male group, were singled out as a significant threat to White male hegemony.514 As
late as 1901 Arizona introduced a law which banned the marriage of any White woman to any
non-White husband. Any marriages already solemnized were targeted by authorities who
refused to acknowledge their legal status, thus rendering marriages null and void, followed by
fines for anyone who defied the law.515 Chinese men were considered a threat to the assumed
property that White women were considered to be by White men; with White women deemed
commodities as marriage partners, exclusively for White men.
Further north in Canada, additional laws were introduced which banned the employment of any
White woman by Japanese, Chinese or “Orientals.” 516 Not only was White masculinity at risk,
there was a general fear that with too-close proximity, children of mixed race would be born. A
fear of mixed-race citizens and a “hybrid” community provoked deep-rooted fears based on
White Sino-phobic paranoia: a paranoia which is buried deep in the belief in the superiority of a
‘pure’ the White race. Anti-miscegenation laws still existed in America with little amendment
until the late 20th century when the Supreme Court ruled the law unconstitutional in 1967.517
Despite this, some interracial marriages and unions managed to take place and with surprising
results.
512 Peggy Pascoe, “Race, Gender, and Intercultural Relations: The Case of Interracial Marriage,” Frontiers: A Journal of Women’s
Studies, 12, 1 (1991): 7 ; Bronson and Ho, Coming Home in Gold Brocade,. 199; “Abrogation of the Marriage Relations,” Helena
Weekly Herald [Montana], 21 March 1872, p. 2; “Maud”, Wood River Times, [Hailey, Idaho], 6 March 1886, p. 3. Attitudes towards
Chinese- White marriages varied from State to State with some legislating marriage between the two as illegal by 1900.
513A person of mixed White and Black ancestry, especially a person with one White and one Black parent, was referred to as a Mulatto.
514 Pascoe, “Race, Gender, an Intercultural Relations”, 7-9.
515 Delgado, “Neighbours by nature”, 410.
516 Constance Backhouse, “The White Women's Labor Laws: Anti-Chinese Racism in Early Twentieth-Century Canada,” Law and
History Review, 14, 2 (Autumn, 1996): 315-368. It was called "An Act to Prevent the Employment of Female Labour in Certain
Capacities."
517 Pascoe, “Race, Gender, an Intercultural Relations,” 6 and 17. In 1948 in Perez vs Sharp, in the Supreme Court of the U.S., it was
found that the laws were unconstitutional, but changes only occurred at a state by state level and did not occur straight away. Texas
and Oklahoma were the last two states to change in 1967. They only changed because of another legal case, Loving vs Virginia; It was
later extended to Malays when couples challenged the constitutional legality of the legislation in the Supreme Court, but this did not
occur until the middle of the 20th century.
140
Very little statistical data is available to explore the prevalence of marriage by White women to
Chinese men across the United States. Some academic researchers have historically skirted
around the issue of Chinese –White marriage, either ignoring it or focusing on sexual
exploitation of women as a means for relations.518 It was authors such as Adam McKeown and
Huping Ling who provided the best insights into the origins of women partnering with Chinese
men across the United States. Ling notes that White women who partnered with a Chinese man
came from a range of places of origin in the British Isles and Europe. The small number of
White women - Chinese marriages is evidenced in the population trends of 1880 for Louisiana.
Among 489 Chinese men in Louisiana, there were 4 married to Chinese women and 31 to non-
Chinese women including 4 Mulatto women, 12 African-American women and 8 White
women.519 The dominance of Irish women, and the specific place of origin for women coming
from Europe, can be seen in the following geographical breakdown of Chinese marriages in the
U.S.
Along the south-west coast, in California and further south in Cuba, Chinese labourers
associated with sugar plantations and railroads partnered with White women from Irish and
French immigrant backgrounds.520 The immigration of French women reflected established trade
routes and French colonial interests which were prominent in Cuba and California at the time.
Along the borderlands in the southern state of Arizona, only a handful of unions occurred
between Chinese men and immigrant French women. 521 Along the East Coast, in New York,
women were initially from Irish immigrant backgrounds, which later shifted in the 1890s to
Italian origins, reflecting new immigration sources in Europe.522 Further north in the Mid-West,
White women were principally from German and Polish backgrounds,523 and in the twin cities of
Minneapolis and Saint Paul only 6 marriages had occurred by the early part of the 20th century
with all women being from Irish or Polish backgrounds. 524
In summary, White women across America who partnered with Chinese men in 19th /early 20th
century U.S.A. were of Irish and of European backgrounds, either Italian, Polish or German in
the northern States, while in the southern States along the Mexican border, and in California as
well as further south in Cuba, the women were principally Irish or French in origin. This point is
518 Jew, “Chinese Demons,” 389-406; Yu Fang Cho, “’Yellow Slavery,’” 44.
519 Huping Ling, “Family and Marriage of Late- Nineteenth and Early twentieth Century Chinese Immigrant Women,” Journal of
American Ethnic History,19, 2 (2000): 57; Adam McKeown, “Transnational Chinese families”, 73-110.
520Ibid.
521 Delgado, “Neighbours by nature”, 410
522Warwick Examiner and Times, 18 February 1893, p. 5; Ling, “Family and Marriage”, 57.
523 Jew, “Chinese Demons”, 389-390.
524 Ling, “Family and Marriage”, 57.
141
encapsulated an article published in several Queensland newspapers in early 1893 under the title
“John Chinaman marrying White Women”. It notes when reflecting on White women having
intimate relations with Chinese men in New York that the Irish immigrant “Biddy” was said to
be charmed by Chinese men in New York, as well as Australia, Chile, and Peru, with her fellow
female immigrant Italian counterparts equally enamoured with the prospects of a Chinese
husband.525
Reaction against Chinese men for stealing the mothers of the nation was immediate. Anti-
Chinese sentiment based on sexual rights to women resulted in unrest, violence and in some
cases murder.526 Chinese men were seen as a threat to White women, who were thought to be at
risk of moral corruption.527 Chinese men on the other hand, met, managed and negotiated both
platonic and intimate relations with children and women in accordance with Chinese traditional
social values. Just how successful they were in accommodating Western social values in this
traditional framework remains unknown. The negotiation of intimate relations by American
Chinese men was a deeply personal and individual experience. Adam Mc Keown suspects that
Chinese men who were married to White women in the United States never fully committed to
integration, preferring instead to keep firm links back to China. This theory is highlighted by the
Chinese Diaspora practice of the “two primary wife” or transnational polygamous marriage
where White wives were a second wife, sometimes oblivious to the First wife who remained in
China.528 He provides a teasing hint about the complexity of relations by relating the cultural
frustration in the memoir of Situ Meitang, who lived in Boston and New York over a seventy
year period. His book I Bitterly Hate Imperialistic America: Reminiscences of a Seventy Year
Sojourn in the United States, hints at the problematic negotiation required between Western and
Eastern cultural traditions, gender expectations, law, property rights and practices associated
525 'John Chinaman Marrying White Women', Warwick Examiner and Times, 18 February 1893, p. 5.
526Zeehan and Dundas Herald, 5 September 1913, p. 3. In the article “News from America, Tragedy of Jealousy”, an incident
occurred where a neighbour of an interracial couple, a White woman and a Chinese man, went into their house and murdered the
husband and attempted to murder the wife. The White neighbour had previously warned them of his objection to the marriage on the
grounds that he did not want a White woman marrying a Chinese man. The incident occurred in Chicago, yet the article was published
in Tasmania, indicating that the subject of interracial marriage attracted interest globally. Racial violence occurred across America
with incidents in Lake Michigan, Denver, Seattle, Tacoma, San Francisco, Rocky Springs and Wyoming. The number of anti-Chinese
riots held after the mid 1850s was approximately 153 with a human cost of 143 Chinese murdered and 10,525 men displaced from
homes and businesses.
527Jew, “Chinese Demons”, 389-390. White female sexuality was kept hidden and suppressed as a convenient way to ensure that
Chinese men were always cast at fault, as seducers and the perpetrators of immoral and indecent acts, even if the claims were spurious.
528 McKeown, “Transnational Chinese Families”, 98-99. He hints at intimate relations between non-Chinese women and Chinese men
but emphasises that the patriline remained firmly based in China and that the American wife was in all likelihood a second wife. He
speculates that many China-based wives encouraged the marriage of her husband to non-Chinese wives as a means to secure his daily
attention to the responsibility of providing for his families rather than gambling or engaging in activities which would deplete his
earnings. Relationships between American women and Chinese men tended to incorporate the women into the migrant groom’s local
society. Not all “non-Chinese wives” realised what they were getting into. Many were shocked and dismayed upon meeting the
primary wife in China. Some were even left in China against their will when the husband returned abroad. He notes this situation only
occurred occasionally to wives married in America. However, newspapers sensationalized the difficulties and sided with the White
woman in a pitying manner should she find herself abandoned or at risk of confinement to China.
142
with marriage. When combined with traditional Chinese paternalism, White-Chinese interracial
marriage and cultural negotiation remains a poorly understood Diaspora attribute.529
While evidence of statistics for Chinese – White marriages in the U.S. exists but only State by
State at best, other countries which attracted British and French colonial interests had nearly none.
Countries and colonies such as the British West Indies including Jamaica, Trinidad and British
Guiana as well as the colonial districts of British and Dutch South Africa have nearly no figures
for Chinese-White interracial marriage recorded at all. While it is known that a high rate of
intermarriage occurred in the British Caribbean in the early 20th century, it is not clear if any
White women were among the partners or if the intermarriage was predominantly with African
or Indigenous plantation women.530 Chinese-White intermarriage is an area which would benefit
from more exploration in the context of the Chinese Diaspora. Britain, on the other hand, found
itself faced with the issue of interracial marriage, when Chinese seamen began to arrive in
Liverpool and London to work on the docks.
England
England tackled interracial marriage by rendering women stateless as means to offset any benefit
marriage may bring to the woman. This was achieved through three pieces of legislation,
commencing in 1870 with The Naturalisation Act 1870. Historically, until 1870, a natural born
British subject could not lose British nationality even by settling in a foreign country and
naturalizing there. Marriage was considered a voluntary act and this did not affect a woman’s
citizenship status. This meant a British born woman under common law did not lose her British
subject status upon marriage to an alien, and conversely an alien woman marrying a British
subject did not become British. The British law was not directly aimed at non-White men. In
fact, the law was initiated in response to disputes about allegiance sparked by the growing
global community, particularly the U.S. This meant that the indelibility of allegiance conflicted
with emigration complexities of transnational citizenship status.
This legislation changed the situation for women born in the United Kingdom and deprived
them of their nationality upon marriage to a foreign national. Strong legislation also provided a
deterrent for intimate relations between Chinese men and White women in Britain because the
law also applied to their children. Later, The British Nationality and Status of Aliens Act 1914
529Ibid., 76 In his memoir Situ complains that when “an overseas Chinese marries an American wife, he does not have the right to
manage property that he has bought himself, but after he dies is forced to leave it to his wife.”
530 Aaron Chang Bohr, “Identity in Transition: Chinese Community Association in Jamaica,” Caribbean Quarterly, 50, 2 (June, 2004):
47.
143
deemed that any British woman who married an ‘Alien’ became an ‘Alien’ herself. This meant
that act of legal marriage rendered all British Subjects’ rights and privileges, normally afforded to
those of British Nationality, null and void.531 Not only would she renounce her claim to be a
British Subject through the act of interracial marriage, she put herself at risk by stepping outside
the protection of the Empire.532The legislation was clearly an overreaction to Chinese
immigration. Population trends in the United Kingdom reveal the number of Chinese men who
permanently settled in Britain, when compared to other Diaspora countries, was always low. The
few who were permanent settlers lived principally in Chinese cultural precincts located at
Limestone or Liverpool Chinatowns.533 Those who settled serviced the larger transient Chinese
merchant seamen population, with numbers remaining small due to a lack of industrial
opportunities to drive an immigration influx.534
Difficulties in quantifying interracial unions are made clear by John Seed who laments the
accuracy of British census statistics, noting that they should only be used as a guide due to data
classification issues.535 A snapshot of Chinese in Britain can be viewed through the 1881 census
figures which recorded the total male population of Chinese in London’s Limestone Chinatown
as seventy men, consisting of temporary seamen, ship bound labour in the docks, and a
permanent population of Chinese men in the cultural precinct consisting only of up to ten people
who were spread over two shops and a boarding house. Of the possible 10 Chinese men in the
permanent Chinese population, two of them were married to White wives and with families.536 It
could be speculated that 20% of the Chinese Limestone population were engaged in interracial
marriage and families with White women, but this percentage should be viewed with caution.
Nearly forty years later, the 1918 census of Pennyfields, near Limestone, recorded 182 men of
whom only nine had English wives. The effectiveness of both the 1870 and 1914 legislation was
531 M. Paige Baldwin, “Subject to Empire: Married Women and the British Nationality and Status of Alien Act, ” Journal of British
Studies, 40, 4 (October, 2001): 522
Not only were women discriminated against in the legislation, their status as married women also made them ineligible for the rights of
naturalisation alongside the other ineligible citizens including infants, lunatics and idiots.
532 This left her particularly vulnerable because she was not in turn recognized as a Chinese national. This meant that British
consular assistance would have been denied had she left for China and been subsequently abandoned.
533 Benton and Edmund Gomez, The Chinese in Britain; Gregor Benton, “Chinese Transnationalism in Britain: A Longer History”,
Identities: Global Studies in Culture and Power, 10,3 (2003): 347-375; Seed, “Limehouse blues”, 58-85.
534 Benton and Gomez, The Chinese in Britain; Benton “Chinese Transnationalism in Britain.”, 347-375; Seed, “Limehouse blues”,
58-85. Such was the experience in the U.S., Australia, South Africa and New Zealand.
535Seed, “Limehouse blues”, 63. He notes that the inaccuracies stem from classification, as Chinese persons born in Malaysia, British
Guiana or other colonial Dominions were not categorized as “Chinese” in the census, nor were children of mixed marriage and
children of China born parents who were born in England. Before WWI the Chinese population in England was .5% percent.
536Ibid., 63-67 and Blog, “The Chinese in Britain (United Kingdom), History Timeline”,
http://www.zakkeith.com/articles,blogs,forums/chinese-in-britain-history-timeline.htm Mixed heritage children were subject to racism
and persecution through their illegitimate birth status. To fit in, some families changed their names to more Anglo sounding names so
that it was difficult to trace their interracial heritage. Families of Anglo-Chinese unions found it extremely difficult to get work and
were ostracized and bullied, referred to as “Broken Blossoms”.
144
outstanding; however it was limited to the United Kingdom and did not extend across the British
Empire.537
Naturalisation only conferred British subject status in the colony in which subjects lived. This
meant the colonial Dominions of Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa developed
their own laws regarding naturalisation which, when tested, could conflict with Britain’s laws.538
Attempts to reach consensus and make legislation uniform across the British Empire occurred in
1911.539 It was conceded that all members of the British Empire were theoretically equal and
derived their status from the crown. However, the question of inequity regarding the status of
women who married an alien remained. This provoked outrage from women’s groups but was
not addressed as an issue until the First World War, at a time when Britain was forced to protect
British born women as wives of men deemed enemy aliens.540 In 1922 the National Council of
Women drafted a Nationality of Married Women Bill which provided for a woman who was a
British Subject to retain her nationality even if she married an alien. Support for the bill was
strong but it still did not pass immediately within Commonwealth countries, with Australia and
New Zealand not coming in line with the legislation until the mid-1930s.541 The combined
colonies of New Zealand and Australia, or ‘Australasia’, were bound together as trans-Tasman
outposts of the extensive British Empire. Together they attracted the attention of the Chinese
Diaspora, with New Zealand experiencing a trickle in Chinese migration from the 1870s onwards
which developed into a “continuous flow” peaking in the early 1880s.
New Zealand
New Zealand’s response to the arrival of Chinese men commenced with restrictive legislation
introduced to limit the flow of Chinese immigration into the colony. When it came to protecting its
domestic asset, women, New Zealand took a strident approach to enforcing marriage separation
between Chinese men and any other race of women, including Maori and Pakeha (White) women.
Anti-miscegenation laws were introduced to prevent intimate relations and marriages occurring
537 Blog, “The Chinese in Britain”.
538 Baldwin, “Subject to Empire”, 522-556; British Nationality: Summary,
https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/267913/britnatsummary.pdf
539 Canada passed the law in 1914 but Australia did not adopt it until 1920.
540 Baldwin, “Subject to Empire”, 528.
541 The question surrounding nationality and British Subject status may account for why a few British born Queensland women applied
for Australian naturalisation in the early 1930s. This is an area which requires further investigation and is outside the scope of this
thesis, but it does raise questions as to how the Dominions organised their internal migration/ naturalisation/ immigration affairs in
conjunction with expectations from the British Empire.
145
and as a result only a few interracial marriages took place across New Zealand when compared to
Queensland and the southern colonies of Australasia in the same period.542
The low number of marriages and unions between Chinese men and White women in New
Zealand is confirmed in a study by Julia Bradshaw. She suggests that the few White women who
did enter marriage and intimate relations with Chinese men experienced difficult lives. She hints
that their experiences of marriage showed similarities with Australian colonial wives in that they
were second wives, lived in Chinese cultural precincts, and were “generally accepted” by the
Chinese male community.543 James Ng on the other hand takes a different approach and
explores Chinese male reasons for interracial marriage. When talking about White woman he
suggests that:
The Chinese husband, who had adventurously travelled well away … and who probably had a
better than usual command of English, was isolated from Chinese peer attitudes. He therefore
entered into a mixed marriage more readily. Once married, that same isolation led to the
tendency to stay in the European world.544
Both Bradshaw and Ng’s observations suggest that more work needs to be undertaken in the area
of Anglo-Chinese marriage and unions to allow comparisons with the colonies of Australia.
***
Part 2: National Trends: Australian Colonies
New South Wales
Interracial marriages and intimate relations between Chinese men and White women occurred
across the Australian colonies in large enough numbers to indicate that a pragmatic approach was
taken when it came to selection of partners and formation of families. Contemporary scholars
including Morag Loh, Paulene Rule, Sophie Couchman, Paul Macgregor and Val Lovejoy in
Victoria; Janis Wilton, Kate Bagnall, and Dinah Hales in New South Wales, and Jan Ryan in
Western Australia provide insights into intercultural relations across a spectrum of relationships:
marriage, defacto relationships, intimate relations and paid sexual services.
Having set the scene with White British female migration patterns and comparable global
interracial White-Chinese marriage relations, this section provides national colonial comparisons
542 Manying Ip, “Maori–Chinese Encounters”, 237. Manying Ip interrogates the report of the Committee on Employment of Maoris on
Market Gardens, 1929, which suggests that White women and Maori girls were suspected of trading sex for money in the late 1920s.
543 Bradshaw, Golden Prospects, 213.
544 Bagnall, Golden Shadows on a White Land, 140-141
146
between Queensland, Victoria and New South Wales, where the most research has been
undertaken and is currently available. It is to be noted that comparisons with Western Australia,
South Australia and Tasmania, while important to gain a national approach to trends, can only be
referred to as generalisations because to date, no in-depth statistical study has been undertaken in
those colonies. It is thought that both Western Australia and Tasmania also experienced incidences
of interracial marriage between Chinese men and White women despite smaller Chinese
populations.545
Defining the number of relationships between White women and Chinese men in 19th century
Australia is problematic. The issue was best summed up by Bagnell, 2006, when she observed that
identifying interracial couples through marriage records alone was insufficient to capture all types
of relationships. In particular de facto relationships, affairs, brief liaisons and intimate relations
which involved monetary exchange, remain hidden and unaccounted for.546 Her case study period,
1850 -1888, was limiting in that it did not take in the later part of the 19th and early 20th centuries.
Published data sets for this period have yet to be undertaken. With no other studies of its type for
NSW or any other colony, Bagnall’s thesis remains the only firm statistical analysis available for
comparison with the colony of Queensland and regional North Queensland. Victorian data, on the
other hand, is available from the work by Rule whose second colonial intermarriage set of data can
be used to compare and contrast with the data set obtained for Queensland. At this point I remind
the reader that conclusive figures for Chinese- White marriages and unions across Australia may
never be available and should be viewed as “best estimates” only, as it is impossible to find every
marriage, relationship or liaison between White women and Chinese men across the colonies.
However, I believe that, given the robust scrutiny Bagnall, Rule and I have applied to primary,
secondary and oral sources, figures contained in this thesis are both conservative and correct
within a 5 % margin of accuracy.
From the late 1840s, Chinese indentured workers arrived direct from Amoy to Sydney, Melbourne
and after 1848, to Moreton Bay (Brisbane), to work on pastoral stations. It was the first time they
were exposed to relations with White women and those who married became the first Chinese men
to marry and raise non-China born families.547 New South Wales recorded the first Australian
Chinese–White marriage in 1823 with the marriage of John Shying to Sarah Thompson in
545 Chinese immigration to Western Australia was very small when compared to eastern colonies, and exact data on this area is not
available for the purpose of statistical comparative analysis. For Chinese in Western Australia, see various articles by Jan Ryan.
546Bagnall, Golden Shadows on a White Land, 91.
547Fischer, “The Forgotten Pioneers”, 89-99; Darnell, The Chinese labour trade to New South Wales, 111-113.
147
Sydney.548 New South Wales also experienced a modest upsurge of Chinese- White marriages
brought on by the gold rushes, with 37 marriages recorded in the 1850s in both urban and rural
Chinese communities.549 As the colony expanded with greater arrivals of new immigrants, 77
marriages were recorded for the ten year period to 1869. A decade later in 1878, marriages were
estimated to have swelled to 352 couples. Of these relationships, Bagnall identifies 171 couples
who were legally married while a further 181 were identified as living in de facto relationships.550
For the entire period between 1852 and 1888, Bagnall found that there were 397 registrations of
marriage between Chinese men and White women which included marriages which occurred
outside NSW but where the couple migrated to NSW. By 1901, Bagnall estimated that New South
Wales had over 1000 Chinese family couples.
Victoria
Victoria, on the other hand, did not start to record interracial marriages until the mid -1850s. Like
New South Wales, these marriages were triggered by migration consequent upon the discovery of
gold and by 1866 Victorian Chinese marriages were occurring at a slow but steady rate with 50-
60 families identified across Victoria by the end of 1868.551 Mining towns such as Ballarat
attracted larger populations of couples with 24 Chinese-White marriages recorded there alone in
the same year.552 Interracial marriages continued to increase over 1866-1882. Rule estimates
that by the early 1880s the Chinese Family Landscape of Victoria had reached 258 marriages,
which rose to 383 by 1888.553 (See Table 1. p.154) By 1901 the Chinese -White family landscape
has been estimated by Rule as approximately 700 marriages including marriages of first
generation Australian born Chinese children.554
When the three colonies of Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland are compared to each
other, it could be said that in the early years of Chinese interracial marriages, the number climbed
more quickly in Victoria than the other two colonies combined. For example, for the same period
New South Wales recorded 37 marriages and Queensland only 12. During this period, it is also
important to note that Queensland’s overall Chinese male population was well behind that of other
548Bagnall, Golden Shadows on a White Land, 30.
549Ibid., 92
550Ibid., 96-97
551 “Vital Statistics of Victoria, 1866”, The, Argus, 14 September 1867, p. 6. Victorian statistician, William Archer, estimated that for
the period 1855 -1860 the number of Chinese –White marriages was approximately 60 for the decade. This included the 1857 marriage
of John Egge and Mary Perring. See also Morag Loh, “'You're my diamond, mum!”, 7.
552 “The Chinese Population, 1868”, The, Argus, 28 September 1868, pp. 5 and 6.
553 Rule, “Women and Marriage.” 52.
554Bagnall, “Golden Shadows on a White Land”: Thesis: 98 and Pauline. Rule, “The Chinese camps in Colonial Victoria,” in
Couchman et al. (eds), After the Rush: Regulation, Participation and Chinese Communities in Australia 1860-1940. edited by Sophie
Couchman, John Fitzgerald and Paul Macgregor Special edition of Otherland, no.9, (2004): 25
148
colonies as the mining boom which later came in the late 1860s and 1870s had not yet begun. The
Chinese male population of Queensland in the first decade remained at 537 compared to 24,724 in
Victoria and 13,020 for New South Wales.555
Table 1: Colonial Chinese- White Marriage Populations, 1850-1889 556
555 Ronald Laidlaw, Discovering Australian History to 1900: an evidence-based approach (Edward Arnold (Australia) Pty Ltd, 1990):
318.
556 The figures are difficult to accurately understand as it is not always clear when they are just inclusive of China born immigrants or
a composite including Australian-born children. The figures focus on Chinese born men and White Immigrant or Colonial women.
Table derived from a variety of sources including Official Marriage registers; Commonwealth or Colonial Census data; Bagnall,
“Golden Shadows on a White Land”: Thesis; Rule, “The Chinese camps in colonial Victoria..”: 52 ; 'Statistics Relating to Chinese.',
Clarence and Richmond Examiner and New England Advertiser, 9 June1888, p. 3. ; ‘Vital Statistics of Victoria 1866', The Argus 14
September 1867, p. 6; 1868 'The Chinese Population in Victoria.', Illustrated Australian News for Home Readers, 5 October, p. 6; The
Argus, Monday 28 September 1868, pp. 5- 6; 'The Irish and the Chinese.', South Australian Weekly Chronicle, 19 May 1888, p. 5;
‘'The Kapunda Herald.', Kapunda Herald, 25 January 1889, p.2; 'Victoria in Figures.', The Inquirer and Commercial News, 28
November 1860, p. 3; ‘Local Court-Kapunda.', Kapunda Herald, 28 November 1890, p. 3; ‘The Bendigo Advertiser.', Bendigo
Advertiser, 6 May 1890, p. 2; ‘Council Paper.', The Argus, 15 January 1856 p.5; '& The 1891 census was different.', The Canberra
Times, 25 June 1966, p. 9,; ‘Population Statistics for .', The Sydney Morning Herald, 4 April 1892, p. 8.
COLONY
Queensland
Victoria
New South Wales
Year
White women
Chinese men
% Per male
population
White women
Chinese men
% Per Male
population
White women
Chinese men
% Per Male
population
1850-1859
12
537*
Est
1860
--
8 children
recorded
60 wives
estimated
25,421 4% -- 37
13,020
Est 1860
1860-1869
69 537 12.8%
50-60
total in* 1868
estimate
55 avrg
24,724 0.2% 77 12,986 0.6%
1870-1879
142 3,304 4.3%
185 est
17,795 1.4% 125 7,208 1.7%
1880-1890
133 11,206 1.9%
171 est
11,869 1.4% 158 10,141 1.5%
Total
356
(1850-
1889)
8574 4.0%
383 ( 1866-1889)
est census
7761 5%
397
(in
1888)
14200 2.8%
149
Over a forty-year period, 1850-1890, Queensland’s Chinese-White marriage population for
primary couples reflected the population trends of both Victoria and New South Wales. However,
overall when looking at all three colonies, Chinese-White marriages per colony for Australia
indicate that New South Wales had the most relationships, at 35% followed closely by Victoria at
34% and Queensland at 31% for the period 1850-1890. With only a marginal difference between
all three colonies, a maximum of 4%, all three recorded a little over 350 families within the fortyyear
period. It is fair to say that White women married to Chinese men formed a significant part of
the cultural family landscape of Chinese communities. Across all three colonies for the period
1850-1890, the average percentage of Chinese men per population marrying White women in
NSW, Victoria and Queensland was between 2 - 5%. New South Wales had the lowest percentage
of the Chinese population at 2.8%, Queensland at 4% and Victoria had the highest, at 5% of the
Chinese male population. This suggests three aspects of the Chinese Diaspora which still need to
be reviewed.
Fig. 38. Colonial Chinese – White marriage in three colonies: 1850-1890
Firstly, as suggested by Bagnall, the incidence of interracial marriages between Chinese men and
White women in 19th century colonial environments were more prevalent than previously thought.
Secondly, firm statistical evidence indicates an active decision-making process was undertaken by
White women in the selection of a Chinese husband at a time when marrying foreigners,
particularly Asian foreigners, was unpopular. This challenges researchers to revisit settlement
landscapes and family formation within the Australian colonial context to include marriages which
150
were not main stream to understand reasons underpinning personal departures from societal
norms. Thirdly, these figures challenge researchers to approach Chinese Diaspora studies through
the lens of colonial family formation. This sheds light on colonial Chinese male decision making
and their experiences in the selection of non-Chinese wives and partners, and raises the question of
the influence of Chinese cultural traditions in decision making for the broader transnational family.
This may lead to new interpretations of what it means to have and form “family” within the
Chinese Diaspora. One persistent belief which should be investigated to provide a more accurate
historical representation is the belief that Chinese men preferred Irish women.
Myths and marginalized: Irish women
It has been popularly believed that women who married Chinese men were of Irish origin. This
erroneous opinion developed in the earliest days of Chinese -White marriages for two reasons.
Firstly, prejudice against both the Irish and Chinese took up precedents from the Californian
goldfields and the Irish immigration experience in the United States. Reports came from parts of
America with Chinese populations, which condemned and belittled Irish women for marrying
Chinese men.557Secondly, prejudice in Australia against Irish Catholics, and Irish Catholic
women in particular, has resonated since convict settlement and before. Forced to submit to
British rule, Irish Catholics frequently rebelled, and tensions with British Protestants fueled
sectarian violence which was continued by subsequent generations of colonial born children.558
If colonial born women of Irish parents couldn’t escape their heritage, there was no hope for
Irish immigrant women. Not only were they female (the weaker sex), they were Irish (anti-
British troublemakers) and Catholic (automatically suspect as owing allegiance to a foreign
potentate, the Pope). Commentary about Irish women married to Chinese men was routinely
negative, and derogatory. From the 1850s onwards, colonial newspapers reported on White
wives and interracial marriage as a local curiosity as well as repeating similar articles from
abroad.559 The Illustrated Sydney News of 1888, in its advocacy of restrictions on Chinese
immigration, canvassed the view of Chinese family life from a White wife’s point of view.
However, even before the subject’s viewpoint was mentioned, she was described as “a woman
of the lower classes” with the editor’s point reinforced by making her declare “I’m an Irish
Girl”.560 It seemed Irish women were “at fault” for their choice of husband rather than making
557 “John Chinaman Marrying White Woman”, Warwick Examiner and Times, 18 February 1893, p. 5.
558 Manning Clark, abridged by Michael Cathcart, Manning Clark’s History of Australia, (Melbourne University Press, 1993): 9, 26.
Irish convicts were labeled “the very worst of characters” under early colonial rule.
559Warwick Examiner and Times, 18 February 1893, p. 5
560Illustrated Sydney News, 26 April 1888, pp. 5-7.
151
an active choice for a better partner. This view is captured by Rule when she noted the
prevailing belief, “it was only Irish women who were sufficiently low enough on the social scale
to be prepared to marry marginalized Chinese men”.561
Both Bagnall and Rule argue that during the early part of the gold rushes, during the 1850s and
1860s, many women who formed relationships with Chinese men across New South Wales and
Victoria were of Irish background, having arrived direct from Ireland as part of early government
incentive schemes in the late 1840s.562 Bagnall clarifies her argument by noting that Chinese-
Celtic unions were limited to the period of the 1850s and1860s, after which new marriage trends
begin to emerge.563 As New South Wales’ northern districts opened up and pastoral and mining
men moved north, so too did the negative attitudes towards women, race and religion. It seems that
Chinese- Celtic relationships aroused the three prejudices at the one time, and left a lasting
impression on White women married to Chinese men thereafter. However, despite the belief that
Irish women were the only ones partnering with Chinese men, there remains no evidence to
substantiate the claim. This myth has been unpacked through analysis of statistics contained in
colonial Vital Statistics and census records for all three colonies.
Statistics from 1866 indicate that Chinese men married into a cross section of the community, of
which Irish immigrant women were only a part. The Vital Statistics of Victoria in 1866
registered 12 interracial marriages, including 4 which had English born wives, 3 Irish, 3 colonial
born and 2 from Scotland.564 The small number of Irish born women marrying Chinese men was
confirmed in 1888 in Victoria by statistician A.E. McDermott in a letter reprinted in the South
Australian Weekly Chronicle, when he outlined that out of a possible 340 White wives of
Chinese men for the years 1866 – 1888 across Victoria, only 25 women or just over 10% were
Irish born. The largest groups of women, he argued, came from Colonial born and English born
backgrounds.565Rule notes when looking at the period 1866 – 1882 that of the 258 marriages
where the grooms were Chinese, the majority of White wives were identified as colonial born.
This left only 75 women or less than one third of the wives of Chinese men with a birth country
from the British Isles or other European places.566 This trend is picked up by Dinah Hales in her
study of families in central New South Wales. She corroborates Rule’s observation when she notes
561 Rule, ‘Women and marriage”, 52.
562Ibid. 50; and Bagnall, Golden Shadows on a White Land, 112-114.
563 Bagnall, Golden Shadows on a White Land, 112.
564 “Vital Statistics of Victoria, 1866”, The Argus, 14 September 1867, p. 6.
565South Australian Weekly Chronicle, 19 May 1888, p.5.
566 Rule, ‘Women and marriage”, 52.
152
that New South Wales wives were taken from a domestic pool of potential female partners rather
than from recent migrant arrivals.567
Queensland always recorded a high percentage of non-Irish born women marrying Chinese men.
The Queensland trend was highlighted in the 1871 Census Report which remarked on birth
places,
...the next largest number are Chinese 3,305 or 2.75 percent but among whom was only one
woman. It must be borne in mind, however that in not a few cases Chinamen were married to
European wives, it is popularly supposed as Irish, but in reality, the English predominate.568
The propensity for immigrant English women to partner with a Chinese man occurred more
readily in Queensland and could be attributed to a number of factors. Queensland’s departure
from trends in New South Wales and Victoria could be explained by the fact that it did not have
a substantial post-convict, colonial born female population. Queensland with its active direct
assisted immigration scheme targeted single women from the British Isles but principally from
England, in contrast to Victoria and New South Wales which focused on Ireland. When English
women arrived directly from England to Queensland, especially north Queensland, they entered
communities which had large Chinese cultural precincts as a result of mining, commercial or
large-scale agricultural industries which kept a stable population. In particular, with north
Queensland dependent on Chinese economic interests, the White community developed a more
relaxed attitude to relationships with Chinese which may have extended to marriage patterns.
The absence of any great number of colonial born women combined with direct immigration of
single White females, along with greater acceptance of Chinese men as husbands, separated
Queensland’s interracial marriage trends from those of Victoria and New South Wales.
567 Dinah Hales, “Lost Histories”, 110.
568 QVP, Vol. I, 1872, “Registrar General’s Report: Vital Statistics, Census of 1871”, p. 984.
153
Table 2: Birth Place of White Women married to Chinese men: 1860-1892569
569 Colonial Comparison taken from Colonial Vital Statistics Various Years 1861-1891.
QUEENSLAND
Year
England
Scotland
Ireland
QLD born
Other colony
Germany
France
Norway
Denmark
USA
@sea / unknown
Total
Colony marriages
Census
Percentage
1870 5 -- 4 -- -- 2 -- -- -- -- -- 11 879 1.25%
1874 7 -- 2 1 1 1 -- 1 1 -- -- 14 1340 1.04%
1885 9 -- 6 5 -- -- -- -- -- -- -- 20 2842 0.70%
1888 4 -- 1 2 1 -- -- -- 1 -- -- 9 3254 0.28%
1890 9 2 7 4 -- -- -- -- -- -- -- 22 2603 0.84%
1892 6 -- 6 4 -- -- -- -- -- -- 2 18 2774 0.64%
TTL 40 2 26 16 2 3 -- 1 2 -- 2 94 13,692 0.69%
VICTORIA
Year
England
Scotland
Ireland
VIC born
Other colony
Germany
France
Norway
Denmark
USA
@sea / unknown
Total
Colony marriages
Census
Percentage
1866 4 2 3 2 1 -- -- -- -- -- -- 12 4253 0.28%
1870 3 -- 1 7 6 -- 1 -- -- -- -- 18 4715 0.38%
1874 4 1 -- 7 2 -- -- -- -- 1 -- 15 4925 0.30%
1885 3 -- 1 15 4 -- -- -- -- -- 1 @
sea
24 7395 0.32%
1889 2 1 1 10 -- -- -- -- -- -- 2 16 9194 0.17%
1890 3 1 -- 7 2 -- -- -- -- -- -- 13 9187 0.14%
1892 1 -- 1 6 2 -- -- -- -- -- -- 10 7723 0.12%
TTL 20 5 7 54 17 -- 1 -- -- 1 3 108 47392 0.23%
NEW SOUTH WALES
Year
England
Scotland
Ireland
NSW born
Other colony
Germany
France
Norway
Denmark
USA
@sea / unknown
Total
Colony marriages
Census
Percentage
1891 28 3 16 129 35 1 1 -- -- -- 3 213 8452 2.52%
TTL 28 3 16 129 35 1 1 -- -- -- 3 213 8452 2.52%
154
Queensland Trends:
Queensland (All)
Across Queensland, in the port towns, the western pastoral communities, and north into the mining
and tropical agricultural districts, Chinese men settled, partnered and raised families with White
women from the mid-19th century and early 20th century. With nearly a thousand Anglo-Chinese
primary marriages and unions identified across Queensland and with a third of those in north
Queensland, the Chinese-White family provided an integral function within the Chinese
community through the introduction of children and subsequent succession marriages through
sons and daughters in what otherwise was a male dominated immigrant society. Within a seventyyear
period, 1847-1920, no fewer than 918 Caucasian women married, lived with or had other
intimate relations with Chinese men across Queensland. This figure consists of 504 legal
marriages under The Marriage Act 1864 and 411 unions where the legal status remains unverified.
These couples, some with families, lived in rural environments, on the fringes of towns at market
garden areas, in Chinese cultural precincts, and within larger Chinatowns.570
Despite efforts to identify exactly where couples were living, the locations of 359 White women,
or 39% of Anglo-Chinese couples across Queensland, have yet to be found. Their existence is
captured from entries in the Colonial Births Register or Deaths Register, as an entry for the birth of
a child marked “illegitimate” or where a birth is recorded but there is no corresponding marriage
registration in the Marriage Register; no death entry for a White woman because she had taken on
her lover’s last name; and no additional information had come to light in secondary sources to
identify where she was living. This rather large number skews the statistics for analysis according
to geographical region. It is anticipated that as the 359 women are studied more carefully, and as
more information comes to light, not only will the percentages for districts change, but that the
majority of these couples will be found to reflect trends already outlined in this study, including
the expectation that there will be a higher percentage located in north Queensland based on the
known data. However, to investigate all of the 359 couples, a task which requires verification of
data to pinpoint exact domiciliary location, remains a huge undertaking and remains outside the
scope of this thesis. The number of Chinese-White couples identified already in this thesis where
whereabouts are known, all 559 couples, is sufficiently robust to allow reasonably accurate
statistical patterns to be extrapolated.
570 Robb Database: Marriages and Unions, 1848-1920.
155
Fig. 39. Queensland: Total number White wives identified in colony:1847-1920
Fig. 40. Queensland: White Wives Location known: 1847-1920
Findings arising out of known data confirm that the Chinese-White marriage patterns in
Queensland mirrored the settlement patterns of the Chinese population generally. Across
Queensland over one third of identified Chinese- White couples or 37% of White women who
were married or lived with a Chinese man were identified as having lived in north Queensland.
Other parts of the colony include 23% of Anglo-Chinese relationships in the inner city and
metropolitan districts including Fortitude Valley, Nine Holes (Albert Street)571 and the Enoggera
district of Brisbane; 22% in the Central District; and 18 %, including some of the earliest mixed
heritage couples, on the Darling Downs and across the Southern Districts including the port towns
of Gympie and Maryborough. North Queensland’s Anglo-Chinese family landscape comprised
208 couples raising families compared to 129 couples in Brisbane, 122 couples in Central region
and 100 couples identified across Southern Region.
Of the 504 Chinese-White official marriages under The Marriage Act 1864, 151 families or 26%
were identified as married and living across north Queensland; 88 families or 15% lived in or
around Brisbane; 60 families or 10% lived across the Central Districts and 48 families or 8% lived
in the Southern Districts, including the Darling Downs.572 Removing the 41% of unknown couples
from the data, it is clear that nearly half of all couples, 44%, who were legally married under The
Marriage Act 1864, were living in towns and settlements across north Queensland. The high
571The Brisbane Courier, 10 September 1891, p. 3. Reference to “Nine Holes” can be found in numerous newspaper reports
associated with prostitution. This includes articles about Ellen Hayes who was arrested for liaising with a Chinaman in an outhouse.
She was “just visiting” Nine Holes. See also Raymond Evans, “Anti- Chinese Riot: Lower Albert Street” from Raymond Evans and
Carole Ferier with Jeff Rickert (eds.) Radical Brisbane: An Unruly history, (Vulgar Press, Carlton North (Vic), 2004),
http://www.multiculturalaustralia.edu.au/doc/evans_anti-chinese_riot.pdf
572 Location of 237 couples remains unknown at this stage.
156
number of legal marriages undertaken does not reflect the stereotype that women were of low
moral repute if they partnered with a Chinese man, nor does it reflect rash decision making.
A similar pattern is repeated in the data for the 411 couples or families identified as informal
“unions”. A resounding majority, 104 couples and families, were living across the Northern
Region when compared to 66 couples identified in the Central Region; 55 couples in the Southern
Region; and 49 couples located in Brisbane. Additional to these figures are 137 couples who were
identified from a variety of sources but whose place of residence remains unknown. With the 32 %
of unknown couples removed from the data, north Queensland again dominates the figures with 38
% of all known couples residing in Queensland.
The difference between informal union figures compared to marriages is that in Central and
Southern Regions, the pastoral, agricultural and mining districts have a larger percentage of White
women living with Chinese men than the metropolitan areas of Brisbane. However, with
percentages of 24%, 20% and 18% respectively, there is only a small 6% margin between all three,
with the low rate of women living in a de-facto or casual union with Chinese men in Brisbane a
reflection more of the problems associated with registering marriages in rural and remote
Queensland districts rather than any greater propensity for marriage by women living in Brisbane.
In other words, data presented for Brisbane, as a key metropolitan city district, may be more
reliable as a demonstration of the ratio between marriages and liaisons due to a greater likelihood
of marriage registrations reaching authorities than from other parts of the colony. Should this be
the case, and using Brisbane as a model, then it could be hypothesized that two thirds of the
Chinese–White family landscape were legally married under The Marriage Act 1864 compared to
one third of all couples living in de facto or engaged in casual relationships throughout
Queensland. This hypothesis remains yet to be proven and can only be correctly assessed when all
known locations of couples are identified.
157
Fig. 41. Chinese – White Families across Queensland by relationship status: incl. North
Queensland insert
When reviewing relationship status on a decade per decade basis across all four districts of the
colony, it can be seen that the majority of marriages and unions occurred between 1870 and 1900
with a particular increase in north Queensland from the 1880s (see inset above). The rise in unions
in the decade 1900-1909 is noted as significant on the graph above, but should be regarded as a
guide only as it is a constructed figure arising from the need to enter data at a nominal point in
time, for relationships where exact data was unavailable, which in this case was 1900. The period
1870-1900 which registered the highest number of marriages and unions across the colony
correlates two aspects of settlement history. Not only does the increase in number of marriages
mirror the expansion of settlement and industry growth across north Queensland after 1860, but
the steady increase in marriages and unions mirrors colonial supported migration schemes of
single young White females. These spikes also correlate to the periods previously mentioned at
the beginning of the chapter, which described emigration figures out of the British Isles for the
same period.
In the minds of the colonial administration, Queensland in the mid-19th century was a homo-social
male society which required White women to produce a permanent population and undertake jobs
in the domestic sphere so that men could be freed up to explore, develop and exploit the landscape.
White, single, work ready, women direct from England were considered essential to stem the
threat of White men partnering with women from other races, especially Indigenous women, or
158
worse, between themselves.573 As a result colonial authority were anxious that ships carrying
marriage-eligible women should arrive quickly. Upon arrival, young women were met at the wharf
by men who made offers of work, marriage or both. A woman’s financial ability to immigrate
depended on assisted passage schemes either funded by the government or though remittance
schemes sponsored by families and friends already residing in the colony.
Queensland’s colonial settlers were encouraged to support the expansion of the colony
through family unification by depositing money into an assisted immigration fund to offset the
cost of passage. Many women were supported in their passage this way, to be met on arrival
by family members who had migrated earlier.574 However, many single immigrant women also
travelled alone or with a female friend, and arrived in the colony without the support of their
families, instead relying on their skills to secure employment as a means to support
themselves.575
Part 3: Chinese-White Family Landscape:
General patterns
Queensland and north Queensland’s Chinese-White Family Landscape cannot be characterized
by one type of relationship, one type of woman, or one family experience. Decisions made by
White women when partnering with Chinese men were shaped by two key influences: the causal
environment which surrounded a moment in time and a woman’s response to it, contrasted with
the emotional response when making decisions for survival. The first aspect, governed by
demographic and environmental influences, included the place of birth, age, family trends, and
societal values. Demographic circumstances, how migration was financed, age at migration and
family situation upon arrival, all contributed to what happened next. Analysis of this initial
information provides some insight into aspects of White female marriage patterns. In particular,
the act of migration itself changed young women’s interactions with colonial society due to the
absence of natal influences.
573 A. Perry, “’Fair ones of a purer caste’: White women and colonialism in nineteenth-century British Columbia”, Feminist Studies 23,
3 (1997): 501-524.; Abrams, “Hidden Dimension of Nineteenth-Century Immigration Law”, 8. Ships from English and Irish ports
were destined for the U.S. and British Columbia, as well as the colonies across Australasia including Victoria, New South Wales and
Queensland.
574 Pers comm: Ping family, Gayndah, 2003. This was the case for sisters Ellen and Jane Craig of Scotland, who were sponsored by
their half-sister Jemima Wood and her Chinese husband Thomas Ashney in 1860.
575 Shang, “Hing Family Records”; Joanna Olsen and Keith Shang, With his gold in a little velvet bag (Joanna Olsen, 2013): 61. This is
the case for Christina Wilkie, who, at age 17 after three months’ voyage from Plymouth, England in June 1872, secured
employment as a domestic servant with John Marshall and his wife. However, unlike other White women who remained in their
employment and eventually moved on and married into colonial White society, Christina met Moe Ung (romanised to George
Hing) and within six weeks of her arrival in Maryborough had left her employment to marry Hing. They married on 27 October
1872 just six weeks and 4 days after Christina’s arrival. George and Christina moved north to Charters Towers where they raised a
large family. She had secured employment with Marshall for 6 months as a housemaid at £20 per annum.
159
It could be argued that separation from the family home enabled the individual to make
decisions independently, without prejudice and without the need for permission. The absence of
a mother to seek advice about suitability of potential partners, lessened the likelihood of
opposition to interracial marriage, and highlighted the role of female networking in the colony.
On arrival to the colony, single White migrant women turned to short term female friendships to
fill the void of confidants and act as sounding boards for important decisions. As friendships
developed and women began to marry, they introduced other single women to prospective
eligible men. At the time this was an acceptable introduction method between the sexes and
actively pursued in all communities. It was therefore not unusual for White wives of Chinese to
introduce other White women to Chinese men for the purpose of marriage. Already married to
Chinese men, these women were supportive to those who sought an alternative matrimonial
partner.
It is not surprising that the majority of White women who married Chinese men in north
Queensland came from an overseas background and arrived without family connections.
Evidence can be found in many marriage certificates where female witnesses were non- related
women within the Chinese community, themselves married to Chinese men. This supports the
idea that non-related women played an important role in supporting young females when the
decision was being made to marry Chinese men.576 For others, the presence of extended family
members already in the colony, including female siblings or relations, strengthened the
development of an immediate family and female support network. Having a member of the
family already married to a Chinese man in the colony meant that single migrant women were
introduced to the Chinese community more quickly which led to some being more likely to
marry within it. Over a forty-year period, at least eight pairs of sisters married Chinese men
including three sisters from the one family.577 Conversely it is suspected that Chinese brothers or
576 QBDM-MR-MF, 1884, 1884/000333, AH HOIN/ AH HONG to LOTHIAN, Jane 21 March1884; QBDM-MR-MF 1884,
1884/000348, AH CHOW to CHURCHER, Annie 10 May1884: QBDM-MR-MF 1883, 1883/000310, AH YOU, James to
SOMMERVILLE Agnes 09.10. 1883 The interconnectedness of White women’s networking and influence in matrimonial affairs
can be seen in the marriage of Jane Lothian from Scotland to Ah Hon from China in Cairns, 1884. She was married in the house of Ah
Chow, and Ah Chow’s White wife Annie (nee Churcher) acted as witness signatory to the marriage along with another Chinese man,
Ah You. James Ah You himself was already married to a White wife, Catherine Sommerville, and they all lived in the Cairns
Chinatown community.
577 QBDM-MR-MF 1860, 1860/000060, CHAY, John to CRAIG, Jane, 12 September1860; Pers Comm. Heather and Stanley
Ping, Gayndah, 2003, Identification of family John Deian to Ellen Craig, 23 August1860, Gayndah. Three sisters married Chinese
men. Ellen was sister to Jane Craig and half sister to Jemima Wood, who married Thomas Ashney. Assisted migrant sisters Ellen and
Jane Craig were sponsored by their half sister Jemima Wood of Gayndah, arrived from Scotland in the early 1860s. Both were below
the age of consent and required permission from their adult sister. They married John Deian and John Chay, men who most likely had
kinship relationships with Jemima’s husband Ashney, within months of the girls’ arrival and the three sisters all lived near each other
in Gayndah. They supported each other to raise families, and two sisters raised the third sister’s children after her death from
childbirth.
160
kinsmen may have introduced future White wives to each other, but the incidence of this
arrangement has been more difficult to verify.
Sisters living with their Chinese husbands in the same community provided emotional support to
each other in an environment which was culturally foreign, environmentally harsh and isolated
from the broader community. At times of birth, sickness or even death, sisters were guaranteed
help and support in family matters and could enjoy the familiar social intimacy which siblings
bring with them.578 The likelihood of this arrangement occurring was more evident in rural and
remote areas where eligible marriage partners were scarce.
Marriage figures indicate that there was a small preference by White women across Queensland,
including north Queensland, to remarry back into the Chinese community after the death,
separation or abandonment by the first Chinese husband. Re-marriage by women in the 19th
century was a common practice for many women, who in the face of limited employment and
low wages were dependant on men for economic security. In this study at least 13 White women
were identified as re-marrying after the death of their Chinese husbands. Of those, 9 married a
second Chinese man579 while 4 married back into the White community.580 This small sample
demonstrates that White women were making active choices on the quality of men when repartnering,
suggesting that race or ethnicity was secondary to security and economic factors.
In other cases, White women sometimes engaged in extra marital affairs, taking in Chinese
lovers, while married to White men,581 or abandoned their White husbands in favour of living
with their Chinese lovers.582 Women who took this direction were sometimes sentenced to gaol,
578 See marriages: QBDM-MR-MF1886, 1886/000876, AH SOU/AH SUE, James to HARSTOFF, Alice Maria, 14 August 1886;
QBDM-MR-MF1888, 1888/000178, HARSTOFF, Louis John Frederick to AH SUE, Ellen, 19 July1888. This pattern continued with
the first generation Australian Born Chinese with at least one pair of siblings marrying another pair of siblings. For example, one
brother and sister from one family on the Etheridge goldfield married an Australian Born Chinese brother and sister in 1886.
579 Robb Database: Marriages and Unions, 1848-1920 and Pers. Comm. Ray Poon, Email 2002. For example: Jane Gilligan of
Warwick married Lau Tien in 1860. He died two years later in 1863. Jane Tien then met and married another Chinese man, Fu Qi, in
Stanthorpe and they went on raise twelve children. Further north, Annie Beechley had a daughter with James Wing in Townsville in
1885. He died a couple of years later and she then met Pang Muen Young and they moved to Cairns where they lived. They had
another child not long after. They lived together for a number of years and eventually got married in a private ceremony in 1899.
580 QBDM-MR-MF 1878 , 1878/000927, CRAVINO, Emile to YAN, Eliza Alice, 3 September 1878; QBDM-BR-MF 1872,
72/00395 Charles Frederick YAN, 17 October 1872, to YAN, Eliza Jane. This is the case for Eliza Alice who had a son to her first
partner, Yan, in 1872 but later on married Emille Cravino in 1878.
581 Interview Carl Richardson, Mareeba, 8 August 2002. Born on the Palmer, Mary married her first husband Hooley when she was
very young. He was killed in an accident by 1886 when she was just 17. She remarried William Leswell and they moved to another
mining community at Thornborough, but when their daughter was born it was obvious the child was not his and had a Chinese father
instead. Two more children were born the following two years: first a White child and then another child whose father was Chinese.
Leswell abandoned the family and Mary Hannah went on to marry a third husband, Harry Finn.
582 The Northern Miner, 1 October 1900, p. 2. Mrs Collins was living apart from her husband, with William Ah Mook in a humpy on
Alexander Creek, Millchester. Her husband was jealous and believed she was having "intimate relations" with William Ah Mook.
Things were so bad between them that she had previously sought protection from the police. Mrs Collins was injured and Mr Collins
then shot himself dead.
161
accused of being of ill repute, despite there being no evidence of unlawful behaviour.583 Women
were also charged under The Vagrancy Act when they had separated from their lawful husbands
and did not have appear any visible means of support. Under these circumstances White women
with mixed heritage children were often locked up and their children sent to the orphanage.584
However, many White women lived with Chinese men for companionship and protection, with
some women living with more than one Chinese men in their lifetime, in preference to living
with a White husband.
The stereotype of White women married or living with a Chinese man being of a low moral
class cannot be substantiated. However, there is overwhelming evidence of long term marriages
and partnering, large and successful families, strong Christian affiliation and accounts of
assistance rendered to women within the Chinese community. Yet some White women were of
questionable repute with numerous convictions in the newspapers for acts of slander, assault,
larceny, prostitution or public drunkenness. There were White women married to Chinese
husbands who had affairs with other Chinese men,585 fought with other White wives of Chinese
men,586 and made public nuisances of themselves.587 Not all White women had the interests of
others at heart especially other White women in the period of settling when social,
environmental and economic conditions remained difficult, leading some to engage in behaviour
outside society norms.
White women without the benefit of a trusted family member may have been more susceptible
to influences from other females who, through unscrupulous motives or coercive manipulation,
contributed to poor marriage choices in the face of future uncertainty. For example, some
women acted as matchmakers for Chinese men and introduced newly arrived migrant women to
583 The Northern Miner, 29 January 1891, p. 3. This is the case for Margaret Cummings in 1891, who was charged for being in a
disorderly house and complaints made against her. She had separated from her husband and was living with Tommy AH BOW in
Townsville. She was sentenced to three months hard labour in the Townsville gaol; see also QSA: JUS/ 96/ Police Court, rape case
involving an alleged “prostitute”, Eliza Jane Ferris, who lived with Ah Sue, Aberdeen Creek Charters Towers, and witness details of
Mary Ellen Moffatt in Ferris case, who lived with Ah Sam.
584 The Western Champion and General Advertiser for the Central Western districts, 4 February 1896, p. 12. Sarah Ann Haywood was
charged under the Vagrancy Act as having no means to support herself and living off men. The police said the accused had a bad
character and had been kept by a Chinaman for the past 6 months. Men had been seen coming and going from her house. She had been
married for 15 years and her husband supported her, but she did not live with him. She had been living with a Chinese man for 14
months and had left him 3 months prior. She had a child by that man. Reputed as a habitual drunkard, she was sentenced to 6 months
gaol in Rockhampton and her daughter was ordered to the Orphanage at Rockhampton for three years.
585 Tony Mathews, Mayhem and Murder in Pioneering Queensland: True stories of Real Crimes and Mysteries (Central Queensland
University Press, 2000): 79-86. In 1886 Tim Tie, husband of "Kate", shot Jimmy Ah Fook in Dulbydilla, Southern Region. Wife Kate
was regarded to be a woman of loose morals which incensed Tim Tie, who thought that his fellow Chinese settler Ah Fook was having
an affair with her. Tim Tie was charged with murder in the Roma Court in March 1886, and later hanged.
586 Fischer, “The Forgotten Pioneers”, 96 referring to Ann Cooey, Toowoomba.
587 QBDM-MR-MF1896, 1896/001306, AH YOUNG/ AH YUN to COLING / COOLING, Mary Ann, 23 May1896; QPG: 1902:220
Mrs Ah Young, Roma; Western Star and Roma Advertiser, 23 March 1898, p. 2. Mrs Ah Young was named in a newspaper report for
swimming with a Chinese man other than her husband in the drinking water reservoir of Roma.
162
Chinese men in the community while subtly applying pressure on new- comers to get married.588
The deliberate introduction of women to Chinese men with a view of marriage or intimate
relations (by him) as the outcome, was a form of procurement and crossed several social
boundaries of acceptability, particularly if it involved underage girls. At least three occasions
were revealed where White women procured girls for the purpose of offering them as brides to
older Chinese men. While not significant in numerical terms over the whole number of Chinese-
White relationships recorded, the fact that that it occurred and the age of the young women
suggests that some White women were complicit in obtaining children for sexual services.
Despite hysteria surrounding Chinese men’s intentions with White girls, there were few actual
newspaper reports outlining incidences of “corruption” in Queensland. When reports of genuine
incidents were published, White women were portrayed as having played an important role in
the procurement, grooming or introduction of young girls and women for the purpose of
marriage to Chinese men. This suggests that some White women may have had an expectation
of a paid transaction for the service, either in the form of a financial recompense, goods or
provisions, or somehow indebted the Chinese man with a favour to be repaid at a later date.
While no instance of this sort of behaviour was observed in north Queensland, it occurred in
Central and Brisbane Regions in large urban Chinese environments. All three instances occurred
in private homes and two cases involved girls as young and 12 and 13 years of age.589While
there is some evidence to suggest White women were involved with the marriage or procurement
of underage girls in Queensland it remains unclear to what extent it occurred. Similarly, while
there is anecdotal evidence to suggest that some families sold their daughters to Chinese men for
marriage, this remains anecdotal with no clearer evidence found.590
588The Darling Downs Gazette and General Advertiser, 16 March 1860, p. 5. This is the case for Mary who entered into a hastily
arranged marriage when she visited her sister-in-law near Drayton. At the time she was unaware that her sister-in-law was acting as a
matchmaker for a Chinese man, Josh, who had sought assistance to find a White wife. Under pressure, Mary married him in her sisterin-
law’s house but later regretted the decision. Having not consummated the marriage Mary ran away, taking the clothes her husband
gave her as a trousseau and which she intended to sell. In her defense when charged with larceny, she stated the sale of clothes was to
pay her husband off for the clergy fees. That he had paid a clergyman to marry the couple implicated the priest in the deception.
Unable to morally clear herself in the eyes of her God, other than to abstain from consummating the marriage, Mary resorted to
running away.
589North Australian, 3 October 1863, p. 3; Brisbane Courier, 20 October 1893, p.3. The first case occurred in Rockhampton in
September 1863. Young Mary Ann Gray was married to Samuel Sue in a ceremony in the private home of Mr Hawthorne. The
witnesses included Chinese Stephen Uzah and his White wife Harriet Hisscock, who had been married a year beforehand. At the time
the girl was just 13 years and 6 months old but her age had been bumped up to the legal age of consent, 21 years. In the second case, in
1893 Chinese-White couple Mr. and Mrs Ah Tow of Brisbane were charged with procuring a young White girl for a Chinese man.
Elizabeth Watts, age 12 years, had been offered a “position” up country along with her young sister. Mrs. Tow was the person
responsible for the offer and was making arrangements at the time of her arrest.
590 Roma Family History Society, un-paginated papers 2002. It is reported through family history that Mary Ann Cooling was "sold to
a Chinese gardener" for marriage. When Mary Ann was 17 years old she married a Chinese man Ah Young who was 36 years old. At
the time she would have needed parental consent for marriage.
163
Across the border in New South Wales, Bagnall notes that there is also evidence there of some
White couples selling their daughters to Chinese men with a view that the girl later will become
his “wife”.591 This suggests that the practice, although not widespread, was not limited to
Queensland. The cultural practice of purchasing a child bride, with a view of marrying her when
she was of age, San Po Tsai, was an acceptable cultural practice in China. Bagnall argues that in
New South Wales there is some evidence of the circumstance where a bride price was paid to the
family in a form of dowry, albeit in rare cases. A cultural proclivity to San Po Tsai and its
application to young White girls in a host country community could indicate that the economics of
a marriage was important to some White families when providing consent to Chinese marriage
partners, making the practice acceptable to them. In families where poverty was prevalent, the
offer of a bride price or financial dowry may have been an important motivator to overcome racial
prejudice against Chinese men as marriage partners.592 This theory remains untested in
Queensland and requires further investigation which remains outside the scope of this thesis.
Conclusion:
White women migrated away from England and Ireland during the mid to late 19th century in the
hope of finding a better situation for themselves in countries and colonies such as the United
States, British Columbia, South America and Australasia.593 Migration was encouraged by
colonial sponsored migrant assistance schemes as well as by reports of an elevated labour
market for women. Upon arrival, women were faced with rudimentary, harsh and male
dominated colonial communities, which encouraged alternative decision making when it came
to the selection of a husband. It seems White women made active choices based on the quality
of a man rather than his race, leading to a number of women partnering with Chinese men.
Interracial marriage between Chinese men and White women developed as an unexpected
consequence to female migration. This led to countries such as the United States and colonies
such as New Zealand to put in place legislation to prevent interracial marriage and
miscegenation. In contrast, the colonies of Australia applied a fairer legal framework for
marriages and unions to occur, which resulted in an average of 379 marriages for the three
colonies of Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland combined. This suggests that the
number of marriages and unions between Chinese men and White women across the colonies of
591Bagnall, Golden Shadows on a White Land, 124.
592Ibid., 125-126.
593 In the case of the British colony of South Africa, no information could be found regarding interracial marriage between Chinese
men and White women. It is acknowledged that South Africa has descendants of early settlers but does not reveal what the primary
race of mothers was.
164
Australia is higher than previously thought. This makes the colonies of Australia unique in their
numerical incidence of interracial marriage at a transnational level when global marriages rates
are compared, which should excite researchers to look at more closely to Diaspora trends from
an evolving family perspective to pave way for new understandings to emerge.594
Analysis of interracial marriages between White women and Chinese men throughout
Queensland clearly demonstrates that the most marriages and unions occurred across north
Queensland with peak periods for marriage and family formation occurring 1870 – 1910. This
correlates with the peak emigration period of women from England and supports the evidence
that women married to Chinese men in the colony were migrant women direct from the British
Isles rather than colonial born. This is in contrast to both Victoria and New South Wales which
record not only a higher percentage of colonial born wives but also women of Irish heritage.
The Chinese – White Family Landscape across Queensland suggests that sisters and family were
important in not only assisting migration for family members to the colony, but also provided an
initial introduction to Chinese men within the community and family thereafter. The large
quantity of interracial marriages and relationships by White women with Chinese men across
Queensland, supported by long term relationships, large families, and re-marriage with other
Chinese men, suggests that women were not unhappy with their selection of partner, but were
making informed decisions for themselves at a time when marrying foreigners, particularly
Asian foreigners, was unpopular. While some women married to Chinese men were
unscrupulous in behavior, unruly, uncouth, drunkards, and sold sexual services, there is no
evidence to suggest that they were more or less prone to anti-social behavior than women who
had married White men.
What is evident is that the economics of marriage, cycle of poverty and an anti-Chinese colonial
environment, all played a role in determining the outcome of a life for White women who
married and partnered with Chinese men. Having stepped outside the acceptable boundaries
associated with marriage at a time of Empire building, that is to marry a White man, White
women in interracial marriages and relationships found themselves susceptible to fingerpointing,
denigration and ostracization from the wider community, leading some to engage in
negative behavior, casting themselves as low class and of ill repute. On the other hand, Chinese
tended to be less judgmental than White men and may have been more likely to shelter homeless
594 The lack of statistical data makes specific analysis of global trends difficult and it remains an area which would benefit from future
enquiry.
165
White women. Chinese cultural understanding of perfectly acceptable practices such as San Po
Tsai or marriage transaction may have been present, but misunderstood by the dominant
Western culture. Instead, it may have been viewed as predatory behavior. This sheds light on the
complexities of gender and cultural differences towards experiences regarding the selection of
White women as wives. This may lead to new interpretations of marriage relations and practices as
Overseas Chinese negotiated marriage in a host country.
166
C h a p t e r 7
“NUMBER FOUR WIFE CATCHEM BOY…”: CHINESE FEMALE DIASPORA
Introduction:
Chinese women, who migrated between 1860 and 1920 to north Queensland, did so within a
framework formed by thousands of years of gendered cultural and political tradition. Their journey
positioned them at the vanguard of change at home and abroad, and led to the beginnings of a truly
transnational family experience, as Chinese children were born in Queensland. Chinese female
migration across the globe reflected broader Diaspora trends, with the majority of women
migrating to the U.S., Hawaii and the colonies of Australia. Their migration was in response to
global economic trends, largely in mining and agriculture, with the colony of Queensland featuring
prominently alongside California, South America and the British West Indies. Queensland
emerges as one of the three most populous Chinese colonies in Australia, along with Victoria and
New South Wales, and consequently one of the most important in attracting Chinese female
migration. Statistical analysis of Chinese women who arrived in the colony of Queensland
indicates that new arrivals were mainly in north Queensland, with a small number in the Central,
Southern and Brisbane Regions. All women experienced similar circumstances and were unified
by their youth, circumstances and place within the expanding transnational family. Through shared
experiences, they contributed to a contemporary understanding of traditional family values and
maintenance of female culture within the north Queensland community, framing what has come to
be regarded as the China born Chinese Family Landscape.
This chapter will commence by providing a brief outline of the gendered cultural constraints
characteristic of the filial family structure which underpinned the Chinese Female Diaspora
experience in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Analysis of the statistics is guided by the framework
of the filial family and the strategies which were employed to maintain compliance to traditional
cultural values. Global and national trends for the Chinese Female Diaspora will be compared to
those for the colony of Queensland. This information will be then compared specifically to
settlement and marriage patterns across north Queensland to reveal a more rounded interpretation
of the China-Born Chinese Family Landscape.
167
Part 1: The Filial Family
The colonial Chinese female Diaspora of the 19th and early 20th centuries saw women sent as
wives, servants or chattels, to Chinese men around the globe in an effort by families to provide
comfort to men, increase family wealth though birth of colonial born children, and secure future
funds through intergenerational tenure in overseas destinations. Their migration was underpinned
by centuries of traditional Chinese societal rules set out through Confucius’s teachings, which
governed social conduct between men and women. Confucianism positioned man as the positive
Yang force (bright, strong, and dominant) while the woman was the negative Yin force (dark, weak
and passive). Men were superior to women, as heaven is to earth, so woman could never elevate
herself enough to bring glory and prosperity to the family, other than through her role as the
producer of sons. Her function was to marry, procreate, and benefit the position of her husband’s
clan and lineage, thus increasing the wealth, power and prestige of his ancestors.595 This system
favoured the wealthy, was socially hierarchical and included wife buying.596 It was as natural for
men to maintain their dominant role, as it was natural for women to submit.597
From birth, Chinese girls were considered of little value to the family and destined to leave the
natal family home. For that reason, and until that point, she was regarded a drain on the family
resources. It could be surmised that Chinese marriage was not about love, but was a union between
two clans entered as a contractual arrangement to support the lineage system. “Matchmakers”
were engaged to consider compatibilities and arrange good matches.598 Upon marriage, a Chinese
bride served her husband and his mother. It was essential to please the mother-in-law as the
women’s relationship was critical to family harmony.599 In many cases the relationship was
fractious and it was not uncommon for abuses of daughters-in-law to occur.600 Producing male
heirs was the key to respect within the family structure as it perpetuated the ancestor lineage.601 As
external global opportunities to gain wealth presented themselves, the Chinese family system was
595 Julie Kristeva, About Chinese Women, (Marion Boyars Pty Ltd, Great Britain, 1977): 71
596Ibid. 67. In China, the groom to be, or his family, gave money or goods to the wife’s family as a dowry to “purchase” a wife. Rubie
S. Watson, “Girls' Houses and Working Women: Expressive Culture in the Pearl River Delta, 1900-41”, in Maria Jaschok and Suzanne
Miers (eds), Women and Chinese Patriarchy: Submission, Servitude and Escape, (Hong Kong University Press, Hong Kong. 1994):.30
When a young bride goes to her new family she may take with her a dowry or more correctly a trousseau, usually as a few pieces of
jewellery or some clothing as in her own personal wealth which is regarded as her own and establishes her as a “wife”.
597 The ideal woman was one who followed the three observances known as the Three Obediences and Four Virtues. This meant she
owed it to her father, her husband, and her son to be submissive, industrious and domestic.
598 V.R Burkhardt, Chinese Creeds and Customs (South China Morning Post, 1972): 72.
599 J. Yung, Unbound Voices: A documentary history of Chinese Women in San Francisco (University of California Press, 1999):108.
Imperial law offered little protection for young wives and the official penalty for disobedience to a mother-in-law was death by
strangulation.
600Burkhardt, Chinese Creeds and Customs, 96.
601 Within the Confucian system a Chinese woman could achieve status in three ways: she could be the mother in law, she could be
“First” wife (‘first mother’), or she could produce sons. As grandmother/ mother in law, she was the matriarch of the family; as First
wife she was the potential bearer of sons, but if a young wife was unable to produce a son, a second wife might be taken, sometimes
picked by the first wife and leading to wealthy families conducting polygamy with a Chinese man having up to three or four wives and
a concubine to support.If not wealthy, she could arrange for the adoption of a boy.
168
re-organised so that the duty of men was to earn their living abroad and send home remittances to
further advance the family wealth.602 A woman’s role within this changing environment was to
help her husband achieve this objective, whatever her place in the family.
The departure of a husband and creation of the transnational marriage meant that the moral duty of
a wife could only be to remain in China so she could keep order in a family system based on filial
piety and ancestor worship. As Manying Ip noted in Home Away From Home: Life Stories of
Chinese Women in New Zealand, “In traditional literature, to respect and serve your parents-inlaw,
was the first commandment of model womanhood”.603 This was even above obeying and
serving a husband. Joining a husband overseas became secondary to the obedience required for
staying home, caring for the family and keeping his affairs in order. Moreover, as Elizabeth Sinn
observes, relocation of the primary wife to another country put the whole cultural relationship
between the living, the dead, and future offspring at risk. This was a risk that many families were
unwilling to take, with absent relationships providing an indemnity strategy to maintain strong
core family structures.604 As a result, two strategies were developed by Overseas Chinese families
to maintain the filial family structure in order to protect the core values of the ancestral home.
Firstly, it was advantageous for families to marry a son off before his journey. This meant that his
family could ensure remittances from him through marital obligations to his wife, as well as ensure
his eventual return; provide help for his aging parents; and ensure his affairs were managed in his
absence. This trend was consistent across the Diaspora with early American historians estimating
that up to one third of Chinese men were married before they migrated to California.605 Australian
colonial patterns are suspected to be similar, as the Chinese immigrant population was made up of
outwardly “single” men, but who were known to have wives and families in China.606
Secondly, the protection of the core patriarchal Chinese family structure, which inhibited large
scale global female emigration of First Wives, led to alternative family arrangements being sought
in order to satisfy husbands’ conjugal rights, with the added benefit of sons born in a foreign land,
thus creating roots and opportunities for future financial growth. Chinese women chosen to
emigrate to overseas settlement countries were in many instances not from the core family
602The British Empire’s aggressive colonial expansion provided the opportunity for Chinese men to migrate by the easing of laws after
the Treaty of Nanjing (1842) and Treaty of Tientsin (1858).
603ManyingIp, Home Away from Home: Life Stories of Chinese Women in New Zealand, (New Woman Press Ltd, 1990),19.
604Sinn, “Bound For California”, 224.
605 Todd Stevens, “Tender Ties: Husbands’ Rights and Racial Exclusion in Chinese Marriage Cases, 1882-1924”, Law and Social
Enquiry, 27, 2 (Spring, 2002): 278.
606Ovens and Murray Advertiser, Tuesday 13 October 1857, p. 3. Many of the Chinese Exemption to the Dictation Test CEDT files
note that men travelling to China multiple times were going to see their wives and families.
169
structure (matriarch mother and First wife), but selected or bought as second wives, bonded
servants (Mui tsai) or women deemed to be of a class considered “worthless” such as girls sold by
families or stolen to be worked as “prostitutes”. Girls and women were selected, stolen and sent to
countries where large populations of Chinese men were working. For example, after the discovery
of gold in the United States, or commencement of large railway projects in British Columbia,
Chinese women were sent there as wives, bonded servants and “prostitutes”; to the British West
Indies as inducements to bind Chinese contract workers to estates and plantations; and to north
Queensland as second wives to provide comfort, produce sons and look after the affairs and health
of a husband in the host country. All examples benefitted the ancestral home, maintained filial
structures and maximized family wealth. On the other hand, women who remained in the village
household provided a continuation of traditional family values, executed their duties as First
wives, and provided for the in-laws while maintaining their moral obligations.
However, the effect of providing a ‘second wife’ overseas was in fact the setting up of “two
primary wife” female households. This began to impact on the traditional female hierarchy in
ways which were unforeseen and which challenged the traditional family model. These changes
had long term consequences within the ancestral home, as overseas wives exerted a newfound
freedom as they emerged as mistresses of their own homes.
***
Part 2: Chinese Female Diaspora
Settlement drivers
The Chinese Diaspora offered Chinese men many global destinations to gain experience and
secure wealth for the family with transmigration contributing to Chinese settler success. While
Chinese seamen had been traveling around the world for at least 30 years before, it was not until
the global gold rushes began with California in 1848 and ports opened up that men left en masse
from China to escape poverty, take refuge from China’s social and political internal upheavals, and
find a means to create wealth for their families back in China.
Chinese women commenced their migration around the western globe from 1848 onwards, when,
six years before the first goldfield in California, a Chinese female servant along with two Chinese
male servants arrived with their master Charles Gillespie on the San Francisco-bound brig The
Eagle. Their arrival coincided with the discovery of the Suttor Mill gold and the two men
immediately absconded from their master to try their luck while the fate of the woman remains
170
unknown.607 Three years later, a clandestine meeting was held between two curious groups of
women, one Chinese, the other European at a Hong Kong location so secretive, in 1851, that even
the Chinese Consul remained unaware.608 However, by 1855, concurrent with changing Chinese
ideas about women and exposure to foreigners, two young women travelled to Paris, presumably
with a diplomatic envoy, as papers described the arrival of a Chinese lady accompanied by servant
and child.609 As a snapshot to migration, Chinese women were first recorded in San Francisco,
1848; 610 British Columbia, 1858;611 the Colony of Victoria, 1859;612 British Guiana, 1860;613
Colony of Queensland, 1861;614 Colony of New South Wales, 1864;615 Cuba 1865,616 and New
Zealand 1867.617 The provinces of South Africa were among the last destination countries for
emigration around 1900.618
Not only did mining provide the impetus for Chinese female migration, so too did the sugar
industry. From 1851 onwards, increased demand for Chinese labour occurred in equatorial
colonies such as Cuba, Hawaii, and the British West Indies including British Guiana, where
Chinese ‘coolies’ were engaged as indentured labour.619 In 1862, as part of a labour drive, British
recruitment agents in Hong Kong sought to encourage Chinese women to migrate as an enticement
for Chinese men to sign up. A bonus of £20 was offered to be paid to each man on arrival who
was accompanied by his “wife”. This scheme was taken up by some men eager to work on the
plantations; however, a loophole left Chinese women vulnerable to exploitation. Upon arrival
many women brought over as “wives” were abandoned, having served their purpose for the men
by attracting the financial bonus.620 Left to fend for themselves, they were later described as
607 See Table 1. Liping Zhu, “No Need to Rush: The Chinese, Placer Mining, and the Western Environment”, Montana: The Magazine
of Western History, 49, 3, Special Gold Rush Issue (Autumn, 1999): 43.
608 Empire, Friday 10 October 1851, p. 4. Early Western descriptions of a Chinese woman across South East were not
recorded until at least 1852, when a Chinese woman was noted as administering her deceased husbands’ estate on a
plantation in Java. See Bathurst Free Press and Mining Journal, 25 December 1852, p. 1;
609 Morton Bay Courier, 12 November 1855, p. 1.
610 Zhu, “No Need to Rush”, p. 43.
611 Yuen-Fong Woon, “Between South China and British Columbia: Life Trajectories of Chinese Women”, British
Columbia Studies, 156/157 (Winter 2007): 83–107.
612 South Australian Register, 28 December 1859, p. 3.
613 Wally Look Lai, Chinese Indentured Labour: Migratios to the British West Indies in the Nineteenth Century,
Amerasia, 15/2 (1989), pp. 131-132.
614 Queensland Votes and Proceedings (QVP), 1872 Vol. I, Numbers of Chinese, Polynesian, Prisoners, Lunatics and
Inmates of Charitable Institutions in Electorates, and by Census Districts, Part II Table XXI: 1113
615 Goulburn Herald and Chronicle, 31 August 1864, pp. 2–3.
616 Manying Ip and Liangni Liu, “Gendered Factors of Chinese Multi-locality Migration: The New Zealand Case”,
SITES, new series, vol 5 no 2, (2008), pp. 31-56 (33).
617 Look Lai, p.-132 See also Jessie G. Lutz 2009, “Chinese Emigrants, Indentured workers and Christianity in the
West Indies British Guiana and Hawaii”, Caribbean Studies, Vol. 37, No 2 (July –December 2009), pp133-154.
618 Darryl Accone, “‘Ghost People’: Localising the Chinese Self in an African Context”, Asian Studies Review, 30, 3
(2006): 261. While Chinese women did not arrive in South Africa until around 1900, Chinese men had first migrated
from Guangdong in the 1870s.
619 Lutz, “Chinese Emigrants, Indentured workers and Christianity”, 140. This occurred across Cuba and the British West Indies as
well as British Guiana.
620Ibid. 140-141. It is recorded in 1861 that the boat Mystery had on board a number of Chinese women as well as at least one girl, age
12, bound for British Guiana.
171
having “poor moral standards and “worthless” having failed to do their job, that is, to tie Chinese
labour to the plantations.621 The practice of directly encouraging women to migrate to sugar
industry countries continued. Between 1866 and 1870, Chinese women left for Hawaii, and South
America and formed part of the 17,904 Chinese migrants across the British West Indies in 1884.622
The pattern for migration was set. Industries and countries associated with European colonial
expansion attracted both Chinese male and female migration, yet the colonial powers in Europe
itself failed to advertise or offer an industry to motivate Chinese migration there. While Britain
attracted Chinese seamen, from the 1850s onwards, both England and Europe failed to attract
Chinese women at any time during the 19th and early 20th centuries. The scant handful who did
manage to visit any European countries during this period, were associated with an official
diplomat and travelled as his companion concubine, daughter or servant.623 Instead, it was
Europe’s colonies in far flung places including across the Pacific Rim, the British West Indies and
parts of Africa where their exploitative resource industries were located, that Chinese men
ventured and some cases, Chinese women followed.
Fig. 42. Chinese Female Diaspora: Destination Countries: 1850 onwards
Note: Date represents the first year a Chinese woman was recorded in a destination place.
621 Lee- Loy, “The Chinese are preferred to all others”, 214-215.
622 G.W. Roberts and J. Byrne, “Summary statistics on indenture and associated migration affecting the West Indies, 1834-1918,”
Population Studies: a Journal of Demography, 20, 1 (1966): 125-134, Table 6. Chinese were introduced into the British Caribbean,
mainly under indentures, 1852-1884. Ibid. 131.
623 Jung Chang, Empress Dowager Cixi: the Concubine who launched modern China,(Jonathon Cape, London, 2013):41-50; Morton
Bay Courier, 12 November 1855, p. 1.France was the only destination country noted for a Chinese woman before 1900, and even then
the circumstances of her arrival were association with diplomatic officials rather than with a broader immigration pattern.
172
Transnational Trends
Between 1851 and 1921, the largest number of Chinese women emigrants went to the U.S. and
Hawaii, followed by the colonies of Australia and Canada. On a decade by decade basis the
United States, Hawaii and Australia remained consistent in intake numbers and saw incremental
rises each decade for all three locations. In the 1861 census, the State of California, taking in San
Francisco and Los Angeles, recorded 1,784 Chinese-born females compared to 33,149 Chinese
born males.624 This meant that 9.2% of the Chinese Californian population was made up of
women. The United States female migration intake can be seen in contrast with the Chinese
female population for the colonies of Australia in 1861, which recorded only 11 Chinese female
immigrants to 38, 247 men (most of them in Victoria) or .02% of women in the combined
Australian Chinese population.625 By 1884, Chinese women living in Hawaii consisted of 871
women or 5% of the Chinese population, itself representing one quarter of Hawaii’s total
population.626 In contrast, for the same period the Chinese female population of Queensland
remained at 2% of the total Chinese population or 23 per 11,206 men.627
Despite their settling by Chinese men and the creation of Chinese communities and cultural
precincts, the British West Indies and South Africa recorded the smallest number of Chinese
women migrants. This could be due to a number of influences including a greater incidence of
relationships between Chinese men and local women in the West Indies; an increased level of
difficulty to migrate to these countries because of restrictions, distance and transportation
problems, or because there was a reluctance to migrate to England and South Africa in the first
place. South Africa, for example, attracted Chinese male labour to the Natal, Cape and Transvaal
Provinces, but few Chinese women. This can be seen in the 1904 census where only 23 Chinese
women were recorded compared to 2434 men.628 In short, the host countries which attracted most
of the Chinese Female Diaspora included the west coast of the Americas, islands in the Pacific
including Hawaii, Fiji and New Zealand, and the colonies of Australia. In contrast, the British
West Indies, Britain, Europe and South Africa attracted very few.
Taking a snapshot of global statistics and census figures for eight destination countries 1861-1921,
a noticeable trend emerges which is captured by the West coast of the United States.
624McKeown, “Transnational Chinese Families”, 88.
625 Charles H. Wickens, Official Year Book of the Commonwealth of Australia, No.18 (Melbourne Government Printer, 1925): 618.
626McKeown, “Transnational Chinese Families”, 88.
627 QVP, 1887, Vol. II, “Registrar-General’s Report, Queensland Census, 1886”; and Vol. 1: 981.
628Accone, “Ghost people”, 261.
173
Approximately 52 % of the total number of female migrants journeyed to California for reasons
that were mining based, followed by Hawaii for sugar-based migration, which attracted 34 %.
These two global destination countries were followed by the gold mining and agricultural colonies
of Australia, (6%) and British Columbia (5%) with New Zealand, South Africa and Britain
totalling a very low percentage of just 1%. The West Indies, with its low migration number, did
not even have enough Chinese women to rate a percentage despite at least 123 women being
recorded there in the early 1870s.629 Cuba’s intake of Chinese women was so insignificant it was
estimated that between 1847 and 1874, there were fewer than 100 Chinese women who migrated
to Cuba compared to 142,000 men who were stolen, recruited as indentured labour, or cajoled to
labour on the plantations.630 Australia can statistically stake a claim to being one of the four most
important Western colonies or countries for the Chinese Female Diaspora, which consist of:
U.S.A., Hawaii, Australia and Canada.
Fig. 43. Snapshot of Global Chinese Female Diaspora: Eight Key Destinations
629 Lutz, “Chinese Emigrants, Indentured workers and Christianity”, 140 and Roberts and Byrne,“Summary statistics on indenture and
associated migration”,131.
630 Kathleen Lopez, “Afro-Asian Alliances: Marriage, Godparents, and Social Status in Late Nineteenth – Century Cuba”, Afro-
Hispanic Review, 27, 1(Spring, 2008):59-72. This figure did not increase. By 1899 there were only two Chinese women and 8,033
Chinese men.
174
The Chinese Diaspora experience in the eight destination communities around the globe was
identical in its propensity for a gender imbalance between women and men, even without
exclusionary laws which were later introduced in some countries. This trend reflects both the
reluctance for Chinese women to leave China based on social conditions in the first place, and
highlights restrictions set by some host countries to prevent Chinese female migration in order to
prevent family formation.
Countries which introduced exclusionary or deterrent laws to prevent the migration of women
include the United States, British Columbia, Australia and New Zealand with the United States
introducing a specific law to prevent Chinese women from entering in 1875. This piece of
legislation, known as the Page Law, saw a decline in Chinese female immigration by 68 % and it
was an effective means by which authorities kept the female migrant population at a constant low
intake.631 Only one destination country, Hawaii, managed to close the gender gap with Chinese
females registering above 15% of the total Chinese population from the turn of the century
onwards. By 1921 it had reached nearly a third of the population.632 It could be suggested that
Hawaii had the most open immigration policy towards female Chinese for the whole period. In
contrast, the migration of women to the colonies of Australia remained steady but slow, due to
both external and internal influences resulting in their presence only reaching 4% of the total
Chinese population by 1911. Clearly, something was going wrong. Why was it that California, at
twice the distance from Queensland and the colonies of Australia, could attracted far more female
migrants than New Zealand, Australia, Hawaii and British Columbia combined? (See Table.3. p.
182)
631George Anthony Peffer, "Forbidden Families: Emigration Experiences of Chinese Women under the Page Law, 1875-1882",
Journal of American Ethnic History 6, 1 (1986): 29-31; McKeown, "Transnational Chinese Families”, 79-80.
632 McKeown,"Transnational Chinese Families”, Table 1, 87.
175
Table.3. Australian Colonial Chinese Populations and Global Female Diaspora Trends: 1856-1921
Note: Table is derived from a variety of sources, most of which are ultimately derived from Colonial Census data, historic newspapers and select works outlined in the Bibliography.
•Chinese female Diaspora figures for the West Indies and British Guiana including Trinidad, Jamaica, British Honduras and Antigua are difficult to locate and the figures with the asterix denote the number of Chinese males introduced into the British Caribbean only.; David Chuenyan Lai, Chinatowns: Towns
Within Cities in Canada, University of British Columbia Press, Vancouver 1988, p. 26
Diaspora
Australia
New Zealand
British Columbia
United States of America
(San Francisco and California)
Hawaii
British Caribbean
(West Indies)
South Africa
(Natal, Cape and Transvaal
Provinces)
Britain
Year
Chinese women
Chinese men
% Per Male population
Year
Chinese women
Chinese men
% Per Male population
Year
Chinese women
Chinese men
% Per Male population
Year
Chinese women
Chinese men
% Per Male population
Year
Chinese women
Chinese men
% Per Male population
Year
Chinese women
Chinese men
% Per Male population
Year
Chinese women
Chinese men
% Per Male population
Year
Chinese women
Chinese men
% Per Male population
1856
9
25,421
0.03%
1856
--
--
--
1856
--
--
--
1856
--
--
--
1856
--
--
--
1852-3
--
2,107*
--
1856
--
--
--
1856
--
--
--
1861
11
38,247
0.03%
1867
6
1,213
.50%
1861
--
--
--
1861
1,784
33,149
9.20%
1866
110
1,196
9.19%
1858-60
--
6008*
--
1861
--
--
--
1861
--
78
--
1871
44
28,507
0.15%
1871
4
2,637
.15%
1871
30
181
16.50%
1870
4,566
58,633
3.44%
1872
107
1,937
5.52%
1871
123
311
40%
1871
--
--
--
1871
--
--
--
1881
259
28,274
2.05%
1881
9
4995
0.18%
1881
124
4,030
--
1880
4,779
100,686
4.75%
1884
871
17,383
5.01%
1884
--
680*
--
1881
--
--
--
1881
--
224
--
1891
298
35,523
0.27%
1891
18
4426
.40%
1891
--
9,129
--
1890
3,868
103,620
3.73%
1890
1,090
16,367
6.66%
1891
--
--
--
1892
--
--
--
1892
--
767
--
1901
474
29,153
0.92%
1901
78
2,885
2.70%
1901
--
17,312
--
1900
4,522
85,341
5.30%
1900
3,466
22, 301
15.54%
1901
--
--
--
1904
23
2434
0.94%
1901
--
387
--
1911
897
21,856
4.10%
1911
88
2,542
3.46%
1911
253
3,205
7.90%
1910
4,675
66,856
6.99%
1910
4,526
17,239
26.25%
1911
--
--
--
1911
35
1870
1.87%
1911
--
1,120
--
1921
1146
16,011
7.15%
1921
273
2993
9.12%
1921
2,424
37,163
6.52%
1920
7,748
53,891
14.38%
1920
7,310
16,197
45.13%
1921
--
--
--
1921
341
1487
22.93%
1920
262
2,157
12.14%
Australian Colonial Chinese Populations and Global Female Diaspora Trends: 1856-1921
176
Recent studies by historians have revealed that Chinese women who migrated to California were
varied in age as well as purpose. They included women who migrated as bonded girls, mui tsai;
purchased and kidnapped women; and second wives, who were selected to migrate to San
Francisco and California generally to live with their husbands, act as companions, carry out
servant duties or work as “prostitutes”.633 The human trafficking of Chinese girls and women in
mid-19th century U.S.A. has been explored by researchers including Adam McKeown,634 George
Peffer,635Huping Ling,636 and Elizabeth Sinn.637 San Francisco statistics from the 1870 census
indicate that up to 71% registered Chinese women in California were women brought over by
both Chinese men and women to work as “prostitutes” in an organised and systematic way.
However, it is argued by Peffer that the original statistics were flawed and the percentage of
women working as “prostitutes” is possibly inflated.638 What remains evident is that young girls
and women were purchased or stolen from poor families in China for the purpose of sexual
exploitation, which provoked moral outrage amongst White members of the public, resulting in
the laws passed to restrict the entry of women into the United States. The enactment of the Page
Law saw the female population figure, mostly working as “prostitutes”, decline to 21% by
1880.639
Unlike the experiences of many women to the United States and West Indies, as unwilling
participants in the Diaspora, there is no evidence to suggest that Chinese women were kidnapped
or selected to work as “prostitutes” in the colonies across Australasia or the extended Pacific
region. Instead, the pattern of experience by Chinese women in Australia and in particular
Queensland, was seated in the “two primary wife” model. Why, then, was the Chinese female
experience to California based on prostitution, while the Chinese female experience to the
colonies of Australasia not?
There are two reasons which may explain this major difference in migration experience. Firstly,
the geographical proximity of Australia to Hong Kong and China meant that men in Victoria, New
South Wales and Queensland could more readily return back to the village and ancestral home
633 Sinn, “Bound for California”.
634McKeown, “Transnational Families”, 73
635 George Peffer, If They Don’t Bring Their Women Here: Chinese Female Immigration Before Exclusion (University of Illinois Press,
Champaign, 1999).
636Huping Ling, Surviving on the Gold Mountain: A history of Chinese American Women and their lives (State University of New
York Press,1998).
637Sinn, “Bound for California”.
638 K. Scott Wong, [Review of] “George Peffer, If They Don’t Bring Their Women Here: Chinese Female Immigration Before
Exclusion”, Journal of American Ethnic History, 20, 1 (Fall, 2000): 102.Peffer argues the White American census collectors could not
speak the language, and were hostile and ignorant of cultural practices. He concluded their census interpretation did little to allay moral
paranoia or entrenched antagonistic views towards Chinese women.
639McKeown, “Transnational Families”, 73
177
than their counterparts in the United States. This in itself was a huge benefit to the transnational
family, which expanded and grew solid networks across the Asia Pacific Rim region through a
combination of marriage to non-Chinese women, both White and Indigenous.
Secondly, many Chinese women who migrated to California did so under conditions of coercion
and deceit, or were treated as goods and chattels by predatory agents, or were used as a
commodity for economic gain through prostitution and wife selling practices. These women and
girls procured in Hong Kong and China came from a section of the female community which was
already regarded as having little or low social value. It didn’t matter if they were unable to return
to China, and they had little future prospects as a second or third wife due to their low social
status. In contrast, the colonies of Australia with their close proximity to China were able to
attract a higher status Chinese woman, as village-based families carefully selected Second Wives
to send to overseas Chinese men for the express purpose of creating family wealth in the new
country. Female Chinese migration to the colonies of Australia enriched the Chinese male
community and brought new opportunities for the village family.640
***
Part 3: National Trends
Australian Colonies: Victoria and New South Wales
The Chinese Female Diaspora to Australia commenced with the gold rushes in the colonies of
Victoria and New South Wales after 1851. By 1856, both colonies of Victoria and New South
Wales recorded the presence of Chinese women, Victoria with 3 women and New South Wales, 6
women. Five years later the first Chinese female was recorded in Queensland.
For twenty years, the three colonies of Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland were
recipients of an influx of Chinese men and a small percentage of women and bonded servant
girls.641 It wasn’t until after 1881 that other colonies such as Tasmania, Western Australia, and
South Australia including the area it administered as the Northern Territory, attracted any Chinese
women with both Western Australia and South Australia attracting the fewest arrivals with one
640 Choi, Chinese Migration and Settlement in Australia, 9.
641Illustrated Australian News for Home Readers, 5 October 1868, p. 5. From the beginning, immigrating wives were accompanied to
Victoria by young girls who may have been muitsai. This interpretation is borne out by a report by William Young for the Victorian
Parliament whereby he notes “There are not more than a dozen native women in this colony, and some of these are not wives but
servants.”
178
each in 1881. Northern Territory, with the commercial centre of Port Darwin, a major gold field at
Pine Creek and close proximity to the British port and distribution node Hong Kong, was the
fourth most populous colony for Chinese women after Queensland. The Northern Territory, with
its similar history of pastoralism and mining, provides a valuable comparison to north Queensland,
yet the number of Chinese women to the Northern Territory never quite reached the same
numbers as Queensland, probably because agriculture there was negligible. Despite this, distinct
relationships developed across the two regions, through Chinese families living in Port Darwin,
Thursday Island and port towns of north Queensland. These relationships intertwined cultural
traditions and marriage practices extending to migration and intermarriage patterns, the
procurement of mui tsai help through Chinese “adoption” practices, and even foot binding.
The collection and verification of statistical data for Chinese female immigration figures for the
Australian colonies between 1850 and Federation is problematic at best. Colonial records for
counting Chinese female members of the community are often inaccurate, contain anomalies such
as inclusion of Australian born daughters in the Chinese female tally, or vary when re-stated in
newspapers. While all efforts have been made to ensure the data is accurate, these figures are
presented as a best estimate only to provide representative statistical figures for what was
occurring in the colonies. The figures provided in Table 2, a snapshot of each colony at 10 year
intervals, are mostly derived from the 1925 Commonwealth population statistics, but I have also
made one or two corrections from colonial statistics which I feel are more accurate for the time.
In the period 1856 -1921 the sum total of the data and resulting percentages in various locations
for Chinese female immigration shows that New South Wales attracted the most at 32%, followed
closely by Victoria at 29%, and Queensland at 25%. With only a 7% margin between New South
Wales and Queensland, it is clear that the northern State was an important family migration
destination. (See Table 4. p. 179)
179
COLONY
Q u e e n s l a n d V i c t o r i a New South Wales W e s t e r n A u s t r a l i a Northern Territory
S o u t h A u s t r a l i a
T a s m a n i a C o l o n i a l T o t a l s
Year
Chinese women
Chinese men
% Per Male
population
Chinese women
Chinese men
% Per Male
population
Chinese women
Chinese men
% Per Male
population
Chinese women
Chinese men
% Per Male
population
Chinese women
Chinese men
% Per Male
population
Chinese women
Chinese men
% Per Male
population
Chinese women
Chinese men
% Per Male
population
Chinese women
Chinese men
% Per Male
population
1856 - - - - - - 3 25,421 .01% 6 2 7 0 2.22% - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 9 25, 691 .03%
1861 1 5 3 7 0.19% 8 24,724 0.03% 2 12,986 0.02% - - 2 0 - - - - - - - - - - 4 0 - - - - 3 0 - - 1 1 38,247 .02%
1871 * 1 3,304 0.03% 3 1 17,795 0.17% 1 2 7,208 0.17% - - - - - - - - 2 0 0 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 4 4 28,307 .15%
1881 2 3 11,206 2.05% 1 6 4 11,869 1.38% 6 4 10,141 0.06% 1 1 4 4 .69% 4 3,800 0.11%
1
3 4 6
.29% 2 8 4 2 0.24% 2 5 9 28,274 .91%
1891 2 2 7,978 0.27% 1 3 4 8,355 1.60% 1 0 9 13,048 0.84% 3 9 1 4 0.55% 1 5 3,598 1.72%
2
1 8 0
1.11% 8 9 3 1 .86% 2 9 8 35,523 .84%
1901 1 9 2 8,783 2.17% 1 1 1 6,236 1.78% 1 5 9 10,063 1.58% 1 8 1,503 1.24% 1 1 0 2,962 3.71%
1 7
2 7 0
6.30% 2 4 4 8 2 4.97% 4 7 4 29,153 1.6%
1911 2 1 2 5,783 3.66% 2 1 6 4,707 4.59% 2 8 4 7,942 3.56% 3 7 1,775 3.15% 1 0 7 1,224 8.74%
1 4
2 4 1
5.80% 2 7 4 0 0 6.75% 8 9 7 21,856 4.10%
1921 3 4 0 3,806 8.93% 2 4 4 3,162 7.71% 3 7 9 6,903 5.49% 1,278** 4 7 2719.0% 1 1 3 6 0 9 18.55%
8
2 7 3
2.93% 1 5 2 4 7 2.02% 1,146 16,011 7.15%
Table. 4. Colonial Chinese Populations: Percentage ratio Women to Men: 1856-1921
NOTE: This table is derived from a variety of sources, most of which come from either Commonwealth or Colonial Census data, academic theses, newspapers and year books. The
figures are difficult to accurately interpret as it is not always clear when figures are inclusive of China born immigrants only or as a composite which includes Australian-born children
in the household. The figures are best estimates from reliable sources and represent China-born men and women only.
Colonial Chinese Populations: Percentage ratio Women to Men: 1856-1921
180
South Australia, Northern Territory, Western Australia, Tasmania
The Northern Territory, with its small but thriving Chinese community in Darwin, was the fourth
most populous community of Chinese women at 11%, despite migration starting 26 years after the
intake of the three East coast colonies. Both Tasmania and South Australia at 1% and 2%
respectively indicate that these southern colonies were unable to attract large scale female
migration, despite Tasmania having a strong mining industry and South Australia, agriculture and
pastoralism; this mirrored the experience of the male Diaspora. Both colonies recorded an overall
intake of fewer men and women than the male Chinese immigration figures for Victoria, New
South Wales and Queensland. For Tasmania, this may be attributed to small scale tin and gold
mining being the only attractions when compared with the major gold rushes of Victoria, NSW
and Queensland. Western Australia is difficult to rationalise for its figures. It is clear that the
practice of including Australian born daughters in annual census figures was an ongoing statistical
practice when it came to census collection in Western Australia. Figures in 1901 for the census
return for the Commonwealth make no delineation between age and family of women or men,
with 18 women recorded for 1503 men.642 This skewed the data and led to a whopping apparent
increase of 1241 women in the ten years between 1911 (recording 37 women) and 1921
(recording 1278 women). Due to this large anomaly they have not been included the colonial
comparison graph below, as it distorts the statistical outcomes. However, it can be confidently
stated that the Western Australian pattern of Chinese female immigration ran parallel to the
Chinese female migration intake in Tasmania. (See Fig.44 p.181)
642 NAA: PP131/1 1903/262, Census return: Coloured Aliens in the Commonwealth: WA.
181
Fig. 44. Snapshot of Colonial Chinese Female Population 1856-1921
Districts of Origin
Unlike the Chinese women of north Queensland who predominantly came from Zhongshan
(Chung Shan) district of Guangdong province, migrant Chinese women and girls arriving in
Victoria and New South Wales emigrated predominantly from Sze Yap or Sam Yap speaking
regions including Taishan (Toishan), along with a smaller number of Hakka speaking women.
Both Melbourne and Sydney had large Sze Yap communities and erected community
infrastructure including Temples and meeting halls as well as forming tongs to support incoming
migrants.643 With the fears of an increasing influx of Chinese miners and the threat to economic
and labour opportunities of Whites by Chinese workers, successive colonial and Commonwealth
governments introduced legislation to inhibit immigration. These laws also affected Chinese
women and family unification. When combined with a cultural reluctance within China against
disrupting the filial family structure and the close proximity allowing men to return home to the
village, it was inevitable that female Chinese migration to the colonies of Australia would always
be small, particularly when compared to the robust and active migration schemes which applied to
White women.
643 See works by Kate Bagnall, Pauline Rule, Paul Macgregor, Sophie Couchman, Keir Reeves, Val Lovejoy and Janice Wilton.
182
Prior to Federation, Chinese women in the community barely reached 1.6% of the total Chinese
population across all colonies. The introduction of the Commonwealth Immigration Restriction
Act 1901 and in particular the positive measures introduced in clause 3m of the Act escalated the
intake number in every colonial state briefly in 1901, with the exception of Victoria. Consistently
since 1856 and up to Federation, more Chinese women had immigrated and joined their husbands
in Victoria than in any other colony, with a peak notable in the 1880s of 164 women, but which
declined every decade after. Just why Victoria reversed its trend when other states were
increasing is unknown. What is known is that Commonwealth Immigration Restriction Act 1901
opened the door for family unification, albeit for a very brief period.
On average, colonies saw a fivefold increase in the number of women entering the colonies to join
their husbands between 1901 and 1911. In the case of Queensland, Western Australia, the
Northern Territory and South Australia it was up to eight times the pre-Federation figures. In
contrast, there was a steady decline in the Chinese male population prior to and around Federation,
with four of the seven colonies recording a decrease in the male population and only Queensland,
Western Australia and South Australia showing a modest increase. This indicated that Chinese
immigration was already on the wane and that restrictive laws were working. There was a delayed
response in both Western Australia due to the attraction of new goldfields and the pearl-shelling
industry, and north Queensland due to the large-scale Chinese investment in the banana, maize
and sugar industries. However, by 1911 that was on the wane, and both colonies reflected the
general negative growth around the Commonwealth within the male Chinese population.
What was increasing in the three most populous States of the Commonwealth, Victoria, NSW and
Queensland, was the ratio of Chinese women to men. By 1921, Queensland had the highest female
to male gender ratio, consisting of 8.93% Chinese females in the general Chinese population.
There were 340 Chinese women living across the State with the majority in the north. This
provides more evidence that north Queensland was a significant host destination for the Chinese
Female Diaspora.
***
183
Queensland Trends
Immigrant Chinese women who settled in north Queensland 1860-1920 originated from
Guangdong province in the Southern Pearl Delta region of China.644 There were strong family
connections with Zhongshan, Guangzhou and Taishan districts as well as neighbouring Hong
Kong. In many cases, women from Zhongshan (Chung Shan) spoke the distinct dialect of Loong
Du or Liang Du, with a smaller number of women coming from the Four Districts of Taishan,
Xinhui, Kaiping and Enping (Toishan, Sunwei, Hoiping and Yangping), speaking Sze Yap, or
Sam Yap, as well as some who spoke Hakka.645In Chung Shan, the small district of Loong Du
had natal village links with Liang Du, and both districts are well represented among the
descendant families who still speak this dialect in north Queensland today. When they first
arrived from Zhongshan, women from Loong Du district were unable to understand women from
the Taishan region but could understand, due to kinship and other alliances, women from Liang
Du. This serves to illustrate that emigrating Chinese women were not one homogenous group, a
fact which later had bearing on community relations.646
Fig. 45. Natal Districts: Guangdong Province: Chinese Females to NQ: 1860-1920647
644 This is based on analysis of kinship links and descendant family trends throughout north Queensland from over 50 oral history
interviews.
645Robb, “Out of Sight, Out of Mind”, 205
646 Interview with Vincent Lee, Cairns, 9 May 2002. Geographically located across the Pearl River from each other, the two districts
developed friendly relations involving political, clan and marriage lines. Villages on the river in Liang Du received wives from villages
of Loong Du and vice versa. While village men were not as conversant in multiple dialects and spoke village-specific dialects from
birth, by the very act of marriage, women often spoke and continued to speak two dialects. This ensured continuity of the clan alliance
system, as the daughter would be already well versed in her husbands-to-be's dialect if she married back into her mother's natal
village across the river. In turn she was the linguistic bridge builder for future marital unions, often speaking her natal dialect to her
female friends and children and speaking her new clan dialect to her husband and father-in-law. In north Queensland many families
were raised speaking both Loong Du and Cantonese with the primary dialect at home being Loong Du. This may indicate a propensity
for the new wife to speak her husband's dialect in her new Queensland clan home.
647 Death: Dying, Funerals, and Cemeteries in North America, Chinese in Northwest America Research Committee
http://www.cinarc.org/Death.html
Chungshan aka
Zhongshan
Four Districts
Three Districts
184
The first Chinese woman to immigrate to Queensland was recorded in 1861, just three years
after the colony of Victoria and approximately eight years after the first of many Chinese women
arrived on the west coast of the U.S. Early records indicate that she lived on the eastern edge
of the Southern Darling Downs town of Ipswich, a rural settlement situated on the eastern
edge of the pastoral belt of the Darling Downs and near the emerging port city of Brisbane.648
By 1868, eight women had arrived including three at Brisbane, two at Nanango, one in
Rockhampton, one in Bowen and one in Townsville.649 This represented 8 females to 2621
Chinese males or .3% of the Chinese population (1 woman to every 328 men). In 1876, an
upturn of mining activity in the Northern and Central goldfields saw an influx of Chinese
men to the colony. In the 1876 census thirteen Chinese women were recorded, including one
each in Brisbane and Enoggera, one each in Ipswich, Warwick and the Darling Downs, two
in the Central Region including Gladstone and Rockhampton, and six in the Northern Region
including Mackay, Townsville and Somerset, which each had one woman, and three located
in Cooktown, the emerging port for the Palmer goldfield.
North Queensland
The importance of north Queensland from 1876 as a destination for Chinese migrant settlers
is evident when the north accounted for 46% of the Chinese female population for the year
1876 with the pastoral districts of the Southern Region attracting 23%, Brisbane and district
16% and Central Region at 15%. The development of the Northern Region through the
Palmer Goldfield rush, development of port towns Mackay, Townsville, and Cooktown and
rapid expansion of agricultural regions, attracted Chinese men with a view to supplying
goods and services or establishing businesses through kinship partnerships. These men were
transnational capitalists, taking advantage of emerging business opportunities with the full
security of kinship and business links behind them to other colonies and across the Pacific.650
Merchant men displayed their wealth and importance to other men in the Chinese community
through the importation and presence of a second wife, and her status in the Chinese
community was high among the female population. Her very presence signalled success
648QVP, 1872 Vol. I, Numbers of Chinese, Polynesian, Prisoners, Lunatics and Inmates of Charitable Institutions in Electorates, and by
Census Districts, Part II Table XXI: 1113.
649QVP, 1869 Vol. II, “Third Census of the Colony of Queensland Taken 1868”.
650Rains, Intersections, 388 and 389. Rains discusses in full the network, partnership and transnational linkages between the firm Wing
On and Co., a prominent business in Cooktown, and key early Chinese settlers and settler families.
185
among men with her husband’s economic ability on display as he supported his “two primary
wife” transnational family. He was likely to be a powerful community leader.
North Queensland’s Chinese male population in 1876 constituted 97% of the total colonial
Chinese population or 8162 individuals compared with Central, 64, Southern, 110, and
Brisbane, which had 57 Chinese men recorded in the census. With a total figure of 13
women to 10,399 men, the gender ratio of women to men across the colony was 0.125% or
one woman for every 799 men.
Brisbane
16%
Southern
23%
Central
15%
Northern
46%
Census: Chinese women in
Queensland - 1876
Brisbane
1%
Southern
1%
Central
1%
Northern
97%
Census: Chinese men in Queensland -
1876
Fig. 46. Census Snapshot: Chinese Women in Queensland: 1876
Fig. 47. Census Snapshot: Chinese Men in Queensland: 1876
By 1886, the Chinese male population had remained relatively static at 10,388, but the
overall percentage of women had changed to .54% or one woman for approximately every
187 men. Of the 56 women over 18 years of age counted in the colony, nearly half resided in
the north. The high incidence of women located in the north is attributed to the stable
communities which had formed, associated with mining and with large scale agriculture
which was becoming well established.
By 1891, the number of Chinese women above 15 years of age had decreased in the colony,
leaving the female Chinese population at 22, mostly in the north. By 1901, due to stable
economic conditions in north Queensland and the promise of more relaxed immigration
conditions with Federation, the Chinese female figures had jumped considerably, to 11.45%.
186
This means that there were 8,783 men and a total of 192 Chinese women who were of
marriageable age (above 15 years) with a little less than half of these in north Queensland.
By 1901 there were approximately 83 Chinese women residing across north Queensland out of
192 Chinese women across the whole colony of Queensland. This represented a peak of 2.17%,
or one Chinese female to every 45 males.651 After Federation, the Commonwealth
Government became responsible for census collection resulting in specific regional data
pertaining to north Queensland becoming difficult to locate or skewed by the possibility that
Australian born daughters were lumped into the female statistics.652
***
State Distribution:
Between 1860 and 1920 there were 146 marriages between China-born wives and Chinese
husbands which accounted for 13% of all marriages, including those with non-Chinese women,
White and Aboriginal.653 Of these China-born couples, 57% lived in north Queensland compared
to 14% in Brisbane, 6% in Southern Region and 7% in Central Region. The location of 23
Chinese women, or 16% of those living in Queensland, has yet to be identified. Excluding these
unknowns, the majority of Chinese women, 68%, are identified as living across north
Queensland. The larger percentage found in marriage analysis is consistent with census data
statistics previously discussed.
651 Census figures of population data inQVP: Years 1861, 1871, 1876, 1886, 1891, 1901.
652QVP, Vol. II, 1877, “Registrar-General’s Report: Statistics of Colony for 1876”: 326-327; “Statistics of Colony”, 1876, pp. 326-327.
North Queensland census collection was traditionally difficult, even dangerous to undertake especially on the goldfields or in remote
regions. The population was transient, roads and transport difficult and White collectors were hampered by language difficulties when
counting Chinese participants. In addition, Chinese women, accompanying girls, and children remained in doors in the private quarters,
out of sight from the broader predominantly male community and so could go unnoticed. Population data was unreliable and, in an
effort, to secure a more accurate return, the government engaged Chinese census collectors for the 1876 Census in the Palmer, Cook
and South Kennedy districts at 35-40 shillings a day, taking in the Palmer Goldfield, Somerset, and Cooktown.
653 This figure is based on my personal database collected from Birth Deaths Marriages and other sources.
187
Fig.48. Regional identification: Locations known: Chinese Women 1860-1920
Chinese women who arrived in Queensland entered by one of three ways: either married to a
husband before he left China and emigrated with him (or later joined him); married by proxy
while he remained in Queensland and subsequently sent to him by his family; or sent to him and
was married upon arrival, in either a Christian or Register ceremony. The propensity to marry in
a Colonial based register or church-based ceremony instead of a traditional Chinese ceremony
was nearly equal to traditional marriages within the seventy-year period. Over all, there were 82
women who arrived in Queensland who were already married by traditional Chinese custom
prior to emigration. This compares to 60 women who had a marriage in Queensland upon arrival.
The prevalence of Christian or Western marriages began to emerge from the 1880s and steadily
increased until Federation and into the decade beyond. The majority of Queensland legal
marriages occurred in north Queensland.
The population increase of Chinese women in Queensland is evident post Federation, 1901 to
1910. The relaxation of immigration requirements noted above enabled the merchant class to
bring out a bride. Both Brisbane and north Queensland saw an increase in arrivals. However, the
data also reveals that there was an increase in Queensland legal marriages under The Marriage
Act 1864 over China based ones. This could be explained through three reasons. Firstly,
Christianity was well established in China by 1900 and a Christian wedding in Queensland may
indicate a natural change of marriage practices by Chinese citizens. Secondly, a wedding was a
joyous occasion for the community. A wedding provided an occasion for public celebration, and
a Christian wedding was more accessible than a traditional ceremony. Thirdly, a legal marriage
188
in Queensland was a strategic measure taken to enable other processes to occur. This included the
perception of assimilation in the eyes of the broader community, to elevate a community or
commercial status, or to provide an all-important verification of identity in an environment where
suspicions against Chinese individuals and families was rising in regards to fraudulent entry into
the Commonwealth. Certainly, there were strategic advantages to legally marrying in Queensland
which extended to Australian Born Children.
The Queensland marriage certificate provided an effective tool to assist in any application for
naturalisation prior to 1900. Proof of marriage was a condition of naturalisation and a China
based marriage, which did not generate a paper document, remained inadequate for official
colonial assessment purposes. Of the 142 men with China born wives living in Queensland, 60
were legally married under The Marriage Act 1864. Just over half of these men (34) are
identified as also having taken the Oath of Allegiance, usually within the first year of marriage,
and becoming naturalised British subjects.654 Of the 82 men who had a China based traditional
cultural marriage, only 12 had taken out the Oath of Allegiance and applied for naturalisation.
Fig. 49. Chinese Women: Marriage Patterns: 1860-1920
654 Thirty-four men married to Chinese women in Queensland were identified as having taken the Oath of Allegiance and become
naturalised out of the 60 identifiable marriages entered into Births, Deaths and Marriages registers under The Marriage Act 1864.
189
The link between the decision to legally marry under the Marriage Act and taking out
naturalisation, is unquestionable as a strategy employed by families to maximise opportunity and
elevate status in the colonial environment. Naturalisation enabled Chinese men to purchase land
and create wealth as well as be regarded along with their families as British subjects. This
enabled family transmigration between Queensland and China for filial and educational purposes
to occur smoothly and assisted with re-entry back into the colony. However, after 1901, the
ability to naturalise was prevented by a new Commonwealth policy which refused naturalisation
to Chinese applicants. Those who were already naturalised, had their certificates repealed in
favour of the new system, the Certificate of Exemption to the Dictation Test. The dictation test
could be applied to anyone trying to immigrate but was specifically targeting non-White groups
for exclusion, and returning Chinese could be caught up in it. This particularly affected Chinese
settler women and families and made re-entry difficult and often humiliating, as families went to
extraordinary lengths to prove identity. This was, of course, part of the White Australia Policy.
The Immigration Restriction Act 1901 was one of the first pieces of Commonwealth legislation
passed following Federation. The overall aim of this and other related legislation was to limit
non-White immigration to Australia, particularly Asian immigration, and thereby preserve the
dominance of a White British society. This, and related legislation, became known as the White
Australia Policy. Restrictions on China-born women and Australian born Chinese children under
this legislation were stringently applied by the authorities. The implication of the restrictions
combined with the potential of a refusal for re-entry into Queensland may have prompted a
greater emphasis on the marriage certificate to authenticate identity. This would account for the
spike in legal Western-style marriages 1901-1909. The marriage certificate along with birth
certificates and references from leading White citizens became crucial for women and families
visiting China in the early to mid-20th century, where every re-entry to Australia was examined
closely. Women who had lived in the colony but had been married in a traditional cultural
ceremony in China, found it increasingly difficult to establish identity through marriage as no
certificate from China could be produced for scrutiny by increasingly zealous Customs officers.
***
Part 4 :
China- born Chinese Family Landscape: North Queensland
Chinese women who journeyed to north Queensland shared many characteristics. This included
age, status and circumstance. Chinese women migrants were very young, between 15 and 20
190
years old, contracted for marriage usually as a Second Wife, sent from China, sometimes on
their own or accompanied by a child servant or someone with a kinship relationship, and sent
to marry men who they had never met or did not know. In most cases the husband to be was
substantially older, had spent a long period overseas, and paid off his debts: he had proven
himself to be financially secure. The delayed period for marriage meant that the average age
of the majority of men in north Queensland upon marriage was 43 years old.655 This meant
that communities where Chinese women were located in north Queensland experienced both a
gender as well as age imbalance in the 19th century and this did not level out until the 20th
century.
When they arrived, most Chinese immigrant women remained hidden in the private quarters of
the family business, venturing out rarely, such as when public events required a presence. This is
the case when the Chinese wives entertained Lady Chermside in 1903 when her husband,
Queensland’s Governor General, visited Cairns.656 Some Chinese wives were required to work in
their husbands’ businesses but normally they were protected from the unfamiliar and rough
colonial environment by husbands on whom they relied for everything.657 The successful arrival
of children (particularly sons) meant that a wife had fulfilled her conjugal duties, and more
importantly secured the extended transnational family as an asset to the ancestral lineage. In a
number of cases the whole community rejoiced for the couple, who often laid on a large banquet
or spread.658 Conversely, if tragedy followed a birth, the whole community mourned the loss of
the child.659
“Two Primary Wife Family”
The actual percentage of First Wives who were allowed to migrate to Queensland to join their
husbands is difficult to quantify and there is sufficient anecdotal evidence to suggest that the
majority of women over the whole period were Second Wives in the Chinese order of marriage,
First wife nearly always remaining in China.660 However, there least three instances where
families or individuals took action which resulted in young Chinese women becoming First
Wives under what would have been regarded as unusual Chinese marriage circumstances. The
655Average estimate, taken from sample study using oral history accounts, dates on immigration records, and dates on death certificates
or marriage records.
656Morning Post, 12 June 1903, p. 7.
657 This is the case for Mrs. Quong Hing in Cooktown and Ah Bow on Thursday Island.
658 “Banquet by Willie Ming”, Morning Post, 16 October 1900, p. 3.
659Morning Post, 26 October 1900, p. 3; QBDM-DR-MF 1900 C805 Herbert Low Key Ming, child of Willie Ming andYuen Day.
660 NAA: J3115/ 55/1902. Chung Chang for example married twice, once to Chang Lime in 1879 and to Wong Hae in 1887.
191
first situation occurred when a young bonded servant was abused by her family. In this case a
leading storekeeper was implored by other men in the Chinese community to pay her bond and
marry her for protection. This was duly undertaken, making her among the earliest, and perhaps
the first, First Wife married on Queensland soil.661
The second marriage arose when a son refused to return to China to marry. His family constantly
wrote to him over an extended period imploring him to return home, saying “to have amassed
great wealth and not to return home is comparable to walking in magnificent clothes at night”.
After all efforts to pressure him to return “home” failed, his family arranged a marriage with the
daughter of an appropriate family and the girl was married to her overseas husband by proxy662
on 14 January 1897. She was sent to him in Geraldton, north Queensland.663
The third situation occurred when a former bonded servant, Mui tsai, living with her family in
Cairns was married off to a Chinese settler man when she reached the age of 16 years. This
indicates that a transferral of cultural tradition, i.e. marrying off young servant women at the age
of 16, was maintained in the colony and that her social value or worth in status as a servant was
maintained through the marriage, as he was a gardener.664 However, in both the first and last
examples, social status for both women was increased substantially as both gained legitimate
status as “First Wives” in the community.
The selection and marriage of a Second Wife to an overseas Chinese man provided a neat and
sustainable solution for families who could afford it. Having a Second Wife meant that balance
and harmony could be maintained in the ancestral home, which in turn enabled overseas men to
maintain their filial duties while increasing their wealth elsewhere. Transnational polygamy or
the maintenance of “two primary wives” was a development directly attributed to the Chinese
Diaspora and practiced across the globe.665
661 Darryl Low Choy, The Quintessentially Assimilated: Darryl Low Choy’s Story. Unpublished manuscript, un-paginated, 2001.
662Taam, My Life and Work, 38-41 and Burkhardt., Chinese Creeds and Customs, 106. This principally occurred when the husband
was abroad, and the bride was then sent over to him. In some areas objections were raised if another man stood in for the bridegroom
as the "proxy". Instead, a rooster was used as the substitute with the bride referred to as a "Chicken Bride".
663 Interview with Bill Sue Yek, Innisfail, 29 July 2002. Geraldton later became known as Innisfail. Having migrated to north
Queensland during the Palmer gold rush and subsequently moved to Geraldton looking for an easier way to make money, Taam Sze
Pui consistently refused to return home to get married. Chiu Chan Han was around 17 years old when married, whenTaam was 43. An
intelligent woman, she readily understood the English that her husband taught her and was well liked. In particular Taam’s English
customers liked her and she took over the running of the ladies’ dresses and piece goods in his store. As a result that side of the
business flourished and her presence helped build up the mercantile business.
664 Pers. Comm., Norma King Koi, 6 September 2002.
665McKeown, “Transnational Chinese”, 98-99.
192
The “two primary wife” or transnational polygamous family had several benefits. If managed
well, both families could benefit from kinship and family networking and trade arrangements
between them. On one hand, sons born in Queensland could be sent to the ancestral home,
usually when between the ages of 4 and 10 years, for a Chinese education.666On the other hand,
sons from the First wife in the ancestral home could be sent to their father’s household in
Queensland to learn the family business.667 It is not known how many China based families sent
their sons to Queensland to take over their fathers’ businesses, but the practice continued well
into the mid-20th century.668
While the establishment and maintenance of a “two primary wife” family provided a solution for
Chinese families, the selection and setting up of a Second wife away from the ancestral home had
other unintended consequences which impacted on the established female structures within the
traditional family.
Tensions appear to have emerged between the “two primary wives”, which may account for the
reluctance by some Queensland based Chinese women to return to China. Due to the
geographical separation from the primary ancestral home, the Second Wife was afforded much
freedom which she otherwise would not have experienced. That is, she was free from scrutiny by
her mother-in-law as well as First Wife. This freedom challenged the strict female hierarchy
which ran the natal home and its production of sons. As a woman’s status grew in the overseas
home she may have regarded herself as a First Wife for all intent and purposes, with any tension
amplified through her greater access to the shared husband, or the production of healthy children.
669 A shift in the female hierarchy as a result of the “two primary wife” situation would not have
gone unnoticed by women living in the ancestral home. For example, the second marriage would
not have been recognized as a legitimate marriage, leaving it difficult for the returning wife when
she re-entered the ancestral home to live.
666NAA: J3136, 1906/309 James Yee Tong. For example, the son of Yee Tong of Georgetown was sent home in 1906 and did not
return until November 1927, having undertaken his education in China.
667 NAA: J3115, 100. Correspondence relating to a Certificate of Domicile for Fat Kee and family, re-entering the Commonwealth.
This includes Certificate of Domicile for Fat Kee and photographs of Fat Kee, his second wife Li Ha (first wife was Ha Kam) and
children Lau Un, Lau Kiu and Tsoi Wing. The family entered Cooktown from Hong Kong. See also NAA: A9, A1902/69/65, titled
[The persistent and successful application from] Fat Kee [to bring wife and family from China]: Fat Kee from Cooktown took the
opportunity of a visit back to Hong Kong not only to visit Ha Kam, his First wife, but to also marry a second wife,Leu See, who
travelled back to Cooktown with him along with his three young adult children, Lau Un (18), Lau Kiu (16) and Tsoi Wing (12). See
NAA BP384/9 Birth Certificate Register - Chinese, Book 1 and NAA BP384/9 Birth Certificate Register - Chinese, Book 2.
668Robb, Heritage Assessment of Willie Mar Snr (Mar Way) and Willie Mar Jnr (Mar Yen Shoo) Garden, unpublished report for
Winton Shire Council, 2008: 10-11
669This freedom was also experienced in the U.S. where Huping Ling notes that women were able to rise above the traditional female
head of the household, enabling greater autonomy for the overseas woman. See Ling, “Family and Marriage”, 50-51
193
However, it was not just during the lifetime of a husband that managing a “two primary wife”
household became difficult for families both in the ancestral home and abroad. The death of a
husband meant that complex probate arrangements had to be negotiated between the China based
First Wife and north Queensland based Second Wife for the distribution of assets. An example
of this struggle can be seen in the relationship between two primary wives, one living in Hong
Kong, the other on Thursday Island. Second Wife in particular challenged her traditional place in
the Confucian family structure, having risen from humble beginnings. Tensions and difficulties
began to emerge between the two families after their husband died.670 Prior to his death he had
made out a Will. However, it was made in Queensland, on Thursday Island, and his action in
itself demonstrates a cultural shift in thinking towards asset distribution. By all rights under
traditional Chinese marriage law, he should have left his property and wealth to First Wife and
her sons in the ancestral home in China, as it was her role and expectation to administer a
husband’s estate as part of her filial duty to the family. Instead, he appointed his Second Wife as
sole executrix, and bequeathed her all his estate, a move which pitted the families against each
other and resulted in a lengthy court battle. It ended with Second Wife being awarded her
husband’s estate. This not only vindicated her legal position as a First Wife in the “two primary
wife” system, but also demonstrates the final shift in female hierarchy from a subordinate
position to matriarch of the family. This example emphasises the benefits that some women
achieved through migration to north Queensland, particularly as this woman started in life as a
bonded child servant.671
Chinese law and legal requirements for the distribution of assets of a deceased estate in a “two
primary wife” transnational family, is outside the scope of this thesis, but is an area which would
benefit from future investigation. It would shed light on the rights of wives and sons as recipients
of assets, particularly assets divided between the women living under British common law
jurisdiction including both Queensland and Hong Kong, versus traditional Chinese customary
law.672
670Interview with Mrs. Mabel Garvey, 26 June 2002, in Robb, Out of Sight, Out of Mind, 98. Lai Foo was married to two women: First
Wife, Kee Kew in Hong Kong and Second Wife, Chin Ow, who lived on Thursday Island with him.
671Townsville Daily Bulletin,4 September 1930, p. 6.
672There are at least two cases where these intricacies are teased out. See “Lai Fook” inTownsville Daily Bulletin, 4 September 1930, p.
6. and for the estate of Tam Sie, “Chinese Will”, Townsville Daily Bulletin, 13 April 1930, p. 3.
194
Polygamy
Chinese polygamous tradition made the Chinese husband responsible all wives under the one
ancestral roof and was undertaken only by middle and upper class families, as money was
required to maintain and sustain an extended household. Very few men who settled in
Queensland were able to sustain this arrangement which is why very few true polygamous
families arrived. Polygamous families, where multiple wives lived with one husband, were
structured by rank and status. With migration so expensive and maintenance and protection of
families difficult in Queensland, it is not surprising that only four or five Chinese polygamous
marriages have been identified in Queensland within the seventy-year period, where one man
lived lawfully with two or more women under a traditional Chinese marriage arrangement. Three
of the families are in north Queensland, and one in the central region town of Blackall.673There is
also one case of a first generation Australian born Chinese man married to two wives, but little is
known about him.674 The most well documented case of traditional polygamous families in
Queensland, is the family of prominent Cairns herbalist Kwong Sue Duc, who had four wives,
three of whom lived in Queensland with him.675
There is no doubt that by having four wives, three living with him, Kwong was displaying his
wealth and status to the community. His pride in his family was demonstrated in a newspaper
announcement shortly after his arrival:
“A prolific Chinaman Kwong Sue Tack, the Chinaman with his four wives and 18 children,
called in at this office to joyfully announce ‘number four wife catchem boy, half past three
yesterday’. Kwong states that number one wife is in Canton and has four children. Of his 14
children in Cairns, nine are attending school.” 676
Kwong by all accounts exuded traditionalism. He was a respected doctor /herbalist, a civic leader
of great standing, wealthy, and not only able to maintain a “two primary wife” family but in fact
673 Chinese in Queensland: Blackall’s Chinatown, loose pages, LEE TIM KIN SING and GOW SEE, with reference to Mrs Lee Tim
Kin Sing (wife #1 of Gow See) and Mrs Lee Tim Kin Sing (wife #2, name unknown). One of his wives, presumably First Wife, had
small bound feet, and the family were regarded as high class. The Second Wife was responsible for the housework.
674 Pers. Comm. Ray Poon re: Brisbane Diamond Lum, 2014.
675 Interview with Jenni Campbell, Cairns, 8 May 2001. Kwong arrived from Darwin to Cairns in 1903, where he had been living with
his three wives and family of fourteen children in the late 19th century, while First Wife remained in China. On arrival in Cairns the
family was immediately conspicuous due to the unusual nature of the marriage arrangement, the sheer number of wives, and the fact
that Kwong Sue Duc displayed a prominent photo of the family in the front of his shop. While initially the family most likely lived
together as a practical measure, they did not live together the entire period while residing in Cairns.
676 Cairns Morning Post, 20 January 1903, p. 2.
195
able to maintain a “four primary wife family” as Kwong eventually housed each wife and
respective children in separate households, which appeared to enhance family harmony.
As a transnational Chinese man of the times, Kwong also guided his family into modernity by
adopting selective practices of acculturation with his large Australian born family, while
maintaining filial observances and practices. This is demonstrated in his approach to changing
marriage practices for three daughters677 as well as the abandonment of foot binding tradition
after advice from his sons.678Lykin Kwong, daughter of Kwong Sue Duc, was born in
Palmerston (later Port Darwin), and was the only Australian born British subject daughter in
northern Australia whose feet were bound at age 2 by her mother. There is no other evidence
to suggest that foot binding was ever carried out in north Queensland. However, a number of
China born women with bound feet migrated to Queensland to join husbands in the 19th
century.
Bound Feet
In China bound feet signified an enhanced social position, and girls were subjected to the
deforming practice until it was banned in the early 20th Century. So far, ten Chinese women with
bound feet have been identified as having immigrated to Queensland, with seven of the women
residing in north Queensland between 1876 and 1903.679 Three women lived in Cairns, three
lived in Cooktown, and at least one and possibly two lived on Thursday Island. The others lived
in the Central Region, at Blackall, with two in the Southern Region at Roma and Toowoomba.
This represents less than 1% of the overall population of migrant women who arrived in
677Daily Mercury, 26 January 1906, p. 2; “Feminine Topics”, The Cairns Morning Post , 8 June 1907, p. 5; Methodist Church:
Marriage Records, 18 November, 1891-1960; Robb, Out of Sight out of Mind, 135. In 1904, at age 16, LykinKwong was married to
Lee You Leong in the Lit Sung Goong Temple after her marriage was “arranged” by her parents. She wore the traditional red
embroidered wedding skirt and blouse and went on to have 11 children over the next twenty years. Her sister Elsie was married in
1907 and this too was a traditional affair. She also wore the traditional wedding attire and head veil and was taken by a carriage to her
husband’s house after giving reverence to her parents. A year and a half later, sister Kwong Ah Moy was married to Lee On from
Atherton in a Western Methodist ceremony, in 1909. At age 14, Ah Moy was 34 years younger than Lee On. Seven years later,
younger sister Katie Kwong married in St Mary’s Anglican Church in Innisfail to James George Sang. Her wedding was much
different to that of her sisters. Not only was it a Christian wedding but her marriage dress was white and Western in style
678 Interview with Roma Leong See, Cairns, 20 May 2001 and Interview with Jenni Campbell, Cairns, 8 May 2001. In Darwin, around
1890, the third wife of Kwong Sue Duk, Yuen Luk Lau, bound her eldest and first daughter's feet at around age 2. The binding of
LykinKwong’s feet occurred at a time when within China it was becoming very unfashionable. As Yuen Luk Lau was a traditional
Chinese woman, she probably bound her first daughter's feet to enhance future marriage prospects. It is believed that pressure placed
upon Kwong and Yuen Shee by Lykin's younger brothers, who had been to China, ensured that Lykin's bindings were removed. It is
reputed that the brothers told Kwong that it wasn't the "done thing" any more. That is the most likely explanation, as he seemed to be a
man to keep abreast of these matters. Lykin's bindings had crippled and malformed her feet, making it difficult for her to walk
naturally. This gave her a lifetime of sore feet and bunions. Later on she wore children's shoes stuffed with cotton wool at the toes.
679 In an effort to enhance marriage prospects, foot binding was promoted by the lineage councils and matchmakers as a desirable asset
for women and was practiced by families of means. The ten women were: North Queensland: Ah Bow, Ah Kuw, Mrs. Lee See, Chiu
Chan Han, Mrs. QuongHing, Mrs. Lee Gong, Yuen Luk Lau and Mrs. Lee Yan; Blackall, Mrs Lee Kim Tim Sing; Roma, Mrs Gee
Chong; and Toowoomba, MrsKwong Sang
196
Queensland but this figure may rise as it is possible that more women had bound feet. The first
arrived in 1876 and the last arrived in 1903. At least three women were accompanied by a mui
tsai while others had no help and relied on their husbands and children for support.
Mui Tsai
Bonded servitude or mui tsai was a widespread practice whereby young girls were sold by poor
families into rich households.680 This practice was not only acceptable but also considered a
charitable institution whereby poor families were able to safeguard to some extent the future of
their daughters through the placement of a child in a more affluent household. Here, she could be
considered as a household drudge and servant, a companion, san po tsai (betrothed wife) or
daughter. In some cases, upon reaching a certain age, she became a concubine or was further
sold to another household. Mui tsai were valuable resources for marrying daughters, not only
keeping the latter company but also as the “eyes and ears” in the new household and a trusted
confidant.681Exploited as unpaid workers and as a form of child slavery, mui tsai had no legal
rights and were in some households subject to extreme cruelty, sexual abuse, and
abandonment.682 As Hong Kong and Singapore developed as ports of trade, so did the trade in
girls increase. Western missionaries described the trade in mui tsai as form of slavery. However,
in small villages where families could keep an eye on their treatment, it was regarded as a
practical measure to alleviate family poverty.683 Certainly there was a general cultural acceptance
of the practice of purchasing a bonded mui tsai and a number of Chinese women who migrated to
the colonies were accompanied by a young mui tsai.684
Young child servants who were most probably mui tsai accompanied their mistresses to colonies
such as Queensland, Victoria, New South Wales and South Australia (Northern Territory). This
is evidenced in early newspaper reports which often described the arrival of a Chinese woman as
680Jaschok and Miers, Women and Chinese Patriarchy, 11.
681Pers. Comm., Professor Yuen-fongWoon, 18 August 2002. The difference between a Mui tsaiand a servant is that a Mui tsaidoes not
get paid for her service except for the bond price, which is paid to her parents at the beginning. If the parents wanted her back they
would have to pay this for her, plus interest.
682 In a society where family ascribes identity, being a muitsai carried the stigma of not having any kin or family, therefore no “face” in
society. This caused considerable shame for many women and some went to great lengths to conceal from their later family the true
nature of their circumstances. However, this was a widespread cultural practice where impoverished peasantry, wars and natural
disaster produced a steady supply of young girls to be sold as child servants.
683JaschokandMiers, Women and Chinese Patriarchy, 11.
684The Mc Ivor Times and Rodney Advertiser, 8 September 1865, p. 2. For example, in 1865 in the colony of Victoria, Ah Kit paid
£120 for a young servant Chinese girl, in the employment of another family, to be his wife. She was the bonded servant to the wife of a
Chinese interpreter in Bendigo.
197
young and accompanied by a ‘child’.685 It is difficult to believe that a whole family would
migrate in the 1850s, due to cultural and family traditions, and I argue that it is plausible that
many early girl child arrivals were bonded servants.686 A report in Victoria in 1862 provides a
clear indication that bonded servant females were present in the southern colonies. A small yet
telling article titled “Sale of a Chinese woman” in 1865 Victoria outlines the exchange of money
for a newly arrived servant girl who was on-sold by her owner, making a hefty profit of £110, to
a Chinese man in Bendigo who promptly married her in the Chinese temple.687
In north Queensland, at least four Chinese women arrived as bonded servant girls or mui tsai for
the period 1876-1900, and five in total have been identified across the State.688 The first bonded
servant to arrive in north Queensland came in 1875 when she accompanied her mistress to
Cooktown to join the lady’s merchant husband. 689 She was followed by a second girl a year later,
also with her mistress, the wife of a prominent storekeeper, also in Cooktown.690 At least one mui
tsai lived on the Palmer goldfield with a storekeeper family in Maytown,691 while another young
mui tsai lived in Cairns with the wife of the principal in a prominent merchant firm, Lee Yan
Brothers.692 Bonded mui tsai girls migrated, grew up, married and died in Queensland, arriving
when very young. This is the case for the nameless 13-year-old noted as a census entry for the
Cooktown district, who can be traced in north Queensland for over 25 years.693
Traditional Chinese cultural practices including foot-binding and selling of children as bonded
servants, were not maintained in Queensland. It could be argued that this was due to the greater
love and affection that female children were showed in the Chinese community, as a rare chance
685The Courier, 25 July 1863, p. 3. In the Melbourne Argus there is an article concerning how few Chinese women were in Victoria –
only one or two - and it notes the arrival of Chinese woman and a ‘child’ to Melbourne. The child was about 7 years old and the
woman was about 20 and the wife of a merchant. It begs the question: was the child a daughter, or amuitsai? How much do we know
about child migrants associated with the Chinese Diaspora?
686The Australian News for HomeReaders, 24 February 1864, p. 15. The article noted the arrival by train to Ballaratof a Chinese
woman and two children, the family of a prominent Chinese man, storekeeper Chong Peng Nong.
687 “Sale of Chinese Woman”, Rockhampton Bulletin and Central Queensland Advertiser, 15 June 1865, p. 3.
688Brisbane Courier. 3 October 1884, p. 6. The fifth muitsai was located in Brisbane and attached to the wealthy merchant household
of Chick Tong. He was charged and fined for cruelty to the 16-year-old Chinese girl servant Yang Cue in his employ. He had beaten
her very badly with a whip or cane about the legs, thighs, buttocks and arms. He apparently beat her regularly (100 times) in the four
years she had been in his employment. Her father had sold her in Canton to a man who on-sold the girl to Chick Tong. Chick Tong
brought her to Brisbane for himself and his wife. She had not been paid during the four years and Mrs. Chick Tong had also beaten her.
She was afraid to go back to Mr and Mrs Chick Tong and had not complained before because she could not speak English. She had
complained to neighbors and they had alerted the police.
689Cooktown Herald, 19 May 1875, p. 2 Her mistress was Mrs. Lee Gong.
690Cooktown Herald, 13 September 1876, p.2 Her mistress was Mrs. Quong Hing.
691Interview with Darryl Low Choy. This was WunToong Yuan, who was bonded to the Ah Fun family. She must have tried to do her
best to assist her mistress Wong Kew, who had twins in 1883, but as it turned out, it was not enough and she was often subjected to
verbal abuse and physical beatings.
692King Koi, “Discovering my Heritage”, 289.
693Robb, Out of Sight, Out of Mind, 87. `
198
for family life and an asset to the community. Families also experienced higher living standards
than the village family, ensuring that female children did not have to be sold or have their feet
bound as a solution to poverty or for social mobility. Both of these reasons were consolidated by
changing attitudes back in China, especially for foot binding, which gave rise to social change in
the 20th century. However, the selling of children as bonded servants in China continued to be
practiced well into the 20th century. Like the presence of at least one foot binding story, there is
one incident which is suspiciously like mui tsai, regarding the Chinese practice of “adoption” to
alleviate a domestic problem which was undertaken in North Queensland.
A young female child from a large family on Thursday Island was “adopted” out to an influential
family in Darwin in the early 1920s. It is suspected that this could well be the first recorded case
of an Australian born Chinese child sent out of the family to another household as a bonded
servant or a mui tsai.694 The fact that there was no extended family relationship with the adoptee
family, combined with the girl’s life being spent in drudgery working “in a servant like manner”
for the adoptive family through her childhood and until marriage, suggests that the decision made
by her natal family to adopt their daughter out was undertaken as a means to alleviate economic
stress associated with having a large family. In this instance I believe her position as a mui tsai is
plausible.695 This story also reveals the special relationship between the major communities of
northern Australia which, with deeper investigation, may reveal broader kinship ties, social
attitudes and transnational implications as the family in question was highly active in the Chinese
reform movement and held a position of high status in the Darwin Chinese community.
Kinship networks and Marriage Patterns
The maintenance of cultural traditions, filial piety and kinship network in an overseas household
was difficult for Chinese women. Faced with a lack of traditional female transferral of knowledge
in the household at times such as child rearing, women maintained established practices when it
came to social perimeters for their family. The marriage of daughters and sons in particular to
appropriately aligned kinship partners were one way that traditions were maintained.
Throughout north Queensland, marriage patterns based on clan and village traditions were
maintained for at least two generations, with some extending well into the 20th century. For
694Interview with anonymous informant #1, Cairns, 16 May 2002.
695 Northern Territory born Moo Kim Kow (also known as Kim Foong), and her husband James Chee Quee, had a large family of ten
children on Thursday Island. With so many mouths to feed, a decision was made to “adopt” out one of their daughters, Ruby, to a
family in Darwin, Northern Territory sometime in the 1920s. The Hassan family was an influential family in the Darwin community,
and Ruby spent many years until her marriage in 1939 working very hard for them “in a servant like manner”. It wasn’t until she got
married that she was able to leave the adoptee family.
199
example, Australian born daughters from the Sze Yup speaking community married back into the
Sze Yup community, and Chung Shan, specifically Loong Du and Liang Du families, married
back into the Chung Shan community. 696 Cross district marriage, that is men from Toishan
county marrying an Australian born Chinese daughter of Zhongshan (Chungshan) parentage, did
not emerge until the late 1920s and 1930s when the White Australia Policy had impacted
sufficiently on a Chinese man’s ability to bring a wife out to Queensland, a decline in eligible
district partners, and the Westernization of Australian born couples, who began marrying for love
rather than as the result of an arranged marriage involving matchmakers.
The pattern of marriage links along district, kinship and family lines occurred across north
Queensland Chinese communities and extended south to Maryborough - Gayndah, Rockhampton
and Brisbane, and across to Darwin. A small sample of the marriage trends which reflect the
maintenance of district, family, village, clan and kinship traditions can be seen in (Fig. 50 p. 211)
This map illustrates settler families in north Queensland from the small Chungshan districts of
Loong Du and Liang Du with surnames Lee, Cheng, Mow, Lum, Jong, Wong and Kwok. It
highlights the maintenance of village and district connections through intergenerational marriage
and extends to two generations in some cases. Marriage in north Queensland was not only entered
into along district and kinship lines, but was strategically undertaken to maintain and reinforce
transnational family and business networks between the ancestral village and the community in
Queensland. It cemented trans-local networks with existing families also settled in Queensland.
The maintenance of marriage patterns along village district lines extended sometimes to third
generation Australian born Chinese, 697 and remained in place until well after the Second World
War.698
696Robb Database: Marriages and Unions: 1860-1920; BDM Q Birth Register, 1900 C1711 Ruby Beatrice Ah Moon, Ah Moon, Ah
Moon Show Young. For example, in Cairns in 1900, 16-year-old muitsai Chou Young, who had previously arrived in 1896
accompanying her mistress Mrs. Lee Yan from the Lee village of Lung Du, was married in a Chinese customary marriage to the much
older Wong Yui Cheung (Ah Moon) from the Wong village in Lung Du. Interview with George Wah Day, Cairns, 5 April 2001. This
pattern was also repeated with the marriage of Maggie Lin Ding to Lee Yan in 1912, and again with the marriage of their daughter
May Lee Yan to Wong Wah Day in 1928, making two Australian born Chinese heritage daughters marrying along district lines.
697Interview tihMary Lee, Cairns, 16 May 2002 and interview with Vincent Lee, Cairns, 9 May 2002. For example, see the marriage
of Mary Jane Lippert, a first-generation mixed heritage Australian born Chinese born in Geraldton (Innisfail), who was contracted in
marriage at 15 years of age to Low Gun Inn from Babinda. Low Gun Inn came from a village north of How Shan and he knew Mary
Jane’s adopted father, who was from the same district. Mary Jane and Gun Inn also continued the maintenance of marriage traditions
along district lines with their own second generation Australian born Chinese daughter Mary, who was married to Vincent Lee Sing
Moon. He was considered a suitable partner having come from the neighbouring district of Liang Du.
698Sandi Robb and Dr Joe Leong, Casting Seeds to the Wind: My Journey to North Queensland. Joseph Leong who was born in the
Leong family village of Cao Bian, Liang Du married Chinese Australian born woman Judy Jue Sue, whose family originated from the
Mow village of Soye Kai in Lung Du. Contemporary families across north Queensland, descendants of early settler Chinese families,
are almost all invariably interconnected by marriage over the 130-year period. This is an emerging area of research.
200
Fig. 50. Representative Map: Maintenance of Confucian Marriage Patterns associated with
North Queensland Families: District, Village and Kinship Links.
Conclusion
For all purposes, the migration of Chinese women to Queensland is the story of “home” as they
transplanted thousands of years of family obligation, filial and marital observance, and duty.
From the evidence outlined in this chapter, it is clear that Queensland was a significant
destination colony for the Chinese Female Diaspora in the late 19th and early 20th centuries,
especially when it is contrasted to broader global migration patterns. It has also emerged that
north Queensland shares its female settler characteristics such as age, status and experience with
other Australian colonies of the period: from primary wives and concubines, to bonded servants
and child mui tsai.
Queensland stands as the second most favoured colony behind New South Wales for the number
of women arriving to join their husbands, in front of Victoria, these being the three preferred
colonies for migration. It also contributes to Australia’s overall status as one of the four most
Low
Low Gun Inn
Mary Low Gun
Cheng
Chen Ying Fong
Wong Ho
Lum
Lum Sou San
Lee
Lee Sing Moon
Vincent Lee Moon
Long Du
Liang Du
Kwok
Kwok Yin Ming
Kwok See
Kwok Lin Ding
Alice Lin Ding
Maggie Ling Ding
Wong
Wong Wah Day
Wong Sun Gong
Wong Hoy
Wong Yui Cheung ( Ah
Moon)
Wong See Hoe
Wong Ah Sam
China born man
Qld Born Daughter 1st gen 1880 - 1910
Qld born Daughter 2nd gen 1910 -1960
China Born Son 1st gen
Lum
Leong
Leong William John
Joseph
Gow
Lee
Lee Yan
May Lee Yan
Lee Sye
Lee Joy Yan
Low Joy
Lee Wing
Lee Long
Lee Yan bros Cairns
Chou Young ( mui tsai)
Mow
Mow Jue Sue
Jue Sue
Judy Jue Sue
Low
Jong Quan Po
Mary Jane Jong
Leong Village
(Cao Bin)
Leong Lum Sing m
Sarah Jane Yong See NSW
Leong Yong Gee
Leong Chew
Leong Shah
Leong Mang
Leong Hip
Ella
Eva Minetta
Annie Louisa
Hilda Maude
William Lester
Ethel May
Grace Caroline
201
important Western countries for the Chinese Female Diaspora of the 19th and early 20th centuries
along with the U.S., Hawaii and British Columbia. Unlike the young Chinese women who were
sent to the U.S. predominantly as chattels in the 19th century, Chinese women and girls who
migrated to Australia were valued in the community from the moment they arrived, even if their
circumstances were poor. This is particularly evident in north Queensland, where women could
elevate their status and challenge established practices in the Chinese female hierarchy. Chinese
women, brought up to expect a prescribed female order, found themselves challenged in family
status as First Wife and Second Wife negotiated around the distance between them, the
successful production of Australian born children, and filial and marital obligations.
The presence of over 80 Chinese women residing in north Queensland signalled the
establishment of multiple transnational families and cemented the role of the “two primary wife”
family, shared between the village and northern Australia. The establishment of the “two primary
wife” family, while not exclusive to north Queensland, Queensland or Australia for that matter,
formed part of a feature of the Chinese Diaspora where traditional family roles and marital
expectations came under attack from problems caused by distance, and the need to respond. The
subsequent birth of children in Queensland provided a means for Chinese families to establish
ancestral links in Queensland, extend opportunities though the successful marriage of sons and
daughters, create partnerships and networks, and develop a sustainable economy – all aimed at
maintaining and increasing family wealth and the ancestral lineage: a truly transnational family.
202
C h a p t e r 8
“…CO-HABITATING WITH HIS ABORIGINAL PARAMOUR”.: ABORIGINAL WOMEN
AND CHINESE MEN
Introduction
Historical relationships and marriage patterns of Chinese men and Aboriginal or Torres Strait
Islander women across north Queensland are the least understood aspect of the Chinese Family
Landscape. Unlike Chinese men who were able to settle with a migrant China born wife, or
partner with colonial and migrant White women, family relations for Chinese men who partnered
with Indigenous women were fraught with social disapproval, Government anti-miscegenation
policies, and disruption of family through official removals. Attitudes by authorities towards
Chinese –Indigenous relationships in Queensland were stridently negative, and these mirrored
deep seated British colonial attitudes which applied across the globe. However, despite the
number of restrictions faced by Chinese men when choosing to partner with an Indigenous
woman, some intimate relationships managed to occur where families were formed and kinship
connections for women maintained with country.
It is popularly believed that there were numerous interracial relationships between Chinese men
and Aboriginal women throughout Queensland’s settlement history.699 The true extent of positive
interracial interactions in general between Chinese men and Aboriginal groups is usually
underrated and misunderstood, and scholarly work has failed to provide firm information which
identifies the exact number of intimate relationships between Chinese men and Aboriginal or
Torres Strait Islander women. Much of the discussion focuses on themes of race relations, or the
politics of marginalisation. This leaves the presumption of large numbers of Chinese men in
relationships with Aboriginal women as speculative at best, with no real statistical evidence to
verify claims. This chapter aims to explore the incidence of Chinese-Indigenous Family
Landscape across north Queensland, taking into account Aboriginal law, ability by Aboriginal
699 Margaret Slocombe, Among Australia’s Pioneers: Chinese Indentured Pastoral Workers on the Northern Frontier 1848-c1880
(Balboa Press, 2014): 282; Anne Mc Grath, Illicit Love: Interracial Sex and Marriage in the United States of America and Australia
(University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln, 2015): 251-321. Historians who have taken an interest in this area include Fred Cahir, Regina
Ganter, Henry Reynolds, and Hilda Mclean, yet they have only ventured into this space in the last two decades. Greater attention has
been paid by scholars in anthropology including Guy Ramsay, Anna Snukal, Richard Martin and David Trigger, with more research
occurring in NSW with the work of Marie Reay and more recently, Barry McGowan, Genevieve Mott and Juanita Kwok. Within
Queensland’s Indigenous community there is some interest from family history researchers, such as Helen Ellems and Carol Chong.
See Carol Chong, “The Chong Family History at Mungana”,in G. Grimwade, K. RainsandM. Dunk (eds), Rediscovered Past: Chinese
Networks (CHINA Inc., 2016):51-65; Helen Ellems and Jana Kahabka, “My ‘Half Full Lations’: Unravelling the threads”, paper
delivered at the CHINA Inc. conference, Cairns, 2014.
203
women to partner with a non-Aboriginal man, and the number of relationships as best can be
determined so far. This thesis provides an overview of Chinese-Aboriginal relationships only, due
to the size of the task to research all Chinese-Aboriginal marriages and marriage-like relations.
This chapter instead positions the experience of Chinese –Indigenous family formation in
Queensland within the broader context of Chinese – local marriage formation in other Australian
colonies and comparable global colonial communities. This in turn is compared to information
from other colonies, which is discussed within the framework of British and European colonial
experiences.
For the purpose of this chapter, an “Indigenous” woman is a woman who is neither Chinese nor
White but Indigenous to the country on which she is living: in Australia, either Aboriginal or
Torres Strait Islander. “Aboriginal” refers to those of full or partial Aboriginal parentage who are
accepted by their communities as Aborigines. It will be used interchangeably at times with
“Local woman” to denote that she is “Local” to the country. The difficulty in applying both
terms, whether separately or together, internationally, when making comparisons is that while the
term can be applied to women who are First Nation women or Indigenous to a colony or country,
it falls short of describing women who are non–Chinese, non-White, and not First Nations
women. For example, African women who were former slaves associated with plantation
economies; Mulatto women; or South Sea Islander women in Australia are not in this category.
Scholars in America overcome this problem by describing the variances using individual cultural
terms. I will continue where practical to observe this practice, particularly when making the
distinction between Aboriginal, Torres Strait Islander and South Sea Islander women where
necessary.
***
Part 1: Global Trends:
Legislation, regulation and exploitation
Intermarriage between migrating Chinese men and local Indigenous women in host countries first
commenced in the 7th Century across South-east Asia. Chinese sailors, traders and merchants
visited, traded and put down roots in places such as Siam (Thailand) and Cochin (now part of
Malaysia), as well as in kingdoms and sultanates of island nations including Timor, Sumatra,
Java, Kalimantan, Sulawesi and the Philippines. These men settled abroad to enhance economic
opportunities for their China based families, and developed commercial and kinship networks
through marriage with local women. As a result, commercial success extended across these
204
countries and sea routes which enabled a flow of commodities such as sandalwood, beche-demer
and copra.700 Built up over generations, some bicultural Chinese-local communities
developed into new ethnic groups such as the Straits Chinese Peranakan,701 Phuket Baba,702 Cook
Island Tinitos703 and the Filipino Mestizo.704 Due to several cultural similarities such as with
kinship systems, religious values and reverence for ancestral entities, Chinese men were able to
enter interracial marriage with local women with ease.705
The second phase of migration commenced in the late 17th century and continued into the early
20th century. During this period an estimated 11 million Chinese men migrated around the globe
including South and North America, Africa, islands across the Pacific, and Australasia.706 The
second phase of Chinese migration occurred in response to expansion by British and European
colonial powers that competed with each other to colonize in order to extract resources. Their
efforts to exploit the natural and human resources across each dominion created an opening for
labour which China based families responded to. Migration and settlement in this second phase
led to the marriage of Chinese men to local and Indigenous women across the Asia Pacific region,
and is recorded in at least five colonies of Australia. The only exception to this pattern of marriage
occurred on the Nauru707 and Banaba Islands.708
European colonial powers, including Dutch, British, German, French, Spanish and Portuguese
nations, colonized many countries and islands across South-east Asia and Oceania. The Dutch
had colonized most of the islands in the Indonesian archipelago and western New Guinea, while
the French had established administrative rule in Indochina, as well as the New Hebrides, New
Caledonia and Tahiti.709 Germany administered colonies in northeast New Guinea, Micronesia,
the Solomon Islands, Samoa and Nauru,710 while Portugal, which had formerly claimed many
700 Salma NasutionKhoo, “Hokkien Chinese on the Phuket Mining Frontier: The Penang Connection and the Emergence of the Phuket
Baba Community”, JMBRAS, 82, 2 (2009): 81-112 ; Ed Hong Liu, “ Conceptualizing International Migration,” in The Chinese
Overseas, 414.
701Khoo, “Hokkien Chinese”, 81.
702Ibid.
703 Bill Willmott, “The Chinese Communities in the Smaller Countries of the South Pacific: Kiribati, Nauru, Tonga and Cook Islands”.
Macmillan Brown Working Paper Series, Number 17, Macmillan Brown Centre for Pacific Studies, (University of Canterbury, 2007):
43
704 Hong Liu, “Conceptualizing International Migration”, 414
705Khoo, “Hokkien Chinese”, 83
706Stanziani: 129
707 Willmott, “The Chinese Communities in the Smaller Countries”, 19
708Ibid., 10-17
709Bill Willmott, “Chinese contract labour in the Pacific Islands during the nineteenth century”, The Journal of Pacific Studies, 27, 2 (
2004): 169.
710Ibid. All of Germany’s colonies were confiscated following its defeat in WWI and they became protectorates under the
administration of other nations, including in the Pacific Japan, Britain, the U.S. and Australia.
205
islands in Indonesia, retained its claim over Timor and leased Macao.711 For its part, Spain
concentrated most of its colonial interests in South America including Mexico, Peru and Cuba
until the Spanish-American War of 1898. However, it also had a strategic interest in the rich
trading region of the Philippines until 1898 when it was taken by and then sold to the U.S.712 The
British Empire dominated and maintained an active interest across many regions, taking in India,
British Columbia, the British West Indies and parts of Africa as well as Australasia and a number
of islands across the Pacific.713 At its peak, the British administered dominions, colonies,
protectorates and territories extending around the Pacific including Australia, New Zealand,
Papua, Fiji, the Cook Islands, Gilbert Island (Kiribati), Ocean Island (Banaba), North Borneo,
Burma, the Malayan peninsula and Hong Kong. They also, when the opportunity presented itself,
took over administration of the Solomon Islands, New Hebrides (Vanuatu) in conjunction with
the French, and (very briefly) Samoa. U.S. colonies included the Philippines, Samoa and Hawaii.
Fig. 51. Chinese Migration Patterns: Asia Pacific Region: Known location where interracial
Marriages occurred
***
711 John Braithwaite, Hilary Charlesworth and AderitoSoares, Networked Governance of Freedom of Tyranny: Peace in Timor Leste,
(Australian National University, E Press 2012): 9. The Portuguese arrived and established an administration on Timor in 1511.
712 E. Wickberg, “The Chinese Mestizo in Philippine history”, 67-68,
https://kuscholarworks.ku.edu/bitstream/handle/1808/1129/CEAS.1964.n10.pdf;sequence=1
713 Demand for desirable commodities such as opium, tea, sugar and spices led to trade and colonial expansion in the 1840s. This
sparked British instigated wars against China and around the Dutch East Indies. The demand for plantation crops such as sugar,
tobacco, copra, and rubber caused a grab for land around the Pacific.
206
Colonizing attitudes towards Chinese- local interracial marriage:
British Empire
Analysis of British colonized and settled countries around the globe indicates that the British and
German Empires applied a distinctive form of cultural prejudice against other races to
discourage, separate, and regulate interracial relationships. British authorities were most strident
when it came to relationships between Chinese men and local Indigenous women. Colonies
across the Pacific, around the Atlantic Rim, Australasia, British Columbia and British South
Africa had policies and laws introduced to segregate Chinese male and Local female populations
based on a range of motives, including racial eugenics, “protection” of racial purity and morality
of Indigenous populations, and as a means of enforcing racial domination through population
control measures. Draconian anti –miscegenation laws and administrative policies resulted in
inhibited family formation, couples separated, and intimacy denied. The only region where
interracial marriage was viewed as an advantage to British colonial authorities was in the older
colonial administration centre of the British West Indies where the profits of plantations were
built on a culture of human exploitation: slavery from the continent of Africa, and the children of
those slaves. By the time Pacific Rim nations were being colonized, the British West Indies was
well established as a multi-ethnic New World society.
When Chinese indentured migrants arrived in the British West Indies, from the 1850s onwards,
they entered a community where marriage to local women was already easier through a general
acceptance by authorities accustomed to administering a heterogeneous multicultural society.714
In this environment, a flexible approach to interracial union was taken by authorities, as a result
of pressure exerted by plantation managers and owners, who endorsed interracial marriage as a
means to tie imported male labour to the plantation. Marriage, it seemed, proved to be an
excellent method for labour retention, as Chinese filled the labour gap which had opened up after
the abolition of slavery.715
However, while the British West Indies proved tolerant in its approach to interracial marriage,
the United States, with its Anglo-British background and parallel history of slave labour on
714 Aaron Chang Bohr, “Identity in Transition: Chinese Community Associations in Jamaica”, Caribbean Quarterly 50, 2 (June 2004):
47. Bohr quoted Look Lai, who noted “Chinese assimilation patterns of the West Indian plantation society evolved against the
background of the society’s uniqueness- its colonial historical context, its Euro African American heterogeneity, its New World social
environment”.
715 Lee Loy, “The Chinese are preferred to all others'”, 206. Lee Loy notes that Chinese men in Trinidad and British Guiana were
considered a key factor in the maintenance of control over the native and ex-slave population.
207
plantations, proved the opposite. While it was not illegal for Chinese men to marry First Nation
women, Black or White women, the actual number of marriages between First Nation women
and Chinese men remains speculative at best, with figures assumed to be low due to cultural,
social and frontier conflict reasons.716 However, from a small sample of historical newspapers
reviewed for this thesis, it is clear that mixed marriages between Chinese men and First Nation
women occurred from the mid-1860s onwards,717 was more prevalent after the frontier conflict
period had settled down, and occurred in rural regions of the United States.718 Intimate relations
between Chinese men and First Nation women was motivated by a mutual economic benefit,
companionship and attraction, all of which showed many similarities with the Queensland
colonial experience, particularly in north Queensland. Further north in British Columbia, the
situation remained similar with Chinese–Canadian Aboriginal relationships scarce, located in
rural regions, and undertaken at times which was mutually benefit for both parties. For example,
there were several women from the Musqueam nation of Vancouver, British Columbia who
partnered with Chinese men in the early part of the 20th century.719 Across the United States as
well as British Columbia, interracial Chinese /First Nation/Aboriginal families were raised with a
strong Indigenous identity, with most taking their mothers’ culture as the dominant culture.720
European Empires
However, the British Empire was not the only empire to hold strongly negative views about
interracial marriage. Germany also introduced laws and policies to separate Chinese men from
the local female population in their colonies across the Pacific.721 As German colonial
administrations transitioned to British colonial rule, segregation was enforced more rigorously.
This was most evident across the Solomon Islands as well as Samoa when former British colony
New Zealand took over administration during the First World War.722 At the time, it was easy for
716 Bronson and Ho, Coming Home in Gold Brocade,119.
717 See Montana’sThe Montana Post, 19 October 1867, p. 5.; Pioche, Nevada, Lincoln County Record.,25 March 1904, unpaginated;
Seattle, Washington’s The Daily Intelligencer, 1 February 1880, Image 3, and Montana’sThe Anaconda Standard., 29 December 1894,
p. 2.
718Daniel Leistman, “Horizontal Inter-Ethnic Relations: Chinese and American Indians in the Nineteenth Century American West”,
Western Historical Quarterly, 30, 3 (Autumn, 1999): 347-349.
719ZoolSuleman, Vancouver Dialogues: First Nations, Urban Aboriginal and Immigrant Communities (City of Vancouver,
2011):39andMusqueam Elder, Guest Speaker address, delivered at 9th International Society for the Study of Chinese Overseas
Conference (ISSCO) Vancouver, July 6-8, 2016.
720Leistman, “Horizontal Inter-Ethnic Relations”, 347-349.
721TuatagoloaAumua Ming Leung Wai, “Reflections on the experiences of the Chinese community in Samoa”, Presentation of
Attorney-General of Samoa, at the “China and Pacific: The view from Oceania” Conference, National University of Samoa – Apia,
Samoa, (25 February 2015): 4-5,https://www.victoria.ac.nz/chinaresearchcentre/programmes-and-projects/chinasymposiums/
china-and-the-pacific-the-view-from-oceania/9-Ming-Leung-Wai-Chinese-Experience-in-Samoa-papersp2-
15-REAL-FINAL-2.pdf This included German occupied New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, Samoa and Nauru.
722 A.S. NoaSiaosi, Catching the Dragon’s Tail: The Impact of the Chinese in Samoa, Master of Arts Thesis in Pacific Studies,
University of Cante, 2010: 1 and 44
208
British authorities to establish strong anti-miscegenation laws in previously occupied German
colonies, owing to the strict laws already in place. Both the German and British Empires
displayed similar ideas regarding miscegenation, racial superiority and race relations over their
local populations. In contrast, other European empires such as the French, Dutch, Spanish and
Portuguese took a more relaxed attitude to Chinese-Local interracial marriage in countries they
occupied around the globe.
Across the Dutch colonies of Sumatra, North Borneo, Java, and Kalimantan, as well as
Portuguese Timor, and the Spanish Philippines, Chinese trade and family networks provided
colonial administrations with a means to secure local assistance in the production and distribution
of plantation grown resources such as cocoa, rubber, coconut and tobacco. Colonial
administrators were reluctant to impose regulations against interracial marriage, for fear of
upsetting the access by local village headmen to a ready and mobile Chinese indentured
workforce from China. In particular, with many plantation interests across what is now the
Indonesian archipelago, the Dutch left the local population to their own devices when it came to
regulating interracial marriage.723 For colonial authorities, the benefit of interracial Chinese-
Indigenous marriages could be measured in the secure trading relations developed with China
through family, kinship and community relations which they brought into the colonies.724 These
relationships were acknowledged by both the Dutch and Spanish who relied on local Chinese as
intermediaries between East and West for community, commerce and Christian reform matters.
In other colonies held by Spain, France, the Netherlands and Portugal a flexible approach to
interracial marriages was held wherever they colonized and they were unlikely to introduce
legislation in order to maintain racial purity of populations. In places such as Timor, New
Caledonia, Tahiti, Mexico, Peru, Cuba, and Dutch South Africa, populations of mixed heritage
Chinese-Indigenous families were left unimpeded by legislative restrictions. Foreign colonial
administrations weighed up the benefit of mixed marriage families to the local economy,
preferring to exploit the benefits than lose resources to maintain an ethnic divide. However, this
was not a uniform colonial policy - for example, Spain had an ambivalent approach to interracial
723 O.T.A. Atsushi, “Toward Cities, Seas and Jungles: Migration in the Malay Archipelago, c 1750-1850” in Jan Lucassen and Leo
Lucassen (eds), Global Migration History: The Eurasian Experience (16th -21st Centuries) (KoninklijkeBrillnv, Leiden, The
Netherlands, 2014): 180-214.
724Anne Richter, Bruce W. Carpenter, JorgSundermann, Gold Jewellery of the Indonesian Archipelago (Editions Didier Millet,
2012):36; Andaya and Andaya, History of Early Modern South-east Asia, 31, 47-53.
209
marriage in colonies such as Mexico and Peru, yet adopted a different administrative approach to
interracial marriage in the Philippines, based on religion rather than race.
Spanish colonial authorities in the Philippines established a policy of “social
compartmentalization” to keep culturally different groups separate, which was aimed at the
whole community. The government opposed Chinese interracial unions with local women and
restricted cohabitation and marriage. However, as a strongly Roman Catholic institution, the
colonial authority concurrently demonstrated a pragmatic approach to relationships, and allowed
some marriages to occur providing the man converted to Catholicism. Children born from a
Chinese father to a Filipino mother were referred to as Chinese “Mestizo”. Social distinctions
were determined by culture, but religion dominated the structure of society and mobility within
it. The Spanish regarded conversion by Chinese to Catholicism as a satisfactory solution to the
dilemma of interracial couples. In particular, Chinese commercial traders were considered an
economic benefit to society. With an eye on saving souls, the Spanish regarded conversion of
Chinese settlers an additional benefit for missionary work in China by providing a foothold into
Chinese villages.725
Social interface of Chinese – Local marriage: reciprocity, difficulties
Colonising countries which had economies based on exploitation, used gender and labour as a
means to secure economic advantage for White settlers, exposing both Chinese men and local
women to deprivations.726 These conditions provided common ground for relationships to
develop between Chinese men and Local/ Indigenous women, bringing benefits of intimacy and
family to the couple. As families grew, extended family networks developed and social status
was elevated. Family wealth was increased when children reached a suitable age to help as
additional labour. Local marriages provided Chinese men with a valuable tool to re-negotiate the
terms of contract with employers once the indenture contract period had expired or, at the point
of departure, enabled men to move into storekeeping more confidently due to the support of
extended local family relations. Storekeepers were able to expand their commercial interests via
kinship links in neighboring towns and some family networks extended across border regions.727
725Wickberg, “The Chinese Mestizo”, 4.
726 Eugenio Change-Rodriguez, “The Chinese in Peru: Historic and Cultural Links”, Review: Literature and Arts of the Americas, 39,1
(2006): 131-145; Lopez, “Afro-Asian Alliances”, 58-72. So brutal were the conditions for Chinese men in some instances, that
indentured labour was likened to the former slave trade with some of the worst exploitation occurring in the guano mines of Peru and
on the sugar plantations in Cuba.
727Delgado, “Neighbours by nature”, 406; Hu Dehart, “Chinatowns and borderlands”, 442.In Mexico, where Chinese / Local family
networks extended across the borderland regions and into the United States. Chinese men married to Mexican women in the towns of
210
Extended kinship links enabled the fostering of family-based relationships within the
community.728 Family based social networks which nurtured business and personal relationships
utilized the Chinese philosophy of guanxi, which was applied in communities across the Atlantic
countries and colonies as well as across Australasia.
Guanxi or the Confucian modus operandi based on mutual respect for social and family ties,
describes the framework of reciprocity and network connections which developed across an
individual’s or family’s lifetime.729 It applied to the nuclear family, who were expected to work
on behalf of the family as a whole, extended family relatives, as well as clan associations across
the village and often involved the exchange of an item, a favour, or money to improve trust
within a network, the goal to ensure a successful outcome. It could be achieved either directly or
indirectly and it worked both horizontally amongst peers, and vertically when applied to class or
status. For overseas Chinese, guanxi provided the ability for migrants to advance their personal
and commercial standing in a host community, resulting in benefits which reached beyond the
colonial community and back to the village in China.730
Interracial marriage with local women provided Chinese men with a platform for guanxi to be
applied across host colonial countries such as Mexico, Peru, and Cuba as well as in the British
West Indies.731 It was also utilized throughout the Asia-Pacific region, with Manying Ip
suggesting, when discussing Chinese-Maori marriages in New Zealand, that guanxi relations
were fostered by Chinese men with Maori women, as a natural extension to shared cultural
values between the two groups.732 Applying Ip’s approach to Chinese-Aboriginal interracial
relationships across north Queensland, it could be argued that guanxi also existed through a
shared common value and respect for elders, family identity and structured kinship relations.
Chinese men put the collective welfare of wife, family and extended kinship relations above
individual interests which may account for the ease with which Chinese men interacted with local
Aboriginal communities in the 20th century.
Mexicali, Tijuana or Yuma, were able to take advantage of these links which took in two economies –those of Mexico and the United
States. Families of Chinese brothers married to local women shared cross border transactions with each other to the benefit of both
families.
728 Peter Verhezen, “The prevalence of networking or guanxi in Asian [family] business”, Occasional Paper: 5 http://www.euasiacentre.
eu/documents/uploads/pub_34_networking_in_chin_fam_busin_v01.pdf
729 This philosophy takes in all aspects of relationships, both business and private.
730Verhezen, “Prevalence of networking”.
731 Hu Dehart, “Chinatowns and borderlands”, 425-451; Delgardo, “Neighbours by nature”, 401-429; Curtis, “Mexicali’s Chinatown”,
335-348; Lutz, “Chinese Emigrants, Indentured workers and Christianity”, 133-154; McKeown, “Transnational Chinese Families”, 73
-110.
732ManyingIp, “Maori–Chinese Encounters”, 230. With a high respect for elders and a love for children, Chinese-Maori families shared
child rearing responsibilities and cherished the family unit within a tight knit and clannish community.
211
Throughout South-east Asia, where interracial marriage was frequent, interracial partnering had
several advantages for both parties. Local women, known for their business acumen in the
domestic market, proved reliable and trusted members of a growing family business with the
additional benefit of sexual relations. Chinese – Local relationships enabled women to have
access to outside capital as well as economic resources, which were recycled back into the
domestic economy.733 On island communities across Melanesia, Micronesia and Polynesia, local
women were also key economic participants and in many cases, exercised considerable tolerance
towards Chinese men. This is evident in the frequent marriage and relationships in Hawaii which
led to an estimated population of 1200 – 1500 Chinese–Hawaiian families by 1900.734 Samoan
women in particular considered Chinese men to be good providers and were attracted to their
stability and hardworking nature.735
Fig. 52. Chinese migration: Areas of Micronesia, Melanesia and Polynesia.
However, there were also drawbacks for local women when choosing a Chinese husband. Firstly,
while it seemed Samoan women were able to freely make their own choices, possibly with a
perceived gain for the family in mind through selection of a “superior” husband, their strategy
733 Andaya and Andaya, History of Early Modern South-east Asia, 153
734Ip, “Maori–Chinese Encounters”, 229
735 Ali Bessie Ng, Chinese in Fiji, Suva, Fiji, (Institute of Pacific Studies, University of the South Pacific, 2002): 44.
212
did not advance their children at all.736 While mixed race children were absorbed into the
Samoan kinship and family system, they were not entitled to land or chieftain titles. This left
many first and subsequent mixed heritage offspring in cultural limbo. The birth of children was
seen as a Samoan problem, rather than a Chinese one, and not everyone was happy with
interracial marriage. While Samoan women considered Chinese men to be superior husband
material to local Samoan men, Samoan men saw Chinese men as a threat to their natural conjugal
rights.737 In 1917, an attempt was made to convince Samoan women to return to their rightful
place alongside their men by the village headmen. Village communities enacted laws to ban
women from living with Chinese men.738 Later on, Chinese–Samoan families suffered distress
and disconnection when Chinese husbands and fathers were forcibly repatriated to China in the
1930s.739 This was also the case in Mexico where Chinese men faced government-imposed
deportations during the 1937 Mexican anti-Chinese crisis.740
Secondly, many Local women faced deprivation and poverty upon the death of or abandonment
by Chinese husbands. This was the case for many Chinese-Local wives in Hawaii.741 In
comparison, the abandonment of women and families, while a feature of some Chinese-
Aboriginal families across north Queensland, appeared to occur at a later stage in the couples’
lives; usually at the point when the husband had become elderly. This suggests that his return to
China was based on patrilineal ancestral obligations rather than a callous abandonment of his
Queensland Aboriginal family.
Thirdly, some Local women who made the journey back to the village ancestral home with their
husbands, suffered from culture shock when faced with Chinese polygamous family
arrangements. This was the case for many Indigenous women from Peru who struggled to make
the cultural transition into the village ancestral home.742 Many women experienced isolation and
loneliness, and were particularly vulnerable when their husbands returned back overseas. This
negative attribute to mixed marriage is evident in the repeated incidences of abandonment of
736Ben Featunana’ILiua’ana, “Dragons in Little Paradise: Chinese (Mis-) Fortunes in Samoa, 1900 -1950”, Journal of Pacific History,
32, 1 (2008): 45
737 This friction in the male community was not dissimilar to the colonial Australian experience when Chinese men married White
women.
738In Queensland, decision making by colonial Protectors of Aborigines enforced traditional betrothals, putting Aboriginal men’s
conjugal rights above Aboriginal women’s conjugal wants.
739 Ming, “Reflections”, 4-5.
740 James R. Curtis, “Mexicali’s Chinatown”, Geographical Review, Vol. 85, No, 3 (July 1995) pp 341-342.
741McKeown, “Transnational Chinese Families”, 99.
742 This was particularly so when they found out he already had a wife in China.
213
Indigenous women in the early 20th century. “Dumped” in the village ancestral home with little
or no means to return to South America, some Peruvian women resorted to begging on the streets
of Hong Kong in order to secure passage money back to Lima.743 In contrast, women from
Hawaii found themselves at ease in the Chinese family system, and readily formed friendly
relationships with primary wives and mothers-in-law due to their familiarity with polygamous
traditions.744 It is not known how many Australian Aboriginal women visited the ancestral home
in China, nor if they were welcome or abandoned.
Queensland’s negative attitude towards Chinese-Aboriginal marriage did not emerge in isolation
as a single colonial response to interracial marriage. Instead, the desire to dominate and control
both the Local/ Indigenous/Aboriginal and Chinese male migrant population, through prevention
and control of interracial relationships, occurred as an extension to well-established cultural
biases associated with empire building itself. Deep seated, negative, cultural attitudes towards
miscegenation played out across all Anglo – Saxon colonies in the 19th and 20th centuries and
these attitudes shaped the way laws and policies developed thereafter. In the newly federated
Australia, this ultimately led to the White Australia policy of the early 20th century: a policy
partly based on Queensland’s response to Aboriginal-Chinese relations in the 1890s.
743McKeown, “Conceptualizing Chinese Diasporas”, 318.
744Ibid. 319.
214
COUNTRY
COLONY OR
ISLAND
EUROPEAN COLONIAL
ADMINISTRATION
INDUSTRY PARTNERING WITH
REACTION BY ADMINISTRATION LINKS TO ANCESTRAL HOME
British
French
Spanish
Portuguese
German
Dutch
British America
Kingdom/ Sultanate
PLANTATIONSSUG
AR
MINING
PASTORALISM
PLANTATIONS -
AGRICULTURE
ISLAND
TRADE/COPRA/
TREPANG/ PEARL
SANDLEWOOD
Indigenous
women
Other
Mulatto ,
African,
Indias
LAWS & LEGISLATION
CHILDREN sent
to CHINA for
EDUCATION
WIVES accompany to
CHINA
MEN ABANDONED
FAMILY AND
RETURN TO CHINA
REPATRIATION
PROGRAM
MEN STAYED IN
HOST COUNTRY
WITH Local
FAMILIES
COLONIES AND COUNTRIES ACROSS
PACIFIC RIM REGION
Year of
Arrival
YES
NO
YES
NO
PREVE
NT
RESTRI
CT,
REGUL
ATE
MAINT
AIN
SEPEAR
ATIONPROHIB
ITION
REMOV
AL wives
or
children
LAWFU
L OR
OTHER
WNOISTE
INHIBI
TED OR
RESTRI
CTED
Forced
Returns
indentur
e
finished
Encoura
ged
returns
Indigent
schemes
Colonies of Australia
Queensland
1848 indent
Gold
Tin
indent Bnana
Maize
MG
Traders
Pearl
Trepng
1 1920’s
onwards
Victoria 1823 Gold ? ?
NSW 184S Gold indent Bnana ? ?
MELANESIA
Fiji 1855 Bnana Traders
shopkr
German Papua New Guinea 1884 Indent
tbcco
Germans
favoured
repatriation
Solomon Islands 1893 Traders
shopkr
New Hebrides (Vanuatu) 1844 Ccnut
Copra
cottn
Traders
Sndlwd
New Caledonia 1846 indent
nickel
Traders
Sndlwd
POLYNESIA
New Zealand Maoris 1870s MG
Hawaii 1802 indent
Samoa C1850s Indent
copra
1914 – 47
forced
Tahiti 1865 Indent
cotton
Cook Islands (Tinito) 1882 Traders
MICRONESIA
Kiribati (Gilbert Is) 1883 Traders
Nauru 1886 indent
phspte
At end of
indenture
Banaba (Ocean Is) 1920 indent
phspte
SOUTH EAST ASIA
Timor From
7th
century
Traders
Sndlwd
Sumatra From
7th
century
Indent
Tin
gold
Indent
tbcco
Traders
North Borneo 1846
1881
Indent
tbacco
Traders
Java Peranakan 1293 Indent
tbacco
Traders
Kalimantan c1600 Indent
gold
Ccont
rbber
Traders
Siam (Thailand) 1809 indent
Tin
Traders
Philippines Mestizos 1594 Traders
Shopkr
Encourgd
CnvrtedRC
ATLANTIC RIM
United States 1856 Gold shopkr
British Columbia 1871 Fur
Mexico 1893 shopkr 1930’s
Peru 1849 indent Indent
Silver
Guano
Cuba 1850s indent
BRITISH WEST INDIES
Trinidad 1806 indent
Jamaica 1854 indent
British Guiana 1853 indent
South Africa 1875 Indent
gold
At end of
indenture
BRITISH GERMAN SPANISH PORTUGUESE DUTCH UNITED STATES
Table. 5. Global Analysis: Marriage and Partnering:
Chinese men to Women who are identified as Indigenous, Local non- White or Mulatto women.
215
Part 2:
Australian Colonial Comparisons
The extent of marriage between Chinese men and local Aboriginal women across north
Queensland in the 19th century remains uncertain. Large scale research of Chinese –Indigenous
marriage has never been undertaken, nor have the cultural constraints based on Aboriginal law
been factored in to provide understanding of how, or when, these interracial relationships began to
occur. Until the end of the 19th and early 20th centuries, the incidence of interracial marriages and
unions between Chinese men and Aboriginal women remained very low, particularly when
compared to interracial relationships between Chinese men and White women. I argue that this is
because of two primary reasons: inability to form relationships due to frontier relations, and
Aboriginal Customary Law.
Queensland’s interracial Chinese-Indigenous relationships did not begin to emerge until after
frontier violence had ceased. Aboriginal tribes living ‘on country’ regarded both White and
Chinese migrant settlers as usurpers of their land: foreigners who crossed tribal country and helped
themselves to limited resources without permission. These intruders upset the balance of traditional
Law and as a result were considered a force to be repelled. During this war, violence against the
Aboriginal population did not diminish until populations had been “dispersed”, eradicated,
decimated by disease, or pacified. Frontier violence remained active until the late 1890s in rural
and remote districts of the north745 with detachments of Native Police active across the region.746
By the time colonial settlement was complete, Aboriginal populations had been diminished both
physically and spiritually, and family groups split up or permanently separated. In this
environment, cultural traditions regarding marriage partners, kinship and skin totem rules could not
be maintained, leaving women with little option but to partner with non- Aboriginal men including
Chinese.
North Queensland like the Northern Territory and Western Australia was one of the last frontiers
for post-contact violence associated with colonization. Eastern states such as Victoria and New
South Wales had already experienced a bloody frontier phase 40 years prior to Queensland, at a
time before gold was discovered and Chinese miners arrived.747 To date, no evidence has emerged
to suggest that interracial intimate relations, marriages or unions occurred between Chinese men
745Queenslander, 25 May 1889, p. 1008. Sub-inspector Urquhart and his Aboriginal troopers were still “dispersing” Aboriginal people
from their country near the Mein Telegraph Station on Cape York in 1889.
746 “North Queensland Aborigines and Native Police”, Brisbane Courier, 16 April 1897, p. 6.
747 Cahir, Black Gold; Barry McGowan, Thematic history of the Chinese people in the Rutherglen/Wahgunyah region of Indigo Shire,
Victoria, (Barry McGowan, June 2015): 18. Barry Mc Gowan notes concerning Aboriginal-Chinese interaction in Victoria, “By the
early 1850s, when the bulk of Chinese miners were arriving in the north east goldfields, the Aboriginal people had been decimated by
contact with whites, disease and alcohol.”
216
and Aboriginal women in Victoria748 with only a few in New South Wales. The first hint of
Chinese-Aboriginal interracial relations in New South Wales did not emerge publicly until 1898,
when the Aboriginal Protection Board commented, when referring to mixed race children, that
some had “a Chinese taint in them”.749 New South Wales interracial relations occurred around the
central, central west and far north western borderland districts, in towns and districts spanning
from Cowra, Young, Orange, and Dubbo to Wellington750 and extending further north-west to the
borderland districts of Walgett, Moree and Bogabilla.751 Even then it was not until the early
decades of the 20th century that Walgett had its first Chinese-Aboriginal family752 although there is
anecdotal evidence that earlier marriages occurred up to forty years prior.753 Across the three
eastern colonies, a general pattern of interracial relations commenced after frontier violence had
settled down and culture and traditions had been disrupted. It was only then that relationships
developed between the two marginalized communities.
Developed over thousands of years, Aboriginal culture was bound together in a complex set of
rules and social constraints which governed marriage, community relations and tribal affiliations.
Despite tremendous dislocation of culture after the arrival of colonists, Aboriginal populations in
remote towns and places across western New South Wales and across northern Australia
maintained some semblance of Law, particularly when it came to marriage practices. Strong
matrilineal and matrilocal bias remained prevalent in rural and remote New South Wales and north
Queensland, and these traditions remained until well into the 20th century.754 However, in the late
19th century when colonial settlement had stabilized, Aboriginal women found themselves
increasingly faced with the loss of suitable partners as “promised” husbands and eligible
totem/skin partners no longer existed having been decimated by years of frontier violence.
Aboriginal women were faced with a difficult decision: turn away from traditional Law and partner
with a non-Aboriginal man, or remain vulnerable to predatory White men who had settled and now
worked the country. It was a difficult decision for Aboriginal women. Traditional marriage was
governed by strict customary edicts. Those who breached the rules became at risk for ostracisation
from the tribe or, in some cases, death. When it occurred, interracial marriage disrupted the heart of
customary Law, clan, and kinship rules, and dislocated totem and moiety relations.
748 A search of newspapers of the time in Victoria, using a number of search terms which yielded good results in the U.S. and
Queensland, failed to produce any evidence of Chinese-Aboriginal marriages between 1850 and 1910.
749 “Aboriginal Protection Board”, Singleton Argus, 8 November 1898, p. 2
750Barry McGowan and Genevieve Mott, True Australians and Pioneers: Chinese Migration to the Orange, Blaney and Cabonne Shires
and the Town of Wellington, report prepared for Orange City, Blaney and Cabonne Shire Councils (August 2017): 121-131.
751 Marie Reay, “A Half-Caste Aboriginal Community in North-Western New South Wales”, Oceania, 15, 4 (June, 1945): 296-323.
752Ibid., 296-323
753McGowan and Mott, True Australians, 127.
754 Reay, “A Half-Caste Aboriginal Community”, 307; Christopher Anderson and Norman Mitchell, “Kubara: A Kuku-Yalanji View
of the Chinese in North Queensland”, Aboriginal History, Special Issue: Aboriginal – Asian Contact, 5 (June 1981): 30
217
When Chinese –Aboriginal interracial marriages did begin to occur, tribal marriage laws were
considered violated, and the union “wrong” by community standards. Women faced rejection
from their tribes and ran the risk of no longer being able to take their customary place within the
clan. In response, some Aboriginal women moved away from their families in order to protect the
reputation of the clan.755 This is evident in Walgett, New South Wales where Chinese-Aboriginal
couples lived outside the Aboriginal camp and away from the rest of the community.756 In the
Orange, Blaney and Cabonne Shire districts, mixed heritage families lived on the Chinese gardens
in preference to the Aboriginal Reserves nearby. 757 It may also explain why Opal Maginmarm left
her “country” on the Brunette Downs, Northern Territory to live with her husband Sam Ah Sam on
Lawn Hill Station in the Gulf country of western north Queensland in 1893.758 The move may also
have been precipitated by the decimation of suitable marriage partners from clan territory as a
result of “dispersal” actions by station owners and Native Police.759
The impact of Queensland’s dispersal policies 1860-1900, by White men and Aboriginal Troopers,
on Aboriginal women’s access to marriage partners and ability to maintain traditional customary
marriage laws, was substantial. By the time Chinese – Aboriginal marriages were first legally
registered from 1898, Aboriginal populations had been subjected to over thirty years of frontier
violence. Those who were left to “come in” and settle on pastoral stations, did so in the hope that
they would be able to remain on country and maintain traditional connections to the land and
traditional sites in exchange for labour services.760 Remote station managers across the north-west
Gulf districts capitalised on the situation, using Aboriginal men as ringers and boundary riders
while women worked as house maids and laundry-girls. Some women also worked as “stockmen”
and were very adept at horseriding. When the station Chinese cook/ gardener married a local
Aboriginal woman it provided another means to secure a property labour-force. Remote station
managers acted as local Justice of the Police and married their Chinese and Aboriginal
employees.761 Stable interracial relationships proved mutually beneficial for both the station
owners and the Aboriginal population on the property.
755Marie Reay and Grace Sitlington, “Class and Status in a Mixed-Blood Community (Moree, N.S.W.)”, Oceania, 18, 3 (March,
1948): 180.
756Reay, “A Half-Caste Aboriginal Community”, 308.
757McGowan and Mott, True Australians, 125-26.
758 Marian K. Dent, "’Moody’ Leon - Colourful Bush Character”, MIMAG (November 1991): 10. Opal's "country" was in the
Northern Territory on Brunette Downs. It is important for scholars to seek new perspectives on Aboriginal intercultural relationships,
where customary law and partner choices collide.
759For an account of dispersals by Native Police see Jonathan Richards, The SecretWar: ATrue History of Queensland's NativePolice
(University of Queensland Press, St. Lucia, 2008); and “Police Protection in the Burke District”, Queenslander, 22 April 1882, p. 498.
760Dawn May, “The 1920s: A Turning Point for North Queensland Aborigines”, Journal of the Royal Historical Society of Queensland
13, 10 (1989): 375-388.
761 QBDM-MR-MF, 1898, 1898/000218, SAM AH BOW married MAGINMARM, Opal, 14 November 1898; Marriages in the
Bourke District 1898; and “Mr. T. B Macintosh”, Courier Mail, 16 December 1933, p. 18. This was the case for Sam Ah Bow and
Opal Magimarm from Lawn Hill Station who were married by Justice of the Peace, J.B MacIntosh, who was at the time manager of
Lawn Hill.
218
An accord developed over time between Chinese men and the Aboriginal community. Both shared
a social structure based on a clan system, and alliances between family groups were based on
marriage and kinship structures. Gender roles were maintained as separate, and both had a cultural
and spiritual reverence for the landscape, the spirits, the sea, and the environment. Aboriginal
culture could be patriarchal or matriarchal in structure, yet was matriarchal when it came to
children, family raising and knowledge sharing for girls. The maternal Aboriginal grandmother
was not only at the pinnacle of female power but responsible for ensuring her grandchildren were
raised appropriately so cultural transfer occurred and children did not to bring shame on the
family.762 This was not unlike the role of mother-in-law in the patriarchal Confucian family. Both
sets of women provided a focal centre for family and clan: a system which was amenable for a
Chinese –Aboriginal interracial relationship.763
However, despite synergies between Aboriginal and Chinese cultures which were acknowledged
by each group, there appeared to be some initial reluctance for Chinese men to partner with Local
Aboriginal women as readily as they did in other host countries. There are some considerations as
to why this was so.
Firstly, Chinese men were economic migrants: focused on making sufficient money to send home
to sustain the village family. As McKeown points out, “migration was just one of a variety of
investment strategies designed to keep the family line solvent.” 764 Partnering with a non-Chinese
woman in a host country was an additional financial burden to the primary task at hand, and
pastoral cooks/gardeners were not rich. When compared to marriage with a White woman, who
provided a pathway to economic expansion through naturalisation, Aboriginal women with their
low status in White society provided little economic incentive for marriage. However, the
advantage of intimacy, companionship and labour for men who were unable to attract a wife in
China, cannot be understated as a legitimate reason later on to take a “wife”. As a result, there was
often a huge disparity of age between the man and woman.
Secondly, by 1852 in the colonies of Victoria and New South Wales, the Aboriginal population
had been decimated and Aboriginal women rendered ‘invisible’ by the broader White society.
Some Chinese men may have had prejudiced views against Aboriginal women’s low status in what
was by then a relatively urban society. These two points, lack of women and low status, are evident
762Reay, “A Half-Caste Aboriginal Community”, 313.
763 Similarly, both Chinese and Aboriginal women shared female specific traditions which Chinese men would have been sensitive to,
including the traditional conjugal month of rest after the birth of a baby.
764McKeown, Transnational Chinese Families, 97
219
in the words of a contributor to the Sydney Morning Herald who reflected on the likelihood of
Chinese men marrying local women in N.S.W. when he said
“The introduction of so many males into countries like our own, without a fair proportion of the
opposite sex, has been remedied in our other colonies as well as other States, by the Chinese
gradually intermarrying with the Aboriginal women of these countries, but there is no such
resource in this country.” 765
At the time this statement was made, Queensland and the Northern Territory portion of South
Australia were expanding and the frontier wars were yet to reach their violent peak.
Thirdly, a sustained period of Aboriginal violence and aggression towards Chinese shepherds and
miners in northern Australia left an indelible impression on Chinese settler men. While generations
of Asian-Aboriginal families had formed as part of the interaction with the Aboriginal community
across the coast of then South Australia (Northern Territory), Arnhem Land and the West
Australian Kimberley district, Chinese-Aboriginal relations across Queensland, and in particular
north Queensland, were quickly defined by fear, violence, and conflict wrought by the Aboriginal
clans against Chinese men.766The push into northern New South Wales from the late 1840s, and
after 1850 into the Darling Downs and Maranoa districts, sparked violent conflict and hostility
between Aboriginal clans and White settlers. This conflict extended to newly arriving indentured
Chinese shepherds.767 Violence expanded in intensity when Chinese men arrived on north
Queensland goldfields.768Chinese miners, in search of gold, quickly learned to fear for their lives
as they travelled to and settled on remote goldfields such as the Gilbert and the Palmer.769
Aboriginal clans across the north, seeking to rid the intruders from tribal lands, conducted fear
invoking raids and violence against all settlers which resulted in retribution and “dispersals”.770
Newspapers of the day seized on the violence and graphically related accounts of it across the
colonies. This gave rise to reports about terrifying practices exacted on innocent miners, including
dismemberment and cannibalism.771 Rumours about cannibalism were cultivated by White miners,
765 Paul Pax, “‘Chinese Immigration’, No. VI”, The Sydney Morning Herald, 3 April 1852, p. 2.
766 Athol Chase, “‘All Kinds of Nation’: Aboriginals and Asians in Cape York Peninsula”, Aboriginal History 5, 1(1981): 7-20.
Chase argues that unlike the top end of Western Australia and Northern Territory, Aborigines of Cape York peninsula had little contact
with overseas visitors until the arrival of Cook and later in the mid-late 19th century. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries Cape York
Aborigines interacted more with Japanese fishermen and pearl shell operators than Chinese men, who were located mostly in the
Palmer and Coen goldfields as gardeners and storekeepers.
767 “Local and Domestic'”, The North Australian, Ipswich and General Advertiser, 29 July1856, p. 3; “Murder at Colington”, Morton
Bay Courier, 27 November 1852, p.3. A Chinese shepherd was reported murdered by an Aborigine: “Latest News”, Moreton Bay
Courier, 5 June1858, p. 2.
768 Anderson and Mitchell, “Kubara”, 23-24. The Kuku Yalanji and Kuku-Mini Aborigines, on whose territory the Palmer goldfield
was located, responded to White and Chinese intruders with a campaign of fierce resistance.
769Taam, My Life and Work, 23
770 “The Nebo correspondent of the Mackay Mercury, writing on the 8th ultimo, says…in 'The Courier.'”, The Brisbane Courier, 6
March 1869, p. 4.
771 “Townsville”, Queenslander, 17 December 1870, p. 3.
220
with an emphasis on the myth that Aboriginal tribes “preferred” to eat Chinese over Whites.772
This story has parallels with the Indian-Anglo-Chinese conflict in the United States where Native
Americans were said to have coveted the long queues of Chinese men when taking scalps.773 Both
accounts inflamed Chinese fears, which resulted in concern and paranoia.774 For example, in one of
the few accounts written from a Chinese perspective, Taam Szu Piu, on recalling his journey to the
Palmer Goldfield as a 17 year old, wrote that his group ‘stuck together’ “lest we should be set upon
by the black natives and probably be devoured by them.”775
Fig. 53. “Queensland Aboriginal Australians attacking Chinese Diggers on the Gilbert River”:
1873776
Fig.54. “The Fight at the Conglomerate: “Burking a Chinaman” 1878777
Noel Loos, in his work regarding the invasion and resistance period of north Queensland’s
colonisation, estimated that within the peak conflict and immigration period 1861 - 1897,
approximately 404 deaths of colonists were recorded as a result of Aboriginal aggression. Of those
killed 102, or one quarter, were Chinese men.778 These figures suggest that Chinese men were not
particularly targeted as intruders, nor were they singled out for racial reasons as the cannibalism
myth would have it. Under these conditions, it is not surprising that Chinese- Aboriginal
relationships built on trust and reciprocation could not, and did not occur until the 1890s, when the
frontier regions had become largely peaceful. At the end of the frontier war, both groups found
772 Anderson and Mitchell, “Kubara”, 26 andGeoffrey Partington, “Cannibalism: A White Colonist Fiction?”, Quadrant (May 2008):
87-90. There remains some conjecture over the practice of Aborigines in regards to cannibalism. Historians and social observers
continue to argue about the semantics of the word ‘Cannibalism’. What is known is that ritual practices based on traditional mortuary
practices were carried out by some Aboriginal tribes across Queensland until the end of the late 19th century. The practice of
consuming parts of the enemy or even the family, for cultural reasons, was not limited to Australia, but also practiced around the South
Pacific. However, when confronted by evidence of mortuary practices at the time of settlement, White Christian settlers apportioned
Western perceptions of “cannibalism”, based on moral grounds, to the actions they witnessed and as a result it has remained the subject
of debate, condemnation and misunderstanding ever since.
773Leistman, “Horizontal inter-ethnic relations”, 332.Native American Indian tribes waged a sustained war against encroaching
Chinese placer (alluvial) miners, to a much greater degree than the conflict experienced across north Queensland.
774 'Cannibalism in the North', The Week, 29 August 1885, p. 7.
775Taam, My Life and Work, 12.
776 'Queensland Blacks attacking Chinese Diggers on the Gilbert River- See page 10.', Illustrated Australian News for Home Readers,
30 January1873, p. 5.
777 'Sketches about the Palmer, North Queensland.', “Burking a Chinaman”, The Australasian Sketcher with Pen and Pencil, 13 April
878, p. 5.
778Gordon Briscoe, “Aboriginal Australian Identity: The Historiography of Relations between Indigenous Ethnic Groups and Other
Australians, 1788 to 1988”, History Workshop,36(Autumn, 1993): 146
221
themselves driven together through necessity which under ordinary conditions may not have
readily taken place.779
Over time, Chinese and Indigenous communities across northern Australia developed complex
social interactions across a range of areas which were mutually beneficial to the two groups.780
Chinese settlers employed Indigenous labour to work on gardens, or for odd jobs, and they worked
together on station properties.781 These reflected the progression of relations which had occurred in
central and northern New South Wales some 40 years prior.782 It is about this time that Aboriginal
women began to partner with Chinese men. The mixing of Chinese settlers with the Aboriginal
community raised alarm among White colonial authorities who feared the corruption of
Aboriginals through opium addiction, loss of valuable Aboriginal labour to White employers,
prostitution of women in return for food and shelter, and the creation of a “piebald race” through
unrestricted miscegenation; all of which threatened White racial dominance. To remediate the
problem, a series of Acts were introduced across the colonies to contain, control and manage
Aboriginal populations in a way which excluded Chinese employers, partners, friends and fathers
from mixing with them.
***
Colonial Legislation, Interracial relationships: Racial Panic
Between 1838 and 1897 legislation was introduced in New South Wales, South Australia, Victoria,
Queensland and lastly Western Australia, as a response by colonial administrations to control and
manage Aboriginal populations. While broad in application, and tailored to each colony, the
legislation was uniform in its application as a means to control Aboriginal lives including marriage
and relationships. Furthermore, depending on the colony, legislation sanctioned the removal of
women and children, controlled an individual’s association with other groups, reduced property
rights, restricted movement and place of abode, regulated work opportunities and last but most
telling, controlled women’s sexual partners in a bid to regulate social eugenics.783 Aboriginal
protection was proclaimed as the duty of “responsible government” towards its Aboriginal
population, but must be considered against a backdrop of exploitation when labour was scarce in
the colonies.784
779Guy Ramsey, “Myth, Moment”, 263.
780 Anderson, and Mitchell, “Kubara”, 32.
781Ibid.,.29,31-32
782McGowan, True Australians, 121-124.
783For example, in Victoria under the Aboriginal Protection Act 1869, Aboriginal women’s right to marry was restricted and they had
to seek permission. The Act was also called the “half caste Act”, due to its provision for removal of mixed heritage children from their
Aboriginal families in an attempt to assimilate them into White society, usually as cheap labour.
784Ganter, Mixed Relations, 91
222
The Aboriginal Protection Act 1886, introduced in Western Australia, was the first colonial
restrictive Act passed as a means to regulate an Indigenous population, particularly those who were
not employed in pearl-shelling. Incorporating elements from Victorian and South Australian
legislation, the Western Australian Act established a Protection Board and appointed Protectors of
Aborigines who oversaw all aspects of Aboriginal welfare including the regulation of the lucrative
pearl-shelling industry. In an attempt to control Aboriginal women working on the Japanese pearl
luggers of Broome, Aboriginal women were banned from working on the luggers, and in doing so,
segregated them from the influence of Asian men. Under the auspices of the Act young girls and
boys were removed from their families to be put in the care of the colonial administration, where
they were trained in domestic and unskilled labour occupations to provide a ready workforce for
the White population until they became adults.
From the early 20th century the push to regulate and control the Aboriginal population increased in
intensity. The Aboriginal Protection Act 1886 was suspended and repealed to make way for The
Aboriginals Act 1905 which made it illegal for Aboriginal women and Asian men to cohabitate or
form intimate relations. With a large Malay, Japanese, Chinese and Macassar population in
Broome as well as across north Australia, The Act had huge intergenerational implications for
Aboriginal communities. Aboriginal women were prohibited from visiting Japanese and Malay
crews on the pearl luggers when they were in port, as well as when dry docked in the creeks for
repairs.785 Any Aboriginal woman found consorting with an Asian man was targeted for removal
and this extended to her mixed heritage children as well.786 This policy secured the benefit that the
State was aiming for: separation of troublesome non-white races; control over social eugenics to
maintain White hegemony; security of a ready future workforce through control and training of
mixed heritage children; and a subdued and compliant Indigenous community. Asian men,
including Chinese, were required to seek approval in order to marry Aboriginal women, and
approvals were rarely granted. To circumvent this restriction couples just took the risk and lived
together.787 A policy of separation was not confined to Western Australia, but was also applied in
varying degrees across northern Australia.
Until 1910-1911, Chinese-Aboriginal relations remained unobtrusive in South Australia’s Northern
Territory, despite a large Indigenous and immigrant population. Statistics reveal that there were
surprisingly few recorded offspring from interracial unions in the Northern Territory with only 99
785Balint, “Aboriginal Women and Asian Men”, 546 -547
786Ibid., 549
787Ibid., 550
223
names registered by 1908 in the Protector of Aborigines’ “Register of Half Castes”.788 These
figures suggest that interracial unions resulting in a child between an Aboriginal woman and a
Chinese migrant man, were few. However, anxiety concerning interracial marriage was notable in
the broader community. Previous attempts to regulate Chinese-Aboriginal interactions had been
made through the criminal justice system. This involved prosecution under The Crown Land Act
1890, which enabled the governor to grant land to Aborigines while preventing the granting of land
to Asians. In addition, the Opium Act 1895 made it illegal to supply opium to Aborigines until its
amendment in 1905, after which it was illegal to possess opium altogether.789 After Federation,
stricter measures were introduced, largely driven by a southern preoccupation with the northern
States’ lax approach to their multicultural communities, which led to the introduction of the
Northern Territory Aboriginals Act 1910 followed quickly by the Aboriginals Act 1911.
With powers to remove mixed heritage children from their Aboriginal mothers, the Northern
Territory embarked on a policy of removals to separate “pure” Aborigines from mixed heritage
children. With a large population of Chinese in Port Darwin, Pine Creek and Brock’s Creek,
accusations were mounting that Chinese men were exploiting and abusing local women and girls.
In particular, fear focused on the decimation of the female population through venereal disease and
the procurement of underage girls for sexual services – something that had been done by White
men since colonisation.790 Many mixed heritage girls and young women deemed “at risk” from
Asian men were removed to government reserves, in order to protect them from sexual predation
and disease. This policy was strengthened when the Northern Territory Aboriginals Act 1910 was
suspended through the repeal of the Aboriginals Ordinance Act 1911 in 1918. In its place, the
Aboriginal Ordinance Act 1918 was introduced to “better control the welfare and protection” of
Aborigines.791 “Half caste” institutions were set up across the Territory in a deliberate attempt to
segregate “full blood” from mixed heritage Aborigines.792 There, girls and boys were trained in
domestic and farm occupations, exactly the same as in Western Australia, before placement in
employment as adults was secured under agreements (a type of indenture) to service the broader
White population across the Northern Territory.793
Under this legislation, no Asiatic men could employ Aboriginal labour. Despite this, a path
remained open for the granting of licenses to Chinese women or women of Asiatic background. It
was felt that Chinese women in particular suffered great hardship in rearing their large families
788J. P. M. Long, “The Administration and the Part-Aboriginals of the Northern Territory”, Oceania 37, 3 (March, 1967):189.
789Ganter, Mixed Relations, 112.
790“Pigmented Paramours: A corrosive Curse andColoured Concupiscence”, Truth,12 March 1911, p.4.
791Northern Territory Times and Gazette, 17 August 1918, p. 12.
792Long, “Administration and the Part-Aboriginals of the Northern Territory”, 190.
793Ganter, Mixed Relations,119-121
224
when compared to their White counterparts, who had access to Aboriginal female help, and this
move was an attempt to assist them.794
Under the Ordinance Act 1918, it was illegal for anyone who was not Aboriginal to cohabitate with
or marry an Indigenous woman without permission from the Aboriginal Protector. Any couples
who cohabitated attracted substantial fines for breaching it:
“Any person, other than an aboriginal or half caste not living with his wife, who habitually
consorts with a female aboriginal or half caste, or keeps one such as his mistress, or unlawfully
has carnal knowledge of a female aboriginal or half caste, shall be subject to a penalty of £100,
or three months imprisonment, or both. In this case the onus of proof that the offence has not
been committed is upon the person charged.”795
Under these conditions Chinese-Aboriginal relations were so restricted that it is presumed that few
relationships were successfully able to occur. Consequently, the Northern Territory governments
could be considered successful in their aim of segregating Aboriginal people from other races796
and setting up a legal framework for the removal of mixed heritage children in an effort to
manipulate social eugenics.
The north Australian colonies of Western Australia and South Australia’s Northern Territory
modelled their policies in the early 20th century on Queensland’s draconian Aboriginal legislation.
Queensland’s Aboriginal Protection and Restriction of Sale of Opium Act 1897 provided a
template for other colonies to follow in an effort, among other aims, to control Asian interracial
relationships with Aboriginal women and prevent a growing mixed heritage population.
Queensland’s legislation aimed to intervene in interracial relations and it regulated who could live
with whom, when and where.
***
Part 3 : Queensland
Colonial Queensland legislation controlling interracial relationships
In 1895, two years before the Aboriginal Protection and Restriction of Sale of Opium Act 1897
came into force, Archibald Meston wrote a report which laid out a methodology to improve and
preserve the Aborigines of Queensland. Meston proposed that special reserves should be initiated
where Aborigines could be sent where they could be educated and skilled sufficiently to be utilized
as a workforce to replace South Sea Islander labour when the Queensland sugar industry phased
them out.797 The mission and Government reserve system provided an ideal setting to achieve this
794Northern Territory Times and Gazette, 17 August 1918, p. 12.
795 1918 'New Aboriginals Ordinance.’ Northern Territory Times and Gazette, 17 August, p. 12.
796Ganter, Mixed Relations, 113, 123.
797Ann Curthoys and Clive Moore, “Working for the White People: An Historiographic Essay on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander
Labour”, Labour History, special edition ‘Aboriginal Workers’,69 (November, 1995), p. 7
225
goal. Aborigines in missions could be trained in occupations such as housemaids and nursemaids,
labourers, fencers and station workers. Very much focused on the north, the combined removal and
mission systems under the Act solved a number of problems: humanitarian concerns about
treatment of Aborigines, access to cheap labour for White employers to cope with the chronic
labour shortage in the north, and racial separation between the races.
In his report, Archibald Meston indicated clear western patriarchial views of how Aboriginal girls
should counduct themselves and how they should go about marriage relations with Aboriginal men
showing no understanding of Aboriginal Law or partnering protocols. He wrote:
“They arrive early at a marriageable age, and unless they find a mate of their own race at that
period, no abstract principles or virtue or morality inculcated by the missionaries, or anybody
else will save them from intercourse with white men.”
This last point assumed two points concerning the women: that Aboriginal women were perceived
as permiscuous, and secondly that women had agency to partner at will rather than through a
match determined by skin, kinship and moeity protocols. He argued that misecengation for girls
from an early age would “save” them from themselves and a life of “degredation and burden on the
State.” Rather than regard women as the potential victims of sexual exploitation, or victims of a
lack of appropriate sexual partners, he implied that Aboriginal women were the perpetrators of
sexual advancements and a danger to their own “virtue” (western imagined by Meston himself). 798
Regina Ganter explores the implication of the Act on north Queensland Aboriginal sexual relations
further when she notes The Aborigines Protection and Restriction of the Sale of Opium Act 1897
was very much focused on north Queensland and where most Queensland Aborigines lived, with
great impact of the Act felt in industries such as pearl shelling which were conducted almost
exclusively by Asian men who employed Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander labour.799
The Act specifically targeted Chinese men through a clause inserted to prevent Chinese settlers
from employing Aboriginal labour. Section 5, clause 2 of the 1901 amended Act read “a permit to
employ an Aboriginal or half caste shall not be granted to any alien of the Chinese race”. It also
had provisions for the Protector of Aboriginals to segregate the Chinese and Aboriginal
communities. Moral righteousness as well as racism guided the administration of the Act, which
was clearly reflected in the reasons stated by the Protector of Aborigines’ Annual Reports to the
798 Gordon Stephen Reid, Queensland and the aboriginal problem, 1838-1901, PhD Thesis, Australian National
University, 1986.pp. 226-227
799Ganter, “Living a Immoral Life”, 13
226
Queensland Parliament. Aboriginal women living with Chinese men were portrayed as morally
corrupt with the Northern Protector of Aborigines, W.E. Roth, making it very clear that women
who resided with Chinese men were considered “prostitutes”.800
Aboriginal women were highly regulated and had no control over their bodies, location,
employment, daily lives or decision making. Women found to be living unlawfully in de facto
marriages with a Chinese man were summarily removed, with the patriarchal Law extending
across north Queensland. Both women and children were removed to missions and Government
stations from as far west as in the Burketown region,801 for the crime of being without
“employment and living in the Chinese Quarters.”802 Indigenous women, it seems, were viewed as
being unable to look after themselves and required “rescuing” from Chinese men.803 It also
implies that ordinary family life was considered impossible between a Chinese man and an
Aboriginal woman. Yet for many Chinese settlers across north-west Queensland and in the Torres
Straits, Indigenous women provided the only potential sexual partners available and mutually
beneficial intimate relations occurred.
Yet loving relationships between Chinese men and Aboriginal women were severely hampered by
both Clause 8 and Clause 14 of the Act804 and the amended Aboriginals Protection and Restriction
of the Sale of Opium Amendment Act 1901. Racial dogma at the time held the notion that children
of racially mixed families would naturally hold all of the vices of their parents: a consideration
which socially influenced official views when deciding whether to consent to an application or
not.805 The partnering of Aboriginal women with non-Aboriginal men raised concern that a new
hybrid community would develop which posed a direct threat to racial purity aspired to by the
White colonial administration.806 As a result, it was seldom approved by the Protector.
800QPP., 1902, Vol. I, “Annual Report of the Chief Protector of Aborigines for the Year 1901”, pp. 1132-1139..The Chief Protector
wrote, “The following list of young women and children, rescued from a life of destitution and immorality and neglect and placed in
healthier and more comfortable circumstances will show that the department has not been inactive in its operations for the welfare of
this section of the community.” Included in the list was a “young woman and children removed from Blackwater to Barambah for 6
months for opium smoking, prostitution and neglected conditions”.
801 Ramsey, “Myth Moment”, 264.
802 QPP, 1907, Vol. II, “Annual Report of the Northern Protector of Aborigines, 1906”, p. 1270. For example, Kitty and her two
children were removed from Cooktown and sent south to Yarrabah Mission. Kitty’s crime, it was reported, was that she was not
employed and lived in the Chinese quarters. Some Chinese men pushed back. Willie Ah Duck, the son of Ah Duck and his Aboriginal
wife of Mossman, was removed because he was living with a Chinaman (his father) under Clause 14 of the Act. The Cairns Police had
been given instructions to remove him to Yarrabah on the grounds of “neglect.” Ah Duck’s response was to take the Crown to court
in a case which saw the local constable speak in Ah Duck’s defence, highlighting Ah Duck’s good character, therefore challenging the
claim of neglect.QSA : CPS 12E/P9, 27 Oct 1900. Willie Ah Duck vs Crown.
803QPP, 1909, Vol. II,“Annual Report of the Chief Protector of Aborigines for the Year 1908”, pp. 980-990.
804QPP, 1902, Vol. II, “A Bill to Amend “The Aborigines Protection and Restriction of the Sale of Opium Act 1897”, pp. 555-560.
Clause 8 of the Act stated “No marriage of a female Aboriginal with any person other than an Aboriginal shall be celebrated without
the permission, in writing, of a Protector authorized by the minister to give such permission.”
805May, Topsawyers, 210. In 1901, the Commissioner for Police commenting on the affair of Goon Goo and Kitty at Herberton, wrote:
“Apart from any other consideration, offspring resulting from such intercourse are, I think, by no means a desirable addition to the
population”.
806 “Half-Castes”, Morning Post, 10 February1903, p.3.
227
Permission to marry was, for all these reasons, difficult to secure for Chinese - Aboriginal
interracial couples. The Protector of Aborigines was always suspicious of the true nature of the
relationship between the couple, leading to a perception that Chinese men were luring Aboriginal
women into bed with opium in return for sexual services.807 By 1907 attention was clearly on the
illegal harbouring and employment of Indigenous workers, and fines for Chinese men were
increased. In this year alone 11 fines out of 20 cases were imposed on Chinese men in in north
Queensland, from Tully to the Palmer goldfield, and west to Atherton and Mareeba. Two years
later in 1909, twenty Chinese men were fined for harbouring or illegally employing Indigenous
people out of a possible 46 men prosecuted.808 The fact that these relationships were in areas
where intense agriculture was underway (in particular maize and tobacco growing) was not taken
into consideration. Concurrent with the increased zeal displayed in fining men harbouring
Indigenous women was the decrease in permissions given to Chinese - Aboriginal couples to
legally marry.
The reluctance to grant permission to Chinese men to legally marry an Aboriginal woman is
evident in the granting of permission for only 3 marriages out of 32 mixed-race marriages by the
Chief Northern Protector in 1901. W. E. Roth wrote
“Personally I have always exerted my influence in the direction of trying to put a stop to these
mixed marriages, but cases repeatedly occur where they may be considered both expedient and
justifiable”.809
In 1908, out of the 41 marriages granted for interracial unions, only two were to Chinese men.810
This trend continued with only 1 Chinese man in Boulia granted permission to marry out of 12
applicants of other races in 1912; 1 Chinese man in 1913 out of 24 marriages; and only 3 Chinese
men granted permission out of 43 approved marriages in 1914. Of the 1914 marriages, the
Protector noted
“43 aboriginal and half-caste women to marry men of other races, the circumstances of each
case being first carefully inquired into in the interests of the woman. Twenty-one of these
marriages were to pacific islanders…the men were in regular employment and seemed attached
to the women…Eleven half castes married Europeans and three Chinese half castes were
allowed to marry Chinese, the remainder being cross breeds who desired to mate with other
coloured aliens.”811
807 QPP, 1902, Vol. I, “Annual Report of the Chief Protector of Aborigines for the Year 1901”, p.1132. In 1901 Roth wrote: “The
excuses which some of the defendants so summoned, [for cohabitating with Aboriginal women] brought forward were very various:
one coloured alien went so far as to state that he let the gin sleep on his premises because she was too frightened to sleep in her camp -
he was fined £15 and costs”.
808QPP, 1909, Vol. II, “Annual Report for the Chief Protector of Aborigines for the Year 1908”, p. 990.
809QPP, 1902, Vol. I, “Annual Report of the Chief Protector of Aborigines for the Year 1901”, pp. 1132-1139.
810QPP, 1909, Vol. II,“Annual Report for the Chief Protector of Aborigines for the Year 1908”,p. 990. In Mossman, a report stated
there were nine Aboriginal women living in the district with either “Kanakas” (South Sea Islanders) or “Chinamen”. Permission to
marry Indigenous women was more likely to be granted to Malay or Pacific Islander men than Chinese men, who were instead fined
for “harbouring” Aboriginal women. “Kanaka” is a broad term given to people from the South Sea Islands (SSI) brought to north
Queensland as cheap labour on the sugar plantations. They were also known as Pacific Islanders and ‘Polynesians’, even though they
were actually Melanesian. There was much animosity between the Islanders and Chinese men.
811QPP., 1915/1916, “Annual Report of the Chief Protector of Aboriginal 1914”, Vol. III., p. 1684
228
By 1920, the Government remained resolute in its position with812 government officials
administering what had become a key national policy.813 As Julia Martinez notes,
“the level of control over marriage demonstrates that the White Australia policy was far more
than a matter of immigration restriction. It was the basis for internal population control
including criminalisation of miscegenation.”814
The impact on the children of Chinese – Aboriginal couples was disastrous.
The beginning of sustained intergenerational cultural dislocation for mixed heritage Aboriginal-
Chinese children commenced with the Clause 14 of the Aborigines Protection and Restriction of
the Sale of Opium Amendment Act 1901. The clause legalized instructions to forcibly remove
“half-caste” children where they were deemed “at risk”, and were validated in reports by
descriptions such as children, particularly girls, being “in the habit of frequenting Chinese Dens”,
“Acting as spies for Chinese”, “living an immoral life harboured by a Chinaman”, “hang[ing]
around Chinese farms and gardens”, “Frequents Chinese Habitations” or “Frequenting Chinese
quarters for Opium and prostitution”. By officially targeting children, the very heart of the family,
culturally vital in both Aboriginal and Chinese culture, officials reasoned that this would be
enough to prevent intimate relations for “…as long as the Asiatic or low class European realizes
that no government Action is taken with regard to his half caste children, he will continue co
habiting with his Aboriginal Paramour”.815
The legal action by the government proved catastrophic to mixed heritage children’s self-identity
associated with their mother’s country, and severed ties with the landscape and spirit stories which
were vital for cultural initiation and spiritual maturity. Removed mixed heritage children also
suffered from the loss of a Chinese father. Children were classified according to percentage of
Aboriginality and stigmatized in terms such as “half caste”, “quarter caste”, or “octoroon”. In
1934, under the ever-tightening White Australia policy, the Act was amended.816 The new
provisions widened the definition of ‘Half Caste’ to include anyone who was the child or
grandchild of an Aboriginal, or was the child or grand-child of two ‘half castes’, and anyone of
Pacific Island extraction. In the 1920s and 1930s Torres Strait Islanders were also increasingly
subjugated when it came to racially inspired colonial laws.
812QPP, 1921, “Annual Report of the Chief Protector of Aboriginal 1920”, Vol. II., p.559
It noted “The Department is still firmly discouraging the marriage of full bloods to aliens.”
813 Balint: 545
814Julia Martinez, “Indigenous Australian-Indonesian Intermarriage: Negotiating Citizenship Rights in Twentieth Century”, Aboriginal
History, Vol 35, (2011): 180-181
815The Morning Post, 10 February 1903, p. 3
816Ganter, Mixed Relations, 76-81
229
The islands across the Torres Straits, including the colonial administrative centre of Thursday
Island, contained a uniquely multicultural society which developed in stark contrast to
Queensland’s mainland. At the time, Torres Strait Islanders were considered as Pacific Islanders
until 1872, including those north of the 10th latitude.817 The population on Thursday Island
included Christian influenced Torres Strait Islanders, South Sea Islanders, Chinese and Japanese
pearl shell operators and storekeepers, a diverse Asian workforce including Malays, Macassans,
and Javanese as well as a White colonial administration. Census figures indicate that by 1880,
Thursday Island had 214 Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders, 200 Asians (including Chinese,
Japanese, Malay, and Javanese) and 28 White settlers. Within ten years, White dominance was
established with 270 White people recorded, 126 Asians, 38 classified as Aboriginals and Torres
Strait Islanders, and 38 South Sea Islanders. By 1901, the White community had reached 700 with
over 113 Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders, 304 Japanese, 114 Chinese, 83 Filipinos and 55
Malays.818 The majority of the population at the time was engaged on pearl-shelling, working in
associated maritime occupations, or engaged in the commercial sector.
The distinction between Torres Strait Islanders, Pacific Islanders and Aborigines, was not made
until 1884 with the introduction of the Native Labourers Protection Act 1884. This standardized
the terms of employment for those working in the maritime industries across Australia and Papua
and recognised Torres Strait Islanders as a separate people. Torres Strait Islanders were exempt
from the provisions of The Aborigines Protection and Restriction of the Sale of Opium Act of 1897
when it was first introduced.819 However in 1904 a new Protector of Aborigines was appointed to
Thursday Island and changes to the way that the Act was administrated were introduced. All
Islanders across the Torres Straits were then brought under the Act with no distinction made
between mainland Aborigines and Islanders. This impacted on the lives of every family which had
previously been exempt from the Act, as they found that they suddenly came under the control of
authorities where previously they had been ignored. 820
Thursday Island’s broader population defied the Protectors’ attempts to bring Torres Strait
Islanders under the Act and challenges constantly arose. The difficulty lay in the fact that it was
increasingly impossible to identify who was “Aboriginal” under the Act, particularly when it came
down to degrees of Aboriginality which were under scrutiny. Unexpectedly, departmental
817 Torres Strait Islanders are not ethnically distinct from the Melanesians of New Guinea.Germany had north-east New Guinea until
1914 while Papua, the south-east, was briefly annexed by Queensland in 1883, later taken over by the British in 1884, and then handed
to the Australian government to administer from 1906; under a League of Nations mandate Australia also administered the former
German New Guinea.
818 Chase, “Kubara”, 8
819Ganter, “Living a Immoral Life”, 18
820 The death of John Douglas, Government Resident and Police Magistrate on Thursday Island on 24 July 1904 brought
about these changes. He had administered the Torres Strait since 1885.
230
resources became tied up as officers made attempts to defend decisions which were made from a
position of moral rectitude rather than based on legislation. This led to an attempt to reign in local
dissent, and amendments were made to the Act as a concession. This eventually forced the
Department to repeal the 1897 Act and replace it by two separate pieces of legislation: one for
mainland Aborigines and one for Torres Strait Islanders. For Torres Strait Islander women, the
repeal of the Act made little difference. Permission was still required for Chinese-Torres Strait
Islander marriages to occur, with the Department showing little appetite to extend its flexibility
about Islander labour towards interracial marriage.821
***
Part 4 :
North Queensland Chinese- Aboriginal Marriage Trends
Having laid out the difficulty Aboriginal women experienced partnering with Chinese men, and
that interracial Chinese – Aboriginal families faced, it is no surprise that few relationships were
able to officially occur or be left to flourish. Across Queensland for the period 1860-1920, only 28
Indigenous women were identified as married or living with a Chinese man in official documents
such as the Births Deaths and Marriages register. Out of an identified 1095 primary couples
(marriages and unions) whose cultural background is known, only a tiny proportion of marriages -
3% of the total across the State - were between Chinese men and Aboriginal /Indigenous women.
In the Northern Region, the percentage of Chinese-Indigenous interracial couples and families was
higher at 6%, but still small when compared to 66% of relationships with White women, 27 % with
migrant Chinese women and 1% to women with other cultural backgrounds such as Japanese or
South Sea Islander. (See Chapter 5 for an overview of all marriage statistics).
The combination of cultural constraints on both Aboriginal women and Chinese men combined
with the volatile frontier environment and anti-miscegenation legislation, provided an effective
barrier to intimate relations. It is suspected that that these figures may not fully convey the true
extent of Chinese-Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander relationships, and that this area needs more
research. It is suspected that more relationships will be revealed to enable a more accurate picture
to emerge. However, due to the very large task associated with this area of research, and time
constraints required to investigate, it remains outside the scope of this thesis.
821 QSA: HOM/J259/19 HOM YUEN, gardener Marbuiag Island; QSA: A/58735 Chin Fat: Letter to Protector of Aborigines seeking
exemption from Aborigines Protection Act with support letter from See Kee, owner /manager of See Yick and Co. In 1919, gardener
Hom Yuen was unable to marry "1/2 caste" Mabuiag Islander May Hankin on the basis that the office opposed marriages between
Aborigines and Chinese ‘aliens’ at the time. In a move to distance themselves from mainland Aborigines and move towards self
determination, an interracial Chinese-Torres Strait Islander family, the Chin Fat family, sought exemption from the Act in the 1930s.
231
Nearly all of the marriages and unions between Chinese men and Aboriginal and Islander women
have been identified as occurring in north Queensland with the exception of a late marriage in
Central Region. Figures indicate that there were no marriages in Brisbane or the Southern Region;
1 Chinese- Aboriginal family identified in the Central Region, in the early 20th century; and 19
families or 68% identified in north Queensland, including Thursday Island and the Torres Straits.
Approximately 8 more couples have been identified but so far it has not been established where
they lived. It is clear from the low numbers that the Chinese family landscape pattern associated
with Chinese Aboriginal families is rooted in north Queensland with 95% of all the Chinese-
Aboriginal families whose location is accounted for. (See Figs. 55 & 56 below.)
Fig. 55. Queensland: Chinese – Indigenous Families: 1847-1920
Fig.56. North Queensland: Chinese –Indigenous Families: 1860-1920
Marriage patterns between Chinese men and Indigenous women did not begin to make a presence
until the 1890’s and the impact of legislative constraint and strict Colonial policy to keep the two
races apart, was tempered by the impending Federation and possible transfer of Aboriginal affairs
over to the newly created Commonwealth. Within this period, Station managers may have taken
advantage of the impending uncertainty surrounding the changeover of administration from
Colonies to Commonwealth, and quickly married couples. This may account for the small spikes
in marriages 1899-1901. As the White Australia Policy rolled out across the former colonies,
Protectors resumed positions as managers of Aboriginal people across each State and suppressed
marriage requests and family reunions, seldom granting them thereafter.
232
Fig. 57. Chinese -Aboriginal Family Landscape: 1890-1920
In the majority of cases Chinese-Aboriginal interracial families were associated with pastoral
stations where the husband worked as the gardener or cook. Other families lived on the fringe of
towns in small market gardening communities, or on the rear gardens of shops in small urban
areas. Chinese men who lived in these rural and remote areas were reluctant, or unable, to bring
out a Chinese wife. They may not have had the financial means or inclination, as these areas were
very remote, serviced by rudimentary transport and services, and conditions were extremely hot
and harsh. In contrast, it is possible that one or two Chinese men took their Aboriginal wives back
to China, as Willie Sou Kee from Burketown made an application to take his wife Annie and two
children back to China822 in 1918.823 Not much is known about acceptance of Chinese –Aboriginal
mixed heritage children in the ancestral village. For those who stayed in north Queensland, the
majority of Chinese –Aboriginal first-generation children identified with their Aboriginal ancestry
first, though they readily acknowledged their Chinese fathers.
Six locations in the north West Gulf Country of North Queensland, including the towns of
Cloncurry, Camooweal, Burketown and Normanton had more than one Chinese Aboriginal family
associated with the market garden community. Camooweal, with its small market garden cultural
precinct, also had two of its families associated with shop keeping as Ah Chong and Ah Leon
822 NAA: J2483, 256/44, SOU KEE, Annie; NAA: J2483, 256/45 SOU KEETommy; NAA: J2483, 256/47SOU KEE, Willie.
823 NAA: J2483, 384/98,AH CHONG, Bruce; NAA:J2483, 384/99, AH CHONG, Charlie.
233
juggled garden and baker businesses.824 Nine stations were identified across the North West as
having a Chinese cook married or living with an Aboriginal wife. These stations included Delta
Downs, Floraville, Lawn Hill, Delta Downs, Westmoreland, Riversleigh, Neumayer, Augustus
Downs and Lorraine. Further east, Chinese-Aboriginal marriages were associated with the towns
of Herberton and Kairi on the Atherton Tablelands as well as further north on the Palmer goldfield
and in families associated with the Aboriginal community near Cooktown.825
The relationship between the pastoral industry of the north-west Gulf country and interracial
marriage patterns of Chinese–Aboriginal women is unmistakable. Chinese men were the preferred
worker on pastoral stations as gardeners and cooks. Sought after for their skill in growing a
continual source of food in difficult seasonal environments, they kept the station and its workers
alive, nourished and healthy, which was important for the rigorous work undertaken on a daily
basis. Similarly, Chinese station cooks were valued for their ability to feed the family, station
workers and extended community on a constrained resource including bush tucker, as well as
Western cuisine. Chinese cook/ gardeners were mobile, moving from one station to another, which
is evident in the career of Jimmy Ning. Jimmy Ning, married to Aboriginal woman Bessie,
commenced his station cook career on the large and prosperous Lawn Hill Station before he moved
with Bessie to nearby Westmoreland Station, then Augustus Downs Station before retiring to
Woods Lake near Burketown. He finished his working days as a market gardener at Woods
Lake.826
824"Income Tax Cases." The Brisbane Courier, 13 October 1922, p. 8; Townsville Daily Bulletin, 17 December 1931, p. 8 & Townsville
Daily Bulletin, Friday 20 February 1931, p. 11.
825Rains, Thesis: 112.
826QBDM-ONL: 1915 C3232 Bessie Sam and Tommy Ning; Queensland National Bank: QNB Burketown, 1885-1928; QSA,
JUS/N648/17/689 Inquest into fire evidence by Jimmy NING and wife Bessie, at Lawn Hill Station, 1917.
234
Map. 2. North Queensland Gulf districts: Chinese – Indigenous Family Landscape.
Over twenty-one stations and pastoral runs between 1882-1928 employed Chinese cooks or
gardeners827 and up to 10 primary family groups have been identified as interlinked with pastoral
settlement with the most prominent station, Lawn Hill and an area known as Woods Lake near
Burketown supporting the marriage of at least 4 Chinese migrant men to Aboriginal women in
1898. As noted earlier, interracial marriage between the Chinese employee and Aboriginal women
was supported by local Station managers who understood the benefits of Chinese – Aboriginal
marriage as a means to secure workers to the region. Aboriginal women were able to remain on
country, the mobile Chinese labour was more likely to stay, and daughters of such families went on
to often marry other Chinese men and remain in the district and greater region.828
827 QNB: Burketown, 1885-1928
828 QBDM-ONL: 1910/C/448, Sou, Annie Sou, (Willie Sou Kee and Annie Gee Hoy) and QBDM. Marriage Resister MF, 09/000661
Bing Chew, Minnie Ah Too.
235
Table. 6. Chinese- Aboriginal Family Landscape: North Western Gulf District 829
829 Information compiled from, Various entries; QNB Burketown Records, 1885-1928; TROVE newspapers various years; NAA
CEDT records various families; Birth Certificate Register- Chinese Book 2 and specifically QBDM-MR-MF1898_ 1898/000218 _
SAM, AH BOW married to MAGINMARM Opal; QBDM, Birth Register, hardcopy original, 1918/01397; AH SAM married to
Louie (Aboriginal [sic]) birth son Robert Samuel 26.03.1898; QBDM-MR-MF 1898C224 AH MOY/KOM MOY Jimmy married to
Violet MOOROONABE 8.07.1898; QBDM-MR-MF 1898 , 1898/000221 AH MOI Jimmy married Maggie 8.08.1898; QBDMMR-
MF 1901 01/000454, AH NUM married Maggie 16.12.1901; QBDM-BR-ONL: 1902, C2109, Dolly Ah Sin, daughter of Ah Sin
and Topsy ; QBDM, Marriage Register MF, 1898/000210 Tommy Ah Fat and Lizzie; NAA: BP4/3 CHINESE HOOKEY, Alien
Registration Certificate, No.13; QSA, JUS/N624//17/92 Inquest of LEE FONG had Aboriginal wife, AH YEN gave evidence,
Cloncurry, 1917; QBDM-ONL: 1912 C289 Maggie and Charlie Ah Chong; QBDM-MR-ONL 1901/C/166 Ah Man and Lucy
04/03/1901; QPG 1919: 475, John Man Foo; QBDM-DR-ONL, 1952/C/1650 John Chong Man Foo. /02/1951 son of Tommy Ah Foo
PASTORAL STATION/
LOCATION/ YEARS
IDENTIFIED ON PASTORAL
STATIONS
NAME
Chinese husband
OCCUPATION Aboriginal Wife
YEAR
MARRIED
Cook Gardener
Augustus Downs
Lawn Hill Station
1893 - 1924
Sam AH BOW √ √
Opal Magnamara
from Brunette
Downs
1898
Westmoreland Station
Barclay Downs
Lorraine Station
Augustus Downs
Woods Lake
1888-c1910
AH SAM
SAM AH SAM √ √ Louie 1898
Lawn Hill Station
1898 Jimmy KOM MOY √ ?
Violet
Mooroonabe
from Surat
1898
Woods Lake
LEE QUAY/ AH QUEY ? √ Annie 1898
Burketown district
Avon Downs Ah MOI Jimmy/Ah MOY Charlie √ - Maggie 1898
Lorraine Station
Lawn Hill Station
1895-1910
Tommy AH FAT √ √ Lizzie/ Maudy/
Molly 1898
Burketown Ah Low √ -
Dora
from Gregory
River
1900
Wernadinga Station Tommy AH GOW also known as
AH NUM √ √ Maggie 1901
Burketown
AH SIN ? ? Topsy c 1902
Normanton
Uungera Station
Granada Station
Camooweal
Cloncurry
1888-1908
Charlie AH CHONG √ √ Maggie
1912 1912
Louie Creek near Lawn Hill
Riversleigh Station
Kamileroi Station
Lorraine Station
Talawanta Station
1917-1948
Yuen Kim Hook
(HOOKEY) √ √
Violet Darby
defacto
c1910
Cloncurry LEE FONG - √ Ah Yen c1910
Normanton AH FOO Tommy - √ Lucy c.1900
Woods Lakes LEE MAN/ Ah Man - √ Lucy 1901
Croydon /Georgetown
AH SOO possibly “adoption”
For child Minnie
(Father Olford)
? ?
Unidentified
Aboriginal
Woman possibly
Rosey
c.1900
236
Chinese market gardeners were also active on the fringes of nearly all rural and remote towns
across western and north-western Queensland. Tolerated at best by the broader White community,
gardeners played a significant role in keeping communities alive through the supply of much
sought after fruit and vegetables. Their presence on the fringes of towns attracted the attention of
Aboriginal women who sought intimacy with Chinese men. They came for various reasons
including attraction, protection, companionship and economic stability. In return, many worked
around the gardens and were regarded as essential additional labour. There are a number of
Chinese-Aboriginal garden communities found in this study, including those located near the
towns of Cloncurry, Burketown, Camooweal and Normanton. Some couples raised many children
together, including children to different fathers. Chinese men raised them as their own.830 Places
such as Lawn Hill, Adel’s Grove, Burketown and Cloncurry saw children raised to identify with
their Aboriginal identity,831 though some Chinese-Aboriginal children rejected their Aboriginal
identity in favour of the Chinese in the hope that restriction of movement and living conditions
under The Act would be more relaxed if a Chinese identity was assumed. This is demonstrated by
Mrs. Chong of Woods Lake near Burketown, who identified as Chinese.832
Mixed heritage daughters often married other Chinese men, which reinforced the family and
kinship networks of both cultures throughout the west and Gulf district. For example, Lorna Ah
Bow, the daughter of Sam Ah Bow and Opal Magimarm of Lawn Hill Station, married Leon Ah
Sam in 1905.833 To enhance kinship relations, daughters were offered up for marriage with Chinese
men according to Chinese family practice. This is the case for father Johnny Ah Gup (Kup) from
Lawn Hill Station who offered his 14-year-old daughter to Wong of the merchant firm On Sing
Loong, Cloncurry, through marriage broker Ah Wing of Camooweal. When the transaction failed
(the girl did not marry Wong) court action ensued as Ah Gup sued for damages and breach of
contract over his loss, due to costs associated with the transaction.834 What this demonstrates is
that Chinese kinship links remained active around the region, sometimes over hundreds of
kilometres, between Chinese men, and that marriage practices including the sale of daughters
remained intact. Mixed heritage daughters remained a commodity which could be used to increase
guanxi where possible.
and Lucy; NAA: BP4/3 Kee, Annie Sou – Nationality: Chinese - Alien Registration Certificate No 4 issued 10 December 1916 at
Gregory Downs.
830 Pers. Comm.Mrs Connolly, Cloncurry, 2007.
831 Interview with Mrs. Go Sam, Atherton, 6 May 2002This situation is demonstrated by the marriage of Go Sam to Polly in
Ravenshoe. Polly lived at the back of Go Sam’s mixed business shop. Together they raised seven children, not all paternally belonging
to Go Sam, and their loving relationship lasted many years. As Polly was an Indigenous woman belonging to the Djddibulcommunity
she identified as Aboriginal and raised her children as Aboriginal Australians.
832Ganter, Mixed Relations, 76-81
833QBDM-MR-MF1905 1905/000208, LEE ON/ LEON AH SAM /SAM LEON married to, AH BOW, Lorna, 25 May1905.
834“Cloncurry Notes”, Townsville Daily Bulletin, 7 November1935, p. 4.
237
Not all Aboriginal-Chinese mixed heritage daughters married back into the Aboriginal or Chinese
communities. A number of mixed heritage Aboriginal-Chinese girls married White men such as
Sadie Ah Quey, daughter of Lee Quay and Annie, who married George William Watson, a
boundary rider from Burketown, in 1923. Under the legitimate age of consent at 19, Sadie’s
guardian and sister, Sarah Ah Man, provided consent to the marriage, to George who was 53 at the
time.835 While social rules about race usually governed just who married whom, western
Queensland and especially the Gulf districts were a pocket of racial fluidity for some.
Maintenance of racial lines blurred in deference to class with station managers, station
bookkeepers, town shopkeepers, public officials and their wives elevated to the top and a less
differentiated mass of wharf workers, ringers, boundary riders, dingo and ‘roo shooters, drovers,
domestic servants, cooks and gardeners forming the working class. Marriage it seemed could
transcend racial lines for marginalized mixed heritage families, providing no threat was made to
the ruling class of Whites around the district.
In summary, Chinese-Aboriginal families formed in communities associated with the far western
pastoral districts in which they sustained long term interracial relationships. Marriages and unions
were advantageous for both Chinese men and Aboriginal women. Men were able to enjoy
marriage and family which otherwise they would have been without, and women were able to
enjoy secure and safe lives on country where they could pass on culture and tradition to their
children. The bi-cultural family which emerged between the two groups enabled extended family
and kinship networks to develop across the north. Chinese–Aboriginal families were able to
successfully deflect some government policies, including forced removal, because they offered
Gulf Station managers a reliable workforce for the cattle industry.
Conclusion
Around the world, Chinese men associated with the Diaspora formed intimate relations with local
Indigenous women resulting in many mixed families. North Queensland formed part of this pattern
of settling, but to a much lesser degree than other parts of the globe where colonial interests were
prevalent. Reaction to Chinese – local interracial marriage by dominant colonial administrations
varied according to which European empire was nation building. While some were not concerned
by miscegenation, such as France and Portugal, the British Empire was concerned with racial
eugenics across nearly all colonies. The potential for flexibility towards interracial marriage
depended on what economic gain could be made from the union, with White plantation owners in
835 QBDM: Marriage Register Hardcopy Original, Burke District1891/1895 WATSON, GeorgeWilliam, AH QUEY, Sadie10 January
1923.
238
the Caribbean and West Indies and pastoral station owners and managers in the Gulf country of
north Queensland exerting pressure on administrations to allow partnering in order to secure a
reliable labour supply in a vital occupation, cook/gardener.
Table. 7. Chinese –Aboriginal Family Landscape: First Generation Marriage patterns associated
with Market Garden communities 836
Official approaches towards Chinese- Aboriginal marriage were not uniform across all colonies.
Interracial interaction between Chinese settlers and the remnant populations of Aboriginal
836Information compiled from, Various Births Deaths and Marriage Records; QNB Burketown Records, 1885-1928, TROVE
newspapers various years; QBDM-MR-MF1905 1905/000208 LEE ON/LEON AH SAM/SAM LEON married AH BOW Lorna
25.05.1905; QBDM-MR-MF 1909 09/000661 BING CHEW Tommy married AH SOO Minnie11.09.1909; QBDM-MR-ONL 1918,
C1888 BOW m KUP; NAA BP384?9/ Birth Certificate Register- Chinese Book 2; JUS/N943/32/224 Inquest into death of Maggie
GEE HOY, car accident , Augustus Downs, Cloncurry 1932; QBDM M –OL C3014, Clim Ye Dak, Aka, Ah Wing m Dora Ah Fat ;
NAA:J2483, 256/47, SOU KEE Willie; NAA:J2483, 256/44 SOU KEE Annie; ; QBDM-ONL: 1910/C/448, Sou, Annie Sou ;
QBDM-ONL: 1915 C3232 Bessie Sam and Tommy Ning.
First generation mixed race daughters who married Chinese men in Gulf districts
LOCATION Chinese husband cook gardener Mixed Heritage bride Date
Normanton
Lorraine Station
Augustus Downs
Wondoola Station
Jimmy GEE HOY √ ?
Maggie
SAVILLE
1898
Lawn Hill Station
1905 Leon Ah Sam ? √
Lorna Ah Bow
(daughter of Sam Ah Bow
and Opal Magnamara)
1905
Woods Lake Tommy CHONG - √
Sarah Ah Sam or
Ah Quorm
(daughter of Ah Sam and
Louie)
1908
Delta Downs, Strathmore Station
Oakland Park Station
Delta Downs
c1890
BING CHEW √ ?
Minnie Ah Soo
(daughter of Ah Soo mixed
heritage Delta Downs
station)
1909
Croydon
Cloncurry TIM SEE TOO - √
Annie Ah Fat
(daughter of Ah Fat and
Lizzie)
1910
Louie Creek
Lawn Hill
Kamilaroi Station
1913-1921
Willie SOU KEE √ √
Annie Gee Hoy (Daughter
of Gee Hoy and Maggie)
b. Wondoola Station
1912
Loraine Station
1917 AH MAN √ ?
Sarah
Ah Quay
(daughter of Lee Quay and
Annie)
1914
Lawn Hill Station
Westmoreland station
Augustus Downs
Wood's Lake
1901-1918
Jimmy NING
√ √
Bessie Ah Sam
(daughter of Ah Sam and
Louie
1915
Riversleigh station
Lawn Hill Station
1920-1928
Johnny AH KUP √ ?
Dolly Ah Sam
(also known as Dolly Ah
Bow and Ah Cow:
daughter of Ah Sam and
Louie)
1918
Avon Downs
Woods Lake
c1921
KUM SING ?
√
Maudie Lee Quay also
known as Ah Quay
(daughter of Lee Quay and
Annie)
1921
Camooweal
AH WING
Or
Clim Ye Dak
- √
Dora Ah Fat
(daughter of Ah Fat and
Lizzie)
1929
239
communities across the colonies of Australia threatened labour supplies for upper-class White
homes and enterprises, resulting in policy measures introduced in several northern colonies to keep
the two groups apart. Legislation limited interaction, prevented miscegenation and maintained
White racial dominance, and managed every part of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander lives,
including dictating whom they could marry and it formed part of the White Australia policy of the
early 20th Century. Aboriginal women, faced with the decimation of Customary Law and
limitations placed on marriage with non-Aboriginal men, were unable to legally marry Chinese
men in any great number and were forced to resort to clandestine relationships with the constant
risk of being removed and sent to a mission. Children born from Chinese – Aboriginal
relationships lived under constant threat of removal by authorities and severed from their cultural
identity, both Aboriginal and Chinese. The cultural disruption caused by removal had severe
consequences for generations to come.
The Chinese –Indigenous Family Landscape, taking in relationships between Chinese men and
Local Aboriginal or Torre Strait Islander women, is a little understood aspect of marriage relations
in Queensland, associated with the Chinese Diaspora. Compared to the number of White women
who married Chinese men in the period 1860-1920, figures for interracial marriage between
Chinese men and Indigenous women remain very low, with those who partnered with Aboriginal
women typically being men living in rural and remote locations. Most were employed on pastoral
stations or undertaking garden activities, with a smaller number of men engaged in shop keeping
practices. Typically, Chinese men who took an Indigenous wife were unable to bring a wife out
from China, having neither the financial means nor inclination to attract a Chinese wife to live in
these remote places. Chinese – Indigenous relationships were closely tied to the Aboriginal
community and only a few men took their sons to China for an education and fewer still took their
wives. The majority of Chinese-Aboriginal first-generation children who lived in north
Queensland identified with their Aboriginal ancestry and married back into the Aboriginal
community, reinforcing close knit family ties.
240
Fig. 58. North Queensland: Chinese Family Landscape by Cultural Background: 1860-1920
1894-1914
241
Fig. 59. North Queensland:
Number of Families per identified town: 1860-1920
Pastoral Districts
& Gulf Countrycooks
/gardeners
Town –commerce
Small shopkeeper
Port Towns –
maritime& gardening
242
C h a p t e r 9
THE CHINESE FAMILY LANDSCAPE
Introduction:
The Chinese Family Landscape in its physical form provides an alternative means to understand
migration and settlement patterns associated with the Chinese Diaspora to north Queensland. The
presence, or absence, of wives, female partners, lovers and casual intimate acquaintances,
influenced the social development of Chinatowns and cultural precincts and shaped future
commercial ties through gender led allegiances, applied from within the homes and private
quarters of the community through “soft economics”. The influence of women and families on
communities and Chinatowns was felt right across north Queensland, and the benefit of female
contributions assisted with the longevity of places by providing a vital means for renewal through
children. This chapter is divided into two parts: Part 1 sets out a brief discussion of the extent of
transplantation of the Confucian Chinese family and kinship structure to help explain family
formation in a north Queensland environment. Part 2 explores each community by identifying the
incidence of women and families in the Chinatowns and cultural precincts, and highlights some of
their roles in them. It applies the knowledge outlined in previous chapters to the north Queensland
cultural heritage sites of the Chinese Diaspora. A female presence is shown through mapping of
Chinatowns and precincts, and this methodology clearly demonstrates that women can no longer
be ignored as part of the settlement experience.
***
Part 1: Transplanting Confucian social structure to north Queensland
North Queensland’s Chinese Family Landscape commenced with the decision by many families in
the ancestral home to send more than one family member together to overseas destination countries
to support each other in life, work and even death. Brothers, fathers and sons, as well as extended
family members and kinsmen, across a broad range of ages were sent overseas for the benefit of
the family and village, with distribution to destination places targeted to maximise potential
remittances. The investment of sending more than one son, or associated extended family/ clan
member, to Queensland meant that concerns about safety and success could be alleviated for
243
families, both in the foreign land as well as at home. Upon arrival, family, kinship and clan
networks quickly formed enclaves which developed into “Chinatowns” and cultural precinct
communities. These operated under transplanted social principles which enabled social order to be
quickly established and direct links established between north Queensland and the ancestral
village. These networks assisted the making of money via mutual support and “guanxi”, as well as
guaranteeing the ability of men to provide regular remittances and correspondence back to the
village and family in China. Interconnectedness arising from kinship and obedience to the
Confucian family structure was important to the successful development of Chinatowns and
cultural precincts as the Confucian philosophy underpinned both the physical and social
development of community.
At least three aspects demonstrate a transplanted kinship, district and county affiliation associated
with Confucian society: the built environment, the location of community within a Chinatown, and
relationships shared through mercantile and marriage partnerships. All three are present in the
largest and longest running Chinatown outside Brisbane: Cairns Chinatown, as well as in the minor
Chinatowns and precinct communities across the north.
From the early 1880s, Cairns “Chinatown” as it quickly became known, was a busy and thriving
community. Confined to Sachs Street between Spence and Shields Streets, it was divided
according to place of origin and along dialect lines. Storekeepers on the eastern side of Sachs
Street were predominantly Sze Yap and Sam Yap, and storekeepers and merchants along the west
were from Chongshan. The majority were from the small dialect districts of Lung Dou and
neigbouring Leung Dou in Chongshan.837 The urban development of Chinatown was fast, as
infrastructure including temples and meeting halls were established and internal order created. The
first Temple, Lit Sung Goong, or “Temple of All Saints”, was erected by the Chongshan
community in 1886, near Shields Street,838 and ten years later the Toishan community erected the
Buk Ti Goong, or “Temple of the Northern Emperor”. The presence of two temples identified
county affiliation for new arrivals and provided a place for kinsmen to meet to discuss community
837May, Topsawyers, 64. and Robb, Cairns Chinatown, 7.
838Cairns Post, 27 January 1887, p. 2. On 27 January 1887, the Cairns Post noted that the cost of the building, including the internal
fittings and the purchase of land, came to a total of £800, which was at the time a substantial sum. It was collected from both the
Geraldton [Innisfail] and Cairns communities.
244
matters of importance.839 Cairns Chinatown maintained its divisions along kin and county lines,
including marriage divisions, well into the 20th century.
Mercantile relationships relied heavily on family connections with village, kin and district alliances
which were then reflected in the partnerships which formed. This is evident in the merchant firm
Sam Sing which was managed through a partnership between two Sze Yap families, the Yee
family (Yee Gip-Yow and Yee Tung Yep), and Chiu family (Chiu Kin- Nam and Chiu Chock). On
the other side of the street, Lee On Kee, a merchant firm with partners from the Lee village (Lee
On, Lee Look and Lee Kee) complemented the shop keeping firm the Lee Yan Brothers, a firm of
five brothers (Lee Yan, Lee Chin, Lee Wing, Lee Cheok-Yin and Lee Dung Chin) with both Lee
families originating Cai irnn Cshu Cnghshainn.8a40 town: 1900
SHIELDS STREET
LAKE STREET
SACHS STREET
SPENCE STREET
SHERIDAN STREET
Lit Sung Goong
Buk Ti Goong
Fig. 60. Cairns Chinatown 1900 showing Lit Sung Goong and Buk Ti Goong temples.841
Transnational family networks depended on female participation by village wives, mothers, sisters
and aunts, to produce, nurture and rear the next generation of overseas men. Village populations
shifted to become predominantly women, with the reverse occurring in north Queensland. As
noted earlier, male dominated communities were labeled as “bachelor societies” and regarded by
839Robb, Cairns Chinatown, 18.
840 May, Topsawyers, 294-306.
841QSA: SRS4646-1-1 Cairns Municipal Rate Book 1885-1888; SRS4646-1-2 Cairns Municipal Rate Book 1889-1893; SRS4646-1-3
Cairns Municipal Rate Book 1891-1893; SRS4646-1-4 Cairns Municipal Rate Book 1893-1895; SRS4646-1-5 Cairns Municipal Rate
Book 1896-1897.
Chinese owned or
occupied
Temple
245
the broader White society as communities of “single” men.842 This perception has skewed family
connections, and ignored the presence of female relationships both near and far.
“Married bachelor” communities
Despite their family and kinship links to each other within the colony, and despite legal marriages
to women back in the ancestral home in the village, Chinese men have been type- cast as “single”
and living in “bachelor” or more recently, “married bachelor” communities across Queensland.
This myth limits the way the community is viewed and ignores gender and age participation
through the presence of women and children. After a thorough review of Chinatowns and precincts
across north Queensland, only two towns have been identified as having a predominantly male
presence over any length of time. This included Pelican Waterhole just outside Winton, and the
market garden and commercial precincts of Hughenden. When the dynamics of both communities
are analysed, it is evident that gendered and family interactions occurred between Chinese men and
women within each community, but the stereotype hides complexity and is open to further
scrutiny.
Firstly, the Pelican Waterhole market garden precinct of Winton in central western Queensland had
several gardens attended by Chinese men over a period of sixty-five years. Several gardeners lived
together and worked gardens in an area away from the town and it was a male only community. To
the broader White population, they appeared as a “bachelor society”.843 However, this ignores the
kinship connections they had across the region; ignores the ancestral village family where wives
and children remained; and pretended that interactions with local women did not happen. Winton’s
Chinese gardeners and shopkeepers returned regularly home to wives and families in China,
including at least one Australian Born son returning to the ancestral village family.844 Of the
eighteen men who applied for Certificate of Exemption to the Dictation Test, ten men made
repeated applications to visit China with three making four extended visits at regular intervals in
the early 20th century. This included Ah Foo, a fruiterer with the business name of Sun Kum Wah,
842Wai Jane Char and Francis H. Woo, Geography of Kwangtang Province for Hawaii Residents, (Hawaii Chinese History Centre, date
unknown); The Village Database, http://villagedb.friendsofroots.org/search.cgi ; Williams, “Destination Qiaoxiang”, 23; Dr Joe
Leong, Pers. Comm., 2015.Families and firms established networks with other families and firms which extended inter-colonially to
Sydney and Melbourne, and onto key destination ports such as Honolulu, San Francisco and Vancouver.
843Robb Database: Rates and Valuations, Winton.
844 NAA: J2483, 232/76, TAM, Edward Ernest, 1917.
246
who was also married to White woman Kate McEnroe whom he married in 1892.845 The process
of cyclic renewal in the Chinese community at Winton continued until after WWII in 1948, when
Mar Yen Shoo arrived to join his father to grow produce for the market garden which was sold in
the onsite fruit and vegetable shop.846 He was the last Chinese gardener in central-west north
Queensland.
Locally the Chinese “married bachelor” men participated in events with the rest of the Chinese
community for recreation, such a gambling or celebrations such as Chinese New Year.847 When
hawking their produce in town, they came in contact with women and children as they walked
from house to house, with micro-discussions occurring and gifts such as salty plums provided to
children at Christmas time. Interaction with families also occurred within the Chinese community
itself, as most of the Chinese storekeepers were married to White women and had families. 848 It is
also plausible that the Chinese gardeners would have also been aware of, if not intimate with, the
three Japanese prostitutes who rented premises off Charlie Ah Foo in Elderslie Street, Winton for a
brief period in 1898.849 However, there is no evidence that the men were intimate with Aboriginal
women, who had been removed from the district many years before.
845 QBDM-MR-MF, 1892 882.92AH FOO, Charley SUM KUM WAH, married to McENROE Kate, 4 April 1892 and NAA: J2483,
169/68 Charlie SUN HUM (of Winton 1914-1916); NAA: J2483 170/53, AH FOO SUN KIM WAH (of Winton 1915-1917); NAA:
J2483, 257/78 Charlie SUN KUM WAH (of Winton 1918-1921); NAA: BP343/15, 5/273A, Charlie SUM KUM WAH (of Winton
1922-1922).
846 Robb, Heritage Assessment, 10
847 “Winton Whiffs”, The Western Champion and General Advertiser for the Central-Western Districts, 5 March 1901, p. 9; "Winton
Notes",The Evening Telegraph, 22 February 1907, p. 1.
848Robb Database: Marriages and Unions, 1848-1920.
849 QSA: HOM /A22/99/3266 Charley AH FOO -Japanese Prostitutes.
247
Fig. 61. Winton Commercial and Market Garden Districts: 1890- 1920
Fig. 62. Winton Town Commercial District: Allotments owned by Chinese men married to White
Wives: 1890- 1920.850
The second male only community was the market garden community of Hughenden at the end of
the rail head, Western Queensland: 216 kilometers (134 miles) from Winton. It remained the only
850Survey Plans, Town map, W2401, 1880; Winton, Town map,W2402, 1881; HOM A22/99/3266 Charley Ah Foo; QSA SRS 5546
M/F 89402; Winton Shire Council: Water Rates 1911- 1917 ; Morning Bulletin Saturday 16 October 1880, page 2; North Queensland
Register, Monday 20 August 1900 page 3; Winton State School Register: 1888-1927, QSA SRS 5546 M/F 89402 Lucy and Eleanor
Youngkin Winton;; Winton Shire Council: Burial Register 1890-1919; Robb Database: Rates and Valuations:1882-1940; Robb
Database: Cemetery and Burials: 1848-1950; Queensland National Bank: QNB register Winton, 1881-1890; QNB register Winton,
1890-1898; QNB register Winton, 1898-1912; QNB register Winton, 1916-1923; Queensland Post Office Directories (QPD):various
years 1860-1910 microfiche; Willmett’s Almanac: various years 1883, 1885, 1888, 1892, 1898. Microfiche.
Women & Family
Market gardens
Chinese owned or
occupied
Chinese owned or
occupied
Market gardens
248
“married” bachelor population for over fifty years. Only one or two women have been associated
with Chinese men in the town and they did not remain very long.851 Consisting of three small
cultural precincts, Hughenden’s Chinese community supported two large Chinese gardens and a
very small commercial corner consisting of a couple of shops and a boarding house. The two
garden areas were occupied by men only, consisting of See Lee’s Garden, which was worked by a
syndicate of 6-8 men, and Ah Hon’s Garden, which was worked by Ah Hon with occasional hired
help. Ah Hon worked his garden alone for over 52 years.852 The See Lee Garden was sustained and
able to renew its syndicate by rotating its labour force of “married” bachelors through the village in
China as well as through hiring Australian born sons from kinship linked families along the
coast.853 This pattern of renewal continued well into the 1930s.
Similarly, to the situation in Winton, the broader White community would have considered all of
the Chinese men “single”. However, many of the gardeners were married, and supported wives and
families back in China. They also participated in their family’s welfare by sending remittances
back home and made visits to the ancestral home and family when able. Gee Fay for example,
trading under the name of See Lee, returned to China on at least three occasions to visit family
over a twenty two year period, 1901 – 1922.854
851Robb Database: Rates and Valuations, Hughenden; Robb Database: Marriages and Unions 1848-1920; QNB Records Hughenden
852Robb Database: Rates and Valuations, Hughenden
853QSA: JUS/N1037/37/712 Inquest into death Percy SO CHOY, b. Tolga, Townsville 1937
854NAA: J2482 1904/114, J2483 152/144 and J2483 288/ 144 Gee Fay; J2483 104/73, J2483176/86 and J2483 288/42 Hong Chew;
J2483 104/74, J2483 189/28 and J2483 288/44 Lee Wah. Multiple applications for Certificate of Exemptions to the Dictation Test for
Gee Fay, Hong Chew and Lee Wah indicate that men returned many times to China to visit family before returning each time to
Hughenden.
249
Fig. 63. Hughenden “Bachelor” Community.855
Male only communities are complex and misunderstood as a group of “single” men with
presumably little or no interconnection and devoid of family and female interaction: a “bachelor
society”. However, not only did migration occur with multiple family, kin and village connections
such as brothers, uncles, and cousins, they maintained filial and husbandly duties with wives and
families in China, and developed and maintained female relationships in towns with the wives and
children of other Chinese men as well as customer women from the broader White population.
They were, as Yuen Fong Woon notes, “married bachelors”. 856 The cyclic pattern of renewal of
syndicates provided flexibility for men to return home,857 while others were able to retire on
gardens owned by Australian born kin or relations. There they were provided for in their dotage in
exchange for a little work on the garden.858 The absence of women in Hughenden’s Chinese
community or at Winton’s Pelican Waterhole did not hinder the formation of community.
855Historical Survey Plans, Hughenden, H2031, 1877; Hughenden,RP700432, 1891; Hughenden,RP700434, 1892; Hughenden,
Cemetery ,C8150,1885; Hughenden, Tie Hop shop H2036,1880; Queensland National Bank: QNB Signature Register:
Hughenden, 1880-1883; Queensland National Bank: QNB Signature Register: Hughenden; Queensland Post Office Directories
(QPD): various years 1860-1910 microfiche; Willmett’s Almanac: various years 1883, 1885, 1888, 1892, and 1898. Microfiche;
Hughenden Burial Register: held at Hughenden Historical Society; Robb Database: Rates and Valuations: 1882-1940, Hughenden;
Robb Database: Miners Rights, Market Gardens and Machine Area: 1860-1940 Hughenden; Robb Database: Marriages and Unions:
1848-1920.
856Woon, “The Voluntary Sojourner among the Overseas Chinese”, 673-690.
857 QSA: JUS/N1037/37/712 Inquest into death Percy SO CHOY, b. Tolga, Townsville 1937
858NAA: BP25/1, YONG M – CHINESE 1899-1948 andNAA: BP25/1, CHOW MEW. For example Mow Yong worked on See Lee
and Ah Hon’s gardens at Hughenden before he retired to Leong San’s gardens, Hermit Park, Townsville, in1942. Chow Mew on the
other hand worked out on stations near Longreach before retiring to Chun Tie’s gardens, Townsville.
Chinese Owned or
occupied
Market gardens
250
However, female absence retarded the ability of the community to renew with locally born
children.
***
Part 2: The Family Landscape, Diverse places: Cultural precincts and Chinatowns
The presence of women and children within north Queensland’s Chinese communities enabled
each community to develop and grow in ways which male-only communities could not. The soft
yet noticeable impact women had on the growth, tone and development of the Chinatowns and
precincts has yet to be fully understood, with aspects still emerging. Yet it is clear that through the
birth of sons and daughters, strategic marriages, female politics and presence of matriarchs, that the
influence of “soft economics” was not only far reaching, but contributed to the longevity of north
Queensland’s communities.
With its roots in the Darling Downs, the Chinese Diaspora to north Queensland was driven by
pastoralism, gold and tin mining and related activities and eventually by the emerging agricultural
industry. It would be expected, then, that a female settlement pattern would mirror the experiences
of men. However, by mapping the location of wives and families associated with men of the
Chinese Diaspora, a different pattern has emerged where women are predominately associated in
areas where large scale agriculture was the major industry and not mining as is the case for
Chinese men. This suggests that a gendered approach to settlement patterns can reveal differences
between men’s and women’s experiences.
Between 1860 and1920 an estimated 155 couples or 43% of Chinese men who were married or in
intimate relations with Chinese, White or Aboriginal women, lived in, or were associated with,
regions across north Queensland which supported agricultural industries, both large and small. In
comparison, mining districts accounted for 29% or 104 couples while Port towns accounted for
23% or 84 couples. The smallest proportion of families associated with the Chinese Family
Landscape across north Queensland are associated with pastoralism and found in rural and remote
places in the central and north-west regions. Residing on small scale gardening precincts, or
isolated as individual families, only 20 pastoral area couples were identified over the whole study.
This very small number of families only accounts for 5% of the total 363 Chinese marriages and
unions where the location is so far known.
251
Fig. 64. Number of Couples across North Queensland by Industry: 1860-1920.
When this information is broken up further into towns where numbers of families have been
identified, some towns are clearly favoured over others. Cairns, with 57 primary families 1860-
1920, has by far the largest number of families for the whole of north Queensland followed closely
by Charters Towers with 41 families and Townsville with 36 families. This trend mirrors the
overall findings that women and families are associated with the agricultural industry the most,
followed by mining and port towns. Not surprisingly, given the high intensity sugar, maize, banana
and orchard farming of the lush tropical east coast, the population of Chinese families remains the
highest along the coast which is evidenced by the largest and longest running Chinatown in north
Queensland, Cairns. The importance of port towns is shown by the populations in towns such as
Townsville, Cooktown and Thursday Island. Similarly, towns in the hinterland regions with easy
access to major port centres such as Charters Towers and those on the Atherton Tablelands,
regardless of mining or agriculture dominance, also developed stable Chinese communities which
attracted families. However, in places west of the Great Dividing Range859, fewer women formed
intimate relations with Chinese men to produce family groups.
859This range separates the wetter coastal and near-coastal areas of Australia’s east coast from the drier
inland.
252
It seems therefore that it was remoteness which explains why Western pastoral and isolated mining
districts including Normanton, Burketown, Camooweal, Cloncurry, Richmond, Hughenden and
Winton did not attract any great number of families. Primary wives to Chinese men in these areas
included White women and Aboriginal women, with only three Chinese women identified in the
mining towns of Georgetown and Croydon. Evidence of the small number of Chinese families in
rural and remote regions is clearly observable in the population figures for the region. Between
1860 and 1920, central-western towns such as Hughenden, Winton, Richmond, and Cloncurry
featured only 15 Chinese mixed heritage couples over all four towns. Similarly, further north in the
Gulf region at Normanton, Burketown, Camooweal and the garden community of Lawn Hill, 17
primary family groups were recorded with nearly all women Aboriginal, from nearby traditional
lands.860 A total of 32 primary couples were identified in this research (discounting Croydon and
the Etheridge) compared to 184 couples along the east coast (discounting the mining towns). With
a ratio of nearly 1:6 families located in rural and remote pastoral districts compared to the coast, it
can be confidently asserted that north Queensland’s Chinese Family Landscape was not driven by
pastoral or remote mining activities.
Fig.65. North Queensland: Location of Couple: Settlement by Industry: 1860-1920.
860 Robb Database: Marriages and Unions: 1848-1920
Location of Couples and
Families in towns NQ
showing settlement
industry: 1860-1920
253
Cultural precincts: West and North West Queensland
A selection of cultural precincts where wives and families were present, associated with rural and
remote pastoral areas across north Queensland, are outlined below. They are indicative of the range
of communities in the west and north- west, and Gulf Country, of Queensland.
Camooweal
The very small town of Camooweal just 7 miles (11 klms) from the Northern Territory border was
first gazetted in 1884. Primarily settled as a pastoral centre and customs post, it serviced over
sixteen stations in the region in Queensland, including Lawn Hill Station, as well as areas over the
border in the Northern Territory, including Brunette Downs, Barkley Downs and Avon Downs.861
A fortnightly coach ran to Burketown, itself one of the most isolated ports in Queensland.
Camooweal developed with a stable but extremely small population consisting of approximately
60 people by 1892. Chinese first settled there in 1890 but the population remained less than 10
individuals by the late 1890s. Over half of the men were engaged in market gardening, but there
were also some undertaking storekeeping and services.862 The Chinese settlement in Camooweal
developed in two areas: a garden cultural precinct along the Georgina River on the western edge of
town, accessed by a walking track from Worowna and Austral Streets, and one store in town
(location unknown) providing a commercial outlet for the gardens. The garden cultural precinct
along the river was worked until at least the late 1930s, and the store had turned into a store/
bakery in the early 20th century. 863
The Chinese family landscape of Camooweal was solely a Chinese-Aboriginal affair and confined
to the early 20th century. Because of the late start of the community, Aboriginal wives of Chinese
men were first generation mixed heritage Chinese-Aboriginal women who lived, worked, and
raised families on the garden cultural precinct. Three women associated with Camooweal include
Lorna Ah Bow who was married to Leon Ah Sam (m.1905);864 Maggie, who was married to
Charlie Chong (m 1912);865 and Bessie Sam who was married to Ah Ning (m. 1915).866 Chinese
families in the 20th century diversified their interests over time, with both Chong and Leon
861Camooweal Entry, Willmetts North Queensland Almanac, (Willmetts and Co, Townsville), microfiche, 1883, 1885, 1888, 1892,
1898.
862Queensland National Bank Records, QNB Burketown 1885-1928 held at Cloncurry Museum and Historical Society.
The town’s Chinese population was less than 10 in 1898 including 1 storekeeper and 1 tailor.
863 Dent,“’Moody’ Leon”, 10.
864QBDM-MR-MF, 1905 1905/000208, LEE ON/ LEON AH SAM/ SAM LEON, AH BOW Lorna, 25 May1905
865QBDM-ONL: 1912 C289 Maggie and Charlie Ah Chong
866QBDM-ONL: 1915 C3232 Bessie Sam and Tommy Ning
254
expanding their commercial interests to include the bakery and store in town.867 Camooweal
remained an extremely remote location, and the Chinese Family Landscape of Camooweal never
changed from its original Chinese-Aboriginal mixed heritage.
Camooweal
Market Garden
precinct
FRANCES STREET
BARCLAY STREET
WOROWNA STREET
AUSTRAL STREET
NOWRANIE STREET
Reserve for
Police
Buildings
Court house
Reserve
MG
MG
CHINESE STOREKEEPERS
LOCATION UNKNOWN
• 1896 Chin Bon - Tailor
• 1907 Chin Fook - Storekeeper
• 1913 On Cheong Leong (Charlie Chong)
- Baker
• 1924 Sam Leon & Sons - Baker & storekeeper
CHINESE MARKET
GARDENERS
• 1890 Tai Tang Gow
• 1893 Ah Chin
• 1894 Sue Dee
• 1896 Ah Foon
• 1913 Charlie Ah Chong
• c1920 Sam Leon
Fig. 66. Camooweal Garden Cultural precinct and Storekeeper community 1890- 1925.868
Normanton
Normanton on the other hand had both Chinese-Aboriginal and Chinese-White mixed heritage
families. The Chinese Family Landscape of Normanton remained very small with around 6
primary families identified over a sixty-year period; nearly all were Chinese – White couples, with
up to three Chinese-Aboriginal couples. Chinese –White mixed heritage couples included Mary
Peterson married to Woold Ah Sam, in 1874;869 Hanna Elizabeth (Eliza) Garn married to Ah Den
in 1883;870 Mary Josephine Sullivan married to Charles (‘Charley’) Hann (1884);871 Emily Henly
married to James Ah Foo (1884);872 and Mary Black (Minnie) who married Jim Ah Sing in
867 Dent, “Moody Leon”, 10.
868 Historical Survey Plan: Camooweal, Chinese Gardens,C3931, 1888; Camooweal, C3933, 1895; Camooweal, C3932,1896;
Camooweal, C3934, 1914;
Camooweal, W04, 1917; Camooweal,W013, 1948; Robb Database: Miners Rights, Market Gardens and Machine Area: 1860-1940;
Queensland National Bank: QNB Burketown, 1885-1928; QNB Cloncurry Branch, 1884-1945; Queensland Post Office Directories
(QPD):various years 1860-1910 microfiche; Willmetts North Queensland Almanac, Willmetts and Co, Townsville, microfiche: various
years 1883, 1885, 1888, 1892, 1898. microfiche
869QBDM-MR-MF 1874, 1874/000338, AH SAM Woold, PETERSON Mary, 8 January1874.
870QBDM-MR-MF 1883, 1883/000051, AH DEN, Jimmy, GARN, Hanna Elizabeth, 5 March 1883
871QBDM-MR-MF1884,1884/000387 , HANN, Charley, SULLIVAN, Mary Josephine, 4 December1884
872QBDM-ONL: 1885 C321 Emily Ann Henly and Ah Foo
Market gardens
255
1885.873 Mary, Emily and Minnie were all migrant women from England with the disembarkation
port of Cooktown a popular port to marry in before making the journey to Normanton.874 By 1890,
at least three couples lived near one another: Minnie Ah Sing and Emily Ah Foo, who lived in
Green Street, and Eliza Ah Den who lived around the corner in Little Brown Street.875
Up to three Chinese-Aboriginal primary couples were found in the Normanton district including
Lizzie married to Ah Fong (m. 1899); 876 Lucy married to Ah Man (m. 1901), 877 and Man Foo
who cohabitated with an unidentified Aboriginal woman.878 Man Foo’s relationship reflected some
Chinese-Aboriginal mixed heritage relationships where cohabitation occurred. No marriage was
recorded between Man Foo and his lover, or any births registered for their two sons. Instead, it
took a brush with the law to reveal the existence of son, John,879 and an entry in the Carpentaria
Shire Council Cash Book register to record his brother H. Man Foo.880 With no major industry in
the district, such as mining or agriculture, to attract a large population and with the pastoral
industry offering only limited opportunities to Chinese men, the Chinese population of Normanton
was unable to grow sufficiently to form a Chinatown. Instead, it developed a loose cultural precinct
on the edge of town around Green and Little Brown Streets and flowed over onto the adjoining
Crown Land where some families and Chinese men lived.881
873QBDM-MR-MF 1885, 1885/000162, AH SING, Jim, BLACK, Mary, 7 May 1885.
874Mary Josephine and Emily married their Chinese husbands in Cooktown before departing to Normanton with them. Mary Josephine
and Charley later moved to Croydon.
875QBDM: Birth Register, Hardcopy original, Burke District, 1890/898 AH FOO, HENLY Emily, Cecilia Violet 26 November1890;
QBDM: Birth Register, Hardcopy original, Burke District, 1890/899, AH SING, James, BLACK, Minnie, Beatrice Eveline, 4
December 1890; and“Current Notes", Northern Mining Register, 3 February 1892, p. 5. Minnie and Emily had children close in ages;
Emily had two girls and Minnie had two boys, all under five. By the end of 1890 both had added to their families with babies born just
six weeks apart. It is easy to imagine that Minnie and Emily struck up a friendship with their shared experience of migration from
England, marriage to a Chinese man, and childrearing experiences. However, just how cordial and social the relationships among
Normanton’s Chinese family community were, remains speculation. Certainly cracks in the community were present and evidenced by
a notice placed in the local Normanton newspaper by Eliza Ah Den in 1892 which warned Ah Sing that if he made any more
disturbance at her husband’s house in Little Brown-street, that she would call the police and report him as a nuisance.
876QBDM-ONL: 1899, C232, Ah Fong and Lizzie
877QBDM-ONL: 1901, C166, Ah Man and Lucy
878Queensland Police Gazette, 1919, p. 475.
879Ibid.
880Carpentaria Shire Council, General Cash Book 1927-1942.
881Carpentaria Shire Council, Normanton, Rate book 1886-1903.
256
Fig. 67. Normanton: Green Street precinct: Chinese Family Landscape: 1890-1910.882
Normanton’s Chinese family landscape shows that cultural precincts and gendered spaces changed
over time as they expanded, contracted or simply moved in location. Unable to remain static,
locations changed for two main reasons: family mobility and generational change. Firstly the
absence of boundaries, usually associated with a Chinatown, meant that families had some
flexibility when it came to location. For instance, the Ah Foo family was first recorded as living in
Caroline Street in 1887, before they moved to Green Street in 1890 where Emily Ah Foo remained
in the same place until at least 1924.883 Minnie Ah Sing’s family, first located on Crown Land
adjacent to the town, was able to move to Green Street in 1890 when her financial situation
improved. She moved again to Little Brown Street in1892 where she stayed. In addition, as new
first generation Australian born families moved into Normanton, the location of the cultural
precincts changed once again. This occurred in the early 20th century.884
882Historical Survey Plans: Normanton, N1486, 1862; Normanton, township,CHUNG FUNG, N1481, 1867; Normanton, Brown
Street precinct, N14811, 1884; Normanton, township, N14833, 1887; Normanton, Mookie’s garden, N1485, 1889;
Normanton,N1483, 1880; Robb Database: Rates and Valuations:1882-1940 Queensland National Bank: QNB Burketown, 1885-1928
Queensland National Bank: QNB Cloncurry Branch, 1884-1945 Queensland Post Office Directories (QPD):various years 1860-1910
microficheWillmetts North Queensland Almanac, Willmetts and Co, Townsville, microfiche. Various years 1883, 1885, 1888, 1892,
1898. Microfiche. Normanton, Marriage Register, North Queensland Diocese Archives; Normanton, Baptism Register, North
Queensland Diocese Archives.
883Carpentaria Shire Council: Rate book 1886-1903, Rates and Valuations1926-1929; Townsville Daily Bulletin, 8 May 1951, p. 2;
Townsville Daily Bulletin, 16 May 1953, p. 2.
884Carpentaria Shire Council: Rate book 1886-1903.
Chinese owned or
occupied
Women & Family
Market gardens
257
While some primary settlers such as Emily Ah Foo remained at the same location over both the
19th and 20th centuries, the small cultural precinct which she was part of began to shift closer to
the central business district in the 20th century. This shift reflected social changes in attitudes
towards the Chinese community who had by then lived in the town for over thirty years. As well, it
reflected a demand for acceptance led by the next generation of the Chinese community as they
moved to Normanton. Australian born Chinese included Miss Len You and Harry Man Foo, and
new arrivals from other districts – mostly from Croydon such as George Ah Mook, Tommy Chun
Tie, Margaret Ah Kee and her husband Chung Fung, Johnnie Ah You, John Yet Foy, Tommy Ah
Gow, and William Ah Chee, who were able to move directly into areas of town previously
occupied by the broader community.885
Fig. 68. Normanton: Cultural precinct Changes associated with Chinese Family Landscape: 1920-
1940.886
885 Ibid.
886Historical Survey Plans: Normanton, N1486, 1862; Normanton, township, Chung Fung, N1481, 1867; Normanton,N1483,
1880; Normanton, Brown Street precinct, N14811, 1884; Normanton, township, N14833, 1887; Normanton, Mookie’s garden,
N1485, 1889; Normanton, Mookie’s garden, IS70434, 1963; Normanton, RP857730, 1998; Robb Database: Rates and
Valuations:1882-1940; Queensland National Bank: QNB Burketown, 1885-1928 Queensland National Bank: QNB Cloncurry
Branch, 1884-1945 Queensland Post Office Directories (QPD):various years 1860-1910 microfiche Willmetts North Queensland
Almanac, Willmetts and Co, Townsville, microfiche. Various years 1883, 1885, 1888, 1892, 1898. microfiche Normanton
Marriage Register, North Queensland Diocese Archives; Normanton Baptism RegisterNorth Queensland Diocese Archives; Pers
Comm. Nola Gallagher, Historical Society 1.10.2007; Pers Comm. Jack Smeardon, 02.10.2007
Currently the only generation of “Chinese” people remembered in Normanton are the twentieth century- Australian born Chinese
families in town. That is, the living memory of the town’s community does not include earlier settlement phases and only considers
the Australian born Chinese as “The Chinese” of Normanton. This serves as a cautionary reminder that cultural precincts change and
evolve over time and highlights the difficulty of mapping the Chinese family landscape in rural and remote towns if relying on oral
history.
Chinese Owned or
occupied
Women & Family
Market gardens
258
Cloncurry
Historically imagined as a “Chinatown” but operating more like a cultural precinct, Cloncurry
Chinatown was one of two cultural precincts in Cloncurry: both genders integrated, with women
and families. Located in a natural horseshoe bend between Coppermine Creek and Cloncurry
River on the outskirts of town, Cloncurry Chinatown was a multi-racial cultural precinct which
housed a number of families, a couple of shops and market gardens along the riverbanks. The
Chinese Family Landscape included Chinese men, White wives, and Aboriginal wives, with the
precinct supporting a small population of Afghan and Japanese men as well as the occasional
White woman who worked as a “prostitute”.887 Closer to the central business district, but
sufficiently situated away from the main commercial quarter, was also a small precinct of
storekeepers and private homes belonging to White wives of Chinese men. This included Mrs.
Fong who had originally migrated from the Cape River goldfields,888 and Mrs. Bow who lived near
Ramsay Street.889
Unlike other comparable communities such as Burketown and Normanton, Cloncurry’s Chinese
Family Landscape developed a little later than most, commencing at the turn of the 20th century as
families migrated to the region from other northern Gulf areas. The community comprised of up to
6 primary families as well as a number of first-generation mixed heritage Aboriginal-Chinese
families as well. Women who were the Primary wives included Alice Keys, who was married to
Tommy Ah Cum (1881);890 Mary Ann McKey, married to Ah Gee (1910);891 Esther Lowry,
married to Thomas Ah Sue (1865);892 Kate Kempson, married to Ah Yen (1910);893 “Catherine”
who lived with James Ah You (c 1917);894 and Aboriginal woman Louie, who was married to Ah
887Pers. Comm. Mrs. Connolly, Cloncurry, 2007; Cloncurry Shire Council: Sanitary Register and Charge book, 1924-1926.
One woman who lived in Cloncurry Chinatown in the 1930s was a sex worker, Rita Lawrence.
888 QSA PRE/A616: SRS5402/1/605 Mary Ann Ah Cum. Mary Ann applied for naturalisation in 1919. At the time she was living
with her three daughters in Cloncurry where she had been for three years. She was a laundress and in business with her daughters. It is
not known why she had to apply for naturalisation as she was an Irish migrant, and the 1914 British law depriving women married to
aliens of their British subject status was only accepted in Australia in 1920 (and repealed for Australian women in 1935, and further in
1946). Baldwin, “Subject to Empire”, 528, 552, 554.
889Robb Database: Marriages and Unions: 1848-1920
890 QBDM-MR-MF 1881, 1881/000159, AH CUM Tommy, KEYES Alice, 08.02.1881; Cloncurry Shire Council: Cemetery records,
1917-1970
891QBDM-MR-MF 1892, 1041.92, FONG SAM, m. McKEY Mary Ann, 1892 second marriage; QBDM-MR-MF 1910, 1910/001823
AH GEE m. FONG Mary Ann, 14.12.1910 and Cloncurry Shire Council: Cemetery records 1917-1970, Mary Ann Gee.
892QBDM-MR-MF 1865, 1865/000472, AH SUE Thomas m. LOWRY Esther, 15.06.1865 andCloncurry Shire Council: Cemetery
records 1917-1970
893 QBDM-MR-MF 1910, 1910/000671, AH YEN, Jimmy m. KEMPSON, Katie, 15 August 1910; QSA: JUS/92/27 Catherine AH
YEN evidence in inquest into death of Lee Fong, 1917.
894 QSA: JUS/N624/17/92 Catherine AH YEN evidence in inquest into death of LEE FONG, 1917.
259
Sam (1898).895 First generation mixed heritage Chinese –White or Chinese -Aboriginal daughters
continued to live in the Chinatown community as well, and it survived until after the Second
World 896
Fig. 69. Cloncurry “Chinatown” Cultural precinct: 1913-1933897
895BDM Qld, Marriage Register microfiche, 1898/000210 Tommy Ah Fat and Lizzie.
896QBDM-MR-MF 1898, 1898/000210, AH SAM m. LOUIE, 13.06.1898, & Pers. Comm. Mrs. Connolly, Cloncurry, 2007 These
families include the daughters of Alice Keys (Mrs. Ah Cum) who married White men named Webb and Gaiter and lived near their
mother, as well Annie Ah Fat who married Tim See Foo in 1910.
897Historical Survey Plans Cloncurry C196.4 1883;;Cloncurry C196.23 1909; Cloncurry C196.27,1934; Cloncurry, C196.19, 1907;
Cloncurry C196.21 1907: Cloncurry C196.20 1911; Cloncurry 196.22 1907 ; Queensland Post Office Directories (QPD):various
years 1860-1910 microfiche; Willmetts North Queensland Almanac, Willmetts and Co, Townsville, microfiche. various years 1883,
1885, 1888, 1892, 1898. Microfiche; Queensland National Bank: QNB Cloncurry Branch, 1884-1945; Cloncurry Shire Council:
Cemetery Records 1917-1970, held at Cloncurry Shire Council, Cloncurry; QSA, PRE/A616; SRS5402/1/605 Mary Ann Ah Cum;
Robb Database: Rates and Valuations:1882-1940; Robb Database: Miners Rights, Market Gardens and Machine Area: 1860-1940;
JUS/N1073/39/770 Inquest into Murder GO LUM gardener, Cloncurry, 1939; QSA, JUS/N1254/55/223 Inquest into death of child
Kathleen AH SAM, Kerosene Poisoning Cloncurry 1955.
Chinese owned or
occupied
Market Gardens
Women& Family
Japanese
Afghan
260
Fig. 70. Cloncurry “Chinatown” and Business Cultural precinct.898
Fig. 71. Tommy Ah Fat899 Fig. 72. Tim See Foo900 Fig. 73. Cloncurry Chinatown gardens901
***
898* Historical Survey Plans: Cloncurry C196.4 1883; Cloncurry C196.5 1883 ;Cloncurry C196.23 1909; Cloncurry C196.27,1934;
Cloncurry, C196.19, 1907; Cloncurry C196.21 1907: Cloncurry C196.20 1911; Cloncurry 196.22 1907 ; Cloncurry Queensland Post
Office Directories (QPD):various years 1860-1910 microfiche; Willmetts North Queensland Almanac, Willmetts and Co, Townsville,
microfiche. Various years 1883, 1885, 1888, 1892, 1898. Microfiche; Queensland National Bank: QNB Cloncurry Branch, 1884-
1945; Cloncurry Shire Council: Cemetery Records 1917-1970, held at Cloncurry Shire Council, Cloncurry; Pers Comm. Mrs.
Connolly, 28.09.2007; Pers Comm. Gerry Tim, 27.09.2007; Robb Database: Rates and Valuations:1882-1940; Robb Database:
Miners Rights, Market Gardens and Machine Area: 1860-1940.
899Private Collection, Pearl Connolly, Cloncurry, 2007
900Ibid.
901Memorial image taken at Chinese Cemetery Cloncurry, Robb Private Collection, 2007
Chinese owned or
occupied
Women & Family
Market Gardens
Image unavailable
for public viewing
Image unavailable
for public viewing
261
Chinatowns
Chinatowns across north Queensland were gender and age inclusive, hosting not only wives from
various ethnic backgrounds but also other women who were forced to live there through poverty or
the nature of their occupation as sex workers. However, unlike cultural precincts which often had a
limited lifespan, Chinatowns were able to renew their populations and continue to grow as family
environments well into the 20th century. Wives provided benefits to male society through
intimacy, companionship, partnership and mutual assistance, and their presence imbued the
community with a different tone, particularly after China born wives migrated. The presence of
women enabled female traditions to develop in the community, such as practices and traditions
surrounding child-birth, and child-rearing902 and they applied their skills and influence in the “soft
economics” of community relations through matchmaking of marriage arrangements and providing
a female voice in civic affairs.
Not much is really understood about the last two points, as female voice and influence within the
community, through the soft economics of the private and intimate sphere, has remained invisible
in any discussion about Chinese community relations. However, records show White women were
vocal in the courts as witnesses and interpreters, provided midwifery services to the Chinese
female community, and provided matchmaking services to Australian born daughters and sons.903
Chinese women greeted and hosted female civic leaders, sewed and produced gifts and presents for
dignitaries, and had voice as matriarchs of the family home away from mothers – in – law. These
examples suggest that there is more to be discovered about the presence and role of women and
gender relations in Chinatowns and precincts. This section sets out, through a brief synopsis and
mapping of Chinatowns across north Queensland, to demonstrate that were women present from
the commencement of communities and that they contributed to community longevity. These
places have been selected and grouped together, not by location, but by the industry most likely to
attract female populations.
***
902Robb, Out of Sight, Out of Mind,127
903Ibid.
262
Large Scale Agriculture:
Cairns Chinatown
Cairns, first settled in 1876, provided an alternative port to Cooktown to service the Hodgkinson
goldfield, located inland west-northwest of Cairns. Cairns Chinatown developed in the early 1880s
and grew to sustain the largest and longest running Queensland Chinese community outside
Brisbane. With 57 primary families of mixed racial background, it was the epitome of a successful,
robust, age and gender integrated community. Confined to Sachs Street, between Shields and
Spence Streets, and the two blocks back from the earliest central business district on Abbott Street,
Chinatown was occupied to every centimetre of its boundaries.
The first women to live in the emerging Chinatown community were White wives. They were
instrumental in initiating and developing a supportive network for others who followed. White
women married to Chinese men provided a conduit for the Chinese Family Landscape to develop
as they introduced new women into the community, made their homes available as venues for
private marriages, acted as witnesses,904 and acted as informal matchmakers between Chinese men
and White women.905
From the mid-1890s young Chinese women began to arrive in Cairns to join husbands to whom
they had been contracted in marriage in China. By 1901 the Chinese population of Cairns was
recorded as 1598 adults including 11 adult China born women. Census data at this time did not
include White wives, so the figures are limited to Chinese wives and children of Chinese and
mixed heritage families. However, census figures in 1902 also recorded 118 minors in the Chinese
community, of whom at least 56 were from families with a White mother.906 The rest consisted of
7 children of mixed heritage families where the mother was an Aboriginal woman and
approximately 55 children where both parents were migrant Chinese. In 1901, the Cairns Chinese
community had 1 Chinese female for every 13.5 Chinese males compared to 9683 Chinese males
across the whole colony to 532 Chinese females, or 1 Chinese female to every 18 males. This last
figure includes all female Chinese with the majority being girls under the age of 15.907
904QSA: JUS/N541/13/667 Inquest of Chinese gardener: wife gave evidence, Cape River, 1913
905QBDM-MR-MF 1884, 1884/000333, AH HOIN/ AH HONG m. LOTHIAN, Jane, 21 March 1884. For example, Ah Hon and his
wife Jane Lothian made their house available and acted as witnesses for the wedding of Ah Chow and Annie Churcher, in May 1884.
906QPP, 1903, Vol. II, Table XIX, “Census of Queensland, 1902”; QPP, Vol. II, Table XVIII, “Return of all Half Castes, with
Parentage”; also “Parentage to Population of district”, in “Census of Queensland, 1902”.
907QPP, 1903, Vol. II, “Registrar-General’s Report”, “Vital Statistics for 1902”, p. 776.
263
The first Chinese woman to arrive to Cairn was Mrs. Lee Yan and her mui tsai, Chou Young, in
1895.908 Yuen Day, the wife of Kwok Yin Ming, followed not long after her.909 Migrant Chinese
wives relied totally on their husbands for support, in contrast to the village female community
which included other women in the household such as another wife and/ or mother –in-law. White
women instead offered support and friendship to the young Chinese arrivals, which was crucial at
times of childbirth and early child rearing. Women such as English born Bessie Dykes, married to
Chun Kwon Kee in 1886,910 provided midwifery services to the Chinese community: a position
which not only carried great responsibility for the safe delivery of babies but was well respected.
The incidence of both White and Chinese women in Cairns Chinatown is evident in 1900 with 11
allotments out of 28 having women and families living on them.
SHIELDS STREET
LAKE STREET
SACHS STREET
SPENCE STREET
SHERIDAN STREET
Lit Sung Goong
Buk Ti Goong
Chinese
owned or
occupied
Temple
Family
Fig. 74. Cairns Chinatown: Allotments associated with Chinese Family Landscape: 1900911
White and Chinese wives were also joined by another marginalized group of women, “prostitutes”,
who were forced to live in Chinatown, the only place where White owners would rent to them.
908Cairns Argus, 29 August 1895, p. 2. Noted in the “local news” section: “A remarkable event is to be celebrated tomorrow, viz the
birth of the first thoroughbred Chinese boy in Cairns. Mrs.. Lee Yan arrived from China about a year ago, and with the advent of a son,
Mr. Lee Yan, who is one of the leading storekeepers, is delighted, and his countrymen rejoice with him.”
909North Queensland Register, 17 February 1897, p. 41.
910 QBDM-MR-MF, 1886 1886/001023, QUONG KEE Harry, KWONG KEE, DYKES Elizabeth, 15 November 1886.
911Robb, Cairns Chinatown, p.37 & 38
Chinese owned or
occupied
Women with
Families
TEMPLE
264
Single White sex workers lived in Cairns Chinatown from 1888.912 They were joined from 1893 by
Japanese women who worked as laundrywomen and sex workers. By 1898, 16 Japanese women
were listed as living in the Cairns region with the majority identified as “prostitutes”.913 Including
the Japanese and White sex workers in the community, it is estimated that approximately 80
women resided in Chinatown between 1860 and 1920. Up to 80% of the total Chinatown allotment
area was gender inclusive, revealing the true extent of the Chinatown’s Female Landscape
associated with a major port town.914
The Cairns Chinatown was an active Chinese community until the mid-20th century. Its longevity
was owed to the diversity and adaptability of the community within, and its ability to capitalize on
extended kinship relationships through business partnerships, work opportunities, and marriage
arrangements across the region.915 The cross regional approach to family consolidation through
kinship connections also extended to the adoption of illegitimate mixed heritage Chinese children
from women who had abandoned them in what is a hidden aspect of Chinese communities.916
Women not only actively participated in society, but also actively provided voice and protection
for the community. For example, Mrs. Young (formerly Mrs. Patrick Waugh Hing, nee Mary
O’Halloran917) provided many years of service to the community as an interpreter in the courts for
cases involving Chinese men. She also provided protection for young women in the community
providing accommodation in return for household work in a boarding house she ran.918
912Cairns Post,4 December 1889, p. 2. The first “prostitute”, Lily Green, arrived from Townsville in 1889. From then on Chinatown
was considered a place of vice for White men.
913QSA POL/J1; PRV10729/1/5 Japanese women, c. 1897.
914Robb, Cairns Chinatown: A Heritage Study , 38-64.
915NAA: J2483,192/38 TANG YEE, Samuel Herbert. For example, Australian-born Chinese Samuel Herbert Tang Yee from Charters
Towers was apprenticed to the firm Sun WoTiy in Cairns, through what is believed to be a kinship relationship and example of
personal guanxi.
916NAA: BP342/1, 1923/7299 Applications for Certificate of Exemption from the Dictation Test for Sam Sing, a Storekeeper from
Cairns; wife Gue Lun and children Nellie and Edward; NAA: J3136/ 1907/149 Jong Quan Po; NAA: J3136/ 1907/150 Leong Gee;
NAA: J3136/ 1907/151 Mary Jane. Adoption of illegitimate non-family children occurred on at least three occasions in north
Queensland. Cairns merchant Sam Sing and his wife Gue Lun on two different occasions adopted two illegitimate mixed heritage
children: a girl from Charters Towers and a boy born in Cairns. Further south in the Chinatown community of Geraldton (Innisfail)
Jong Quon Po and his wife Leong Gee adopted a mixed heritage illegitimate baby girl in 1904. This indicates that the community was
prepared to take care of its own. The practice by Chinese couples of adopting illegitimate children was also evident in Southern
Queensland with Gee Chong and his Chinese wife adopting a mixed heritage boy. There is some evidence of individual Chinese men
adopting illegitimate White children. This is the case in Bundaberg when Ah Kitt adopted a white boy. This last circumstance caused
anxiety with the broader White population as the practice was always regarded with suspicion.
917 QBDM-MR-MF, 1876 1876/000305, HING WAUGH, Peter, O'HALLORAN, Mary, 23 February 1876.
918 “'District Court”, Morning Bulletin, 24 July 1894, p. 6;Cairns Post, 19 March 1941, p. 3, obituary of Mrs. Mary Young.
265
Family types & women in Cairns Chinatown:
1900
SHIELDS STREET
LAKE STREET
SACHS STREET
SPENCE STREET
SHERIDAN STREET
Lit Sung Goong
Buk Ti Goong
Both parents
Chinese
Temple
Mixed heritage
family
Residence Japanese
prostitute
Fig. 75. Cairns Chinatown: Ethnic background of Women by Allotment: 1900919
Fig. 76. Lit Sung Goong with Community children920
Fig. 77. Cairns Chinatown: Japanese Woman resident c. 1902921
919Robb, Cairns Chinatown, pp.37-41.
920Cathie May, “The Chinese Community in North Queensland in B.J. Dalton (ed.), Lectures in North Queensland History Series
1,Department of History, James Cook University, (Townsville, 1984), p.126a.
921JOL: Image Number: omp00006, former picqld-2004-07-30-14-22, ‘Japanese girl in the Chinese/Japanese section of Cairns, ca.
1902’, 5564 Bertie Family Photographs.
Chinese wives
White wives
Japanese women
“
“
p
r
o
s
t
i
t
u
t
e
”
s
”
TEMPLE
266
Mackay Chinatown
Although settled in 1861, Mackay did not emerge as a prosperous sugar producing district until the
early 1880s, having spent the previous two decades battling crop diseases and labour shortages.922
By then the Mackay Chinese settlement had commenced, with a small community recorded in
1868 of 13 Chinese.923 The community steadily grew: by 1871 it had 35 men; in 1876 it had a
population of 58 Chinese men and one woman; in 1886 it had 510 men only; by 1891 had fallen to
263 men and two women (one aged between 15 – 20 years while the other was between 20-25
years). By the end of the century, Mackay’s Chinese population had diminished to 194 including
one woman.924 After 1887 it became vulnerable to new gold discoveries including rushes to nearby
places such as Mt Britton.925
However, despite official census figure portraying a minimal Chinese Family Landscape, up to 14
primary families have been identified as living in the Mackay district. This included 12 mixed
heritage families of Chinese –White couples and two families where both couples were China
born. All, with the exception of two White women, had arrived before 1890. The first Chinese
migrant wife was recorded in the 1876 Census, though after that, no trace of her can be found. It is
plausible she went on to one of the goldfields. However, in 1890 two Chinese women were
identified in Mackay Chinatown: Tye Tee, who was married to Ah Tye, a clerk in the merchant
firm Sin Soon Wah, in 1890,926 and Ti Yu, who married Gee Wah and moved down from Charters
Towers.927 In addition to the 14 families, there were 9 Japanese women living in Chinatown in
1897, some of whom may have worked as “prostitutes” while others were the wives of prominent
Japanese men.928 Like most Chinatowns across north Queensland, Mackay Chinatown included
several Japanese shops and businesses and the Japanese community was quite large in Mackay and
surrounding districts, attracted as workers in the sugar industry. The Japanese population tended to
922Rockhampton Bulletin, 13 November 1875, p. 2; Queenslander, 15 January 1876, p. 1. Chinese labour on the plantations
commenced in 1876, with forty men arriving from Cooktown to commence work on the Pioneer Plantation as an alternative to South
Sea Islanders. However, the Chinese men cleared out for the new goldfields at Clermont just two months later.
923Clive Moore, Kanaka: A history of Melanesians in Mackay, (Institute of Papua New Guinea Studies, University of Papua New
Guinea Press, Port Moresby, 1985), p.181.
924Queensland Census Reports: 1871, 1876, 1886, 1891 and 1901.
925Mackay Mercury and South Kennedy Advertiser, 27 January 1887, p. 2.
926Western Champion, 22 April 1890, p. 4.
927NAA: BP234/1, SB1930/3438 Mrs. Nellie Gee Wah - Application for admission of her three children.They first lived in Charters
Towers before they moved down in 1903 to Mackay, where they had a shopkeeping business. A victim of domestic violence, Ti Yu
ran away in 1909 with her daughter Nellie, leaving her two boys behind. She travelled under the pseudonym Mrs. Ross to Thursday
Island, where she was hidden by the women before her departure for China.
928QSA POL/J1; PRV10729/1/5 Japanese women, c. 1897.
267
the support and assistance of its own through a Japanese Club which was located in Nelson
Street.929
Mackay Chinatown, located between Nelson and Macalister Streets on the northern end of town
and taking in a section of Victoria Street, started to gain notoriety in the mid-1880s as a place of
vice and entertainment.930 Popular with sugar plantation workers, South Sea Islander, Japanese,
Indian and Malay men from outlying districts regularly visited the cultural precinct for recreation:
gambling and visiting “prostitutes” who lived and worked in the cultural precinct. Boarding
houses, little rooms lined with bunk beds, and private spaces for opium smoking, were crammed in
among shops, in an intensively occupied built up area. It physically covered nearly one whole town
section block and incorporated three or four little laneways for access within the middle of blocks.
The Chinese population was robust enough to construct a temple and community hall which
opened in 1903.931 The community lasted until the 1930s when the council enacted its final
decisions to have most of it demolished 932 and the stain of Chinatown removed from Mackay: a
position they had been working on since 1912.933
929 Recollections by Cedric Andrew, held by Mackay Historical Society and Museum Inc.
930Mackay Mercury and South Kennedy Advertiser, 20 February 1886, p. 2
931 Recollections of Cedric Andrew.
932Townsville Daily Bulletin, 20 June 1934, p. 12.
933Daily Mercury, 9 March 1912, p. 7.
268
Mackay
Chinatown 1900
Lane
Lane
NORTH STREET
WELLINGTON STREET
NELSON STREET
MACALISTER STREET
VICTORIA STREET
Lane
Kwong
Hing
Low
MIne
You Gee
Ah Sue
Yuen Geut
Temple
Wong Kee
Ah Bow
Yuen Geunt
Fig. 78. Mackay Chinatown circa. 1900934
934Historical Survey Plans: Mackay, M.91.2, 1863; Mackay, M.91.8, 1865; Mackay, Victoria Street, M914, 1864; Mackay,
K124636, 1878; Mackay, Macalister Street, RP 700757, 1898; Mackay, Albert Street, RP 700795, 1898; Mackay, Wood Street, RP
700793, 1898; Mackay, Wood St, Lane, RP 700842, 1900; Mackay, Sydney Street, RP 700837, 1900; Mackay, Victoria Street, RP
700823, 1900; Mackay, Section 13, all 2& 3, Yuen Geut, RP 700745, 1900; Mackay, Nelson Street, Lane, RP 700744, 1900; Mackay,
Macalister Street, RP 700763, 1900; Mackay, Macalister Street, RP 700762, 1900; Mackay, Victoria Street, You Gee , RP 700756,
1900; Mackay, Nelson Street, Ah Sue, RP 700746, 1900; Mackay, Section 28, Lane, RP 700850, 1909; Mackay, Nelson Street, Lane,
RP 700732, 1910; Mackay, Wellington Street, RP 700709, 1913; Mackay, Victoria Street, Lane, RP 700840, 1918; Mackay, Lane,
RP700753, 1922; Robb Database: Rates and Valuations:1882-1940; Robb Database: Miners Rights, Market Gardens and Machine
Area: 1860-1940 CPS 10B/26 Register of Firms Mackay, 1903-1933; JUS/N1021/37/21 Inquest death Peter KING LEE Herbalist,
Mackay, 1937; JUS/N997/35/415 Inquest death by opium poisoning of old CHINESE MAN, Mackay, 1935; Moore, Clive, Kanaka:
A history of Melanesians in Mackay, Institute of Papua New Guinea Studies, University of Papua New Guinea Press, Port Moresby,
1985.; Recollections of Cedric Andrew, Information held at Mackay Historical Society and Museum Inc. received 2003.
Chinese owned or
occupied
Japanese owned or
occupied
TEMPLE
269
Fig. 79. Mackay: Chinese Greengrocer with Woman and Child.935
Geraldton/ Innisfail Chinatown
Chinese sugar workers quickly formed a Chinese cultural precinct when they arrived to work on
Geraldton’s emerging plantations in 1887. Just a few months after the first men arrived,
Geraldton’s population of Chinese was considerable at 400 men and growing every day.936 Chinese
settlers quickly moved into establishing the more lucrative Chinese-led banana industry, which
provided the perfect impetus for a Chinatown to grow. By 1901, Geraldton’s Chinatown
population had doubled with 850 Chinese men, and many more throughout the region on farms
and small settlements such as South Johnstone. However, from that point on the population began
to decline, and by the end of the decade had reduced to 700.937 Chinatown began to contract. The
Chinese banana industry had collapsed due to cyclones, southern State fruit fly regulations,
discriminatory legislation, and pressure from increased competition from White growers, leaving
prominent banana grower Tam Sie to estimate in 1913 that over a thousand banana growers had
moved to the Tablelands to grow corn instead.938 The death knell to the large community came in
935Mackay Historical Society and Museum Inc. Image number unknown, received 2003, Glen Hall Assistant Research Officer,
Mackay
936Queenslander, 24 December 1887, p. 1011. The town was renamed Innisfail in 1910 because of confusion with Geraldton, W.A.
937 QSA POL/J2 Chinese Census Records, District of Cairns.
938May, Topsawyers, 14.
270
March 1918 when a cyclone all but wiped out Chinatown along with the rest of Innisfail. While the
Chinese community limped along until WWII, it had effectively contracted to one street.
Located back from the main commercial centre but extending around a whole section of town,
Geraldton’s Chinatown extended from the top of Edith and Owen Streets, along Ernest and Lily
Streets. It occupied much of the land down to the river and tramway, with the whole area occupied
by shops and dwellings, outbuildings and sheds which, on the lower lying land, were accessed by
timber walkways. Around 1891 the community constructed a temple on the high point of Edith and
Owen Streets. Gambling houses and lodging places, as well as key-hole lodgings occupied by
single White “prostitutes”, were concentrated along Ernest and Lily Streets, in the area of town
most prone to seasonal flooding from the nearby South Johnstone River.
Geraldton/Innisfail’s Chinatown supported 18 primary families between 1887-1920, including both
China born and White wives.939 In addition to women married to Chinese men there were also 13
Japanese women reputedly working as “prostitutes” from 1897,940 and by 1900 a number of single
White women as well. The very large sugar cane industry surrounding Innisfail attracted
prostitution, as male White workers migrated north looking for seasonal work, especially cane
cutting. Cashed up and looking for recreational activities, they were catered to for drinking,
gambling and prostitution in Chinatown. However, unlike Cairns Chinatown where the allotments
were owned by men and occupied by men and women, many of Geraldton’s allotments were
owned by women.941
Of the 23 Chinese-owned allotments identified in 1910, up to one third were registered under the
name of the wife of a Chinese settler. Land was owned by the wife of one of the most prominent
men in Geraldton/Innisfail, Tam Sie, and two of her sisters who were married to other Chinese
men. All three women were the daughters of Australian born mixed heritage parents George Hing
939Robb Database: Marriages and Unions 1848-1920; BDM Qld. Birth Register, 1900, C1711, Ruby Beatrice Ah Moon; NAA: J3136/
1907/149 Jong Quan Po; NAA: J3136/ 1907/150 Leong Gee; NAA: J3136/ 1907/151 Mary Jane; QSA JUS / 31 Inquest into death of
Arnold Lee Bow; QBDM-MR-MF 1902 02/000249, JONG QUAN POW /JONG QUAN PO m. LEONG GEE 2 January 1902; NAA:
BP342/1, 9857/299/1903; NAA BP384/9, Birth Certificate Register; Townsville Daily Bulletin, 7 December 1912, p. 2. Key China
born couples included Ah Moon and his wife Chou Young (1899), Lee Bow and his wife Sun Hee (1900), Taam Sze Pui (Tom See
Poy) and his wife Chan Han (1901), Jong Quan Po and Leong Gee (1902), Leong Hong and his wife Ah Cum (1904), and Woon
Loong and Mrs.Woong Loong (1912).
940QSA: POL/J1, PRV10729/1/5 Japanese women, c. 1897;Truth, 12 July 1903, p. 6.
941 It is not fully understood yet whether wives were just paper owners with the allotments purchased by husbands, or if women were
purchasing the allotments for themselves. Across North Queensland there had already been a pattern established in other places such as
in Cairns, where Chinese men purchased land and registered it in their wives’ or children’s names, regardless of whether they were
naturalised or not. This was an effective way of stopping assets being seized if the main businesses went bankrupt.
271
and Christina Wilke from Charters Towers.942 The land was owned by Jessie Hing, married to Tam
Sie;943 Eliza Hing, married to Que Fook (the family changed their name to Carr);944 and Charlotte
Hing, married to Thomas Hong.945 Only one allotment was owned by a primary White wife,
Louisa Crofton, who married Sin Dak in 1886.946 Louisa owned land just outside Chinatown but
lived within walking distance of it. Chinese families in Innisfail appear to have been racially
accepted, a position which was enhanced by one leading woman, Chan Han, the wife of Taam Sze
Pui who was a very well-respected business-woman in her husband’s merchant store, which
catered to the broader female community for drapery and fancy goods.947
Geraldton / Innisfail c. 1910
Humpy
Ah
Lum
Tam Sie
Reserve
Fig. 80. Innisfail Chinatown: c.1910 allotments owned or occupied by women.948
942QBDM-MR-MF 1872, 72/000414 HING, George, MOE UNG ,WILKIE Christina, 27 October 1872.
943QBDM-ONL: 1897, C300 Jessie Hing and Tam Sie.
944QBDM-ONL: 1890, C1208 Eliza Hing and Willie Que Fook.
945QBDM-ONL: 1892, C1087 Charlotte Hing and Tommy Chai Hong.
946QBDM-MR-MF 1886, 1886/001808, SING DAK, Thomas m. CROFTON, Louisa, 13 December 1886.
947 Interview with Tiger See Hoe, Innisfail, 29 July 2002; Interview with Bill Sue Yek, Innisfail, 29 July 2002.
948 Historical Survey Plans: Innisfail, Edith Street, See Poy, I2812, 1884; Innisfail, Edith Street, See Poy, RP706804, 1925; Innisfail,
Edith Street, See Poy, RP707397, 1926; Innisfail, Edith Street, “Joss House”, I28136, 1904; Innisfail, Edith Street, Tam Sie, Q. Fook,
I28133, 1903; Innisfail, Edith Street, Temple , I28124, 1895; Innisfail, Lily Street,, I281115, 1891; Innisfail, Lily Street, precinct,
I28133, 1903; Innisfail, Lily Street, precinct, Temple , RP711875, 1946; Innisfail, Owen Street, , I28171, 1926; Innisfail, Owen Street,
RP707772, 1926; Innisfail, See Poy,, 12817, 1884; Johnstone Shire Council, Valuation Register and Rate Book, 1910; Johnstone
Shire Council, Valuation Register and Rate Book, 1920; Johnstone Shire Council, Valuation Register and Rate Book, 1922;
Queensland Post Office Directories (QPD):various years 1860-1910 microfiche; Willmetts North Queensland Almanac, Willmetts
and Co, Townsville, microfiche. Various years 1883, 1885, 1888, 1892, 1898. Microfiche; QSA, JUS/N841/27/262 Inquest Fire Ada
AH SHAY Innisfail 1927; QSA, A/28872 THE KING vs Lillie THOMAS, Prostitute, wilful murder of May Kerrigan Innisfail, 1929;
QSA, LAN/AW29 Sale of Crown Land, Eliza Carr QUE FOOK Geraldton, 1904; QSA, LAN/AW29 Sale of Crown Land, Charlotte
Hong, Geraldton, 1904.
Chinese owned
or occupied
Women &
Families
TEMPLE
272
Lower Herbert River District: Chinatowns and cultural precincts
Although settled by White settlers in 1865, it was not until 1879 that the first Chinese arrived in the
Lower Herbert River district as a party of Chinese employed to clear land for one of the plantation
owners.949The Chinese population started to increase from 1882 as more men arrived. Employed as
labourers, sugar baggers, and land clearers they were also employed to lay small gauge tramlines,
drain fields, and build roads.950 As the region grew, Chinese men moved beyond laboring for small
farmers, and worked as cooks in hotels and as fishermen supplying fish to the broader community,
until they eventually moved into leasing small acreages of land to grow sugarcane or commence
market gardening. Some branched out into storekeeping in the towns and hamlets which were
scattered throughout the district, most of them along the Herbert River which connected them
all.951 By 1882 the Chinese population in the Lower Herbert Valley was estimated at 300 men and
growing.952 Ripple Creek Plantation recorded 100 Chinese workers and Victoria Plantation, 350
men in 1883.953 By 1889, a tramway connected Ingham and Dungeness along the river, a distance
of 14 miles (22.50 klms), and assisting further development. 954 By then it was estimated that the
district supported between 500-600 Chinese.955 By 1900 the Chinese settler population had grown
to approximately 1095 who were engaged in sugar-mills, providing goods or services, or growing
and supplying food.956
The Lower Herbert River Valley takes in a large area extending from Lucinda on the coast to
beyond Trebonne at the bottom of Mt Fox on the Great Dividing Range. From 1884, most Chinese
storekeepers and merchants moved into the two towns, Ingham and Halifax. The communities in
both towns grew in different ways to each other with Halifax emerging as the major spiritual and
clan centre and Ingham emerging as the major commercial centre. Where Halifax had a
Chinatown, temple and railway barracks for Chinese workers, and was aimed at a Chinese
clientele, Ingham’s merchants and storekeepers, located on the edge of the main business district
in East Ingham, provided goods and produce to both the Chinese and broader White community.
949Brisbane Courier, 29 January 1879, p.5. This proved to be very unsuccessful for the plantation owners as the men gave up the work
soon after arriving.
950BrisbaneCourier, 25 February 1886, p.3.
951See Census reports for 1886 and 1891, QV&P 1887 and 1892.
952Brisbane Courier, 6 September 1882, p.4.
953Pugh’s Almanac for 1884; Queenslander, 15 September 1883, p. 431; Brisbane Courier, 10 May 1883, p.6. In 1884 Victoria
Plantation had 300 and other plantations employed 340.
954Illustrated Sydney News, 4 April 1889, p. 27.
955QV&P 1887 Vol. 1: 981.
956 Census Report for the year 1901; Pugh’s Almanac 1884-1927. This included firms Jang Lee and Co. (Wong Heng), Houng Lee and
Co., Houng Yuen and Co., and Wong Lee and Co.
273
Instead its Chinatown was located outside town altogether near the Gairloch bridge. Each will be
considered in turn, commencing with Halifax.
HALIFAX
CHINATOWN
With Temple
MacknadeMill
CHINATOWN
INGHAM
Commercial Centre: Location
of CHINESE SHOPS
N
NOT TO SCALE
Streets
Major Road
Rivers
Distance Ingham to Halifax 11 miles / 18.89 kilometers
Gairloch
Plantation
Victoria Plantation
Bemerside
Plantation
Roads
Railway
Ripple
Creek
Plantation
Hamleigh
Conns
Crossing
Fig. 81. Lower Herbert District: Ingham, Halifax, Chinatowns, Mills and Plantations.
Halifax
Halifax Chinatown was located on the edge of the small town of Halifax. It lay opposite the tram
stop where the railway barracks had been constructed for the team of Chinese men employed by
CSR to build and maintain its tramway from Ingham to Victoria Plantation and on to the district’s
first port, Dungeness.957 Chinatown consisted of the Buk Ti Goong temple with a meeting hall to
its left, constructed in a similar style to many of the temples across north
Queensland.958Constructed presumably just before or just after 1900, the temple remained in
existence until at least 1929, when the market garden on which it stood was sold and it was pulled
down.959
957Sydney Morning Herald, 25 February 1886, p. 4; Wegner and Robb, “Chinese in the Sugar”, 8 - 9.
958 Alec S. Kemp, History of the Herbert River, ms. Hinchinbrook Shire Council Library. The temple was described as as “a beautiful
building in the Chinese style with overlapping gabled roof and beautifully painted inside and out in peacock blue, gold and purple. The
walls inside were decorated in the style of old China – dragons, beautiful trees and fantastic birds of colourful plumage, subject only to
China.”
959Herbert River Express, 1 November 1929.
274
The Halifax Chinese Family Landscape supported up to 10 families, nine couples of which were
mixed Chinese-White heritage.960 Prominent families in the Halifax included that of Lizzie Casey
and William Low Chong, who romanised their names to Casey.961 There was also one China born
couple, Mar Gee and his wife Ah Gang.962 Halifax also supported a small number of White
women who worked as prosititutes and Halifax was home to 3 Japanese women, also typecast as
“prostitutes”.963
CHINATOWN
NOT TO SCALE
Tramline to
Victoria Mill
Fig.82. Halifax Chinatown: C. 1900 showing area occupied by women 964
960Chinese men who arrived in the 1880s who went on to raise families in the district include: Ah Bow, Mar Kee, Hong, Lee Look
Hop, Ah Lee, Gow, Wan Chap, and Chow Yip.
961QSA: A/43653: Halifax (formerly Herbert River) Admission Register, 1883-1939.
962QBDM-MR-MF 1903, 1903/002132, MAR GEE m. AH GANG, 17 December1903.
963 QSA POL/J1; PRV10729/1/5 Japanese women, c. 1897.
964 Historical Survey Plans: Halifax, adjoining Chinatown RP709996,1838; Halifax, adjoining Chinatown K124834, 1880; Halifax,
adjoining Chinatown RP703780, 1905; Halifax, adjoining Chinatown RP703784, 1922; Halifax, adjoining Chinatown RP703784,
1930; Halifax, Old cemetery H2845, 1896; Halifax, K124395, 1874; Halifax, CAR12420, 1882; Halifax, H2841 1883; Robb
Database: Rates and Valuations:1882-1940; Robb Database: Marriages and Unions: 1848-1920; QSA, CPS 12H/S1 Clerk of Petty
Sessions, 1896-1906; Police Summons Sheets Halifax; QSA, CPS 12H/S1: Clerk of Petty Sessions, Police Summons Sheets Halifax,
1896-1906; QSA, CPS 12H/S2: Clerk of Petty Sessions, Police Summons Sheets Halifax, 1906-1917; QSA, CPS 12H/S4: Clerk of
Petty Sessions, Bench Records and Summons Book sheets, Halifax,1917-1927; QSA, JUS/N376/07/309 Inquest suicide of woman
who murdered a Japanese man, Halifax 1907; QSA: JUS/N120/85/ Report by Police Magistrate Pennefather on Ingham, and Report
by Dr. W.C.C. Macdonald on Ingham gaol; Queensland Post Office Directories (QPD):various years 1860-1910 microfiche; Willmetts
North Queensland Almanac, Willmetts and Co, Townsville, microfiche, various years: 1883, 1885, 1888, 1892, 1898. Microfiche.
Chinese owned or
occupied
Presence of Women
& Families
TEMPLE
275
Gairloch Chinatown (Cowden)
Further inland, situated outside the larger town of Ingham, was Cowden Chinatown on the banks
of the Herbert River: a distance of about 5.5 miles or nearly 9 kilometres from Ingham and near the
Gairloch bridge. This provided sufficient distance from town to enable recreational activities to
occur without scrutiny, but was also far enough away to prevent help from being available when
needed.965 The few White women who lived in the community were particulalry vulnerable to the
distance it took to get help from town. Prone to flooding, mosquitos and sandflies, it was also
troubled by poor sanitation, disease, and potential violence at any point, and at least two women
died before help could reach them: the first a White defacto wife who accidently overdosed on her
partner’s opium water, (a popular product used by Chinese men to keep malaria mosquitos at bay),
and the second a Japanese woman who died at the hands of her jealous Japanese husband, in a case
of domestic violence.966
Ingham Commercial cultural precinct
A small commercial cultural precinct developed in East Ingham where Chinese shopkeepers and
bakers had stores along Lannercost Street and Palm Street, flanked by market gardens along Palm
Creek. Ingham’s Chinese storekeepers catered to the whole community and were present in the
town from 1885, unsurprisingly in the most flood-prone portion.967 While never expanding beyond
four or five firms at any one point, they each continued for some years in Ingham and were able to
continue into the 20th century either through the arrival of sons from China to learn the family
business, or from Australian sons born in the Herbert River district.968
Mobility throughout the Herbert River district between the plantations, towns and smaller riverside
communities was high among families from the very beginning. Families followed work
opportunities arising from the plantations, transitioning from labouring to market gardening and on
to storekeeping, with workplace flexibility demonstrated by the Gow and Moon families who
965 QSA JUS/N120/85/ Report by Police Magistrate Pennefather on Ingham, and Report by Dr. W.C.C. Macdonald on Ingham gaol.
966Ibid.; BDM Qld. Birth Register online,1882, C3861 Ada Maria Postill, William Edwin, Elizabeth Eslienade Dubberley; BDM Qld.
Death Register Online, 1882 , C1606, Ada Maria Postill, William Postill, Elizabeth Estunado Dubberley. This is the case for
Elizabeth Postill, the de-facto wife of Young Sun, a jeweller who lived in Gairloch Chinatown. Elizabeth Estunado Dubberley, legally
married to Edwin William Postill in 1880, had given birth to a daughter Ada in 1882, who died not long after birth. Just when they
separated remains unknown, but she took up with Young Sun and three years later was living in Chinatown at Gairloch. In 1885 while
feeling poorly at home, Elizabeth mistakenly drank her de facto husband’s opium water which he kept next to the bed. Young Sun,
distraught at finding Elizabeth near death, ran into town to fetch the doctor, but she died before help could arrive.
967Ingham State School Centenary 1885 - 1995, held in Hinchinbrook Shire Council Library Local History collection.
968Pugh’s Almanac 1884-1927. Ingham’s key stores included merchant firms Jang Lee and Co. (Wong Heng), Houng Lee and Co.,
Houng Yuen and Co., and Wong Lee and Co.
276
worked around the district over a number of years.969 Australian born children of mixed heritage
families such as those of Ah Bow and Munson remained in the district, with daughters marrying
back into the Chinese community,970 often marrying Chinese men much older than themselves.971
After the 1920s Chinese businesses were run by second generation Australian born children who
diversified and expanded their family’s commercial firms. By then intermarriage with the broader
community had commenced, most notably with the new dominant group –Italian migrants.972
Fig. 83. East Ingham Chinese precinct showing, Houng Yuen & Co. to the right: 1916973
969Hawkins Creek State School, 75 Years 1912- 1987; Ripple Creek State School Centenary 1893 - 1993; Admission Register: Lucinda
State School, from Hetty Shaw (1978); Lucinda N.Q. Yesterday and Today, (The United Press, Ingham): 72-73;Victoria Plantation
State School Centenary 1894 – 1994.
970QBDM-MR-MF 1899, 1899/000375, MUNSON m. AH BOW, Ellen Bridget Florence, 14 March 1899.
971 QBDM-MR-MF 1891, 1891/000352, LOOK HOP, Thomas/LEE LOUK HOP m. AH BOW, Eliza Jane, 5 June 1891.
972Beryl Mulcahy, “Reminiscences of William and Florence Yet Foy” in Wong Hoy (ed.),Miscellany, 23.
973 "Ingham" The Northern Herald, 30 July 1915, p. 30. & Queenslander Pictorial, The Queenslander, 4 March, 1916, p. 26.
277
NOT TO SCALE
Market Gardens
Various periods
NOTE: Approximate
location of commercial
businesses
Distance Ingham to Chinatown:
Approx 5.5 miles / 8.8
kilometers
Ingham
CHINATOWN
Fig.84. Ingham Chinese Commercial Cultural precinct including Cowden/Gairloch Chinatown:
1886-1930s974
Mining Areas:
Charters Towers
Charters Towers, first settled in 1871, developed as the most successful gold mining town in north
Queensland. By 1900 the Chinese population of Charters Towers and surrounding goldfield had
grown to 500 residents,975 spread across three separate communities: Gard’s Lane in Charters
Towers itself, and two other urban nodes within the city: Queenton and Millchester. The district’s
population was diverse and large enough to support the construction of two temples, which
suggests two dialect groups. However, when dignitaries such as the Governor General visited the
city, the Chinese community presented itself as one united community.976
Across Charters Towers there were up to 51 women living in the combined Chinese community,
including just four Chinese wives.977 From the first arrival, Sue See, wife of Lee Liy, to the last,
974Historical Survey Plans Ingham , RP70369, 1882; Ingham, RP703700; Ingham, K124216, 1876; Ingham, 12242V0, 1872;
Ingham, 12243V0, 1881; Ingham, Cordelia, K12498, 1877; A/35850 Index to Register of Liquor Licenses 1913-1935, Ingham;
QSA, CPS 12B/U2 Clerk of Petty Sessions, 10 Feb 1885-23 May 1888, Ingham; QSA, JUS/N548/14/150 Inquest murder/suicide
Japanese wife/husband. Wife accused adultery, Ingham 1914
975 “Charters Towers Statistics”, Evening Telegraph, 13 August 1901, p. 3.
976 “Lord Lamington”, Northern Miner, 4 April 1986, p.3.
977Robb Database: Marriages and Unions 1848-1920.
Chinese
owned or
occupied
Presence of
Women &
Families
Japanese
owned or
occupied
278
Sou Lin, wife of Ah Lin/ Lin Kee, there was a lengthy period of 20 years.978 Attitudes to marriage
on the mining field were fluid and demonstrated by a number of instances where White married
women left their Chinese or White husbands to move in with other men.979 This can be observed in
the name change for Mrs. Mary Phillips (nee Tully) who became Mrs. Ah Lin or Lin Ding when
she moved in with her lover Kwok Ling Ding.980 As they did elsewhere, the female community
assisted one another and strong friendships were formed. This was easy for one pair of women as
they were sisters. Elizabeth Peckham, wife to hotelier Swee Sang981 and Mrs. Ah Chee, a boarding
house keeper, both had prior experience with mining communities, having migrated north first
from Sofala in NSW and then Crocodile Creek diggings in Queensland.982 Mrs. Christina Hing,
married to Moe Ung, raised a large family and endeared herself to the community, providing
female support by “sponsoring” members of the Chinese community, including children of mixed
and Chinese heritage, for baptism to the Church of England.983
From 1915 mining across the region went into decline which accelerated in the 1920s. The lack of
China born wives in the Charters Towers region, combined with Australian born Chinese
daughters moving away to marry Chinese men in other northern communities, meant that the
Charters Towers Chinese Family Landscape collapsed earlier than other comparable towns.
978Anglican Church Records held at the St James Cathedral Archives: Marriages, Charters Towers; NAA: B384/9 Book 1; QSA
SCT/CF10 3030 Lee Liy Wing On, Millchester; Queensland Times, Ipswich Herald and General Advertiser, 29 May 1875, p. 2; NAA:
BP234/1, SB1930/3438, Mrs. Nellie Gee Wah - Application for admission of her three children. Sue See was the wife of merchant Lee
Liy, a partner in Wing On and Co in Millchester. She was the first Chinese woman to arrive in north Queensland, and the first Chinese
woman on the Charters Towers Goldfield. She was also the first Chinese woman in north Queensland to have an Australian born child.
Unfortunately she was also the first Chinese mother to lose a daughter when her daughter Milly, aged 3 months, died from measles.
The couple left permanently for Cooktown where they remained for some years. Sou Lin, wife of Lin Kee, and Ah Moy, wife of Ah
Hon, arrived twenty years later in the mid 1890s while Ti Yu, the wife of Gee Wah, was the last China born wife to arrive in Charters
Towers, having moved to Chinatown from Mackay after the birth of their first child Nellie in 1901.
979Lin Foy, “The Pangs and the Lin Foys”. Charters Towers’ White wives formed a long-standing and robust fraternity of women
which extended to other towns as the north opened up. There was a particular affinity between the women of Charters Towers and
Cairns.
980Northern Miner, 24 April 1893, p.3; Northern Miner, 25 August 1899, p. 3; NAA, BP:/Birth Certificate Register, Book 1, 1901,
Margaret Anne Ah Lin (or Phillips), illegitimate, born Charters Towers 22 August 1898, BC 22877. She went to China in February
1901 and returned on 10 May 1910.
981 Northern Miner, 16 November 1880, p. 2.
982Ibid.
983 QBDM-MR-MF, 1872 72/000414, HING, George MOE UNG married to WILKIE, Christina, 27 October1872;Charters Towers
Baptism Records, North Queensland Diocesan Archives. She stood sponsor for the conditional baptisms of Mabel Sun Kee, daughter
of Minnie Boatwright and Sun Kline Kee, as well as Nellie Gee Wah, daughter of Ti Yu and Gee Wah and Willie Ah Lin, son of Ah
Lin/Lin Kee and Ah Low/ Sou Lin. Mrs. Hing was responsible for ensuring the spiritual welfare of the baptised children under the
terms of the English Church.
279
Charters Towers, Queenton & Millchester:
Chinatown, temples & market garden areas
CHARTERS TOWERS
CHINATOWN
Chinese Cemetery
Buchanon Creek
Queenslander Creek
MILLCHESTER
Porphyry Creek Mossman Creek
TEMPLE
Cemtry
MGA
MGA
MGA
MGA
MGA
MGA
MGA
MGA
MGA
MGA
MGA
178
179
120
195
194
142
QUEENTON
TEMPLE
Fig. 85. Charters Towers, Queenton, Millchester: Chinatowns, & Market Garden areas984
Gard’s Lane Chinatown, Charters Towers
Charters Towers Chinatown, located between Mossman and Deane Streets, occupied an area of
town known as Gard's Lane (Lee Street) and was only a short distance from the main commercial
district, Gill Street. Chinatown incorporated two unnamed laneways which provided an effective
barrier against prying eyes and law enforcement, and where recreational activities such as
gambling and prostitution could be conducted with some impunity. Allotments were occupied with
timber and tin boarding houses with communal kitchens, shops with living quarters out the back,
double storied merchant stores and make-shift lean-tos and in-fill abodes. Little courtyards and
privies were located at the rear of allotments while a rapid population growth saw earlier buildings,
built before roads were properly surveyed, located in the middle of one laneway.985 Gard's Lane
Chinatown was an intensively occupied cultural precinct containing eating houses, lodging houses,
recreational places and diverse shops all catering to a predominantly Chinese clientele. In contrast,
984Historical Survey Plan: Charters Towers, SWEE SANG, 20248, GFH.80, 1878; Charters Towers, SUE FONG, 20237, GFH. 75,
1878; Charters Towers, HONG SHING PONG, 13015, RA.2579 1893; Charters Towers, AH FOO Jimmy, 00320, GFH2774, 1892;
Charters Towers, SIN ON LEE, 13013 RA. 2571, 1893; Charters Towers, AH POO, 13006, RA. 2568, 1893; Charters Towers, AH
HON, 13005, RA. 2569, 1893; Charters Towers, L & S. AH CHIN, 13565, RA 3525, 1893; Charters Towers, CHINAMAN, 00582,
GFL.4108, 1894; Charters Towers, Minni TANG YEE, 00575, GFL. 4106, 1894; Charters Towers, GA. AH SAM, 21159, GFL.
5046, 1896; Charters Towers, LUM SIK; AH KEE, 01197, RA. 2671, 1896; Charters Towers, E. WONG SHUN, 08900,
GFL.5062.98, 1896; Charters Towers, Charlie AH SING, 00653, GFL.4676, 1896; Charters Towers, CHINAMAN HUT 00720,
GFL. 4539, 1897; Charters Towers, Sam Street, JIM SANG, 13080 RA. 2685, 1898; Charters Towers, LUM SIK, 13097, RA, 2684,
1898; Charters Towers, AH FUNG, 13083, RA. 1506 1899; Charters Towers, CHINAMAN GARDEN, MA. 41 1900; Charters
Towers, Brisk Street, 13097, R.A. 2703.4.5 1901; Charters Towers, George HING, 00821, GFL.6689, 1901; Charters Towers,
S.TANGYEE, 01018, MHL.4150, 1907; Charters Towers, CHINAMANS GRDN, 01022, GFL.7433 1907; Charters Towers,
CHINAMAN, 01038, GFL. 7567 1908; Charters Towers, S. TANG YEE, 01018, GFL. 7385, 1908; Charters Towers, C. PHI; 01083,
7764 GFL. 1910; Charters Towers, E.WONG SHUN, 01093, GFL. 7803.4, 1911; Charters Towers, CHINESE GARDEN, 13766,
GFL 7867, 1911; Charters Towers, AH TUNG; 13780, MGA. 225/230, 1913; Charters Towers, E.WONG SHUN, 01146, MHL,
7986, 1914; Charters Towers, SAM LEE, MGA. 246, 1923; Charters Towers, SAM LEE, 01320, MGA 246, 1923; Charters Towers,
CHINESE GARDEN, 01353, MPH 9218, 1927; QSA, A/20704: Charters Towers Mining Warden, Register of Claims, Homestead &
Cape River Claims, 1887-1890.
985North Queensland Register, 4 May 1903, p. 39.
Chinatown or
cultural precinct area
TEMPLE
Market Gardens
280
major merchant houses and hotels catering to both a Chinese and White clientele were located on
Mossman Street. This includes Swee Sang’s Canton Hotel and merchant firm On War Jang on
Mossman Street. Mrs. Ah Chin had her boarding house fronting Deane Street.
Charters Towers Gard’s Lane Chinatown provided a home to most of the Chinese women as well
as a few White wives and up to 14 Japanese women. Some families lived along the major traffic
routes of Mossman Street and Deane Street,986 while the Japanese group worked as prostitutes in
shops which fronted the main thoroughfare.987 Japanese women conducted “comfort” business in
little rooms rented off Chinese men and they shared facilities as well as a community kitchen in the
household.988
Japanese women
Hop Kee
Mrs Chin
BOARDING
HOUSE
On War Jang
Merchant
MOSSMAN STREET
HARGRAVES DEAN STREET
Lane
Lane
Mill Lane
Gards Lane / LEE STREET
Sing Jang
Japanese women
Fook On
Chong
Ah Lin
Chicago
warehse
Lee Hang Loong
Club
House Hotel
Loo Chiu Chin
BOARDING H.
Tai Loy Jang
BOARDING H.
J. Carson
Japnse women
Yee Wah Loon
Japnse women
Hip Lee Jang
Japanese
women
Swee Sang
Canton Hotel
Fig. 86. Charters Towers Chinatown: 1880- 1905989 Fig.87. Japanese woman Gard’s Lane990
986Northern Miner, 1 November 1876, p. 3.; Robb Database: Rates and Valuations.
987“Seventy Women Gasp in Horror”, Truth, 10 May 1903, p. 5; Diane Menghetti, I remember: memories of Charters Towers(History
Dept., James Cook University, Townsville, 1989): 61.This included Lulu, a monocycle riding Japanese “prostitute” who was reputed
to ride her cycle around Charters Towers in her kimono. Upon her retirement and intended return to Japan, she was detained in
Townsville and re-routed to Fantome Island, a place for infectious diseases, where she died from a venereal disease.
988North Queensland Register, 4 May 1903, p. 39.
989Historical Survey Plan: Charters Towers, Deane Street, CT1824, 1872; Charters Towers, Deane Street, RP700196, 1876; Charters
Towers, Deane Street, CT18217, 1878; Charters Towers, Deane Street, CT18218, 1878; Charters Towers, Deane Street, CT18227,
1881; Charters Towers, Lee Street, CT1824, 1876; Charters Towers, Mossman Street, RP700193; Charters Towers, Mossman Street,
CT1824, 1872; Charters Towers, Mossman Street, CT18227, 1881; Charters Towers, Mossman Street, RP700192, 1891; Robb
Database: Rates and Valuations:1882-1940; WBD 11A/2: Charters Towers Waterworks Board 1887-1893; QSA, A/20704: Charters
Towers Mining Warden, Register of Claims, Homestead & Cape River Claims, 1887-1890; “Alien Quarters”, North Queensland
Register, Monday, 4 May 1903, p.39; QSA,SRS1806/1/1: Charters Towers Boys School Admission Register; QSA, SRS1808/1/1:
Charters Towers Girls School Admission Register, 1896-1903; Queensland Post Office Directories (QPD):various years 1860-1910
microfiche; Willmetts North Queensland Almanac, Willmetts and Co, Townsville, microfiche. various years: 1883, 1885, 1888, 1892,
1898. Microfiche.
990“Seventy Women Gasp in Horror”, Truth, Sunday 10 May 1903, p. 5.
Women & Families
Japanese Women
Chiense Allotments
281
Queenton
Queenton incorporated a considerable market garden area with a small cultural precinct of shops
which developed around Sam Street, near the main cemetery. Queenton serviced a large number of
gardening leases along Buchanan Creek, and it was conveniently located near the main Charters
Towers railway station where produce could be railed out. Between Charters Towers Gard’s Lane
and Millchester, Market Garden Leases (MGL) could be found along Sandy Creek, Aberdeen
Creek, Dearies Creek, Queenslander Creek, Millchester Creek, Gladstone Creek, Mossman Creek,
Porphyry Creek and other areas closer to Charters Towers Chinatown itself. The Queenton
Chinese garden cultural precinct had the main temple near it, suggesting it was well supported by
the gardeners. Many women legally married or otherwise lived with Chinese gardeners in and
around Queenton, with at least two families at Porphyry Creek, two couples along Aberdeen
Creek, and others in unknown location such as Biddy O’ Flaherty and her Chinese husband Lop-
Ti-Lo who married in the Queenton Chinese temple in 1877.991 Women were engaged in
traditionally female occupations including egg and poultry selling (Eliza Ferris)992 and dairying
(Sarah Ah Chin).993 In addition, single women shared space in houses, and humpies where they
sold services to men.994 The last occupation made women particularly vulnerable and women
deliberately sought “protection” in the Chinese community as rape and attempted rape by White
men were commonplace.995
Millchester
A little further out, some 2 ½ miles (nearly 4 klms) from Charters Towers, the small settlement of
Millchester developed next to the longest-running crushing mill on the field, the Venus Battery. It
is worth noting that stamp batteries were very noisy and this may have made the surrounding
residential area undesirable. A small Chinese commercial cultural precinct developed off Jardine
Street, the main street, which incorporated a hotel, shops and herbalist’s store as well as a temple.
A sizable population of Chinese settlers lived at Millchester and it incorporated up to 10 families.
Millchester had at least three prominent families: the merchant firm partner of Wing On and Co.,
991Northern Miner, 5 September 1877, p. 3.
992 QSA: CRS/157/96, Rape of Eliza Ferris by Thomas Lester, Charters Towers, 1896; North Queensland Register, 1 July 1896, p.18.
Widow Eliza Ferris, egg and poultry farmer, lived in a humpy at Aberdeen Creek about 2 miles from Millchester with James AH SUE.
993QBDM-BR-ONL: 1875, C2837 Milly, daughter of Liy Lee and Sue See ; QBDM-BR-ONL: 1896, C6289, Bessie Lin, daughter of
Ah Lin and Shue; and QSA, QUE/N2; PRV11288/1/2 Valuation Registers- Queenton Shire Council.
994Northern Miner, 29 January 1891. A case was brought by the police against four women charged under the Vagrancy Act: Jemima
Brown, Mary Ann Coutts, Margaret Cummings and Bessie Whittle, alleged prostitutes. Margaret was noted as living with Tommy AH
BOW in a disorderly house where complaints were made against her. She was at the time separated from her husband. She was
sentenced to three months hard labour in the Townsville gaol and the other women 6 months hard labour.
995North Queensland Register, 1 July 1896, p. 1; QSA: CRS/157/96 Rape of Eliza Ferris by Thomas Lester, Charters Towers, 1896.
282
Lee Liy and his Chinese wife Sue See996; hotelier Wan Chap and his wife Maria Welsh, who
married in 1869 and who had the New York Hotel;997 and shopkeeper/ herbalist and civic leader,
William Lam Pan. Lam Pan was by far the most prominent person across all three Chinese
communities and, due to a proficiency in English, represented the Chinese community in matters
relating to the courts, deputations to visiting Governors- General, and fulfilling filial duties for his
kinsmen by seeking assistance for exhumations from the nearby Chinese cemetery.998 Lam Pan
married two White women: Mary Jane McDonnell, married in 1876 and died five years later in
1881,999 and the policeman’s daughter Sarah Molony in 1884.1000 Not only was he married to two
White women in north Queensland, he also managed to maintain a family in China.1001
996Queensland Times, Ipswich Herald and General Advertiser, 29 May 1875, p. 2: Lee Liy Wing On, Millchester.
997Willmetts North Queensland Almanac, Millchester, 1883-1888.
998QSA: HOM/A22/04405/29 Exhumation Millchester.
999 “Family Notices”, Northern Miner, 18 June 1881, p. 3.
1000QBDM-MR-MF 1876, 1876/000442, LAM PAN m. McDONNELL Mary Jane, 8 August1876; QBDM-MR-MF 1884,
1884/000858, PAN/LAM PAN William, MALONEY, Sarah. 8 July 1884.
1001 NAA: BP342/1, 475/603/1900 Lam Pan - Correspondence relating to re-entry permit into Queensland.
283
One
and
All
Hit or Miss
Just In Time
Temple
Sun Yon Lee 1876
George Sam Wo 1876
MG
MILLCHESTER 1874-1876
Huttons
VENUS MILL /
BATTERY
Shaft
Fig. 88. Millchester Commercial Cultural precinct including Temple 1890 – 19001002
1002 Historical Survey Plans: Millchester, M1756, 1876;Millchester, MP15104, 1876; Millchester, MP28707, 1877;
Chinese owned
or occupied
Women &
Families
TEMPLE
Market Garden
284
Cape River Chinatown
The Cape River goldfield was proclaimed in 1868 and quickly attracted the attention of miners
from the Crocodile Creek diggings,1003 who moved north in search of gold. Among some of the
first to arrive were Ah Sowie and his Irish born wife Bridget Feghan, who arrived in July 1868.
Within six months one of the first children to be born on the field was welcomed: their first
daughter Mary Ann.1004 Cape River diggings, and the nearby town of Pentland, was a small remote
community which supported up to 12 mixed heritage primary families 1860-1920. Some, such as
the Ah Sowie family, stayed only a short while before moving on, while others such as William Ah
Hee, married to Mary Rodda Bailey,1005 and George Ah Pan, married to Mary Murphy,1006
remained in the district until they were laid to rest in bush graves.
With roads rudimentary and basic services non-existent, pregnancy and birth for women was
fraught with concern. Charters Towers, the nearest large centre, was 66 miles (107 klm) or one
day’s travel away, making the journey for heavily pregnant Mary Ah Hee or Mary Ah Pan
dangerous and uncomfortable. In these circumstances’ women departed for the laying-in hospital
in Charters Towers up to two months before the birth of a child and remained there sometimes two
months after. This meant Chinese husbands were left at home to care for children while managing
businesses and/or gardens. When faced with tragedy, wives and husbands were forced to deal with
terrible family circumstances as best they could. This was the case for Ah Hee who had to bury his
stillborn baby in between attending to his beloved dying wife, while comforting his four children,
in 1912.1007 While couples in larger centres experienced the benefits of a large Chinese Family
Millchester, MP29366, 1896; Millchester, Chinese cemetery, MP29234, 1890; Millchester, Chinese cemetery, MP29255, 1891;
Millchester, Chinese cemetery, MP15409, 1902 Millchester, Lam Pan, MP28644, 1875; Millchester, Lam Pan, MP28703, 1877;
Millchester, Lam Pan, M1758, 1888; Millchester, Lam Pan, MP29211, 1889; Millchester, Lam Pan, MP29327, 1892; Millchester,
Lam Pan, MP15444, 1906; Millchester, Lam Pan, MP29528, 1906; Millchester, townscape, MP15171, 1895; SCT/CF10 3030 LEE
LIY Butts of Oaths of Allegiance 1874-1874, Supreme Court Charters Towers 1874; QSA, A/20704: Charters Towers Mining
Warden, Register of Claims, Homestead & Cape River Claims, 1887-1890. Queensland Post Office Directories (QPD): various years
1860-1910 microfiche; Willmetts North Queensland Almanac, Willmetts and Co, Townsville, microfiche. Various years: 1883, 1885,
1888, 1892, 1898. Microfiche.
1003 “Monday, June 22”, Rockhampton Bulletin and Central Queensland Advertiser, 23 June 1868, p. 2.
1004Pers Comm. Merle Douglas, Townsville, 2009. Tommy Ah Sowie or Ah Sue as he was sometimes called, kept a boarding house as
well as working as a part time miner. He had first arrived in Queensland in 1848 among the indentured labourers from Amoy, to work
on the Darling Downs. Tommy and Bridget later moved to Townsville where they remained.
1005 QBDM-MR-MF 1897, 1897/001071, AH HEE, William, BAILEY, Mary R. (Rodda also known as Rhoda and Roda) 22 February
1897.
1006 QBDM-BR-MF 1865 66/001550 Agnes AH PAN, MURPHY, Mary Ann.
1007QSA: JUS/694/12 Inquest into Death, Mary Rodda Ah Hee.
285
Landscape, couples in remote locations had to cope and face family life and tragedy in
isolation.1008
Fig. 89a & 89 b. Cape River: Graves of Ah Hee and Mary Rhoda Ah Hee 1009
Ravenswood Chinatown
From the moment it was discovered, Ravenswood Goldfield was a popular destination for those
seeking gold due to its accessible location near the provisioning ports of both Townsville and
Bowen. By 1873, Chinese men were arriving directly from Hong Kong to Townsville bound for
Ravenswood, making it the first goldfield in north Queensland to attract the attention of overseas
Chinese.1010 Ravenswood, like the Cape River goldfields, was a stepping stone for many families,
with most moving on to other places such as Charters Towers shortly after arrival. Barely two
years after its discovery, was Ravenswood described as a mini-China with the Rockhampton
Bulletin derisively referring to Ravenswood as “The Flowery Land. - One is tempted to ask in
some parts of Ravenswood whether one is in an English colony, or in a Chinese town, the pig-tails
are so plentiful.”1011 A sizable Chinatown developed on the edge of town with Chinese stores in the
main street. Along the waterways, market gardens leases were taken up. By 1874 a temple was
constructed, making it the third temple in north Queensland after Gilberton (1871) and Millchester
(1873).1012 By 1875, the goldfield had attracted a population of over 2000 Chinese miners,
gardeners and storekeepers,1013 although this number dropped significantly to 300 by 1901.1014
1008 This may have put some couples off travelling to extremely remote areas such as the Gilbert River diggings. Although Chinese
miners travelled north to the Gilbert River, there remains no evidence to suggest that any families followed them. The Gilbert
goldfield’s failure to attract Chinese mixed heritage families could be attributed to its very remote and dangerous location and
abandonment in 1873 after only four years’ settlement, combined with the more accessible Etheridge and Ravenswood Goldfields
opening up.
1009James Cook University Images: 11147 & 11150.
1010Mackay Mercury and South Kennedy Advertiser, Saturday 1 February 1873, p. 3.
1011 'The Flowery Land', Rockhampton Bulletin, 22 February 1872, p. 1.
1012Historical Survey MP17906.
1013 “Ravenswood”, Illustrated Sydney News and New South Wales Agriculturalist and Grazier, 21 August 1875, p. 4.
286
Ravenswood’s Chinese Family Landscape supported 7 Chinese primary families consisting of 3
China born couples and 4 who were mixed heritage marriages. The first Chinese woman to live in
Ravenswood was Ah See, the wife of storekeeper Ah Pong. She arrived and was married in
Queensland in 1884.1015 She remained the only Chinese woman in Ravenswood for approximately
twenty years until Young See, the wife of Lee Gow, 1016 and Lee Moy, the wife of Jang Lum Kee,
arrived.1017 All Chinese families lived in Ravenswood until such time as their children required a
Chinese education.
Nearly all of the mixed heritage couples who arrived stayed a couple of years and quickly moved
on to other goldfields such as Charters Towers. For example, Swee Sang and family arrived in
Ravenswood, 1874 and set up a hotel, only to move to Charters Towers a year later.1018 White
wives in Ravenswood included Irish born Mary Herlihy, who was married to Thomas Sun Lee
Sing in 1887,1019 Elizabeth Linton, who was married to Charlie Ah Sing in 1890,1020 and Sarah
Gale/ Peaus who had married William Ah Chin in Sofala, New South Wales in 1862.1021 Mining,
while a lucrative occupation for some, left others, especially families, on the move chasing an
income, and Ravenswood had two disadvantages: it was not an alluvial mining centre, and the ore
was hard to treat, leading to an overall decline in population and therefore economic opportunities.
All three mining fields, Ravenswood, Cape River and Charters Towers, reflected the transient
nature of populations on mining fields as families moved from field to field, following the rushes.
When the Palmer Goldfield was discovered in 1873, everything in north Queensland changed.
1014“Notes”, The Western Champion and General Advertiser for the Central-Western Districts, 19 March 1901, p. 3.
1015QBDM-MR-MF 1884, 1884/001700 AH PONG m. AH SEE, 14 February 1884; QSA, WOR/N14-N15-N16, Ravenswood
Divisional Board: Form of Valuation Return, 1882. Ah Pong owned land and a store in 1883 and Ah See arrived in 1884. Together
they raised three children in Ravenswood until the turn of the century.
1016 QBDM-BR-ONL: 1901, C6790, Lee Hem Lee Gow; QSA: SRS1613/1/1: Ravenswood School Admission Register, 1876.
1017 QBDM-BR-ONL: 1901, C6300, Gem Lum Kee; QSA: SRS1613/1/1: Ravenswood School Admission Register, 1876.
1018School Admission Register, Information held by Ravenswood Historical Society: Samuel Swee Sang, Age 5, enrolled in the
Ravenswood State School, 1874. Father noted as a Publican. They lived near the Church of England. A year later he had purchased the
Canton Hotel in Charters Towers. Transfer of license for Canton Hotel from Sam You to Sue Sang (Swee Sang), Northern Miner, 22
Sept 1875, p. 2.
1019QBDM-MR-MF 1887, 1887/001016, SUN LEE SING, Thomas LIM LEE SING/ LEE SING m .HERLIHY, Mary, 22 September
1887.
1020QBDM-MR-MF 1890 , 1890/001277, AH SING, Charlie m. LINTON, Elizabeth 19 November1890.
1021QBDM-ONL: 3016/1862 Chin A, and Sarah, Sofala; QBDM-BR-ONL: 1863, Emily Mary born Sofala, NSW; QBDM-BR-ONL:
1875, C2844, Sarah daughter of Ah Chin and Sarah Gale.
287
Fig. 90 Ravenswood Chinatown, Commercial Centre and Garden Areas 1022
Fig. 91. Ravenswood Chinatown: Shop Jang Lum Kee and Temple: 19111023
1022Ravenswood, Chinaman Huts, Chinatown, MP17951, 1884; Ravenswood, R16218, 1885; Ravenswood, R16220 1886;
Ravenswood, MPH25916 1890; Ravenswood, MPH25907, 1890; Ravenswood, MPH4657, 1894; Ravenswood, MPH4716, 1901;
Ravenswood, MP15827, 1901; Ravenswood, MP15814, 1901; Ravenswood, MP15826, 1902; Ravenswood, MP15830, 1903;
Ravenswood, MP15825, 1903; Ravenswood, MP15829, 1904 ; Ravenswood, MP15836, 1914; Ravenswood, MP15845, 1936;
Ravenswood, township, Ah Pong, R16210, 1880; QSA, WOR/N14-N15-N16, Ravenswood Divisional Board—Form of Valuation
Return 1882; QSA, WOR/N14-N15-N16: Ravenswood Divisional Board- Form of Valuation Return, 1882; QSA, WOR/N14-N16:
Ravenswood Divisional Board Correspondence, 1883-1914; QSA, MWO11/N3: Ravenswood -Register of Business Licences, 1888-
1908; QSA, MWO11/N5: Ravenswood - Register of Miners Rights, 1900-1908 ; QSA, MWO11/N6: Ravenswood -Register of
Miners Rights, 1888-1890; QSA, MWO 11/15; PRV10576 - 1 – 2: Postage Book and Registration of Applications for Market
Gardens – Ravenswood 1881-1882; QSA, MWO 11/N1: Return of Miners Rights & Business Licences Ravenswood-1870; QSA,
COL/063: Ravenswood Divisional Board Correspondence, 1880-1883; QSA, COL/063: Ravenswood Divisional Board-- Form of
Valuation Return, 1882; QSA, SRS1613/1/1: Ravenswood School Admission Register, 1876. Queensland Post Office Directories
(QPD): various years 1860-1910 microfiche; Willmetts North Queensland Almanac, Willmetts and Co, Townsville, microfiche.
Various years: 1883, 1885, 1888, 1892, 1898. Microfiche.
1023JOL: Negative number: 164766, “Greeting s from Ravenswood” , & JOL: Negative number : 108627, Image Ravenswood.
“Offices and Works of the New Ravenswood Mines Ltd., Ravenswood.
Chinese owned or
occupied
Women &
Families
TEMPLE Market Garden
288
Palmer River Goldfields
The Palmer gold rush was brought into existence by enthusiastic reports from James Venture
Mulligan in September 1873 and quickly attracted the attention of Chinese men in north
Queensland. Within three months an entrepreneurial Chinese gardener was busy planting
vegetables in anticipation of the rush that would come.1024 The importance of the Palmer Goldfield
lies in its role as the first Queensland goldfield to attract large numbers of overseas Chinese men to
Queensland, because unlike Ravenswood and Charters Towers, it was a particularly rich alluvial
rush. The population of Chinese men on the goldfield in the first three years has been estimated at
approximately 18,000 including 2 Chinese women.1025 Chinese men arrived directly from Hong
Kong to the new port of Cooktown, where they provisioned and overlanded to the burgeoning
goldfield.
The Palmer Goldfield took in many small settlements and three main towns including Maytown,
Byerstown and Palmerville. Both Maytown and Palmerville attracted stable Chinese communities
with Maytown becoming the largest commercial centre. Up to three temples were erected on the
goldfield, at Palmerville,1026 Maytown,1027 and on the opposite bank of the river near Uhr’s
Camp.1028 This suggests that temples were constructed along district lines supported by at least two
different dialect groups.1029 Key men on the Palmer goldfield included Gee Kee and James Ah
Fun, who ran provisioning stores in Maytown, and the merchant firm, Wing On in Palmerville,
managed by Lee Liy (formerly at Millchester).1030 James Ah Fun purchased a number of
allotments on the northern side of Maytown and erected tin and bark humpies which he
subsequently sublet to countrymen as shops and lodging houses.1031 All three men were married,
but only Ah Fun and Gee Kee resided with their Chinese wives in Maytown. After the late 1870s,
the population began to dwindle having suffered from drought, declining gold production,
malnutrition, and sickness in the community. Supplies to the region were irregular and violence
from both the White and Aboriginal communities was always a threat. As agricultural
1024Queenslander, 13 December 1873, p. 2.
1025Kirkman, Palmer Goldfield, 199.
1026 “Trip to the Palmer River”, The Age, 24 September 1878, p.3. It was erected in 1874.
1027 Kirkman, Palmer Goldfield, 200
1028Queenslander,21 December 1878, p.370.
1029Kirkman, Palmer Goldfield, 227-229; “The New Steamer Illawarra”, Australian Town and Country Journal, 31 August 1878, p.
24.This is further evidenced by a violent event which occurred between Chinese men from Macao and Chinese men from Hong Kong
in August 1878, when territorial tensions boiled over into a violent dispute resulting in the death of several men.
1030 Rains, Intersections, 96.
1031Queenslander, 6 November 1886, p. 726; Historical Survey M1953, 1882.
289
opportunities opened up around the emerging port settlements of Cairns and Salisbury (Port
Douglas), as well as the new Hodgkinson Goldfields, Chinese miners diverted their attention to
other regions.1032
A female presence on the Palmer goldfield was felt just five months after discovery in February
1874, when the first group of women set out from Georgetown on the Etheridge goldfield by foot
and wagon across the unchartered landscape to the Palmer River: a distance of 250 miles
(402klms).1033 Two years later, three White wives of Chinese men were living in the community:
Kate Knowles Ennis, who co-habituated with Ah Bin; Sarah Ah Chin, formerly from Ravenswood;
and Sarah Ah Bow. Both Sarah Ah Chin and Sarah Ah Bow lived in the Chinese camp associated
with the Maytown community, while Kate Ennis and Ah Bin lived at Revolver Point.1034 Both
Sarah’s knew each other and it was likely they also knew Kate Ah Bin.1035 At least two of the
women worked as midwives to women whose husbands were prominent in the community.1036 In
total, the Palmer field’s Chinese Family Landscape consisted of 5primary families including 3
mixed heritage families and 2 families with Chinese wives. Nearly all lived in Maytown and the
White wives of Chinese men would have known of Won Kew and Wun Toong Yuan. It is
plausible that one of the Sarah’s, both experienced midwives, attended to Won Kew in 1883 when
she gave birth to twins: a boy, Quon Chong and girl, Melend - the first all-Chinese children in the
community.1037
The relationship between the two Chinese women was complex, defined and described by their
place in society. One was a mistress and the other a bonded servant. Together they represented
some of the earliest elements of the north Queensland experience for Chinese women: young,
isolated, finding their way in a foreign land, and with the complexities of redefining their roles in
the family landscape. Ah Fun’s wife Won Kew was not a friend to her mui tsai Wun Toong Yuan,
and both were dependent on the male storekeeper Ah Fun.1038 Like many situations for mui tsai
1032Others simply returned to China.
1033Northern Argus, 14 February 1874, p. 3
1034 Kirkman, Palmer Goldfield, 206; QBDM-BR-MF 1873, 73/000587 Albert, 5 February1873 AH PIN m. ENNIS, Catherine
Knowles.
1035Kirkman, Palmer Goldfield, 206
1036Ibid.
1037 QBDM-BR-ONL: 1883, C6616, Melend, daughter of James Ah Fun and Won Kew; QBDM-BR-ONL: 1883, C6617 Quon Chong,
son of James Ah Fun and Won Kew.
1038 They arrived in Maytown in 1882 and the following year Mrs. Ah Fun (Won Kew) gave birth to twins.To understand the
complexity of identifying migrant Chinese women in north Queensland’s community, it is worth noting that WunToong Yuan was also
290
,Wun Toong Yuan suffered from physical abuse only to be later released from her contract through
a marriage well above her status to storekeeper Gee Kee. This marriage highlights the ability for
migrating Chinese women to step outside the traditional family structure and create new roles for
herself and future daughters far away from the female powerbase in the ancestral home. In 1886,
Ah Fun and his wife departed with their children to China, but their connection with north
Queensland did not end there. Their daughter Melend later returned as the wife of Chinese settler
Wah Poo, manager of merchant firm Hip On and Co., Cooktown in 1911.1039
Fig. 92. Maytown Chinatown: Chinese Owned Allotments: 18821040
Fig. 93. Edwardstown Later renamed Maytown: 18721041
recorded variously as Ah Faun, Hoong Fong, Houng Faun, Won Hoong Fong, Won Hung Faun, May Hung Faun, Hang Fang and
Hanny Fanny.
1039 NAA, A1 1912 17072 Memorandum External Affairs ; NAA, J2483, 263/17 Helena Wah Poo; Townsville Daily Bulletin, 27
October 1911, p. 7
1040Historical Survey Plans: Maytown, MP14383, 1855; Maytown, M1951, 1879; Maytown, M1955, 1884; Maytown, MP282285,
1884; Maytown, MP282286, 1884; Maytown, RA2455, 1981; Queensland Post Office Directories (QPD): various years 1860-1910
microfiche; Willmetts North Queensland Almanac, Willmetts and Co, Townsville, microfiche. Various years: 1883, 1885, 1888, 1892,
1898. Microfiche.
Market Garden
Chinese owned or
occupied
Chinese owned
or occupied
Market Garden
areas
291
Georgetown Chinatown
First settled in 1864 as a pastoral district, it was not until six years later in 1870 that gold was
discovered and the Etheridge Goldfield proclaimed, and Georgetown established.1042 The
Etheridge Goldfield comprised of several towns and settlements including Western Creek, Mt
Hogan, Cumberland, Castleton, Finnegan’s, Percyville, Charleston, Durham, Lane’s Creek, and
Marquis. Within its boundaries were incorporated smaller goldfields: Green Hills, the Gilbert
Goldfield, Balcooma, and Kidston. It also took in market garden areas along a number of rivers
and creeks including the Etheridge River, Percy River, Delaney River, Goldsmith’s Creek, Lane’s
Creek, Queenslander Creek, Alexander Creek, and Four Mile Creek.1043 From 1872, Chinese
gardeners, miners and two storekeepers, Wing On and Co. and Yet War, had established
themselves at Western Creek. Not long after, Wing On and Co. moved to Georgetown despite
resistance from established White storekeepers.1044 The Etheridge Chinese population at this stage
consisted of two storekeepers, two gardeners at Georgetown and a number of Chinese miners
working at Western Creek. 1045 The population grew to 203 in 1886 and stabilized around this
number from then on. In 1891 the Chinese population was estimated at 197, of whom 4 were
married.1046 By 1902, the Chinese population had dropped to 142, with the majority of them
working as gardeners.1047 Market gardening was a dominant Chinese occupation in the region and
it continued well into the 20th century.
A Chinatown developed in Georgetown, on the outskirts of town, and very quickly grew to provide
opium shops, boarding houses, stores, a butcher and bakers. Men provided services as labourers, a
carter, and gardeners.1048 By 1880, Chinatown had the first of three temples constructed.1049 The
first was located on the corner of North and High Streets; the second was relocated around the
corner in Low Street by 18921050, and the third opened with fanfare in 1905.1051 Following the
1041 'Edwardstown, Palmer River Goldfield.', Australian Town and Country Journal, 2 June 1877, page 28
1042 Bolton, Thousand Miles Away, 11-14.
1043Etheridge Divisional Board Registers, 1882 and Etheridge Shire Council Rates and Valuations registers, multiple years.
1044Queenslander, 9 March 1872, p. 10 andQueenslander, 30 March 1872, p.10.
1045Queenslander, 24 February 1872, p.11.
1046Census Records for years 1886, 1891.
1047Morning Post, 10 January 1902, p.2.
1048Etheridge Shire Council, Rate Cash Book 1882-1886 [valuation]; Etheridge Shire Council, Rate Cash Book 1888-1896; Etheridge
Shire Council, Letterbook 1911-1913; Etheridge Shire Council, Valuation Register and Rate book 1916.
1049Queenslander, 20 March 1880, p. 37: "’ John’ is keeping the high festival of the new year, and wakes the silent watches of the
night by crackers and uncouth novices of fire. Here he has a Joss-house, with a gaudy standard floating in front.” Note: no physical
evidence of temples remains. The last one pulled down in the mid 1950s and the collection sent south to Hill End NSW.
1050 Etheridge Shire Council, Rate Book, 1882-1884 and 1888-1896,
292
pattern set by many Chinese men across north Queensland, it was prominent community men Tom
Tip, Yee Tong and Lim Kin who worked to gather funds and secure the erection of the temple,
furnishing it with imported altars and furniture.1052 Further afield in a remote area of the Etheridge,
Mt Hogan also had a bush temple which was present from 1888 until at least 1896, on land owned
by prominent Townsville merchant firm On War Chong.1053
The Chinese Family Landscape of Georgetown consisted of 9 primary families before 1900 with
only three Chinese–White mixed heritage couples to live in the Georgetown region for any length
of time. The other two couples moved onto other goldfields after 1875. Up to 6 China born migrant
couples lived in the region over a thirty-year period, though only 3 Chinese families remained
permanently for any length of time. This included those of Ah Fook, the wife of Tom Tip
(1885);1054 Ah Cum, the wife of Ah Gee (1890);1055 and Hoy How, the wife of Yee Tong
(1894).1056 Georgetown, and the neighboring town of Croydon situated 89 miles (143 klms) west
of Georgetown, shared a special connection based on their location and remoteness. This was
evident in the connections between families in the Chinese community.1057 In addition, midwife
Agnes How Chong, the wife of James Ah Sue in Mt Hogan, attended the births of several Chun
Tie and Yet Foy couples, travelling considerable distance to attend to them.1058 James Ah Sue and
his first generation Australian born wife, Agnes How Chong, were a well-known couple on the
Etheridge where they were hoteliers and storekeepers at Mt Hogan.1059 Not only did they
1051 “Telegrams”, North Queensland Register, 30 January 1905, p. 6.It is presumed that successive constructions of the temple
occurred due to a calamity befalling the previously constructed building. Many places including Maytown, Georgetown and Croydon
suffered from termite attack with many buildings destroyed from what are colloquially referred to as ‘White Ants’.
1052North Queensland Register, 16 January 1905, p. 7.
1053 Etheridge Shire Council, Rate Book 1882-1884 and 1888-1896.
1054 QBDM-MR-MF1885, 1885/001808, SIP TOM /TOM TIP married AH FOO/ AH FOOK, 8 June1885; QSA: COL/A435/85/6412
TOM TIP application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Georgetown, 1885.
1055 QBDM-MR-MF 1890, 1890/001433, AH GEE, AH SUM, AH CUM 16 August 1890.
1056 NAA: J2483, 144/85 YEE TONG.
1057 Etheridge Shire Council, Rate Book 1906-1908; Etheridge Shire Council, Valuation Register and Rate Book, 1911; Etheridge
Shire Council, Valuation Register and Rate book, 1916.Sam Que Woo, a storekeeper with business interests at Georgetown, married
Australian born Chinese Cissy Yet Foy from Croydon and together they settled in Cumberland where he operated a garden, store and
hotel. James Ah Kee from Durham married Cissy’s sister Margaret and they settled in Durham before moving to Forsayth. James and
Margaret owned a number of allotments around the Etheridge, including at Durham, Forsayth, Queenslander Creek, Charleston, and in
Georgetown Chinatown which they leased to storekeeper Ah Kwong.
1058 QSA, CPS 14A/44 CROYDON: Register BDM sent to Normanton District Office by Court House Registrar, 1900-1908; Copy of
Birth Certificate 51908 of Jing Way, supplied by Sadie Fong On, Atherton; Register of Births in the District of Burke in the Colony of
Queensland, Registered by Clement Arnett Collard, District Register, Number 896.Agnes Ah Sue was sought out as an experienced
midwife by women in the community. She attended a number of births across the region, including Alice Ah Chee, the daughter of
Annie Holland and William Ah Chee. A son and a daughter of hers, James and Ellen Ah Sue, married a brother and sister of German
parentage from Croydon, Alice Maria and Louis John Frederick Harstoff in 1886 and 1888 respectively.
1059 QBDM-MR-MF 1883, 1883/001637, SUE James/ CHUNG KUM SUE m. CHONG /HOW CHONG Agnes, 8 May 1883.
They had been married at Townsville in 1883, but moved to the Etheridge not long after.
293
successfully raise eight children on the Etheridge, but James Ah Sue was closely associated with
the Mt Hogan temple.
Georgetown 1890-1910
wood & iron
"joss house“
1883
Ah Foo
Bow Pang
Tom
Ming/Meng
wood & bark
opium shop
Tom Tip
Tom Tip
Yee Tong
War Yuen
Jang & Co
Ah Hoon
publican
Chin Waugh
/Chin Poo
Ah Tie
Tom Tip
Tom Tip/
J. Ah Kee
LIM KIN / James Ah Kee
Occ Ah Kwong store
Tom Ming
SHORT STREET
NORTH STREET
Etheridge River
Temple 1892
New 1905
HIGH STREET
LOW STREET
ST GEORGE STREET
LIM KIN Ah Gee and Jane Gee
Fig. 94. Georgetown Chinatown: 1890 - 19101060
Fig. 95. Georgetown Chinatown, Garden and Cemetery Areas: 1890- 19101061
1060 Historical Survey Plans: Georgetown, G1884; Georgetown, G1885; Georgetown, MPH14038, 1882; Georgetown, IS204094,
1965; Georgetown, MPH22959, 1968; Robb Database: Rates and Valuations:1882-1940; Etheridge Shire Council: Burial Register &
Monumental Inscription Database, Georgetown held at Etheridge Shire Council; QSA, MWO/14B/31: Mining Warden: Etheridge;
Register of applications various; market garden areas, Etheridge District 1888-1907; QSA, MWO/14B/40, Mining Warden
Georgetown, Register of applications various; market garden areas 1887-1890; QSA, MWO/14B/41 PRV10316, Mining Warden
Etheridge, Register of applications various; market garden areas 1880-1912; Queensland Post Office Directories (QPD):various years
1860-1910 microfiche; Willmetts North Queensland Almanac, Willmetts and Co, Townsville, microfiche. Various years 1883, 1885,
1888, 1892, 1898. Microfiche.
Chinese owned
or occupied
Women or
Families
TEMPLE
TEMPLE
Market Garden
Chinese owned
or occupied
294
Croydon Chinatown
The Croydon Goldfield, discovered 1885,1062 is comprised of the town of Croydon, surrounded by
the smaller settlements of Golden Gate, The Gorge, Finnegan’s, Golden Valley, Jubilee Camp,
Mountain Maid, Homeward Bound, Esmeralda, and Tabletop.1063 As it was a hard rock mining
field, very few Chinese were able to mine and men instead turned to auxiliary services in
occupations synonymous with goldfields such as supply of goods: gardeners, shopkeepers,
butchers, and bakers, and supply of services: cooks, packers and labourers. Only Charley Hann,
married to Mary Sullivan, 1064 was able to mine with any freedom or success, and he became
known as an excellent gold and tin miner and admired as a man of great expertise.1065 By 1896
there were an estimated 243 Chinese residents including women and children living on the
goldfield.1066 In 1902 the population had dropped to 201,1067 and by the end of WWI had dwindled
away to just 36 persons - mostly old men and Australian born first generation Chinese settlers.1068
Two years after its discovery, two small Chinese camps had sprung up, one consisting of several
bark huts and tents at the back of Nerstad’s Hotel and a second camp across the creek which also
included Javanese and Malays.1069 The larger one soon developed into a Chinatown taking in a
whole surveyed section between Chester and Charles Streets, and bounded by Edward and Kelman
1061Robb Database: Rates and Valuations:1882-1940; QSA, MWO/14B/31: Mining Warden: Etheridge; Register of applications
various; market garden areas, Etheridge District 1888-1907; QSA, MWO/14B/40, Mining Warden Georgetown, Register of
applications various; market garden areas 1887-1890; QSA, MWO/14B/41 PRV10316, Mining Warden Etheridge, Register of
applications various; market garden areas 1880-1912. The community interacted with the large population of market gardeners who
lived throughout the district. Early settlers such as storekeeper Yee Tong is buried in the Chinese portion of the cemetery. Currently
this portion of the cemetery has been turned into an agistment paddock and horses are sometimes run on it. This section of the
cemetery although part of the original surveyed reserve, has been separated from the main cemetery which has been fenced in with a
white fence. The exact whereabouts of the Chinese portion of the cemetery is not widely known to the current generation of
Georgetown residents. This lost section has up to 5 children buried there.
1062Capricornian, 30 October 1886, p. 25. From the moment it was proclaimed, anti-Chinese sentiment was high with a “Roll Up”
called in October 1886, resulting in several Chinese bush huts destroyed, and the community threatened and harassed.
1063 Unlike the Etheridge, which was a large field made up of many smaller mining fields, some with towns (e.g. Cumberland,
Einasleigh, Kidston, Forsayth) which briefly became bigger than Georgetown, Croydon was more compact, with one big town and
several smaller satellite towns – the only threat to Croydon was Golden Gate, and then only briefly.
1064QBDM-MR-MF1884, 1884/000387, HANN, Charley married to SULLIVAN, Mary Josephine.
1065North Queensland Register, 14 September 1892, p. 4; Northern Miner, 29 July 1896, p.2.; Northern Miner, 23 April 1896, p. 2.;
QBDM-MR-MF1884, 1884/000387, Hardcopy original sighted: 1915 C460/5227015, Death Certificate: Charley Hann.Charley Hann
was a well regarded miner and prospector around Croydon, and epitomised the successful man in 19th century north-western
Queensland. Liked by many miners in the community, Hann operated 1A North gold mine at Golden Gate and took out a tin mine
lease at Stanhills,40 miles (64 klm) from Croydon. An advocate and interpreter for the Chinese community, he died at age 68 in
Atherton, having arrived in the colony as a boy of 8. He married in Cooktown, 1884, to Kent born English immigrant Mary Josephine
Sullivan according to the rites of the Primitive Methodist Church, in the presence of another mixed heritage couple, James Can Ting
and his wife Ellen (nee Vaughan). Mary Josephine Sullivan, born 1861, was 23 years old when she married. They moved to
Normanton after their marriage before they moved to Croydon.
1066Townsville Daily Bulletin, 18 June 1952, p. 5; Morning Post, 10 January 1902, p. 2.
1067Morning Post, 10 January 1902, p. 2.
1068Truth, 3 March 1918, p.10.
1069Telegraph, 7 December 1887, p. 3
295
Streets. A temple was built by the community in 1888,1070 but was replaced just over 10 years later
by a second temple in 1897, presumably due to the building being eaten by termites or having
burnt down, was the case with most replacement temples.1071 Chinatown extended out over a
public purpose reserve on the other side of Charles Street, taking in a section of land of
approximately 5 acres (2 hectares). A market garden cultural precinct developed, and this was
watered by a small seasonal waterway which transacted the area bounded by Kelman Street. In
addition to Chinatown, a small commercial cultural precinct formed along Sircom Street which
was occupied by Chinese storekeepers Chun Tie and Yet Foy. Yet Foy himself also worked
independently as a packer, carrying goods to outlying towns including Tabletop.
Croydon’s Chinatown and Chinese Family Landscape was a large and diverse community which
included up to 14 couples as well as White and Japanese single women who lived in the
community and worked as “prostitutes”. The community had 9 mixed heritage couples including
Tommy Ah Cum and Alice Keyes (m.1881),1072 Charley Hann and Mary Josephine Sullivan
(m.1884), William Ah Chee and Annie Holland (m. 1885),1073 and another White woman, Mrs.
Sue Kee.1074 At least two of the Chinese men had met and married White women in Cooktown first
before taking them west,1075 while others such as Ah Foo and Caroline Tups moved inland from
Townsville.1076 In addition, a small number of single women, such as Kate Connolly, lived in
Chinatown and formed casual intimate relationships with Chinese men.1077
Three Chinese men were married to China born women including Yet Foy married to Luk Yet Ho
(1883);1078 Chun Tie, also known as Chin Tie, married to Yuen Qui Fa (1894);1079 and Ah You,
who married mixed heritage Lillie Ah Gow (1901).1080 The first Chinese woman in Croydon
arrived within five years of its settlement. Luk Yet Ho, also known as Ah How, arrived from
1070Daily Northern Argus, 15 February 1888, p. 4.
1071Northern Miner, 3 August 1897, p.2.
1072QBDM-MR-MF 1881, 1881/000159, AH CUM, Tommy, KEYES, Alice, 8 February 1881.
1073QBDM-ONL: 1885, C297 Annie Holland and William Ah Chee.
1074 QSA, CPS14A/M20 Croydon Petty Cash Book, Mrs. Sue Kee alias Kathryn Damari.
1075 Ah Foo/ Henly and Hann/ Sullivan.
1076QBDM-MR-MF1875, 1875/00048, AH FOOR/James AH FOO m. TUPS, Caroline, 18 February 1875; NAA BP342/1
9857/299/1903 James Ah Foo.
1077Queenslander, 23 November 1895, p. 967; QBDM-DR-ONL 1896 C441 CONNELLY, Kate; QBDM-BR-ONL 1892, C969 Kate
Ah Muck, daughter of Ah Muck and Kate Connolly; QBDM-DR-ONL: 1892 C408 Kate Ah Muck, daughter of AH MUCK, Tommy
and CONNELLY, Kate. Kate Connolly was a married woman but separated from her carrier husband after the death of her baby in
1890. She formed an intimate relationship with Chinatown resident, Ah Muck. In early 1892 she had a daughter to Ah Muck but this
baby died as well. Kate Connolly died of an opium overdose in 1895.
1078QBDM-MR-MF 1884, 1884/000321, YET HOY / YET FOY m. AH HOW/LUK YET HO, 17 January 1884.
1079QBDM-MR-MF1894, 660.94, CHUN TIE m. YUEN QUI FA, 1894.
1080QBDM-MR-MF 1901, 1901/000449, AH YOU, Jimmy m. AH GOW, Lillie, 18 October 1901.
296
Cooktown having lived briefly on the Palmer goldfield.1081 By 1897 there were approximately 14
Japanese women living and working as comfort women in Croydon.1082 One of them, Onatsu
Kashiyama, went on to marry a Chinese man Ah Mook in1900.1083 Theirs was not the only unusual
relationship. At least one Chinese man married an Aboriginal woman, when Bing Chew married
mixed heritage Minnie Ah Too in 1909.1084 Bing Chew had a garden on the corner of Sircom and
Kelman Streets, and was later employed as a station cook on one of the nearby stations. Together
he and Minnie lived at Oakland Park Station which is situated 25 miles (40 klm) from Croydon.1085
Fig. 96. Yet Hoy, Luk Yet Ho and Family: Croydon Chinatown.1086
1081She was without Chinese female company for ten years until Chinese couple Chun Tie and Yuen Qui Fa arrived from Georgetown
after the birth of their first child and son, Jing Way.
1082QSA: POL/J1; PRV10729/1/5 Japanese women, c. 1897.
1083 QBDM-ONL: 1900, C218, John Ah Mook and Kashijama Onatsu.
1084 QBDM-MR-MF 1909, 09/000661, BING CHEW, Tommy m. AH SOO, Minnie 11 September 1909.
1085QSA: JUS/ 684/18 Inquest into the death of Rosie Bing Chew, 2 September 1918 at Oakland Park Station.
1086Private collection, Estelle Kingsley, Cairns, 2 May 2001.
297
Fig. 97. Croydon Chinatown: 1890-19101087
***
Port Towns:
Cooktown Chinatown
In March 1874, six months after the Palmer Goldfield was proclaimed, Cooktown was established
as the port. It was the first town in north Queensland to be associated with any large scale Chinese
female Diaspora, and it developed as a prominent centre. The closest port until then was
Townsville, nearly 400 miles (635 klm) from the Palmer Goldfield.1088 By July 1874, Lee Liy’s
Chinese merchant firm, Wing On and Co., had erected a large store and established a network of
provisioning stores for Chinese miners across two major ports and several northern diggings,
taking in Townsville, Millchester, the Etheridge, the Palmer goldfield and Cooktown.1089
Cooktown’s Wing On and Co. was owned by partners Lee Liy and Lee Gong in conjunction with
another partner, Sun Kum On, who lived in George Street, Sydney.1090 The firm had direct links to
1087 Historical Survey Plans: Croydon, MP15914, 1888; Croydon, MPH15915, 1888; Croydon, MPH22328, 1888; Croydon,
MPH22298, 1890; Croydon, MPH22301, 1891; Croydon, SY28, 1898 ; Robb Database: Rates and Valuations:1882-1940;
Queensland Post Office Directories (QPD):various years 1860-1910 microfiche; Willmetts North Queensland Almanac, Willmetts and
Co, Townsville, microfiche: various years 1883, 1885, 1888, 1892, 1898. Microfiche; QSA, CPS 14A/44 CROYDON: Register
BDM sent to Normanton District Office by Court House Registrar ; 1900-1908; QSA, CPS 14A/M20: Croydon June 1892-Aug 1893;
QSA, CPS 14A/U1 Small Debts Court, Draft Minute Book, Croydon, 1886-1887; QSA, DCT/14 A /D1: Northern District Court,
Minute Book, Croydon, 1889-1910; MWO14A/65/162, Mining Warden Register of applications market garden areas, Croydon, 1887-
1890; QSA, MWO14A/67; Mining Warden: Croydon; Register of applications market garden areas, Croydon, 1890-1911; QSA,
MWO14A/69 Mining, Warden, Index to register of applications for market garden and tailings areas - Mining Warden, Etheridge and
Croydon, 1886-1911.
1088Newcastle Chronicle, 27 November 1873, p. 3.
1089Rains, Intersections, 96; “Palmer River Diggings”, Sydney Mail and New South Wales Advertiser, 25 July 1874, p. 111;
Queenslander, 22 August 1874, p.6, Queenslander,17 October 1874, p. 6. and Kirkman, Palmer Goldfield, 170.
1090Cooktown Courier, 22 September 1875, p. 2.
Chinese owned
or occupied
TEMPLE
Women &
Families
Market Garden
298
Sydney and on to Hong Kong, which indicates that networks could be far reaching for
businessmen.
By 1878 a distinct Chinese cultural precinct had formed on the north side of Adelaide Street which
developed into a Chinatown. As a large and diverse Chinese population, at its peak it supported
two Chinese temples, both which were built by 1880.1091 Overall it may have had up to four
temples constructed: two of which were replacement temples after calamities befell the first.1092
The presence of two temples indicated that two districts and clan affiliations were present.1093
Between 1874 and 1920, up to 23 primary couples lived in Cooktown including China born, White
and Aboriginal wives.1094 Unlike the mining communities of Charters Towers, Ravenswood, Cape
River, the Etheridge and Palmer goldfields, where China born wives remained in the minority and
White wives in the majority, Cooktown’s Chinese female migrant population outnumbered White
wives three to one. At least 18 families have been identified in Cooktown including some Chinese
women who arrived as mui tsai.1095 In contrast, only 6-7 mixed heritage Chinese-White families
were identified, including Elizabeth Thomas, the wife of hotelier Ah Nee See Wah.1096 This makes
Cooktown’s female settlement pattern unique when compared to other north Queensland
settlements.
The first Chinese woman to arrive in Cooktown on 26th March 1875 was “Mrs. Wing On” 1097 who
was possibly Mrs. Sun Kum On from Sydney. She was shortly followed by Sue See, the wife of
Lee Liy, after they had relocated from Millchester.1098 Two months later in May 1875, Mrs. Lee
Gong arrived directly from China with a mui tsai, making her the first woman to do so for north
Queensland.1099 A year later storekeeper Quong Hing (Wong Hing/ Kwong Hing) was joined by
his migrant wife Chen Moy and young mui tsai, sent as an assistant to her mistress who had bound
1091South Australian Advertiser, 2 January 1880, p. 6.
1092 Rains, Intersections, 179-180
1093 “A Ramble About Chinatown”, Queensland Times, Ipswich Herald and General Advertiser, 4 May1882, p. 3: “There are two joss
houses in Adelaide-street: one represents Cantons, and the other Hong Kong, the surroundings and altar in the former being decorated
on a grander scale than those in the latter, and "Joss" is a better looking man. In the Hong Kong Joss house the decorations are rather
"shady", compared with those of Canton, and old "Joss" does not wear such a bright appearance.”
1094Robb Database: Marriages and Unions, 1848-1920.Since compiling the thesis database, up to five additional families have been
identified in Cooktown but not included in statistics.
1095Robb Database: Marriages and Unions, 1848-1920
1096 QBDM-MR-MF 1875, 1875/000072, AH NEE SEE WAH m. THOMAS, Elizabeth A. 27 March 1875.
1097 Rains, Intersections, 388.Wing On and Co. was the business name of the merchant firm. With three manager partners, her identity
must be assumed to be Mrs. Sun Kum On because she arrived from Sydney where her husband had his business.
1098Cooktown Herald, 27 March 1875, p. 2; Rains, Intersections, 388.
1099Cooktown Herald, 22 May 1875, p. 2.
299
feet.1100 In all, between 1875 and 1900 over 11 China born wives, a number of them accompanied
by young mui tsai, arrived in Cooktown. The Chinese Family Landscape continued to grow as
children were born in the community, commencing in 1877 when Chen Moy gave birth to her first
child, Loie Toy.1101
In addition to both Chinese and White wives there were at least 3 mixed heritage Chinese-
Aboriginal families, including Ah Sin and Topsy,1102 Charlie Ah Kee and Polly,1103 and Low Kee
and an unidentified Aboriginal woman.1104 As was the problem across north Queensland, many
Aboriginal women’s births were not registered, making identification of couples difficult. This is
evidenced by the birth of Edward Low Kee, son of Low Kee and an unidentified Aboriginal wife
in 1914, whose birth only came to light when his father unexpectedly died within hours of
returning to China with Edward. This left Edward orphaned in Cooktown and ultimately under the
protection of the local Protector of Aborigines, as he was a minor at the time.1105 Rains notes that
Chinese-Aboriginal intimate relations were difficult to measure, but suggest that unions may have
been present in the outlying Chinese camps and gardens across the north in Cooktown’s
hinterland.1106
Single White women living in and around Chinatown who worked as “prostitutes” and laundresses
struggled with frequent acts of sexual violence against them. They were vilified in the community
for their occupation, and in the courts for living in Chinatown. This is the case for Annie Lang who
was accused of perjury in a case of multiple cases of sexual assault against her, in the Cooktown
Court.1107 In addition to White comfort women, at least four Japanese women are presumed to
have resided in Chinatown and were classified by police as women of “ill-fame”, in line with other
Japanese women across the north.1108
1100The Cooktown Herald, 13 September 1876, p. 2.
1101QBDM-BR-MF 1877, 1877/000654, Lote Toy, 8 April1877, son of HING WONG and CHEN MOY.
1102 QPG 1911/411, Topsy and QBDM-BR-ONL: 1902, C2109, Dolly Ah Sin, daughter of Ah Sin and Topsy.
1103 QSA Inquest JUS /590/36, 1936, Death of Charlie Ah Kee.
1104 NAA: J2483, 415/84 Low Kee; NAA: J2483, 415/29 Edward Low Kee.
1105NAA: J2483, 415/29 Edward Low Kee. It is not known what happened to him thereafter, or his mother.
1106 Rains, Intersections, 112.
1107QSA: A/18484, Depositions Regina vs Annie Lang for perjury.
1108QSA: POL/J1; PRV10729/1/5 Japanese women, 1897.
300
Cooktown
Chinatown
c1900
Cemetery
MG
MG
Chinese section
Cemetery &
Ceremonial burner
Fig. 98. Cooktown Chinatown, Garden and Cemetery area.1109
1109 Map partly based on Rains, Thesis: 168 in conjunction with Historical Survey Plan: Cooktown, Charlotte Street, C17965, 1882;
QSA, SRS 1630/1/1 Admission Register Girls School, Cooktown. 1919-1921; QSA, COL/A338/82/3150 Sam ASHEW application
for Certificate of Naturalisation, Cooktown, 1882; QSA, COL/B1 1872/3451 AH CHIN application for Certificate of Naturalisation,
Cooktown, 1875; QSA, COL/B1 1876/3769 WONG HING application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Cooktown, 1876; QSA,
SCT/CF10 1879 CHUNG CHANG Certificate of Naturalisation, Cooktown, 1879; QSA, COL/A338/82/3166 CHIN PACK
application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Cooktown, 1882; QSA, CPS 13 E/ R2, CPS Register of Business licences,
Cooktown,1889- 1912; QSA, CPS 13E/R 2: Clerk of Petty Sessions Ah Chong, Kennedy River, Cooktown; QSA, CPS 13E/R 2:
Clerk of Petty Sessions Ah Ting, Kennedy River, Cooktown; QSA, CPS 13 E/6 Clerk of Petty Sessions, Register of Firms:
Cooktown,April 1906- Aug. 1915; Queensland Post Office Directories (QPD):various years 1860-1910 microfiche; Willmetts North
Queensland Almanac, Willmetts and Co, Townsville, microfiche: various years 1883, 1885, 1888, 1892, 1898. microfiche
Market Garden
Women &
Families
TEMPLE
Chinese owned
or occupied
301
Thursday Island: Chinese Community
Thursday Island developed as a prominent customs port and the gateway for many migrants to
Queensland. Its position in the Torres Straits was bolstered by the beche de mer, pearl and trochus
shell industry which had developed from the 1840s and the port shipped hundreds of tons of
sandalwood and beche-de-mer to Chinese markets. Situated on the most heavily used shipping
route from South East Asia and the British Isles, Thursday Island became an excellent host
destination for Chinese settlers to establish businesses, expand commercial interests and make use
of kinship and extended family relationships which reached across northern Australia and beyond
to the village in China. Thursday Island was home to a broad and diverse population from across
South East Asia, recorded in 1893 at 1400 people taking in twelve different nationalities including
61 Chinese. Despite their being the sixth largest ethnic population behind the Japanese, White
concerns were still expressed about Chinese migrants “crowding out other races”.1110 This was an
unfounded fear because by 1901, the Chinese population had only increased to 91, and the
population was never large enough to form a Chinatown. Families and businesses remained
interspersed throughout the community.1111
Thursday Island’s Chinese Family Landscape grew to sustain a moderate community of 16
families. Showing similarities to Cooktown, Thursday Island had a higher percentage of China
born women than White wives, most likely as a result to its close proximity to Hong Kong and
regular sea transport there. The community consisted of 7 mixed heritage couples and 9 China born
couples. White wives included Bridget O’Dwyer, married to boarding house keeper Jimmy Ah
Sue,1112 Charlotte Andrews, married to George Bow;1113 and Mary Whyte, who was married to Ah
Sange.1114 As the local baker on the island, Mary Ah Sange’s relationship was one of the longestlasting
mixed heritage relationships on the island.
1110Sydney Mail and New South Wales Advertiser, Saturday 8 July 1893, p. 64.This included nationalities such as Manila men
(Filipino), Japanese, Malay, Cingalese (Sri Lankan), Javanese, Indians and Chinese.
1111 “Population”, Week, 31 July 1903, p. 24. The Chinese population still remained consistently lower than other Asian nationalities,
having dropped to approximately a quarter the population of the Japanese, which had increased to 334, including 34 Japanese women.
Most of these women worked as prostitutes to service Japanese pearl divers, crewmen and boat owners.
1112QSA: A/18963 AH SUE. Ah Sue was registered as a boarding house keeper for a large boarding house which could hold up to 17
persons.
1113QSA: JUS/A59 AH SANG vs Bridget AH SUE for unlawfully beating child Amelia Ah Sang, Thursday Island.
Mrs. Charlotte Ah Bow was summonsed to court as a witness in a case against Mrs. Bridget Ah Sue for indecent language.
1114Brisbane Courier, 3 June 1902, p. 4 While it is not known how long Bridget and Charlotte remained on Thursday Island, Mary
worked as a baker for many years supplying the Thursday Island Gaol with bread, in which she gave “every satisfaction”.
302
The first Chinese woman to arrive on Thursday Island was 22 year old Chun Ayee in 1893, who
was married to King Nam, a merchant storekeeper in Normanby Street. As the first Chinese wife
on Thursday Island, and the first Chinese woman to give birth to a child where both parents were
Chinese, her death from suicide in 1894 came as a shock to the Chinese community, particularly
when it was revealed that she had begged to return to China.1115 After her death King Nam went
back to China and brought out a second wife, Wong Sam in 1897, but they remained only a few
months before returning to China for good.1116 It took a further four years after King Nam’s
tragedy before the next Chinese women was to arrive, in 1898. Thursday Island, it seems, was
considered a difficult place for Chinese women. Mrs. Hop Who Sing, on the other hand, was able
to withstand the island’s isolation, having previous experienced similar conditions in Palmerston
(Darwin) where she had her first five children.1117 She remained the only Chinese woman on
Thursday Island until the turn of the century, after which up to 5 Chinese women arrived from
Hong Kong and China in response to the relaxed conditions for female migration under the new
Commonwealth Immigration Act 1901.1118 While most women returned to the village to visit
family with their husbands, others were reluctant to do so. This is the case for Chin Ow, the wife of
Lai Foo, who made it clear that she never wanted to return to Hong Kong or meet First wife, Kee
Kew, having been mistreated as a child and former mui tsai.1119
It is clear that a triangular relationship developed between the Chinese communities of Thursday
Island, Cooktown and Port Darwin/Palmerston in the Northern Territory. Businesses traded
between the three communities and links were consolidated between families through marriage
arrangements. Australian born daughters, born in the Northern Territory in places such a
Palmerston, Brocks Creek and Pine Creek, were matched with men who had commercial interests
on Thursday Island or at Cooktown. For example, James Chee Quee and Cheung Yet, both
Thursday Island businessmen, married Northern Territory Australian born girls Moo Kim Kow
and Moo Fung.1120 In addition, the large family of Chee Quee “adopted” out one of their daughters
1115QSA, JUS/N226/94/337Inquest into suicide by opium, Ayee CHUN wife of KING NAM, Thursday Island, 1894. She overdosed
on her husband’s opium.
1116North Queensland Register, 8 September 1897, p. 22. King Nam had suffered a business downturn after the 1893-4 bank crashes
from which he could not recover, and he did not wish to risk his family again.
1117NAA: J2483, 105/22 Hop Who Sing; NAA: J2483, 105/23 Mrs. Hop Who Sing; NAA: J2483, 105/27 Ah Line Who Sing; NAA:
J2483, 105/28 Ah Ting Who Sing; NAA: J2483, 105/29, Sue Hang Hop Who Sing; NAA: J2483, 105/30, Ah Hone Hop Who Sing.
1118Robb Database: Marriages and Unions, 1848 – 1920.
1119 Interview with Mrs. Mabel Garvey, 26 June 2002, in Robb, Out of Sight, Out of Mind, 98. Also known as Chin On or Mary Lai
Fook.
1120NAA: CEDT A1/1923 /3544 Moo Fung; see also J2483 359/20; J2483 65/26; J2483 218/34; J3136/ 1908/262. Not long after
Cheung Yet arrived, Wong Yet his wife of two years died from a sudden illness leaving Cheung Yet a widower. He subsequently was
303
to the prominent Darwin family, the Hassan family. The young girl worked hard her whole young
life, in a slave-like arrangement which was very similar to conditions that female children as
bonded servants worked to be a coincidence, possibly making her the first and only mui tsai to be
traded in northern Australia if not Australia.1121
The full extent of the interaction between these three northern Australian regions is not yet fully
understood but it broadened over time to include marriage relations between Australian born
children of key families in the 20th century. For example, brother and sister Ernest and Evangeline
Hang Gong, children of the prominent Darwin family Lee Hang Gong and Sarah Bowman,
married Edward (Kong Lit) and Maizie (Sou Yooung) of the prominent family of Kwong Sue Duk
and second wife Chen Ngor Kwei, who had migrated to Cairns in 1903 from Port Darwin.
In Queensland, the relationship between Cooktown and Thursday Island was very close. Chinese
women who initially arrived in Cooktown found themselves moving to Thursday Island within a
couple of years. This was the case for Ah Bow, the young wife of Hor Lin Sing.1122 Others arrived
to an established family arrangement as was the case for Yong Leong, who was married to Lai
Fook in Cooktown, and Chin Ow, who was married to brother Lai Foo on Thursday Island.1123
Together, the families managed successful merchant stores at Cooktown and on Thursday Island,
and the men also co-owned a fleet of pearl shell luggers who worked the Torres Straits. The fluid
migration and business network within the Chinese Family Landscape, which developed across
this northern triangle and extended to other towns in north Queensland, provides an excellent
example of the importance of strategic marriage relations and prevalence of transnational Chinese
societal traditions.
introduced to Moo Fung who had been sent back to the village from Brocks Creek, near Darwin, when she was a child and had been
living in the village for over ten years since then. A marriage was quickly arranged and the couple returned to Darwin where they were
remarried in 1912. They left Darwin soon after for Thursday Island, where Cheung Yet had a store, trading under the name Tommy Ah
Sue.
1121NAA: A1, 1928/9742 Moo Kim Kow; NAA: BP4/3, Quee James Chee; Interview: Client #1, Cairns, 16 May 2002, in Robb Out
of Sight, Out of Mind,98.
1122 Interview with Estelle Kingsley, Cairns, 2 May 2001.
1123 QBDM-MR-MF, 1902 , 02/000379, LAI FOOK m. YONG LEONG, Mary, 17 May 1902; Townsville Daily Bulletin, 4 September
1930, p. 6; “Pearling Prosecutions”, Cairns Post, 2 June 1911, p. 3. The brothers were in partnership in a pearl shell fleet stationed at
Thursday Island and each owned a large merchant store.
304
Fig. 99. Thursday Island: Chee Quee Open Air Theatre, Douglas Street: c.1920s
Townsville: Chinese Community
Townsville’s Chinese community commenced within five months of Townsville’s settlement, in
1864, when Chinese men established gardens along Ross Creek.1124 Townsville’s reputation as a
key port for provisioning emerging goldfields was quickly established in 1866: first with the
discovery of the Star River diggings and then Cape River, Ravenswood, the Gilbert, Charters
Towers and Etheridge gold fields.1125 In the first four years of settlement, just before the gold
rushes began, Townsville had attracted only a handful of Chinese men. This figure grew to 12
Chinese men and one Chinese woman in 1868; 53 Chinese men in 1871; 77 Chinese men and one
Chinese woman in 1876; and 522 men and three Chinese women by 1886.1126 The Chinese Family
Landscape by the mid-1880s also included 11 children. By 1891 the Chinese community had
stabilized, with a population of 479 Chinese men and 6 women. By the end of the decade, four
Chinese women had departed, leaving only 2 Chinese women. In addition, there were up to 42
local born Australian Chinese children including 28 boys and 14 girls.1127
1124 “Early History in Bank Records”, Townsville Daily Bulletin, 11 July 1968, p.19; Port Denison Times, 21 July 1866, p.2.
Chinese men were noted to be gardening on the banks of the Ross River and near the lagoon which was situated in an area which
quickly became known as Kissing Point. The article stated “There is ground on the river Ross equal to any in Queensland for garden
cultivation. We have already some radishes, the produce of the Chinaman's garden, as good and large as any grown." Dorothy Gibson
Wilde, Gateway to a Golden Land (James Cook University, 1984): 27.
1125 Townsville General Rate Book: 1879: Book 1, 1879, microfilm, Family History Association of NQ and Townsville City Council
Millennium Project 2000.
1126QV&P, Vital Statistics and Census Records for 1868, 1871 and 1886.
1127QPP, 1892 and 1902, Census Records for the years 1891 and 1901.
305
With what was a robust population of Chinese, the development of the community sets it at odds
with the other communities across north Queensland: it did not develop a “Chinatown”. This
phenomenon appears to have occurred due to an immediate integration of the Chinese community
into the broader community from its earliest settlement days, and interspersal of merchants and
shopkeepers in the main commercial district along Flinders Street, Flinders Lane and Hanran Street
with White businesses.1128 It is more apt to describe the community as having a “Chinese
Quarter”, located in Flinders Lane, which while having several characteristics of a Chinatown such
as recreational places, gambling, alcohol, opium, lodging houses and women working as
“prostitutes”, did not develop into a self-contained community but was a mixture of small neat
houses and shops interspersed among major White industries including a wheelwright and timber
yard.
Fig. 100 Townsville Chinese district Flinders Lane and Hanran Street, c.18901129
Between 1864 and 1920 there were at least 36 primary couples associated with the Townsville
Chinese Family Landscape. This included 28 mixed heritage couples and 8 China born couples
with no Aboriginal wives identified at all. At least one married couple had migrated north from
New South Wales Fun Jow and Mary Maher,1130 with the majority of couples marrying in
Townsville after 1870. Several White women were married to market gardeners while others to
1128Robb Database: Rates and Valuations: 1882-1940. See BibliographySmaller communities of market gardeners and shop keepers
established themselves in urban areas, as well as on the outskirts of town which at the time was in the local government Division of
Thuringowa.
1129Image: UQFL243_b1_0189a & UQFL243_b1_0188a Fryer Library, Townsville
1130 Kevin Wong Hoy, “Becoming British subjects 1879-1903: Chinese in North Queensland”, submitted as Master of Arts degree La
Trobe University, Melbourne 2006, p 101. Fun Joe married Margeret Maher in 1861 in Bathhurst NSW. At age 35 he took his Oalth of
Allegiance in Townsville 1879.
306
storekeepers, cooks, a fisherman and a boarding house keeper.1131 Townsville’s White wives came
from a variety of migration backgrounds including women from England, Ireland, Germany and
Denmark with very few colonial-born. This is demonstrated by entrepreneur Irish migrant Mary
Piggott who married Andrew Leon in 1869;1132 Danish migrant Margaretha Anderson, who
married boarding house keeper William Ah Shin in 1873;1133 Swiss migrant Caroline Tups, who
married storekeeper/gardener Tommy Ah Foo in 1875;1134 German migrant Minna Schelke, who
married gardener/fisherman Ap Lee Sin in 1876;1135 as well as English migrants Sarah Hadley,
who married storekeeper James Ah Ching in 18791136 and Lucy Lord who married cook Harry Ah
See in 1881.1137
Couples were dispersed among the broader community and lived in Flinders Lane and Hanran
Street, as well as on Ross Island, South Townsville: the poor and flood prone quarter of
town.1138Single White women, some working as “prostitutes” also lived and worked alongside
Chinese stores and residences but only one Japanese woman was identified in Flinders Lane in
1899: presumably working as a sex worker - but this is not verified. 1139
The first Chinese woman to arrive in Townsville was recorded in 1868 but very little other than a
lone statistic is known about her.1140 The next to arrive is thought to be Sue See, wife of Lee Liy of
Wing On and Co. in 1874, but she quickly departed with her husband for Millchester. It wasn’t
until 1879 that the first of two Chinese women arrived and remained in Townsville with their
merchant husbands: Chang Tie, wife of Sue Fong (m. 1879)1141 and Wah Quay, wife Ah Ming (m.
1131Robb Database: Marriages and Unions, 1848-1920.
1132 QBDM-MR-MF1869, 1869/000005, LEON CHONG, Andrew m. PICKET/PIGGOTT, Mary, 8 February 1869.
1133 QSA, COL/A428/85/2590 William SHIN, application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Townsville 1885 - Marriage Certificate.
1134QBDM-MR-MF1875, 1875/00048, AH FOOR/ James AH FOO m. TUPS, Caroline, 18 February 1875; NAA: BP342/1,
9857/299/1903.
1135QBDM-MR-MF 1876, 1876/004740, AP LEE SIN m. SCHELKE, Mina 26 April 1876; Townsville General Rate Book, Book 1,
1879.
1136 QBDM-MR-MF, 1878, 1878/001042, AH CHING, James, HADLEY, Sarah, 7 May 1878; Myra Timmerman, ““Possibly both a
‘whiteman’ and a Chinese”.
1137 NAA: J3115 143, William Ah See, Registration of Birth, Townsville.
1138 “Townsville Topics, Where the Lepers Live”, Truth, 21 September 1902, p. 2.
1139North Queensland Register, 11 September 1899, p. 21. She lived alone in Flinders Lane and was extorted for money by a police
constable in 1899.
1140This is a lone statistic from a population census and nothing is known about who she was, how long she stayed, or when she left. It
might even be a statistical error in the census.
1141NAA: J3115 /75 / 1903, 1899 copy of a birth certificate for George Sue Fong (Father: Sue Fong, Mother: Chang, formerly Pie) of
Townsville. George was born on 21 November 1882 in Flinders Street, Townsville to Sue Fong, Merchant, age 46 years, from Canton,
China. He was married to Chang, formerly Sue, age 21 on 15 July 1879, in Townsville, Queensland. Mrs. O' Neil presumably was the
midwife as she witnessed the birth.
307
1881).1142 While Chang Tie was the first Chinese woman to give birth in Townsville, Wah Quay
(also known as Moon Sing) was the first Chinese woman to die.1143 She is also the first woman to
be exhumed in Queensland.1144
Only a few merchant men were joined by their Chinese migrant wives,1145 though the majority of
men sent regular remittances back to the ancestral village via a prominent broker in Shekki. Most
returned on a temporary basis leaving kin or family members to look after the Townsville business.
This arrangement occurred for example for Flinders Street merchant firm Kwong Hing Loong,
which comprised of brothers Ju Hop and Ju Bing, along with kinsman Chu Quong. Each man took
turns to visit his family in China for months at a time, while the others looked after the firm.1146
This provided security for the business, knowing it was in safe hands, and continued revenue as the
business was in constant operation.
Fig. 101. Townsville Commercial precinct including “Chinese Quarters”: 1880-19011147
1142 QSA, COL/A435 Ah Ming, Request for Exhumation of remains for his wife Wah Quay and baby Mary Ann. Only three women
had their bones exhumed and sent back to China, including one White wife in Central Queensland.
1143BDM Qld: Birth Register online, 1881, C6292, Mary Ann Ah Ming, daughter of Ah Ming and WahGuie. She and her still- born
baby were later exhumed by her husband and sent back to China.
1144 QSA, COL/A435 AH MING, Request for Exhumation remains for wife Wah Quay and baby.
1145NAA: J3115/21, Quong Chong 1902; QBDM-BR-ONL: 1900, C6227, George Lun son of Wing Lun, and Joce; “Fatal Accident”,
Northern Miner, 10 April 1922, p. 2; NAA J25, 1958/2431, Louie Tim So and wife Ah Sam.Prominent China born women in
Townsville included Choy Lee, wife of Quong Chong (1899),former mui tsai to Mrs. Lee Yan; Chou Young, who was married to Ah
Moon (m. 1899); Chock Lum, wife of Wing Lum (m. China c1899); former Croydon resident Qui Fa, wife of Chun Tie (m. 1896), and
Ah Sam, wife of merchant Tim So (m. China c1920).Quong Chong was age 33 when his first son Sidney William was born in
Townsville in 1901. His wife Lee Choy was 10 years younger than himself and was attended by Mrs. Beaton. At the time they already
had a daughter, Lily Mary. They had been married in Canton, China on 10 February 1899. Quong Chong was a grocer.
1146NAA: BP342/1/9857/299/ 1903, Correspondence: Jue Hop.
1147 Historical Survey Plans: Townsville, Flinders Street West, RP701839, 1918; Townsville, Flinders Street West, T11823. 1873;
Townsville, Flinders Street West, T11853, 1880; Townsville, Flinders Street West, RP707864, 1906; Townsville, Flinders Street,
Chinese owned
or occupied
Women &
Families
308
Fig. 102. Townsville Chinese: An Integrated Community: 1860-1901
Conclusion
The Chinese Family Landscape was represented in every Chinatown and cultural precinct across
north Queensland. Chinese settler men in north Queensland living together in Chinatown and
precincts communities were mistakenly regarded by the broader community as “single” men living
in bachelor communities when in fact, many were married with family obligations. This also
RP701720; Townsville, Flinders Street, T1181, 1865; Townsville, Flinders Street, T11823, 1874; Townsville, Flinders Street,
T11864, 1882; Townsville, Flinders Street, T11853, 1885; Townsville, Flinders Street, RP707864, 1904; Townsville, Flinders Street,
MP17906; Townsville, Flinders Street, Flinders Lane, T11860, 1881; Townsville, Kissing Point, Chinese Gardens, RP701820;
Townsville, Kissing Point, Chinese Gardens, T1186, 1867; Townsville,; Kissing Point, Chinese Gardens, T118104, 1887; Townsville,
Kissing Point, Chinese Gardens, T118112, 1889; Townsville, Monkey Island, Chinese Gardens, T118105, 1881; Townsville, Monkey
Island, Chinese Gardens, K1143, 1865; Townsville, Monkey Island, Chinese Gardens, T118106, 1888; Townsville, Monkey Island,
Chinese Gardens, T118116, 1889; Townsville, Ogden Street, Chinese Precinct, T118133, 1890; Townsville, Ogden Street, Chinese
Precinct, T118212, 1921; Townsville, Ross Island, South Townsville, T118136, 1895; Robb Database: Rates and Valuations:1882-
1940; Townsville Cemetery West End, Cemetery Index 1874- 1997, held at QSA Item 1460222; Cemetery West End, Cemetery
Register 1874- 1972, held at QSA Item 1460220; Townsville Cemetery West End, Cemetery Register 1951-2008 held at QSA Item
1460221; Townsville Cemetery West End, Cemetery Register of Internments 1873- 1998, held at QSA Item 1460219; Queensland
Post Office Directories (QPD):various years 1860-1910 microfiche; Willmetts North Queensland Almanac, Willmetts and Co,
Townsville, microfiche. Various years 1883, 1885, 1888, 1892, 1898. Microfiche; QSA, JUS/N896/29/743 Inquest, AH FAT,
Townsville, 1929, Trove- various item, various years: "What will Sam do with Them?" Queensland Figaro (Brisbane, Qld.: 1883 -
1885) 7 July 1883, page 2.;"Translate this French." Queensland Figaro, 13 October 1883: 5.
309
ignores family migrations which occurred in the form of brothers, cousins and fathers and sons.
The presence of women shaped settlement patterns in ways which may not have otherwise
developed, and strengthened business relations, often influencing the built environment through
the creation of private spaces, family quarters and homes occupied by women and children. The
influence of gender driven “soft economics” from within the family home, through comments,
matchmaking of daughters to older single men or Australian born sons along kinship lines, is little
understood yet it contributed to the creation of new business partnerships and opportunities and is
evidenced in the growth of Chinatowns and renewal of community. By mapping women and
family associated with Chinese settlement across north Queensland’s towns and communities, and
by showing Chinatowns and cultural precincts with their Chinese Family Landscape, it is clear that
a gendered approach is a legitimate mechanism to understand the Chinese Diaspora to Queensland.
310
C h a p t e r 1 0
CONCLUSION
Introduction
The presence of women and families contributed to the successful development, growth, longevity
and renewal process of Chinatowns, precincts, and string communities throughout north
Queensland between 1860 and 1920. By investigating, quantifying and exploring marriage and
relationship arrangements of Chinese settler men, through statistical and spatial analysis, new and
broader understandings of the Chinese Diaspora have emerged. This thesis is underpinned by a
feminist theoretical framework, which positions women and families at the forefront of historical
enquiry and provides a means to further explore how the three key industries, pastoralism, mining
and agriculture, influenced settlement patterns. Information obtained through this research
provides a convincing argument for a more gender-integrated approach to Chinese settlement
history and calls for the meaning of “family” to be reviewed to provide alternative models for
kinships to be investigated. Wives, mothers, friends and lovers of migrant Chinese men formed
the Chinese Family Landscape. They were not only associated with communities across the north,
but their contribution to community development extended beyond local, regional, and colonial
levels to form a broader transnational family landscape with direct links back to the ancestral
village. With the patriarchal family network extending across the seas and growing branches across
north Queensland, it provided the Queensland colonial community an opportunity for growth,
population renewal, and integration into the destination society, well into the 20th century.
This thesis, positioned as it is within a national and international colonial settlement framework,
demonstrates that Chinese family networks contributed substantially to the development and
longevity of Chinatowns and precincts in those colonies. By using Chuenyan Lai’s Chinatown
model, but through the lens of the Confucian family and a gender inclusive viewpoint, this thesis
demonstrates that family and kinship, women and children were integral elements to community
structure, inter community relationships and community renewal. Gendered elements are
demonstrated in all Chinatown and precinct examples as well as the smaller lineal networks called
String communities. In particular, the thesis shows nodal String communities relied on individual
personal and kinship relationships, which were fostered and developed across rural and remote
311
landscapes through connections of marriage, along with commercial and legal relationships, which
supported and strengthened local ties across rural and remote regions as well as back to the village
in China. Most literature on the overseas Chinese is silent on the full reach of the Confucian
family structure, yet it underpinned migration itself.
Transplanted territory: The full reach of the Confucian Family
This thesis affirms established scholarly observations that the paternalistic Confucian family
model, which underpinned family, village and kinship relationships in China, was applied to
emerging Chinese communities in colonies and other countries and underpinned all aspects of
social organisation in an overseas community. Kinship relationships were utilized advantageously
by Chinese settlers across colonial environments including north Queensland, to quickly establish
a network of local, regional and transnational commercial and benevolent relationships, provide
familiar structures to community, and provide the basis by which self-contained TangrenJie or
Chinatowns could be established to quickly meet economic and cultural objectives.
The Chinese family framework underpinned the Chinese Diaspora to north Queensland and is
evidenced by the migration of brothers, fathers and sons, and uncles with nephews. Emerging from
the traditional Chinese family framework was a colonial Chinese Family Landscape across north
Queensland, which demonstrated that the introduction of women to emerging communities
enabled Chinatowns and precincts to be strengthened, maintained and to grow in ways that could
not happen in other comparable host destinations. The presence of women and the politics of the
private sphere enabled “soft economics” to develop as female networks formed. Women’s
participation from the private sphere brought prestige to members of the community, enhanced
commercial relationships and led to strategic marriage arrangements. Most importantly, a
transplanted Chinese family network provided the opportunity for community renewal, via
Queensland born daughters, who were predominantly married off to aging kinship settlers or sons
of other prominent kin or clan families. This practice did not end until well into the 20th century.
The Confucian family framework and the rules of Chinese marriage were maintained, adapted,
modified and even exploited as a strategy to magnify success within a host country and this is
demonstrated in the adaptation of marriage rules to accommodate three new types of family: the
Separated Family, The Two Primary Wife Family and the Interracial Family. The first adaptation
to the Chinese marriage model, which was easily accommodated into the Confucian family, was
312
the practice of an early marriage of men to Chinese women, prior to a sojourn overseas.
Newlywed wives became established as the “Primary Wife” or “First Wife” in the village home, as
a means to secure remittances from the overseas husband and remind him of his filial obligations.
The Separated Family is evidenced by the regular, but intermittent return visit by Chinese settler
men to the family village for a period to visit wives, long enough to produce children, and attend to
filial responsibilities before returning to the host country to resume the role of making money and
sending remittances “home”. This type of marital arrangement maintained the patriarchal balance
and established female power structures, preserving Mother-in-Law as the head of the female
household under which the First wife and her children were positioned. The marriage of young
men prior to an overseas sojourn modified the traditional framework yet maintained the Confucian
family model. This model enabled the traditional female structure within the Confucian family
home to remain in place but led to couples separated for long periods of time, children raised
without fathers, and the family home reliant on an external income source.
Separated Families occurred across the globe and the practice was repeated inter-generationally
when sons were sent overseas upon reaching adulthood, to replace aging fathers who then returned
home to wives whom they barely knew. This type of marriage remained hidden to Western host
communities who remained ignorant of the cultural practice. It led to the incorrect assumption
across north Queensland that the vast majority of Chinese men were “single”. The practice of
establishing Separated Families led to the formation of male only “married bachelor” societies in
host countries and colonies such as the United States and British Columbia.1148 In contrast,
communities in the colony of Queensland, and across north Queensland, while hosting many men
associated with Separated Families, never fully developed into “married bachelor” societies as
some women, wives and prostitutes invariably lived in these communities. Hughenden, located in
north-western Queensland, was the only example known as satisfying the criteria for a “married
bachelor” society in this study.
The second family type, which indicated an adaptation to the Confucian Chinese family and
emerged in response to the Chinese Diaspora, was the “Two Primary Wife” family. This family
type conveniently expanded the Confucian family framework using the already acceptable practice
1148 Until new evidence comes to light, this is thought to be the most prominent community type.
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of polygamy, whereby two Chinese wives were married to the same man, yet were located in two
separate places: one established in the home village household under the usual arrangements, and
the other installed in the host country. The second wife, procured usually by the family, was
provided for overseas sons for companionship, to attend to his conjugal rights under the contract of
marriage, and to keep house for him. With First Wife firmly positioned in the ancestral home,
remittances remained guaranteed under this arrangement. While polygamy, or the taking of a
concubine or series of concubines as Second, Third or Fourth wife, was accommodated within the
Confucian family framework, the ability for consecutive wives, after the First or Primary Wife, to
rise in status within the family structure was, under ordinary circumstances, unachievable due to
established female power structures. However, women chosen and sent as Second Wife to
Queensland, as part of the Chinese Female Diaspora, found themselves advantageously positioned
and able to achieve an elevated family status.
Many migrant Chinese women, through the act of migration, found themselves elevated from the
position of Second Wife /Concubine to “First Wife” status by proxy in the colonial environment.
This proved a direct challenge to the well-established female power structure within the Confucian
household, which in some cases led to female conflict. Second Wives who had migrated to north
Queensland, and former Mui tsai girls who had subsequently married in Queensland, rose in status
in ways which would not have been achievable in China. Their heightened status in the household
and north Queensland community provided a direct threat to the village family structure and First
Wife in China, particularly if she produced many Australian born Chinese who were therefore
British subjects and assets to the transnational family. The “Two Primary Wife” family was
present in north Queensland and mirrored the experiences noted for other destination countries and
colonies including the United States, Hawaii and British Columbia.
The last family type, the Interracial Family, emerged as a direct result of the Chinese Diaspora. It is
both complex in form and diverse in marriage type, and not only used the adaption of the
Confucian family model, the “Two Primary Wife” family, but also expanded the terms of
“appropriate” marriage partner to include non-Chinese women taken both as wives and lovers.
Marriage in host countries by Chinese men to non-Chinese women brought non-Chinese women
into the Confucian Chinese Family for the first time. Not only was this new to all involved, it was
controversial to both cultural communities and exploitative in its convenience and benefit to
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Chinese men, although the gains were not limited to men alone. Marriage between Chinese men
and non-Chinese women included White women, Indigenous women, women deemed as “Local”
mixed race and “Mulatto” women, with the selection of wives determined by Chinese male
circumstance, class, and status in the community. It was also practiced across the globe. Marriage
or the partnering by Chinese men with non-Chinese women depended to some extent on the host
colonies’ local administrative attitude towards mixed marriages. The colonial powers of France,
Spain and Portugal were more tolerant towards Chinese interracial marriage (on the basis that it
was advantageous to their colonial objectives) than those of Great Britain and Germany, who were
more concerned with purity of race. In particular, Britain and Germany saw the offspring of
interracial marriage as a potential “threat” to their racial superiority in both population numbers
and labour objectives.
In every British colony established, the Empire exhibited miscegenaphobia when it came to
Chinese interracial marriage, particularly if it involved Black, “Mulatto” or “Local” women. On
one hand, many colonies enacted laws aimed at keeping the races apart which inhibited Chinese
interracial marriage. This was also the case in Queensland where legislation preventing the
marriage of Aboriginal women to Chinese men was introduced in the 1890s, at a crucial time when
Aboriginal women were already experiencing a severe shortage of suitable totem partners after
decades of frontier conflict. Those who were able to marry Chinese men did so in rural and remote
regions, away from authority’s arbitrary permissions, aided by station owners and managers who
saw the marriage as an advantage to their operational needs, keeping both parties on the station.
To date very little is known about the degree of acceptance for Indigenous, “Local” or “Mulatto”
women within the Confucian family structure or the ancestral family home. The few reports
written about Indigenous women who migrated to the village in China focus on Peruvian or
Hawaiian women, and do shed little light on Australian Aboriginal partners. This is an area which
would benefit from future research to understand Chinese perspectives on interracial relationships
and the changes it brought about to the Confucian family framework.
On the other hand, when it came to interracial marriage between Chinese men and White women
in the colonies of Australia, there was little in the way of obstructionist legislation. Pressure on
White women to desist from interracial relationships with Chinese men came from within the
community itself, with those who did marry becoming the subject of social ostracism, isolation,
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ridicule, and physical and verbal abuse. It is clear from the number of couples which formed
between 1860 and 1920, that White women were not coerced or forced into partnerships with
Chinese men but made strategic decisions to enter relationships for reasons of physical and
financial security, intimacy, and companionship. Some even had the luxury of love.
Legal marriage to White women under the Marriage Act provided several benefits for Chinese
men in addition to intimate relations and a family life. Naturalisation depended on proof of legal
marriage as part of its criteria, and marriage to White women satisfied this requirement. Legal
marriage enabled men to achieve naturalisation, purchase land, accrue assets and elevate status in
the colonial environment. It was a successful strategy employed by families to maximise
opportunities to create wealth as new British subjects. The subsequent birth of Australian born
British subject children provided a ready succession plan in the host colony, which strengthened
opportunities for the ancestral family back in China. Mixed heritage sons and daughters enabled
inter-generational business and kinship relations and investments to grow, and their presence not
only maintained extended transnational family support back to China but secured a future in north
Queensland. Naturalisation and the elevated status it projected enabled a relatively smooth family
transmigration process, assisting with re-entry back into the colony from China, when families
returned from fulfilling filial and educational visits.
Intercultural exchange occurred on both sides with some White women learning Cantonese, and
they went on to advocate for or provide interpreting services for the community in courts, and
travelled to China. However, many also remained ignorant about Chinese cultural marriage
practices and their role in the Confucian family. Although cognisant of their role in a patriarchal
society, whether European or Chinese, many were unprepared for the discovery of a First Wife in
China, or were overwhelmed with sorrow when their husbands took their mixed heritage children
back to China and failed to return, or found themselves without the means of support when
abandoned. Interracial marriage between Chinese men and White women in Australia is complex
and this thesis has been limited in its ability to address the full social implications of this type of
interracial relationship. This study has confined itself to a principally quantitative analysis and a
fuller examination of the topic is yet to be done.
In host countries, the successful adaptation of the Confucian family model influenced kinship
interaction, community formation and social relations. The introduction of Chinese, White and
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Indigenous women as wives and lovers in Chinatowns, precincts and String Communities, went on
to strengthen the emerging male kinship, clan and district networks at trans-local and transnational
level and enabled the formation of a new Chinese Family Landscape across north Queensland.
Limitations and Intentions:
This thesis has been a long process to harvest enough data from both the standard historical and
alternative sources to establish the most credible quantitative database for statistical mapping
purposes. The extent of collection, verification and cross-referencing of large amounts of
information has been an arduous task requiring skill, perseverance and patience. While all care has
been taken to ensure that marriage numbers of Queensland’s Chinese Family Landscape are
correct, it is recognised that this thesis provides only an estimate of statistical data: a
comprehensive, but still flawed snapshot providing figures, which will remain in flux until every
couple has been fully investigated, location verified, and relationship status confirmed. The
database is the most comprehensive set of data available in Queensland, which presents 1095
primary couples over 1847-1920, with 315 in North Queensland alone. It is believed that the
figures provide a reasonable snapshot of settlement patterns and are consistent with the major
growth of industries and other population drivers at the time.
This study has also been limited in its ability to provide comprehensive colonial and global
comparisons between the marriage patterns, which occurred across Queensland, and north
Queensland, the rest of Australia, and other comparable countries and colonies around the world.
Only statistics and information from Victoria and New South Wales can be used as comparisons,
while the same in Western Australia, South Australia and Tasmania remain incomplete, making it
difficult to discern national trends. Both Western Australia and Tasmania with their smaller
Chinese populations have not yet attracted as much academic attention for Chinese Family
relations, and a national approach to the Chinese Family Landscape in the Australian colonies has
yet to be undertaken.
Meaningful, reliable statistical data in the international arena also remains lacking. It is either
targeted towards and dependant on a niche focus group (such as Chinese migrant women),
sporadic, with only brief mentions of White and Indigenous women, or hinted at such as allusions
to White prostitutes in the community. Data from overseas Chinese migrant settlements used in the
thesis is limited to the current figures mentioned in academic sources and representative only. The
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incompleteness of these figures is acknowledged as a limitation to the thesis and will be subject to
change should future researchers focus more widely on female participation in Chinatowns and
precincts rather than on limited groups.1149 Figures outlining the Chinese Family Landscape in
international communities remain unreliable, as only migrant Chinese women have attracted
attention as a research subject. To date, no comprehensive study has been undertaken to quantify
the extent of White women’s marriages, casual intimate relationships, or other interactions with
Chinese men, and any data available remains highly subjective.
In contrast, interracial marriage between Chinese men and Indigenous women is far more
advanced in areas of the U.S.-Mexican borderland regions, South America, and former British
West Indies than in the greater U.S.A. or former British Columbia, or Australia. In Australia, there
is a deficit of information and understanding of relationships with Aboriginal and Torres Strait
Islanders in the colonies, especially in north Queensland and no extended reflection about Chinese
activities compounding Aboriginal dispossession.1150 A gendered approach to family relations and
community formation remains missing. The deficit of Indigenous voices in the settlement
narrative is acknowledged by academics across Australia, the U.S. and Canada as an issue which
should be addressed.1151 Across the Pacific, in the U.S. and Canada, Hu De Hart and Yu have
appealed for a greater focus on Indigenous interracial relationships as a means to understand
family formation, cultural exchange and the integrative interracial family within blended host
communities. Both believe that the understanding, acknowledgement and dissemination of stories
associated with these untold histories is essential to address ongoing issues of racism and
discrimination. Interracial marriage remains an emerging area of study, which should attract
Western academic researcher attention to break the silence concerning Chinese-Indigenous
marriage relations and to integrate hidden stories into established historical narratives.
Research Questions and Key findings:
Chinese communities emerged in north Queensland from 1861, in response to one or more of three
major settlement drivers: pastoralism, mining or agriculture. While pastoralism attracted a small
but stable community of men, usually scattered throughout the north-west of north Queensland in
1149 For example Chinese female migration, with its emphasis on legislation, prostitution, exploitation, quantity and interaction with
Christian women, has remained the focus of investigation across the US.
1150 Other disciplines including Anthropology are advanced in this area through the genealogical research of Trigger, Snukal and
Ramsay. Historians tend to focus on race relations such as historians Gantor and Reynolds, but not disposession.
1151 Anthropologists Trigger and Martin, and historian Maclean, are attempting to address this inequity with their focus on Burketown
in the Gulf of Carpentaria, while Martinez has written extensively about Chinese/ Aboriginal interracial relations in the Darwin region.
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rural and remote areas, it was the more lucrative mining and agriculture industries which attracted
the largest populations of Overseas Chinese. These industries gave rise to the formation the largest
and longest running Chinese community outside Brisbane: Cairns Chinatown. The greater degree
of urbanisation in these two industries, along with the ports established to service them, provided
opportunities for goods and service industries readily available to Chinese, such as shop keeping
and market gardening.
Commencing with recruitment into pastoral expansion, Chinese settlement moved north from the
Darling Downs, following pastoral capitalists who wanted to take advantage of the emerging
northern frontier. From 1861 onwards, settlement of the Kennedy and Cook districts was rapid,
and accelerated with the discovery of gold at Cape River. Chinese settlers not engaged in mining
activities set a precedent by setting up provisioning stores, butchers, bakeries and market gardens.
The Palmer gold rush saw the arrival of an estimated 18,000 Chinese migrant men, signalling the
first single-purpose large-scale Chinese Diaspora experience in Queensland.
As the Palmer goldfield waned and new regions opened up for economic exploitation between
Cooktown and Townsville, the rich fertile lands of the east coast were recognised by agriculturally
experienced Chinese men. They quickly went on to establish the sugar industry in Cairns, the
banana industry in Port Douglas and Geraldton/ Innisfail, and the maize industry on the Atherton
Tablelands, setting up north Queensland’s extended Chinese agricultural communities. Much of
their success lay in their ability to attract a ready labour force through organised kinship migration
direct from the village and the application of guanxi: the reciprocal order of kinship and friendship
obligation. All three industries, pastoralism, mining and agriculture, enabled north Queensland as a
host destination to attract a steady stream of overseas migration. However, despite the popular
belief across Queensland that mining attracted the most migration by Chinese men, this thesis has
found instead that it was agriculture which provided the most stable industry and therefore most
employment to Chinese men between 1860 and 1920. Agriculture, both large and small scale, also
endured the longest. While mining booms came and went, agriculture was more stable, enduring
until the mid-20th century. Agriculture and agriculture-related activities were also the main
industry over the study period for family formation and creation of a Chinese Family Landscape.
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Settlement patterns and community formation:
Across north Queensland, “Chinatowns”, precincts, and small nodal communities developed, as
Chinese migrants sought to transfer and recreate familiar community structures in a foreign and
often hostile environment. A “Chinatown” provided a means to establish cultural, social and
political organisation, and maintain a semblance of familiarity, at a time when uncertainty was
normal. North Queensland’s construction of “Chinatowns” provided a “pseudo village”
environment as a means to manage local affairs along Chinese cultural lines. “Chinatowns”
enabled benevolent societies, political organisations, community hospitals, meeting halls and
temples, to be established without close White scrutiny and were organised along district
affiliations to collectively manage Chinese business. The construction of “Chinatowns” provided a
successful strategy for Overseas Chinese to use a collective force to achieve desired outcomes,
with this strategy applied across the globe as a method to provide support and infrastructure to
large populations of migrant men.
This thesis explores the theory behind the construction “Chinatown”. On one hand “Chinatown”
can be described as a transnational extension of the Chinese village: a transplanted territory which
is noted for its replication of social, cultural and political infrastructure which enabled selfcontained
communities within the wider community to develop. On the other hand, “Chinatown”
has been constructed within the imaginative space of the broader White population: a label used to
describe a particular migrant group and the space they occupied. “Chinatown” provided a physical
metaphor, which positioned its population as “the Other” which was controlled and confined away
from the “respectable” White urban community, one also in the White imagination, and always
relegated to the fringes of town. All of the theories incorporated in this thesis have assisted in the
understanding of Chinese community formation, and the consequent physical landscapes which
developed across Queensland and north Queensland. They have provided excellent tools to
contrast with other host destination colonies across Australia, including New South Wales and
Victoria, as well as providing a global contrast with British Columbia and the United States. They
have contributed to the following key findings.
Across north Queensland between 1860 and 1920, at least 18 “Chinatowns” developed in towns
associated with mining, agriculture and ports. These communities displayed many or all of the
identified elements associated with Chinatown formation, with Cairns Chinatown emerging as the
largest and most complete Chinatown outside Brisbane. The principal indicators of a Chinatown
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community, the temple and hospital, were present in north Queensland with temples found in 26
locations across the north and a further 8 temples located elsewhere in the colony. When compared
to the colonies of New South Wales and Victoria, Queensland has fewer temples discovered to
date than the more populated colonies. Within Queensland, the majority of temples were found in
north Queensland. Rather than focus on the built environment as a measure of definition, and to
provide a broader international context, the Chinese Family Landscape in North Queensland has
been placed in an international context by utilising Canadian scholar David Chuenyan Lai’s four
morphological stages framework for “Chinatowns” to be explored.
By using Lai’s theory, which divides Chinatown development into a budding stage; a blooming, or
booming stage; a withering stage; and finally, either a dying or reviving stage, it has been found
that no north Queensland Chinatown has fully succeeded in transposing over all stages to continue
into the 21st century. In fact, no original Chinatown has survived across Queensland, unlike the
British Columbian experience outlined by Lai. He notes that the BC community remained as a
“bachelor society”, whereas women and families have always been present in Queensland’s
colonial “Chinatown” communities from their inception. From the 1880s onwards, north
Queensland’s Chinese communities mirrored the experience set out by Lai as one of a blooming
stage. As they developed, they continued in a booming stage only to enter a withering stage as
hostile legislation was imposed and local conditions became less favourable. Most north
Queensland large Chinatowns including Mackay, Halifax, Atherton, Cairns and Innisfail entered a
decline or dying stage, offering limited assistance to residents as aging members of the community
began to die, or returned to China. While the structural elements of the community suffered
extreme and uniform decline by the 1930s, the family structures, strengthened through marriages
across the region, remained intact.
Unlike the situation in British Columbia, none of the Chinatowns across north Queensland
managed to survive, revive or be reinvented to enjoy an extended and renewed lifespan as a
Chinese self-contained community. However, this thesis has unexpectedly identified another
occasion where the term “Chinatown” has been used to describe a non-Chinese population, which
may be useful for situations where First Nation or Indigenous cultures are being investigated.
“Chinatown” was used as an identifier by a family group living in a created non-Chinese
environment at a Government administered Aboriginal settlement in Central Queensland. The
word itself took on a new meaning as a third party, in order to maintain Aboriginal identity,
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appropriated it. By taking the term “Chinatown” as a unique identifier for Aboriginal self-identity
in a community where identity was constantly under threat, new meanings of the term have
emerged. On the other hand, precincts or smaller communities, which often occurred in rural and
remote areas and included interracial marriage with Aboriginal women, formed another type of
community, which has been explored in the context of this thesis.
Precincts, consisting individuals, small groups, or small syndicates of men, emerged across north
Queensland, particularly in rural and remote areas. Precincts were associated with pastoral districts
and in places where the Chinese population was too small or unable to support the construction of
a “Chinatown”. Precincts were usually confined to a couple of shops, a small section of street, or a
market garden area. The idea of precincts builds on American scholar Huping Ling’s call to reconceptualize
the terms for the Chinese communities in order to understand the range of Chinese
settlement experiences. The term “precinct” provides an alternative framework to understand the
diversity of community types, which formed outside “Chinatowns” as well as an additional
mechanism to examine the extent of marriage and family formation in an alternative community
setting.
As part of this thesis, 17 such precincts across north Queensland were examined as representative
examples of a type of community associated with Chinese settlement patterns, with market
gardening and small business precincts in particular explored. Precincts ranged from small clusters
of 2-3 shops such as in Richmond and Winton, to large garden areas such as Cloncurry and
Camooweal, and were located in both urban and rural areas. Market Garden precincts were
associated with pastoralism, mining, and port towns. While the study of precincts enables smaller
community types to be explored, particularly as they developed much closer relationships with the
broader community in towns and settlements through the supply of fresh produce, it became clear
as the thesis progressed that something else was also occurring at a micro level which led to a new
theory being formed.
It emerged as an inappropriate descriptor to continue to refer to the smaller extended community
relationships across great distances as individual precincts, as the terminology did not fit with the
linkages which were present through marriage and business relationships. Instead a new term was
needed to articulate the community of connected individuals which at first glance seemed to
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connect in seemingly unrelated circumstances but which emerged as a new type of community:
The String Community.
The String Community provides a lineal model in which individual people with interconnected
relationships with each other, either commercial, through marriage or legal connections, develop as
nodes in a community located over great distances between towns and settlements. String
Communities may be what is described as “Borderland communities” in Mexico/America or the
kinship and marriage relationships across Diaspora countries in South East Asia where the forces
of guanxi are applied. String communities existed in north Queensland and formed in response to
chain migration settlement of family members such as fathers and sons, sets of brothers, or uncles
and nephews, separated by long distances. Linkages between rural and remote settlers, who at first
glance appear to be unrelated, can be better understood by exploring their relationships through
this model. By scrutinising individual Chinese community types through a lineal String
Community model, kinship, family, or marriage relationships may become clearer. The String
Community model provides a useful means to analyse the Chinese Family Landscape as it emerges
in individual Chinese settlement experiences and is best articulated by the migration and marriage
patterns by the Leong family from Caobian village in Liang Du, Chungshan (Zhongshan)
province.
Gendered Analysis:
Statistical information in both official and unofficial data sources reveal that there were over one
thousand primary families and couples identified across the colony of Queensland, over a seventyyear
period. While the location of one third of host families has yet to be established, it is evident
that nearly half of all known families lived in north Queensland from Mackay up to the Torres
Strait Islands and out to the Northern Territory border, and as far south as Boulia and Winton in the
central west. This makes north Queensland the most significant settlement region for the whole
colony, followed in importance by Brisbane, and then Southern Region and Central Region. These
figures correspond to key historical settlement patterns, with the Northern Region host to the
industry’s most favourable to Chinese immigrants: alluvial mining, tropical agriculture, and to a
lesser extent, pastoralism. Types of intimate relations formed were broad and varied in age,
ethnicity and circumstance. They included women who were legally married to Chinese men,
women living with a Chinese man in a de-facto relationship, women who had casual relationships
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resulting in the birth of a child, and women in intimate relationships with Chinese men such as
companionship, or illegal intimate relations such as use of prostitutes.
North Queensland, when compared to other Australian colonies, had very similar marriage types
and broadly speaking, reflected similar historical patterns of settlement including pastoralism and
mining. Very similar marriage figures emerged for all the colonies of Victoria, New South Wales
and Queensland. Western Australia, South Australia and Tasmania, on the other hand, while
having prominent mining and pastoral industries, did not attract the same population of Chinese
men nor develop the same Chinese Family Landscape. With further research it is expected that the
Northern Territory, in particular the community of Port Darwin and the Pine Creek region, will
reveal marriage patterns comparable to Queensland which will elevate the importance of northern
Australia as a destination for Overseas Chinese. As no global study has been undertaken to explore
the Chinese Family Landscape in other host destination places, such as the Unites States, British
Columbia, South America or the former British West Indies region, a statistical analysis of primary
families is recommended in order to make any comment on their comparability to Queensland and
other colonies of Australia.
North Queensland’s Chinese Family Landscape quickly developed alongside the expansion of
settlement as an ethnically diverse community, which can be categorised into three key types of
families: Chinese /Chinese families; Chinese / White families; and Chinese/Indigenous families.
While these family types were not unique to Queensland or north Queensland, they present some
localised similarities and variances when compared with other countries and colonies including
Victoria and New South Wales. The similarities between the eastern colonies included family
types of Chinese/ Chinese and Chinese/ White interrelationships with the main difference being a
greater incidence of Chinese / Aboriginal relationships in the north. Queensland’s Chinese
/Indigenous relationships reflected northern Australian settlement patterns in colonies such as
Western Australia (Broome), and the Northern Territory (Darwin/ Pine Creek).
In this study, Queensland has emerged as a key Australian colony to attract Chinese migrant
women, and integrate White women and Aboriginal women, to make up the Chinese Family
Landscape, with the first two groups of women forming the most usual type of wife. Queensland’s
close proximity to Hong Kong provided an opportunity for many Chinese men, to engage in a
different experience to their United States or British Columbia counterparts. There was no need to
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exploit Chinese women as migrant prostitutes or purchased wives, as physical access to China was
easy due to proximity and established transport routes. In addition, White women were willing and
legally able to marry.
Major findings are that interracial Chinese/ White couples made up the largest proportion of
marriages across Queensland in the period1860-1920, making up over three quarters of all
marriages and relationships for the whole of the colony. Of those, well over half were located in
north Queensland, reinforcing the importance of the north in the colony. The thesis also confirms
that it was literate migrant English women who were the most usual group of women marrying and
partnering with Chinese men, rather than illiterate Irish girls, who remain the popular stereotype in
both the colony of Victoria and on the Californian goldfields. However, not all White women
involved with Chinese men were migrant English girls, with a number of women also colonial
born or from European countries such as Germany, Denmark and Poland. This suggests that
women were making individual choices of marriage based on the quality of the man, regardless of
race. It confirms key findings by both Bagnall and Rule, that interracial marriage and intimate
relations between Chinese men and White women, in mid to late 19th century colonial Australia,
were more prevalent than previously thought. This challenges researchers to revisit family
formation, places and settlement landscapes within the colonial context to investigate marriages
and unions, which were atypical in the dominant narrative of European settlement.
This thesis confirms, as previously discussed, that interracial marriage between Chinese men and
White women may have been favoured as a strategic means to further Chinese family interests in
the colonial Australian environment. The high proportion of interracial marriages suggests that the
investigation of new aspects of colonial family formation, through gender and cultural
considerations, sheds new light on Chinese male attitudes and experiences in the colonies. The
high incidence of marriage and partnering with White women suggests that new interpretations of
what it means to have and form “family” within the Chinese Diaspora can emerge.
Arising out of all of this, is the discovery that the colonies of Australia and particularly Queensland
are unique in their position as having the highest percentage of interracial Chinese /White
marriages associated with the Chinese Diaspora. In contrast, the United States and British
Columbia have recorded very few Chinese/White interracial relationships and marriages.
However, I would like to point out that this position could be challenged by further research. I
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suspect targeted research into the Chinese Family Landscape and Chinese communities in North
America and British Columbia will reveal a different picture. Until then, Australia’s position as the
leader in interracial Chinese/ White interracial marriage in the 19th century, particularly in
Queensland and north Queensland, is an exciting new revelation associated with the Chinese
Diaspora.
The next largest group of women married to Chinese men were migrant Chinese women. Young
Chinese women, sent over as Second Wives or as mui tsai, made up just over a quarter of the
wives in the Chinese Family Landscape in north Queensland. Despite north Queensland attracting
a relatively large Chinese female population in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the overall
number, when compared to other Australian colonies, was the third largest Chinese female
population behind Victoria and New South Wales. After all three east coast colonies came the
Northern Territory of South Australia, including Port Darwin and the mining district of Pine Creek,
although they remained substantially lower in Chinese female migration for wives, behind the
national colonial average. North Queensland’s Chinese migrant women have been identified in the
majority as migrating from the small region of Chungshan, predominantly Long Du and Liang Du
districts. This is evidenced by the continuation of traditional marriage patterns along county lines
across north Queensland for first and second-generation Australian born daughters for these areas,
which reflected the village clusters that many agricultural men migrated from. However, the north
also had men from Sze Yup, Sam Yup and Hakka speaking regions as well, with connections to
Sydney, New South Wales and Melbourne, Victoria.
Young women sent to north Queensland as wives were married upon arrival to betrothed merchant
class men. Mui tsai also normally ended up as wives to merchants, taking a little longer to marry.
With an average age of 16 years, Chinese women were often married to much older men. Migrant
Chinese women were sent by a village family, due to the requirement for First Wife to remain in
the village and attend to the man’s parents and his children. It was Second Wife’s duty in colonial
Queensland to attend to her husband’s conjugal needs, and assist him where possible (particularly
through the birth of children), to build wealth in the host environment. Migrant Chinese women
formed part of the evolving “two primary wife” family, and were elevated in status to First Wife
because of migration. As a result, they often enjoyed improved domestic conditions through
enhanced personal autonomy in their “own” family home. Former bonded servants, mui tsai, were
also able to elevate their status in north Queensland upon marriage to settler Chinese men. Some
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Second Wives refused to return to China, and challenged the traditional marriage laws upon the
death of a husband.
Chinese female migration to the Australian colonies in the late 19th and early 20thcenturies, was
consistent with the general global female Diaspora, which occurred at the time - but only in the
sense that women migrated in response to Chinese male migration. Chinese women were, willingly
and unwillingly sent across the globe to settle in places such as the West Coast of the Americas,
British Columbia, Pacific islands such as Hawaii, Fiji and New Zealand, and the colonies of
Australia. However, not all destination places received migrant Chinese women, with the British
West Indies, Britain, Europe and South Africa failing to attract Chinese female migration in
significant numbers. Australia emerges as one of the top four preferred Western colonial
destination countries: USA, Hawaii, Australia and Canada. Circumstances underpinning Chinese
female migration varied significantly between the countries. The colonies of Australia including
Queensland received Chinese female migrants as wives and mui tsai girls, as an extension to the
traditional family framework, utilising wives as a vehicle to contribute to strong transnational
connections between north Queensland and the ancestral village home. By contrast, women who
migrated to the United States were often those who had been kidnapped, cajoled or purchased
before migration to service the Chinese male population as prostitutes or purchased wives.
Queensland’s Chinese Female Diaspora was established solidly as a legitimate marriage solution to
further the village family and settlement objectives, rather than to produce a commodity with little
transnational social value.
The third group of women associated with north Queensland’s Chinese men were Indigenous and
other non-European women. This group of families accounted for only 3% of the whole Chinese
Family Landscape population, rising only slightly to less than a tenth of the overall population
including Chinese and White family configurations for the whole period under study. To date,
most of these marriage patterns have been found occurring in rural and remote areas where a more
relaxed attitude to interracial marriage prevailed. Only a few Torres Strait Islanders were found to
have partnered with or married Chinese men, and only a couple of South Sea Islander women and
one or two Japanese women. Due to marriage figures for the last three groups being so low, they
can be considered exceptions to the rule rather than the norm.
327
By the time Aboriginal women were willingly, purposefully and legally forming relationships with
Chinese men they had been faced with severe disruption to Law, culture, initiation opportunities
and transmission of traditional knowledge. They collectively faced reduced numbers of appropriate
skin and totem partners within their own communities, and became severed from traditional Law
through the loss of female knowledge after years of White “dispersal” actions, kidnappings and
official removals. The effects of north Queensland’s relentless frontier wars on Aboriginal women
and marriage Law combined with the fractured nature of Aboriginal culture itself has not to date
been investigated when it comes to understanding Aboriginal women’s response to it. This thesis
has attempted to introduce a new approach to understanding Aboriginal women’s perspectives
when forming partnerships with non-Aboriginal men such as Chinese men, and to understand the
events which potentially shaped female decision making. While Asian/ Aboriginal sexual
interactions had already been established over hundreds of years prior to White settlement, through
seasonal interactions with visiting Macassan, Timor Leste and Chinese beche-de-mer and
sandalwood collectors across the greater archipelago region, this fact alone does not explain the
partnering of Chinese /Aboriginal couples in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Chinese/ Aboriginal relationships have not been fully explored in this thesis due to the size and
scale of the investigation required. However, from the statistical sample which emerged while
using the same methodology as for White and Chinese women, it is clear that Chinese men were
most likely to partner with Aboriginal women in the far Western Gulf districts on stations and
communities on the fringes of towns, in remote and isolated areas. The low incidence of partnering
with a Chinese man and the location of couples is consistent with investigations in New South
Wales, with broader similarities discerned for First Nations women in British Columbia.
Investigation of which Aboriginal women were able to partner with Chinese men in the 19th
century should consider why these relationships were able to occur despite traditional Law and
structures associated with Aboriginal or Indigenous cultures regarding Marriage customs. This is
an area which would benefit from further investigation using a range of alternative quantitative and
qualitative sources. It is expected that the statistics presented in this thesis will change as new
information comes to light and it is hoped that a researcher will take up the challenge.
Chinese Family Landscape:
Across north Queensland, all three groups of women, White, Chinese and Indigenous women,
experienced marriage, intimate relations and settlement differently to each other based on cultural
328
background, acceptance by community, and settlement area. White women were associated with
all three major industries, pastoralism, mining and agriculture. They were associated very early
with Chinese men by partnering with indentured labourers brought over as early as 1848 to work
the emerging pastoral districts of the Darling Downs and Wide Bay-Burnett districts. As settlement
extended northward after 1860, couples moved north to the new districts of Kennedy and Cook
including the port towns of Bowen, Cardwell, Townsville and Normanton. When gold was
discovered, Chinese/White families moved to goldfields and interracial marriages became more
frequent across the north as newly arrived women from Britain and Europe disembarked in
Townsville, Cooktown or Cairns. White women settled wherever their husbands conducted
business. They partnered with men engaged in a broad range of occupations across all three
industry areas, and were present in all pastoral districts, gold mining fields and agricultural
communities. White women mirrored to a great extent the general pattern of the broader Chinese
settlement experience and remained the largest family group represented in the Chinese Family
Landscape.
Chinese women emerged as the second largest group of wives and were largely associated with
port towns, and agricultural communities. Unlike White wives whose husbands were engaged in a
range of occupations, Chinese women were married to merchant men or important shopkeepers,
and they were brought over to provide for his conjugal rights as a husband and to confer elevated
status as a trophy wife for him in the community. This position was not available to White wives.
Although present in Queensland from as early as 1870s onwards, it was not until the mid-1890s
that the greatest number of Chinese wives arrived. Unlike Chinese men who migrated in response
to indentured labour, then gold rushes and finally regular work in agriculture, Chinese women
were seldom associated with settlement patterns other than established agricultural economies or
port towns which provided goods and services to a broader region. The settlement experience of
Chinese women is different to White women because Chinese wives for most part arrived to
established Chinese communities, whereas White wives were for most part at the frontier of
settlement. There were a few exceptions to this rule, but generally it appears families were
reluctant to send young Chinese wives over to their husbands to uncertain frontier conditions while
men themselves may not have been in a financial or established position to attract a wife. As a
result patterns of settlement associated with Chinese female migration differ from their husbands’
experiences.
329
The pattern of settlement associated with Aboriginal-Chinese families, whether the women were
married or in intimate relations with Chinese men, was limited for most part to pastoral districts
located west and north-west in the Gulf country near the Northern Territory border. Aboriginal
women married to men who worked on stations as gardeners and/or cooks, or were engaged in
small shop keeping practices in the small pastoral towns, were unable to improve in social status
unlike their Chinese or White counterparts. Aboriginal wives were attached to lower working-class
men who did not belong to the merchant, wealthy storekeeper or land-owning class. However, for
cultural reasons the couples were able to remain on or close to the wife’s “Country” for all of their
married lives and this was an advantage for Aboriginal women. The pattern of occurrence for these
families is interlinked with her cultural background, unlike White women or Chinese migrant
women, though if a woman engaged in an unsanctioned /illegal relationship with a Chinese man
(as many did), she ran the risk of removal by authorities to a mission away from her spiritual and
cultural landscape.
North Queensland’s Chinese Family Landscape followed the settlement patterns set down by the
broader Chinese male migration experience, which was largely determined by economics.
However, while White women were associated with all three industries, pastoralism, mining and
agriculture, Chinese women were associated with agriculture and only a few with mining, and
Aboriginal wives nearly exclusively with the pastoral districts. The majority of families were
located on the east coast in port towns or agricultural communities, while only a few women were
associated with remote districts. This suggests that by looking at a gendered approach to settlement
patterns, new interpretations may emerge when women and families are included in the broader
Chinese migrant narrative.
The thriving Chinese Family Landscape across north Queensland has highlighted the northern
district of the colony as a key destination. This revelation contributes meaningfully to the national
and international narrative by highlighting the influence “family” had on community, and
community longevity, for Overseas Chinese. This thesis has demonstrated that women and
families were linked to all “Chinatown” communities as well as precincts and string communities,
with only one gardening settlement, Hughenden, forming as a purely “married bachelor” society.
A gendered approach to the Chinese Diaspora has found that there are few differences in the
influences of key settlement industries between men and women as to why they were present in
certain towns and places. The only exception which can be allowed to this statement remains the
330
great influx of Chinese men associated with the Palmer goldfield, but even then, the Chinese
Family Landscape was present and contributing to renewal. Through the use of raw statistics in
combination with a spatial approach, i.e. mapping places, to research and analyse the Chinese
Family Landscape, women were found to be present in the early stages of community
development, and continued to remain present until self-contained communities could no longer be
sustained.
Between 1860 and 1920, the Chinese Family Landscape involving primary Chinese settler
marriages and unions across north Queensland outperformed the family landscapes of Southern,
Central and Brisbane Regions in terms of numbers and longevity. The Chinese Family Landscape
across north Queensland was both thriving and varied, with couples reflecting the influence of the
environment and economic landscape, which influenced type of family formation. In Queensland,
women and families had limited influence on the physical development of Chinatowns and
precincts, yet their presence was able to contribute through a subtler means, which is under-played
as a significant factor impacting on community longevity. The influence of the private sphere
through the female presence “normalised” the community for men, and contributed to the
psychological transplantation of the village setting. Women in the community were able to apply
their influence through “soft economics” which played out in the family quarters and female
networks, which developed in “Chinatowns” and precincts. Application of “soft economics”
impacted on kinship and commercial relationships within the community and extended back to
relationships in the village in China.
Most of all, women provided the means for community renewal because they literally gave birth to
community longevity by providing a renewal process from within the Chinese community. The
birth and subsequent marriage of daughters enabled north Queensland Chinese communities to
sustain themselves well into the 20th century and beyond. This aspect of the Chinese Family
Landscape remains evident today in the large numbers of descendants of Chinese settler families
across north Queensland.
Areas for future research:
In the course of researching and writing this thesis, a number of areas have emerged which warrant
future investigation specific to Queensland. These four areas are little explored, have the potential
to reveal new insights, and in some cases align with other disciplines, which will expand
331
interpretations of the Chinese Diaspora. These five areas consist of one general area for
exploration, but one which looks as a broader impact on Diaspora narratives, and four others which
are gender specific. The first area for recommended research relates to the bigger impact of race
relations surrounding dispossession of Aboriginal lands through Chinese based activities. Other
key areas which specifically relate to this topic include: a gendered approach to filial and
spiritual observance; cultural pluralism and Family Law rights; criminological outcomes within
the Chinese Diaspora; and child settler studies. The last area of enquiry which has transcultural
implications is the mapping of key individuals and families who settled in Queensland back to the
village in China to establish the definite pattern of settlement from Guangdong regional
perspective and to integrate women’s experiences within a holistic transnational approach to
family formation and maintenance. This last point requires the cooperation of Overseas Chinese
Bureau and key local and retired historians in a collaborative approach to capture as much
information from within the village remnants, before the last of the qiaoxiang generation left in the
village are no longer are alive.1152
The first area of enquiry remains a much larger question to be investigated and one which may be
controversial to some. With the 19th and early 20th century Chinese population being the largest
migrant population outside the White population to settle in colonial Queensland, the narrative of
dispossession of Aboriginal lands through Chinese based activities has not been explored in the
broader context of thinking about colonising. This thesis, through its investigation of major
settlement drivers such as mining, pastoralism, agriculture and port commercial based activities,
has discovered that Chinese men were part of broader colonial activities, which threatened
Aboriginal people, led to reprisals, and excluded Aboriginal people from their Country, and this in
itself has never been expressed or identified as an area for acknowledgement or scholarly focus.
Chinese settlement in colonial Queensland in the 19th century occurred at the time when the
Frontier Wars began from 1851 onwards and led to the dispossession from land and killing of
Aborigines across the colony. Some of the most violent massacres occurred in north Queensland,
and while there is little evidence to suggest that men of the Chinese Diaspora was associated with
these activities, the migrant Chinese community cannot be exempted, having profited directly by
the dispossession and removal of Aborigines so they could undertake mining and agricultural
based activities on former Aboriginal land. This is an area for future scholarly enquiry.
1152 Pers. Comm. Mrs Chen, former Head of Overseas Chinese Bureau, Zhongshan Province, China, Zhongshan, 4
December 2018. & Pers. Comm. Anthony Leong, Caobian village, China, 3 December 2018.
332
The second key area of enquiry, a “gendered approach to filial and spiritual observance”, has
three components for future enquiry. It arose after investigation into the construction, use and
purpose of Chinese temples across north Queensland found that studies into this area focused on
male uses only. This aspect of the Chinese Diaspora attracts much scholarly attention, and
information is publicly available and reflected in this thesis regarding temples and temple use in
the Queensland community. However, the more they were investigated, and the more I questioned
leading scholars, it became clear that Queensland and Australian temples were being researched
with a singularly male bias centering on construction itself, names of donors (predominantly male),
and male activities associated with the meeting hall. Very little information is available regarding
how, and how often, Chinese and non-Chinese women used the temple space, how engaged they
were with community decisions being reached in that space, and what physical attributes supported
their participation. Concurrent to understanding the temple, it was evident that there was a
scholarly deficit in understanding the incidence and usage of the family altar in the private quarters
of the shop/home as a means for filial observance by the migrant settler and more specifically, the
migrant female settler.
The third aspect of a “gendered approach to filial and spiritual observance” is the need for
investigation into the community purpose of temples across north Queensland as a means to
manage filial obligations concerning exhumation practices. In particular, I recommend that any
enquiry be undertaken as a gender-integrated approach to reveal different approaches to
exhumation, understand female (and child) exhumation back to China, and explore new areas such
as exhumation of White wives.
The third area of enquiry, “cultural pluralism and Family Law rights”, emerged as an area for
future investigation when researching the “two primary wife family”. The death of a settler
husband opened for some families a “can of worms” as transnational families (either Chinese-
Chinese or Chinese- White) attempted to negotiate probate and division of property in a dual
nationality family legal system governed by British Law rather than Chinese Common Law. This
area of research will reveal the extent by which the Confucian family model was challenged by
overseas settlement, as Chinese settler women in Queensland argued for their share in the
distribution of family assets, having been raised from Second Wife, or concubine, to the equivalent
of First Wife status. It will also reveal the extent by which the transnational Chinese family
333
circumvented legal systems by themselves, to arrive at an agreed resolution. The second aspect of
this area of enquiry should take in the legal position of White wives and Indigenous wives and
provisions made for them by their Chinese husbands in the event of their deaths. By casting a legal
eye over this little-known area, new interpretations of family interactions will emerge.
The fourth area of enquiry which remained outside the scope of this thesis, but which emerged as a
strong potential area for social history research, is the investigation into “criminological outcomes
within the Chinese Diaspora”. It became clear in my research that a number of women, across all
three racial groups, experienced periods of loneliness, verbal and physical violence from the
community, domestic violence within the family home, abandonment by the husband, or as the
ultimate exit from a bad situation, suicide. Investigation into this dark history will balance the view
that Chinese men were considered kind, benevolent husbands and provide a more clear-eyed view
of life for women in the 19th and 20th centuries within the Chinese family landscape.
In addition to delving into the darker corners of Chinese settler marriage history, investigation into
poverty, legal persecution, and institutionalisation of White and Indigenous women associated with
Chinese men, will reveal how these outcomes impacted negatively on their lives. Women with
few social or financial opportunities and resources resorted to prostitution, were rendered destitute,
or ended up in gaol and benevolent asylums. In addition, investigation into the extended impact of
these outcomes will reveal that both White and Indigenous mixed heritage children were forcibly
removed, sent to government or mission institutions, experienced social dysfunction, entered
ongoing engagement with the law and officialdom, and experienced a life of dislocation from
communities.
The fifth and final area of enquiry, “child settler studies”, has two components for future
investigation: investigation into Chinese migrant “minors”, and child adoption experiences and
consequent exploitation of “minors”. The first component is anticipated to be a topic as large as
this thesis itself. During the course of research, it has emerged that a number of men arrived as
children or “minors” to the colony of Queensland. As “child settlers” or children under 14 years of
age, boys accompanied older male kinsmen or village family members, while girls arrived as mui
tsai with families and mistresses. Very little research had been undertaken regarding Chinese child
migration or child settlement experiences and it is suggested that “child settler studies” will be a
new frontier for scholarly research. Like gendered approaches to history, the investigation of child
334
settlers will reveal unknown aspects of transnational family migration associated with the Chinese
Diaspora.
Research for this thesis also revealed that there were a number of incidences where Chinese men
and couples “adopted” White or mixed heritage children who did not have any blood relationship
to themselves. They attempted to raise these children as their own and in some instances took them
back to China. Again, this is a very little understood area of Chinese Diaspora and Queensland
colonial history which would benefit from future investigation.
The second and less obvious component of “child settler studies” explores a darker side to child
history through the investigation of child exploitation within Chinese colonial settlement and the
Chinese Diaspora. For some child migrants, assumed to be mostly girls, migration to the colony
commenced years before in their lives when they were sold by poor parents to more affluent
families in a financial arrangement known as bonded servitude or mui tsai. Research in north
Queensland hinted at the maintenance of this tradition within the colony but the extent of it across
Australia, or its extension back to the village in China, remains unknown. Others were promised as
san po tsai or child brides to men much older and the incidence of this tradition in the colony also
remains unexplored, though strategic marriage to minors was observed.
One aspect, which raised the most questions concerns the incidence of White adult women
procuring female “minors” for the purpose of marriage to older Chinese men. This behaviour
suggests that some White women were exploitative of their own sex, for unknown gains. While
not a common aspect of “child setter studies”, behaviour by White women as “agents” for Chinese
men was also observed in American newspapers which suggest that this type of predatory
behaviour was not limited to the colony of Queensland. Furthermore, as noted by Bagnall for New
South Wales, marriages being sanctioned by White parents between their underage White
daughters and older Chinese men, suggests that the economics of marriage was important where
poverty was involved. Both of these examples indicate that female minors in some environments
were at risk of exploitation and that further investigation is warranted.
Conclusion:
This thesis is not a social history of women in the Chinese community, nor a social history of the
Chinese community itself. Instead it has sought, through statistics, exploration of the nature of the
335
Chinese family landscape in north Queensland through its relationship with key industries, and
drawn up a spatial representation of Chinese communities. In doing so it demonstrates that it is no
longer satisfactory in the 21st century to continue to write, speak and interpret the Chinese Diaspora
without acknowledging the presence and role of women and family in the community. At an
international and national academic level, those who continue a patriarchal approach to the study
of Overseas Chinese limit their understanding of community formation and miss important aspects
of inter-community relations which gender inclusiveness brings. Nor at local level is it appropriate
to continue the practice of deliberate exclusion of Chinese settlement stories within local historical
narratives. Those who do so serve only to maintain the program of the White Australia policy,
which was abandoned over 40 years ago.
This thesis has found that “family” and family relationships underpin all aspects of the Chinese
Diaspora from the home village in China to formation of Chinatowns and precincts. Family also
contributed to smaller nodal networks which developed, which are referred to as String
Communities. By positioning the Chinese Diaspora as a transplanted and adapted Chinese Family
Landscape based on kinship, clan and community traditions, new understandings of overseas
Chinese community formation can occur and expand to include non–Chinese women such as
White, Aboriginal and other local women. Those who continue to render women invisible in
destination narratives, remain at risk of presenting a one-sided approach to settlement history and
do not benefit from understanding the importance of the “soft economics” which played out within
the private spaces of shops, merchant houses, residences and female run businesses.
From the information presented in this thesis it is clear that women, families, and children were
present in Chinese communities across north Queensland and contributed to the formation, renewal
and longevity of Chinatowns and precincts. The methodological integration of statistics gained
from extensive analysis of primary sources and spatial mapping has proved a satisfactory tool to
recalibrate the narratives associated with the Chinese Diaspora to north Queensland. I hope that
this method inspires other researchers to apply a gender and family integrated approach to other
aspects of Chinese Diaspora history. I predict that the new frontier of research concerning the
Chinese Diaspora to Queensland will be investigation into age and displacement. To date, child
migration in any form has been overlooked in the narrative, leaving Chinese boys and girls under
the age of fourteen underrepresented. In addition, the complex historical outcomes associated with
children of mixed heritage couples who were forcibly removed by authorities acting on imagined
336
child kidnappings, alleged vagrancy of mothers, and racial profiling of fathers, provides a small but
rich area of research which can be investigated using a criminological framework. These are
frontier research areas of the future and one in which I hope to be involved.
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Queensland Parliamentary Papers, 1920, “Registrar-General’s Report: Statistics of Colony
for1919: Table No. VI. Showing the Birth Places of 5431 Husbands and 5431 Wives Married
During the Year, 1919”, Vol. II.
Queensland Parliamentary Papers, 1921, “Annual Report of the Chief Protector of Aborigines for
1920”, Vol. II.
iii.) Queensland Parliamentary Debates
Queensland Parliamentary Debates, 1888, First Session, 10th Parliament, “Chinese Immigration
Restriction Bill” Vol. LV: 237-239, 717-741
Queensland Parliamentary Debates, 1901, “Questions”, 5 November 1901, Legislative
Assembly, Fourth Session, 13th Parliament, Vol. LXXXVIII.
Queensland Police Gazettes
Queensland Police Gazette, 1901: 143 “LONG / YONG SAM AH QUE, Nellie”.
Queensland Police Gazette, 1901:236 “Tobacco Licences 1901”.
Queensland Police Gazette, 1902:220 “Mrs Ah Young, Roma”.
Queensland Police Gazette, 1904: 170 “AH HONG, Joe 1” .
Queensland Police Gazette, 1904: 256 “LAFEY , Florence Jean William, 1890”.
Queensland Police Gazette, 1904:234 “LONG, John Hanley”
Queensland Police Gazette, 1904: 282 “Tommy”.
Queensland Police Gazette, 1906:15 “May CARTWRIGHT”.
Queensland Police Gazette, 1909:227 “LONG, William”.
Queensland Police Gazette, 1910: 265 &448 “JACKSON/JOHNSON /GORMAN Thomas/ Charles
Harvey”.
Queensland Police Gazette, 1911: 411“Topsy”.
Queensland Police Gazette, 1911: 494 “YOUNG/AH SING YOUNG/ AH SING Jim/Pat”.
Queensland Police Gazette, 1911:284 “FRITH, Bessie”.
Queensland Police Gazette, 1912:79 “ George DANIELLS/DOUGLAS “.
Queensland Police Gazette, 1916:559 “SLEEWEE, Thomas”.
Queensland Police Gazette, 1919: 475“John MAN FOO”.
Queensland Police Gazette, 1919: 65 “RUSHTON/ LOR JUN William”.
Queensland Police Gazette, 1920:34 “ COOEY, George Thomas”.
Queensland Police Gazette, 1935: 68 “AH POW /PARKER, Victor”.
Queensland Police Gazette, 1937:11 “FONG LONG /LONG, Edward Clarence” .
Queensland Police Gazette, 1939:222 “ LEE SANG/ LEE, BAUMAN Eileen”.
National Archives of Australia (NAA)
i.) Naturalisation, Certificate of Exemption to the Dictation Test, and Certificate of Domicile
relating to individuals or families
NAA:A1, 1912/17072 WAH POO, Helena/ Melina/ Melend
NAA:A1, 1913/12299 GUM FOO, David
NAA: A1, 1928/9742 MOO KIM KOW
NAA: A1/1923 /3544 MOO FUNG
NAA: BP 343/15, 18/94 LEE BOW, William
NAA: BP/343/15/7/422 SUNG YEE, Horace
NAA:BP234/1 SB1930/3438 TI YU
NAA: BP234/1, SB1930/1068 KING SING
NAA: BP234/1, SB1930/3438 GEE WAH, Nellie
NAA:BP234/1, SB1933/752 KOM MOY
NAA: BP25/1 SEE CHIN, David
NAA: BP25/1 CHOW MEW
NAA: BP25/1 YONG MOW
NAA: BP25/1 SEE CHINESE H Y. (SEE CHIN, Edith: wife of David See Chin)
NAA:BP25/1LUN Y W YEE WING LUN
NAA:BP25/1MOON LEE LEE MOON
NAA: BP342/1 9857/299/1903 AH FOO, James
NAA: BP342/1, 1923/7299 SAM SING, (wife Gue Lun, and children Nellie & Edward)
NAA:BP342/1, 3101/631/1903 KING SING
NAA: BP342/1, 475/603/1900 LAM PAN
NAA: BP343/15 15/1158 YUEN DOW, Kitty
NAA: BP343/15, 10/592 CHOCK MAN
NAA: BP343/15, 10/597 CHOCK MAN, William
NAA: BP343/15, 10/598 CHOCK MAN, Mary
NAA: BP343/15, 10/599 CHOCK MAN, Thomas Edward
NAA: BP343/15, 10/602 GOON CHOW, Beatrice
NAA: BP343/15, 10/603 GOON CHEW, Lilly
NAA: BP343/15, 15/1147 AH MOON, Mavis
NAA: BP343/15, 16/117 QUAN, Norman
NAA: BP343/15, 18/101 CHIN CHECK, Ruby
NAA: BP343/15, 18/102 CHIN CHECK, George
NAA: BP343/15, 18/103 CHIN CHECK, Fran Sing (Mrs. Doreen)
NAA: BP343/15, 18/105, CHIN CHECK, Joyce
NAA: BP343/15, 18/32 CHOCK MAN, Thomas Edward
NAA: BP343/15, 18/32 CHOCK MAN, William
NAA: BP343/15, 18/34 CHOCK MAN, Jessie
NAA: BP343/15, 18/35 CHOCK MAN, Charlie
NAA: BP343/15, 4/171A IWANGE, OTSUNE
NAA: BP343/15, 7 /369 HANG GONG, Ernest Howard
NAA: BP343/15, 7 /371 HANG GONG, Gordon Ernest
NAA: BP343/15, 8/467 MAR GEE, Ruby Lin
NAA: BP343/15/7/370 PANG SYE, Arthur
NAA: BP343/15, 11/672 YUEN, Erin
NAA: BP343/15, 12/73 LAM, Frederick George
NAA: BP343/15, 15/1157 YUEN DOW, Ah Cum (Mrs. Yuen Dow)
NAA: BP343/15, 18/104 CHIN CHECK, Harry
NAA: BP343/15, 18/85 CHIN TIE, Mrs Gee See
NAA: BP343/15, 7/408 GOON CHEW, Donald Fritz (Ding Gah)
NAA: BP343/15, 8/477 TAM, George David
NAA: BP343/15. 16/16 QUAN, Arthur
NAA: BP343/15/1156 SUE CHOY, Henry Quan
NAA: BP343/15, 5/273A SUM KUM WAH, Charlie
NAA: BP4/3 CHIN EDITH SEE (SEE CHIN, Edith)
NAA: BP4/3 QUEE CHEE, James
NAA: BP25/1 SEE SING, Archie
NAA: J2483, 232/76 TAM, Edward Ernest
NAA: J2383, 539/28 LIP BACK, William
NAA: J2384, 269/43 SEE CHONG, Edward Arthur
NAA: J2384, 324/83 AH MOON
NAA: J2384, 360/014 JANG, May (Mrs. Joe Jang)
NAA: J2384, 360/016 JOE JANG/JONG
NAA: J2384, 414/31 FONG SAM
NAA: J2384, 414/34 SEE CHONG (Sun Lee Chong)
NAA: J2384, 414/38 YEE BUN
NAA: J2384, 414/39 CHONG, Louie
NAA: J2384, 414/40 GUT HONG
NAA: J2384, 414/43 YEE GON CHIN
NAA: J2384, 480/67 SEE CHONG, Willie
NAA: J2384, 481/010 AH MOON (and Mrs. Chow Young Ah Moon)
NAA: J2481, 1900/ 182 JANG LUM KEE, AH GEN
NAA: J2481, 1900/ 184 JANG LUN
NAA: J2482, 1904/175 LEONG HONG
NAA: J2482, 1904/175 LEONG HONG (wife Ah Gum)
NAA: J2482, 1905/59 YEE TUNG YEP
NAA: J2482, 1905/6 AH DONG
NAA: J2482, 1905/71 LEE QUAY
NAA: J2482, 1905/89 PANG HOO
NAA: J2482. 1903/173 AH CHIN
NAA: J2483 18/94 TAI YET HING, (and wife Wong Shee)
NAA: J2483 185/57 HOP WHO SING and Family
NAA: 2483 105/23 HOP WHO SING and Family
NAA: J2483 312/46 WING LUN, George
NAA: J2483 414/1 WING LUN, Thomas (Wing Sun)
NAA: J2483 456/60 YEE TONG, Nellie
NAA: J2483, 10/93 WONG KEE, Charles Edward
NAA: J2483, 104/69 CHING, Sidney
NAA: J2483, 104/93 WONG KEE, Charles
NAA: J2483, 105/11 SEE SING, Archie
NAA: J2483, 105/22 HOP WHO SING
NAA: J2483, 105/23 HOP WHO SING (Mrs. Hop Who Sing and child)
NAA: J2483, 105/27 HOP WHO SING, AH LINE
NAA: J2483, 105/28 HOP WHO SING, AH TING
NAA: J2483, 105/29 HOP WHO SING, Sue Hang
NAA: J2483, 105/30 HOP WHO SING, AH HONE
NAA: J2483, 105/31 HOP WHO SING, Chin Kwong
NAA: J2483, 105/52 LEE CHEW
NAA: J2483, 105/95 WONG KEE, Baby (6 months)
NAA: J2483, 105/95 WONG KEE, Florence Lucy (nee Ching)
NAA: J2483, 105/97 WONG KEE, Frederick Victor
NAA: J2483, 105/98 WONG KEE, Richard Henry
NAA: J2483, 106/55 SUE SEE, Baby
NAA: J2483, 106/55 SUE SEE, Beatrice Eveline and Baby 5 weeks old
NAA: J2483, 106/56 SUE SEE, Dorothy May
NAA: J2483, 106/57 SUE SEE, Victor Gordon
NAA: J2483, 114/70 AH KEE, George
NAA: J2483, 114/84 LAI FOOK
NAA: J2483, 114/89 LEE LEONG, Percy Henry
NAA: J2483, 114/90 LEE LEONG, Richard
NAA: J2483, 114/91 LEE LEONG, Jimmy
NAA: J2483, 114/92 LEE LEONG, Mary
NAA: J2483, 114/92 LEE LEONG, Son (baby)
NAA: J2483, 114/93 LEE LEONG, James
NAA: J2483, 114/94 LEE LEONG, Gracie
NAA: J2483, 124/36 CHING, George
NAA: J2483, 131/21 SAM Kin Tai (Mrs. Ernsol Sam)
NAA: J2483, 131/22 SAM, Ernsol
NAA: J2483, 131/912 HEANG, Lillian Margaret
NAA: J2483, 131/913 HEANG, William James
NAA: J2483, 131/914 HEANG, Ernest Phillip
NAA: J2483, 135/1 CHUN WAH, Gertrude
NAA: J2483, 135/84 JUE SUE
NAA: J2483, 136/27 AH KUM. Tommy ( and wife Lai Kum Fai)
NAA: J2483, 136/34 AH COW
NAA: J2483, 136/36 KING SHAN
NAA: J2483, 136/73 KWONG SANG, Mrs. Leong See
NAA: J2483, 136/74 KWONG SANG, Tar Kong
NAA: J2483, 136/75 KWONG SANG, Tar Mun, Desmond
NAA: J2483, 136/76 KWONG SANG, Kum Fon (Ivy)
NAA: J2483, 137/18 CHAN YAN, William George
NAA: J2483, 144/18 LUM KEE, Gem
NAA: J2483, 144/19 LUM KEE, Quan
NAA: J2483, 144/2 CHONG WAH
NAA: J2483, 144/22 LUM KEE JANG
NAA: J2483, 144/44 JU HOP
NAA: J2483, 144/85 YEE TONG
NAA: J2483, 145/17 AH CUM Pang
NAA: J2483, 145/65 PANG SYE
NAA: J2483, 145/72 LEE LIY/Lee Lay
NAA: J2483, 145/90 GUM ON, Frederick
NAA: J2483, 145/91 SING CHOY, Harry
NAA: J2483, 145/92 KUM YOW, Tommy
NAA: J2483, 146/98 HOP KEE
NAA: J2483, 152/16 SHAW Young
NAA: J2483, 152/23 AH SAM Tommy
NAA: J2483, 152/35 HEANG, George Henry
NAA: J2483, 16/24 FAT KEE
NAA: J2483, 16/25 FAT KEE, (Mrs. Fat Kee Leu See)
NAA: J2483, 16/26 FAT KEE, Mary
NAA: J2483, 16/27 FAT KEE, Alice
NAA: J2483, 16/28 FAT KEE, Lucy
NAA: J2483, 16/43 YEE KEE, George
NAA: J2483, 17/37 LEE SEE CHONG
NAA: J2483, 170/31 LEE SYE, George William
NAA: J2483, 170/33 LEE SYE, Albert Edward
NAA: J2483, 170/40 JU YORK SUN
NAA: J2483, 170/41 JU YORK SUN, Albert
NAA: J2483, 174/28 SEE CHIN, Jan See Chin
NAA: J2483, 174/30 SEE CHIN (wife Maud See and child Irene See Chin)
NAA: J2483, 174/31 SEE CHIN, Norma Aimee
NAA: J2483, 174/32 SEE CHIN, Edna Maude
NAA: J2483, 174/33 SEE CHIN, Phillis Grace
NAA: J2483, 174/34 SEE CHIN, Eunice Yvonne
NAA: J2483, 174/35 SEE CHIN, Percy Reginald
NAA: J2483, 174/49 MAH HING, William
NAA: J2483, 176/47 CHING, James
NAA: J2483, 176/48 AH CHING, Philip Henry Victor
NAA: J2483, 18/48 QUONG CHONG, Mary Lily
NAA: J2483, 18/49 QUONG CHONG, Sudbet William
NAA: J2483, 18/80 HING GUM (Son of SAM WAR)
NAA: J2483, 183/76 AH WEE, Willie
NAA: J2483, 184/16 YUEN SANG, Harry
NAA: J2483, 184/53 LUNG, Alice Florence (nee Li You)
NAA: J2483, 184/54 LUNG, Lester Henry Alfred
NAA: J2483, 184/55 LUNG, James Douglas
NAA: J2483, 184/61 AH CHING, Sid
NAA: J2483, 184/62 AH HOW, Albert
NAA: J2483, 185/57 AH MOO, Willie
NAA: J2483, 185/71 JU MING
NAA: J2483, 189/27 AH HON
NAA: J2483, 189/60 YIN FOO, George
NAA: J2483, 189/61 YIN FOO, (Mrs. Christina)
NAA: J2483, 189/62 YIN FOO, Frederick
NAA: J2483, 189/63 YIN FOO, Herbert Allen
NAA: J2483, 189/64 YIN FOO, Norman
NAA: J2483, 189/65 YIN FOO, Arthur William
NAA: J2483, 189/67 YIN FOO, Alexander Charles
NAA: J2483, 189/68 YIN FOO, Clarence George
NAA: J2483, 189/82 CHUN WAH
NAA: J2483, 19/90 JOE KONG
NAA: J2483, 190/074 AH SEE
NAA: J2483, 190/24 SEE KEE, William
NAA: J2483, 1903/14 GEE CHONG
NAA: J2483, 191/15 CHONG FOO
NAA: J2483, 191/31 CASEY, Joseph
NAA: J2483, 191/32 CASEY, Nellie
NAA: J2483, 191/60 MAN FOOK
NAA: J2483, 191/63 LEE LIY, Francis Charles Cecil
NAA: J2483, 191/81 GUM FOO, David
NAA: J2483, 192/31 CHING, Bue How
NAA: J2483, 192/32 CHING, Lin Kee
NAA: J2483, 192/33 CHING, Choy Lin
NAA: J2483, 192/34 CHING, Choy Lan
NAA: J2483, 192/35 CHING, Sing Ho
NAA: J2483, 192/37 CHING, Choy Young
NAA: J2483, 192/38 CHING, Ching Sum
NAA: J2483, 192/41 CHING, Choy Cook
NAA: J2483, 192/41 MAR GEE
NAA: J2483, 192/42 CHING, Yong Kee
NAA: J2483, 193/11 HANG FONG, Dickson
NAA: J2483, 193/12 HANG FONG, Wah Son
NAA: J2483, 193/35 AH KEE, V.N.D Garside
NAA: J2483, 193/36 AH KEE
NAA: J2483, 193/54 KEE, Louis
NAA: J2483, 193/64 AH HOE, Katie
NAA: J2483, 193/65 SO CHOY, Minnie Ah Gin
NAA: J2483, 193/66 AH HOON, Nellie
NAA: J2483, 193/67 AH CHOY, Charles
NAA: J2483, 193/85 CHOY SHOW
NAA: J2483, 2/14 CHUN TIE, Thomas
NAA: J2483, 2/62 FONG, William S
NAA: J2483, 219/76 AH LUM
NAA: J2483, 219/86 KWONG, George Murphy
NAA: J2483, 225/53 AH CHIN, Charlie
NAA: J2483, 225/54 YOU SING
NAA: J2483, 225/57 MAHN LEONG
NAA: J2483, 225/72 YET HOY
NAA: J2483, 225/73 YET HOY, Quon Yake
NAA: J2483, 225/74 RATHJEN, John Charles
NAA: J2483, 226/100 LAI FOOK, Lily (Way Yung)
NAA: J2483, 226/35 CHING ONE HO, One Ho
NAA: J2483, 226/38 CHING SUM
NAA: J2483, 226/42 CHING, Young Kee
NAA:J2483, 226/99 LAI FOOK, Florrie
NAA: J2483, 227/2 LAI FOOK, George (Lai Tak Yen)
NAA: J2483, 227/28 WAH SHONG, Robert (Jow Sing Wah Shong)
NAA: J2483, 227/52 MAY GOO
NAA: J2483, 227/53 ONE KING
NAA: J2483, 227/99 CHUN TIE, Willie (Ing Yen)
NAA: J2483, 231/33 KWONG SO LEUNG
NAA: J2483, 231/52 KOM MOY, Ah Chee Kom Moy
NAA: J2483, 232/47 CHUN TIE, Mary
NAA: J2483, 232/49 CHUN TIE, Charlie
NAA: J2483, 232/51 CHUN TIE, Frank
NAA: J2483, 233/56 LEE GOW
NAA: J2483, 233/58 LEE GOW, George
NAA: J2483, 233/59 LEE GOW, Amy
NAA: J2483, 233/60 LEE GOW, Jow Lee Gow
NAA: J2483, 233/80 LOOK HOP, John William
NAA: J2483, 233/98 LEE HONG
NAA: J2483, 237/16 SEE KEE, Arthur
NAA: J2483, 237/17 SEE KEE, Bennett
NAA: J2483, 237/69 GAIN, Wong Jack
NAA: J2483, 238/18 CHOY LARN, Margaret
NAA: J2483, 238/28 AH MOOK, Kashyama Onatsu
NAA: J2483, 238/32 AH MOOK, William
NAA: J2483, 238/32 AH MOOK, Lily
NAA: J2483, 238/36 AH DIN, Dolly
NAA: J2483, 239/66 MEE FOOK, Edward
NAA: J2483, 239/67 MEE FOOK, Gertie
NAA: J2483, 239/68 MEE FOOK, George Ying Fit
NAA: J2483, 256/16 SHOW YIU
NAA: J2483, 256/16 SHOW YIU, Annie
NAA: J2483, 256/17 SHOW YIU, Archibald Roy
NAA: J2483, 256/23 LEONG, George
NAA: J2483, 256/24 LEONG, Monica
NAA: J2483, 256/25 LEONG, Mabel
NAA: J2483, 256/25 LEONG, Mary Theresa
NAA: J2483, 256/25 LEONG, Catherine
NAA: J2483, 256/28 LEONG, Rita Francis
NAA: J2483, 256/44 SOU KEE, Annie
NAA: J2483, 256/45 SOU KEE, Tommy
NAA: J2483, 256/47 SOU KEE, Willie
NAA: J2483, 257/004 LEE JOW
NAA: J2483, 257/23 KOM MOY, George
NAA: J2483, 257/5 LEE JOW, Gladys Lillian Charlotte
NAA: J2483, 257/6 LEE JOW, William Fred
NAA: J2483, 257/77 LEE JOW, Arthur Sydney
NAA: J2483, 257/95 NOCK, George
NAA: J2483, 257/96 NOCK, (Mrs. Chin Tuguoy)
NAA: J2483, 257/97 NOCK, Hauley
NAA: J2483, 257/98 NOCK, Willie
NAA: J2483, 257/99 NOCK, George
NAA: J2483, 258/16 WING LUN, George (Wing Line)
NAA: J2483, 258/3 GEE KEE, Albert
NAA: J2483, 263/10 HOCKTEIN, Ah Moy
NAA: J2483, 263/15 WAH POO, Peter
NAA: J2483, 263/2 AKE, Willie
NAA: J2483, 263/23 WAH POO
NAA: J2483, 263/3 AKE, Minnie Grace
NAA: J2483, 263/4 AKE, Hilda Maria
NAA: J2483, 263/9 HOCKTEIN (Mrs. Mon Que Hocktein)
NAA: J2483, 264/ 56 LEE SYE, Alice
NAA: J2483, 264/21 WAR JANG
NAA: J2483, 264/55 LEE SYE, Stanley Marshall
NAA: J2483, 264/57 LEE SYE, Leslie Jack
NAA: J2483, 264/58 LEE SYE, Percy Wilfred
NAA: J2483, 264/59 LEE SYE, Edward
NAA: J2483, 264/61 LEE YOU, Joy
NAA: J2483, 264/62 LEE YOU, May
NAA: J2483, 265/52 TUNG YEP, Yee Tung Yep
NAA: J2483, 265/54 TUNG YEP, Nellie
NAA: J2483, 265/55 TUNG YEP (Mrs. Tung Yep, Maggie Yee)
NAA: J2483, 267/25 SERGEEF, Mary
NAA: J2483, 269/054 AH HEANG, George
NAA: J2483, 269/43 SEE CHONG, Edward Arthur
NAA: J2483, 269/58 CHONG, Charlie
NAA: J2483, 285/70 LEE KEE (Mrs. Lee Kee)
NAA: J2483, 286/21 GOON CHEW, Goon Chu
NAA: J2483, 286/3 YUM TONG, William Josh
NAA: J2483, 288/5 SEE POY, Gilbert
NAA: J2483, 289/38 YIN FOO, Charles
NAA: J2483, 289/70 FONG LEE, Leslie
NAA: J2483, 289/96 QUING BOO, Albert
NAA: J2483, 289/97 QUING BOO, Margaret
NAA: J2483, 289/98 QUING BOO, Charles Henry
NAA: J2483, 290/1 QUING BOO, Margaret Quing Boo & baby
NAA: J2483, 290/1 QUING BOO, May (baby)
NAA: J2483, 290/53 GAIN, Hubert Charles
NAA: J2483, 290/54 GAIN, Victor Thomas
NAA: J2483, 290/57 GAIN, Thomas
NAA: J2483, 298/006 QUIN LEM, Gertrude
NAA: J2483, 298/006 ZAN, Georgina (nee Ah Hee)
NAA: J2483, 298/092 SO CHOY, Sing Quay
NAA: J2483, 299/071 LAI FOOK, William (Lai Kwong Yen)
NAA: J2483, 299/082 AH CHING, James Ishmael Stanley
NAA: J2483, 299/091 MEE SING, (Ing Fong)
NAA: J2483, 299/092 MEE SING, Annie
NAA: J2483, 299/093 MEE SING, May
NAA: J2483, 299/094 MEE SING, Maggie
NAA: J2483, 299/095 MEE SING, Mabel
NAA: J2483, 299/79 LEE YOU, Annie Margaret
NAA: J2483, 3/59 SUN SHUN LEE, (Florence Jessie)
NAA: J2483, 310/040 SEE HOE, Alan
NAA: J2483, 311/055 CHEE QUEE, (child)
NAA: J2483, 311/055 CHEE QUEE, (Mrs. Chee Quee, Moo Kim Kow and child)
NAA: J2483, 311/056 CHEE QUEE, Pauline
NAA: J2483, 311/057 CHEE QUEE, Alberta
NAA: J2483, 311/058 CHEE FOOK, Ernest
NAA: J2483, 311/088 LONG, Edward Clarence
NAA: J2483, 312/021 AH CHING
NAA: J2483, 322/053 KING FOOK
NAA: J2483, 323/048 AH CUM, Bessie
NAA: J2483, 323/049 AH CUM, Charles
NAA: J2483, 323/050 AH CUM, Joseph Pang
NAA: J2483, 323/051 AH CUM, May
NAA: J2483, 324/005 LAI FOO, Harry
NAA: J2483, 324/006 LAI FOO, Linda
NAA: J2483, 324/007 LAI FOO, Ellen
NAA: J2483, 324/008 LAI FOO, Quoy Yong
NAA: J2483, 324/009 LAI FOO, Irene
NAA: J2483, 324/010 LAI FOO, George
NAA: J2483, 334/056 LAI FOO
NAA: J2483, 336/045 WAH SANG, George (Dorchin)
NAA: J2483, 336/074 YEE CHONG YAM, (as Philip YEE)
NAA: J2483, 344/ 087 CHOY YING, (Mrs. Choy Ying)
NAA: J2483, 344/089 AH LIN, William
NAA: J2483, 344/090 AH LIN, Annie
NAA: J2483, 359/23 LEE GEE, Frank
NAA: J2483, 359/31 KWONG SANG, William Morris Rowland
NAA: J2483, 359/38 HANG GONG, (Maisie Kwong So Loung)
NAA: J2483, 360/92 HOW CHIN, Cissy (Mrs. Wing Lum)
NAA: J2483, 361/14 WING LUN, Mary
NAA: J2483, 365/100 KWONG, (Mrs. Florence May)
NAA: J2483, 365/24 SEE HOE, For Quai
NAA: J2483, 365/25 SEE HOE, Edna
NAA: J2483, 365/26 SEE HOE, Arthur
NAA: J2483, 365/38 SEE HOE, Ah Tiy
NAA: J2483, 366/052 LOW CHOY, George
NAA: J2483, 366/33 CHIN CHECK
NAA: J2483, 384/98 AH CHONG, Bruce
NAA: J2483, 384/99 AH CHONG, Charlie
NAA: J2483, 390/21 MEE SING, Ing Fong
NAA: J2483, 390/37 LEONG MUN, Charles
NAA: J2483, 390/92 WING LUN Mrs. Wing Lun (nee Joce Line or Joce Foon See)
NAA: J2483, 391/45 LOOK HOP, Elizabeth Jane
NAA: J2483, 392/70 AH SAM, Jim
NAA: J2483, 408/47 AH MOO, Willie
NAA: J2483, 409/29 HOW CHIN, William
NAA: J2483, 409/78 WING LUN, William
NAA: J2483, 409/88 CHUN TIE, Tommy (Chin Yan Yow)
NAA: J2483, 41/21 WAH SANG
NAA: J2483, 410/5 CHIN CHOCK, Charlie
NAA: J2483, 414/24 HOW CHIN Lin Fay, (Mrs. How Lum)
NAA: J2483, 414/25 HOW CHIN, Way Lee
NAA: J2483, 414/29 HOEY, Ah Hoey
NAA: J2483, 414/59 DUNG YOW, Georgina Young
NAA: J2483, 414/60 DUNG YOW, Frank
NAA: J2483, 414/61 DUNG YOW, Allen
NAA: J2483, 414/67 FONG, Hanarko
NAA: J2483, 414/80 LOOK HOP, Thomas Edward James
NAA: J2483, 414/84 NOCK, Edward
NAA: J2483, 415/29 LOW KEE, Edward
NAA: J2483, 415/49 AH KEE, George
NAA: J2483, 415/81 FUN, Charlie (Charlie Fun Hop Sing)
NAA: J2483, 415/84 LOW KEE
NAA: J2483, 42/34 KWONG CHIN SEE Wife of Kwong Sue Duk
NAA: J2483, 42/86 CHING DO, William
NAA: J2483, 42/87 CHING DO, Joseph Fred
NAA: J2483, 42/88 CHING DO, Lewis Edward
NAA: J2483, 42/89 CHING DO, William John (Quong Jack)
NAA: J2483, 42/90 CHING DO, Ruby Ethel
NAA: J2483, 42/91 CHING DO, Florence Jessie
NAA: J2483, 42/92 CHING DO, Mabel Anne
NAA: J2483, 428/3 GAIN, Mrs. Rose (nee Ah Cow)
NAA: J2483, 429/20 LEE LIY, Frank
NAA: J2483, 429/57 SANG YEE, George
NAA: J2483, 430/64 GOOT SIM
NAA: J2483, 430/78 CHUN TIE
NAA: J2483, 431/12 SAM MOY (Mrs. Sam Moy)
NAA: J2483, 431/32 LOW CHOY, Mary Jane
NAA: J2483, 438/45 AH MOON
NAA: J2483, 438/88 YEE SIN, Jimmy
NAA: J2483, 439/52 SEE CHIN, Dorothy Jean
NAA: J2483, 440/73 SO CHOY, Emily May
NAA: J2483, 440/79 SO CHOY, Sue Choy
NAA: J2483, 456/16 MAR, Willie
NAA: J2483, 456/2 LEONG George (Way In)
NAA: J2483, 456/3 LEONG, Patricia (Mrs. Ah Pat)
NAA: J2483, 456/4 LEONG Charles (Good Lun)
NAA: J2483, 457/32 HOP YEK, Louis George
NAA: J2483, 457/7 FONG YAN (Diamond)
NAA: J2483, 457/75 KWONG SANG
NAA: J2483, 457/76 YUEN KEE
NAA: J2483, 457/94 DAY SUM, (Mrs. Lucy)
NAA: J2483, 457/96 DAY SUM
NAA: J2483, 458/34 CHOCKMAN
NAA: J2483, 458/49 LUM WAN, William
NAA: J2483, 458/83 KONG BOW
NAA: J2483, 465/024 AH KEE, John Henry
NAA: J2483, 466/72 FONG ON, Chai Hee
NAA: J2483, 467/12 CAMPBELL, Dorothy Margaret
NAA: J2483, 480,049 TUNG YEP, Thomas
NAA: J2483, 480/31 BERG, George
NAA: J2483, 481/034 LEE MOON
NAA: J2483, 481/76 LEONG CHONG
NAA: J2483, 482/32 LUM KIN
NAA: J2483, 496/80 SO CHOY, Mavis Olive
NAA: J2483, 497 /04 WONG HOY (Mrs. May Maud)
NAA: J2483, 497/44 SHUN WAH, Aggie Ann Ju Yorkee
NAA: J2483, 497/45 SHUN WAH, Jean Rose Ju Yorkee
NAA: J2483, 497/46 SHUN WAH, Roy /Ronald Ju Yorkee
NAA: J2483, 497/57 SHUN WAH (YORKEE), Sam Moy (Mrs. Sun Shun Wah)
NAA: J2483, 497/60 SHUN WAH, Gum Yee
NAA: J2483, 498/11 GOOT SIM, (also known as Mabel Chan)
NAA: J2483, 498/55 CHUN TIE, Margaret (also known as Margaret Choy Lam)
NAA: J2483, 514/37 TIM SO, Susie
NAA: J2483, 514/38 TIM SO, Doreen
NAA: J2483, 514/39 TIM SO, Freddie
NAA: J2483, 514/40 TIM SO, Lily
NAA: J2483, 515/45 YOUNG AH
NAA: J2483, 515/87 MAH HING, Charlie
NAA: J2483, 515/98 AH LIN, Quia Sang Ah Lin (William)
NAA: J2483, 516/53 QUIN YEN, Mrs. Maud
NAA: J2483, 516/99 FONG ON
NAA: J2483, 519/49 SO CHOY, Minnie Ah Gin So Choy
NAA: J2483, 520/13 LOOK HOP, Ellen Victoria
NAA: J2483, 53/8 MAH HING
NAA: J2483, 535/50 YUEN DOW /AH CUM, Yuen Dow
NAA: J2483, 536/19 CHIN CHONG (Mrs. Chin Chong nee Nellie Yee Tong)
NAA: J2483, 544/12 JOE KONG, Katie
NAA: J2483, 544/43 YOUNG, Mrs. Ellen
NAA: J2483, 569/48 CHUN TIE, (Qui Fa or Gee See)
NAA: J2483, 65/65 SIN DEK KEE
NAA: J2483, 66/88 SUN SHUN LEE, Edward
NAA: J2483, 66/89 SUN SHUN LEE, Ellen
NAA: J2483, 66/90 SUN SHUN LEE, Amy
NAA: J2483, 66/97 SUN SHUN LEE
NAA: J2483, 66/98 AH MOOK
NAA: J2483, 66/99 AH MOOK, Annie
NAA: J2483, 66/99 AH MOOK, Onatsu Kashyama)
NAA: J2483, 78/3 CHUN TIE, James (Ing Yun)
NAA: J2483, 78/3 CHUN TIE (Mrs. Qui Chun Tie and infant Ing Yun)
NAA: J2483, 78/4 CHUN TIE, Ing Way
NAA: J2483, 78/5 CHUN TIE, Ing Jock
NAA: J2483, 78/68 AH PONG, Joe
NAA: J2483, 92/ 75 MOO SHANG
NAA: J2483, 92/45 AH SANGE, Francis Augustine
NAA: J2483, 92/46 AH SANGE, William
NAA: J2483, 92/47 AH SANGE, Fung
NAA: J2483, 92/84 HOW CHIN, Charley
NAA: J2483, 93/71 LUM SING, Eva Minetta
NAA: J2483, 93/72 LUM SING, Annie Louisa
NAA: J2483, 93/73 LUM SING, Hilda Maude
NAA: J2483, 93/74 LUM SING, Ethel May
NAA: J2483, 93/75 LUM SING, Grace Caroline
NAA: J2483, 93/88 CHIN PACK
NAA: J2483, J2483/29 LOY, Yuen Loy
NAA: J2483, 114/69 AH KEE, James
NAA: J2483, 152/91 HING, Patrick
NAA: J2483, 176/47 AH CHING, James
NAA: J2483, 183/77 FORDAY, Willie
NAA: J2483, 192/38 TANG YEE, Samuel Herbert
NAA: J2483, 193/54 AH KEE, Louis Kee
NAA: J2483, 193/84 CHOY SHOW, Robert
NAA: J2483, 263/17 WAH POO, Helena
NAA: J2483, 385/64 SOU SAN, Ellie
NAA: J2483, 440/74 SO CHOY/ SUE CHOY, (Mrs. Ah Hoe Sow Choy)
NAA: J2483, 458/73 CHONG FUNG, Tommy
NAA: J2483, 476/75 PANG YIN, Phillip
NAA: J2483/193/11 NAN /HANG FONG, Dickson
NAA: J2483/225/56 MAN CONG
NAA: J2483/227/3 LAI FOOK, Ellen Nellie (Yet Yung)
NAA: J2483/227/4 LAI FOOK, May (Shuying)
NAA: J2483/257/59 NAN, Lena
NAA: J2483/257/62 NAN, Beatrice
NAA: J2483/257/63 NAN, Allen Francis
NAA: J2483/259/58 NAN, Ella Francis
NAA: J2483/365/30 SUNG YEE
NAA: J2483/365/33 LEE SYE, Edward
NAA: J2483/365/47 SUNG YEE, Horace
NAA: J2483/365/48 SUNG YEE, Ernest
NAA: J2483/440/72 SO CHOY (Sing Quay)
NAA: J2483/66/81 YUEN SANG, Harry
NAA: J2483, J2481, 1899/294 KOM MOY
NAA: J2484, 298/004 QUIN LEM, Charles Conway
NAA: J2484, 344, 086 AH LIN
NAA: J2484, 344, 087 AH LIN (Mrs. Choy Ying)
NAA: J2484, 344, 089 AH LIN, William
NAA: J2484, 344, 091 AH LIN, Harry
NAA: J2484, 346/99 CHUNG YET
NAA: J2484, 359/20 AH YET, Cissy
NAA: J2484, 359/20 AH YET, Moo Fung
NAA: J2484, 482/99 CHIN, Sum Dong
NAA: J2484, 496/16 QUIN LEM, Chong Quin Lem
NAA: J2484, 498/31 CHIN, Loong Kang
NAA: J2484, 514/20 CHIN DAW
NAA: J2484, 535/15 PANG QUEE, Mabel
NAA: J2493 257/67 KWONG, Elsie (You Fen)
NAA: J25, 1958/2431 TIM SO, Louie (Wife Ah Sam)
NAA: J25, 1961/3948 YUEN KIM HOOK, A. Hookey
NAA: J25, 1968/1876 SEE KEE Tsang (Tsing) See Kee
NAA: J2773, 1037/1930 YUEN DOW, Maurice
NAA: J2773, 12/1930 SING, Doreen Joan
NAA: J2773, 12/1930 SING, Dorothy Margaret Campbell daughter of Mrs. Munson
NAA: J2773, 12/1930 SING, Gwendolin Mary
NAA: J2773, 12/1930 SING, Mrs. M.G
NAA: J2773, 184/1929 LUM WAN, William
NAA: J2773, 184/1929 LUM WAN Alfred Thomas
NAA: J2773, 2438/1917 LOOK HOP, John William
NAA: J2773, 498/1924 AH CHONG, Bruce
NAA: J2773, 817/1930 AH MOON, Edie
NAA: J2773, 817/1930 AH MOON, Gladys
NAA: J2773, 817/1930 AH MOON, Phyllis Jean
NAA: J2773, 817/1930 AH MOON, Willie
NAA: J2773/2490/1917 AH FOO, James
NAA: J3115 81 TAI YET HING, Family
NAA: J3115, 138 MOW HING
NAA: J3115, 156 SEE POY, Herbert
NAA: J3115, 39 KING SHAN
NAA: J3115/ 36 LEE WOOD
NAA: J3115/ 6 FAT KEE
NAA: J3115/21/1902 QUONG CHONG
NAA: J3136 1906/251 TAI YET HING, Family
NAA: J3136, 1906/106 GEE KEE, John Hannock
NAA: J3136, 1906/107 GEE KEE, Henry
NAA: J3136, 1906/108 GEE KEE, William
NAA: J3136, 1906/109 GEE KEE, Albert Edward
NAA: J3136, 1906/110 GEE KEE, Ellen
NAA: J3136, 1906/111 GEE KEE, May Maude
NAA: J3136, 1906/162 KWONG CHIN SEE (Wife of Kwong Sue Duc)
NAA: J3136, 1906/193 HODGES, Vivian Sydney
NAA: J3136, 1906/307 YEE TONG, Nellie
NAA: J3136, 1906/308 WING CHONG (Son of Yee Tong)
NAA: J3136, 1906/308 YEE TONG, Florrie
NAA: J3136, 1906/309 YEE TONG, James
NAA: J3136, 1906/310 WING CHON
NAA: J3136, 1907/127 LOOK HOP
NAA: J3136, 1907/149 JONG QUAN POW
NAA: J3136, 1907/150 LEONG GEE (Mrs. Jong Quan Pow)
NAA: J3136, 1907/151 LIPPETT, Mary Jane
NAA: J3136, 1907/205 AH SANGE, John Joseph
NAA: J3136, 1907/337 HOW, Charley
NAA: J3136, 1907/426 AH LIE, (Wife of SEE CHIN)
NAA: J3136, 1907/493 CHING, Edwin
NAA: J3136, 1907/519 LAI FOO, Chin Ow (wife of Lai Foo)
NAA: J3136, 1907/525 AH SHAY, William Charles
NAA: J3136, 1908/114 AH YUNG, Frederick (son of Ah Pong)
NAA: J3136, 1908/124 MAH HING, Spence
NAA: J3136, 1908/20 FONG DIE
NAA: J3136, 1908/206 LOOK HOP, (Elizabeth Jane and child)
NAA: J3136, 1908/38 AH SAM
NAA: J3136, 1908/5 SEE POY (Chun Han and child Gilbert)
NAA: J3136, 1908/50 SEE CHIN
NAA: J3136, 1908/6 SEE POY, May
NAA: J3136, 1908/7 SEE POY, Johnstone
NAA: J3136, 1908/8 SEEPOY, Ida
NAA: J483, 482/81 CHUN TIE, Qui Fa (Mrs. Chun Tie)
NAA: J773, 1037/1930 YUEN DOW, Elsie
NAA: ST84 1 1909/20/21/30 SUNG YEE Family
ii.) Birth Certificate Registers, Files with Birth Certificates, Documents Other (Identification)
NAA BP384/9 Birth Certificate Register - Chinese, Book 1
NAA BP384/9 Birth Certificate Register - Chinese, Book 2.
NAA: 04215 AH CHIN, Annie, Normanton.
NAA: A1 1912 17072 Memorandum External Affairs
NAA: A9, A1902/69/65, [application from] Fat Kee [to bring wife and family from China]
NAA: BP25/1 Mrs. SAM LEE SEE (Lee Chin Wai Pui), Cairns
NAA: BP25/1LEE TIN KIN, Chinese Deaths, Blackall
NAA: BP342/1 9857/299/1903, Margaret Ah Foo, Birth Register, Certificate, Townsville
NAA: BP342/1/9857/299/ 1903, Correspondence: Jue Hop
NAA: D596, 1923/4232 White Wives of Chinese and their Children, 1923
NAA: J2482 1904/114, J2483 152/144 & J2483 288/ 144 GEEFAY
NAA: J2483 104/73, J2483176/86 & J2483 288/42 HONG CHEW
NAA: J2483 104/74, J2483 189/28 & J2483 288/44 LEE WAH
NAAJ2483 169/68 SUN KUM WAH Charlie (of Winton 1914-1916)
NAAJ2483 170/53 SUN KUM WAH Ah Foo (of Winton 1915-1917)
NAAJ2483 257/78 SUN KUM WAH Charlie (of Winton 1918-1921)
NAA: J2483 359/20 Moo Fung and child Cissy Ah Yet, 1923-24
NAA: J2483 65/26 Cheung Yet 1912
NAA: J2483 218/34 Cheung Yet (Thursday Island) 1916
NAA: J3136/ 1908/262Cheung Yet 1908-9
NAA: J25, 1949/2743, HOOK WAH JANG, James Jue Sue (Death)
NAA: J2773, 228/37, QUONG CHONG AND SEE POY Customs and Excise correspondence on
William Sidney Quong Chong and family
NAA: J2773, 3058167; William LAM PAN re Sugar Bounty
NAA: J3115 /75 / 1903, 1899 copy of a birth certificate for George Sue Fong of Townsville
NAA: J3115 143, AH SEE, William, Registration of Birth, Townsville
NAA: J3115, 100, Correspondence relating to a Certificate of Domicile for Fat Kee and family
NAA: J3115, 157, Correspondence, statements and newspaper clippings relating to the prosecution
of Willie GOONCHIU, Patrick WAUGH HING, Cairns, Birth Register Certificate
NAA: J3115, 55, CHUNG CHANG,Montague, Baptismal Certificate
NAA: J3115/ 75, George FONG SUE, Townsville, Birth Certificate ,
NAA: J3115/78Birth certificate and correspondence relating to the application for a Certificate of
Domicile for William Andrew Leon of Townsville.
NAA: A1, 1903/6423 LEON Andrew, letter requesting readmission of son William to Queensland.
iii.) Alien Registration Certificate 1916
NAA: BP/3 /9365/CHINESE, FOO, Alien Registration Certificate, No. 6
NAA: BP4/3 CHINESE, Hoy Jimmy Gee, Alien Registration Certificate, No. 85
NAA: BP4/3 CHINESE, Gee Hoy Maggie, Alien Registration Certificate, No. 8
NAA: BP4/3 CHINESE, Bow K, Alien Registration Certificate, No. 30
NAA: BP4/3 CHINESE, KEE ANNIE SOU, Alien Registration Certificate, No. 4
NAA: BP4/3 CHINESE, KEE WILLIE SOU, Alien Registration Certificate, No. 5
NAA: BP4/3 CHINESE, CHEE QUEE, Alien Registration Certificate, No. 90
NAA: BP4/3 CHINESE, KIM AH, Alien Registration Certificate, No. 10
NAA: BP4/3 CHINESE, MAN AH, Alien Registration Certificate, No. 11
NAA: BP4/3 CHINESE, MAN SARAH AH, Alien Registration Certificate, No. 12
NAA: BP4/3 CHINESE, SUE W.A., Alien Registration Certificate, No. 9
NAA: BP4/3 CHINESE, SAM AH., Alien Registration Certificate, No. 1
NAA: BP4/3 CHINESE, AH SAM BA, Alien Registration Certificate, No. 2
NAA: BP4/3 CHINESE, CHONG SARAH, Alien Registration Certificate, No. 16
NAA: BP4/3 CHINESE, FOLEY Jimmy, Alien Registration Certificate, No. 13
NAA: BP4/3 CHINESE, AH GOW, Alien Registration Certificate, No. 14
NAA: BP4/3 CHINESE, CHIN LOI SIN, Alien Registration Certificate, No. 7
NAA: BP4/3 CHINESE, CHONG, Alien Registration Certificate, No.15
NAA: BP4/3 CHINESE, HOOKEY, Alien Registration Certificate, No.13
NAA: BP4/3 CHINESE, KEM LIN, Alien Registration Certificate, No.1
NAA: PP131/1 1903/262, Census return, Coloured Aliens in Commonwealth: WA.
STATE
NEW SOUTH WALES
a.) Births Deaths and Marriages ONLINE
BDM NSW: 2925/1849 V18492925 34A, Father William, Mother Esther, son Wing William
BDM NSW: 2081/1849 V18492081 34A, Father William, Mother Esther, son Wing David
BDM NSW: 993/1847 V1847993 55, Father William, Esther, son Wing Robert
QUEENSLAND
a). Queensland Births, Deaths and Marriages (QBDM)
i.) Microfiche (MF) QBDM-M-MF
QBDM-MR-MF 1856 1859/B000008 TE YONG, TUCKER Mary, 21.04.1856
QBDM-MR-MF 1859 1859/B000030 YAT SAN , HAYES Eliza
QBDM-MR-MF 1859 1859/B000938 SAM, HAYES Eliza, 25.08.1856
QBDM-MR-MF 1859 1859/B000044 WAN, MITCHELL Mary, 9.10.1856
QBDM-MR-MF 1859 1859/B000113 SIN John, HAYES Mary, 13.04.1857
QBDM-MR-MF 1859 1859/B000177 GEE James, DWYER Mary, 28.10.1858
QBDM-MR-MF 1859 1859/000353 YECK YAB, RICHARDSON Margaret, 27.08.1858
QBDM-MR-MF 1859 1859/000244 SING/ JO SIM John, POULSON Margaret, 2.06.1859
QBDM-MR-MF 1859 1859 000235 KIM John, ROBINSON Naomi, 18.04.1859
QBDM-MR-MF 1859 1859/000325 TEE KIM, RICHARDSON Janette, 10.11.1856
QBDM-MR-MF 1859 1859/000357 TOE, BEAL Elizabeth, 24.12.1859
QBDM-MR-MF 1859 1859/000327 KEUGH James KEW, CASKELL Maria, 5.02.1857
QBDM-MR-MF 1860 1860/000199 LAU TEEN Thomas, GILLIGAN Jane, 20.02.1860
QBDM-MR-MF 1860 1860/000060 CHAY John, CRAIG Jane, 12.09.1860
QBDM-MR-MF 1860 1860/000059 DEIAN John, CRAIG Ellen, 23.08.1860
QBDM-MR-MF 1861 1861/000168 KAOMI, BEER Agnes, 29.05.1861
QBDM-MR-MF 1862 1862/000202 CHIAM James, GORTON Sophia, 14.10.1862
QBDM-MR-MF 1862 1862/000218 KONG DEE, STEWARD Mary, 3.07.1862
QBDM-MR-MF 1863 1863/000176 HAND Samuel, CROSS Eliza, 29.12.1863
QBDM-MR-MF 1863 1863/B000498 YOUDEY George, CAIN Jane, 16.04.1863
QBDM-MR-MF 1863 1863/000404 SUE Samuel, GRAY MaryAnn, 13.09.1863
QBDM-MR-MF 1864 1864/000143 GEE John, PIERCE Elizabeth, 30.01.1864
QBDM-MR-MF 1864 1864/000027 YOE James, FOLEY Mary, 15.09.1864
QBDM-MR-MF 1865 1865/000472 AH SUE Thomas , LOWRY Esther, 15.06.1865
QBDM-MR-MF 1865 1865/000392 BOW George , ANDREW Charlotte, 30.12.1865
QBDM-MR-MF 1865 1865/000472 AH SUE Tommy, ANDREW Charlotte, 15.06.1865
QBDM-MR-MF 1865 1865/B001437 HEN DAN , SCOTT Ellen, 27.09.1865
QBDM-MR-MF 1865 1865/B001202 SANG John, MC IVOR Margaret, 10.02.1865
QBDM-MR-MF 1865 1865B/001236 YOUNG George, LONG Eliza, 22.03.1865
QBDM-MR-MF 1865 1865/000152 SIN WON Martin, GREEN Nancy , 28.08.1865
QBDM-MR-MF 1865 1865/000438 SAM Aimee, CASEY Harriet, 21.02.1865
QBDM-MR-MF 1865 1865/000617 SUE John, WATKINS Francis, 08.05.1865
QBDM-MR-MF 1865 1865/000121 GUAN, GREENWAY Ellen, 13.02.1865
QBDM-MR-MF 1865 435.65 ME SE , LEECH Suzanna , 1865
QBDM-MR-MF 1865 1865/000390 ANOAH Edward, KEE Mary 19.01.1865
QBDM-MR-MF 1866 1866/000582 JIM SAM LEE, LENEHAN Mary, 31.10.1866
QBDM-MR-MF 1866 1866/000662 GEE Jerran, COOK Lucy, 01.10.1866
QBDM-MR-MF 1866 1866/000630 ONGHEEN James, PICKTHORN Esther, 22.03.1866
QBDM-MR-MF 1866 1866/000565 AH FOO Jemmy VESSAY Evelina 23.10.1866
QBDM-MR-MF 1866 1866/000507 AH FUNG Jamie GORDON Mary Anne 16.07.1866
QBDM-MR-MF 1866 1866/000477 HEAT Daniel HE HON Elizabeth 23.04.1866
QBDM-MR-MF 1866 1866/000450 CUNNINGHAM Edward, KEE Fanny, 27.04.1866
QBDM-MR-MF 1866 1866/000445 PON SON, RITCHIE Margaret, 29.03.1866
QBDM-MR-MF 1866 1866/000563 SAM James, QUIN Ann, 13.10.1866
QBDM-MR-MF 1866 1866/000410 NUE HIRAM, DUGGAN Margaret , 22.09 1866
QBDM-MR-MF 1866 1866/000548 TEEFEY William, HOLLAND Ellen, 15.12.1866
QBDM-MR-MF 1867 1867/000150 MINON Peter, TAYLOR Agnes, 20.04.1867
QBDM-MR-MF 1867 1867/000458 AH MOOK, O’CONNOR Rose, 18.06.1867
QBDM-MR-MF 1867 1867/000086 JETT YOUNG, BROWN Mary, 09.03.1867
QBDM-MR-MF 1867 1867/000435 AH FOOK, MARTIN Mary-Ann, 20.03.1867
QBDM-MR-MF 1867 1867/000387 PIN John, KELLY Ellen, 18.01.1867
QBDM-MR-MF 1867 1867/000028 SEUNG RobertL, EHAN Mary, 20.01.1867
QBDM-MR-MF 1867 1867/000284 SHAY John, CATLING Ellen, 18.08.1867
QBDM-MR-MF 1867 1867/000189 YOU LIE , STANSFIELD Annie, 02.01.1867
QBDM-MR-MF 1867 1867/000173 TAN YAN, NALLY Ann, 10.01.1867
QBDM-MR-MF 1867 1867/000175 CHAN DAN, Mc GLOSKEY Margaret, 28.01.1867
QBDM-MR-MF 1867 23.67 LEUNG Robert, Mc LAUGHLIN Mary, 1867
QBDM-MR-MF 1867 1867/000210 SING John, RITCHIE Margaret, 5.02.1867
QBDM-MR-MF 1867 1867/000193 TONG DU, KENNOW Sarah, 16.04.1867
QBDM-MR-MF 1867 1867/000178 TONG O, SMITH Margaret, 28.03.1867
QBDM-MR-MF 1868 1868/000419 KIE Johnston , HARVEY Selina, 17.12.1867
QBDM-MR-MF 1868 1868/000547 SOWIE Tommy, FEGAN Bridget, 8.07.1868
QBDM-MR-MF 1868 1868/B002583 SYE John, SMITH Eliza, 20.11.1868
QBDM-MR-MF 1868 1868/000468 AH WAY, MENNING Minna, 1.07.1868
QBDM-MR-MF 1868 1868/000272 HONG Frederick , BOURKE Catherine, 1868
QBDM-MR-MF 1868 1868/000390 MOY James, GOOCH Charlotte, 10.11.1868
QBDM-MR-MF 1868 1868/000295 COONG YOUNG, GROVES Hannah, 15.04.1868
QBDM-MR-MF 1868 1868/000102 HOO TUNA, ROACH Bridget, 14.03.1868
QBDM-MR-MF 1868 1868/000599 TAMLYN W., RUDDLE Fanny, 10.12.1868
QBDM-MR-MF 1868 1868/000350 BUN James, LAWSON Rebecca, 12.11.1868
QBDM-MR-MF 1869 1869/000005 LEON CHONG Andrew, PIGGOTT Mary, 8.02.1869
QBDM-MR-MF 1869 1869/000573 YOUNG SAM , MANN Ellen, 18.10.1869
QBDM-MR-MF 1869 1869/000456 WAN CHAP W., WELSH Maria, 28.05.1869
QBDM-MR-MF 1869 283.69 SUE Jimmy, CONNOR Catherine, 1869
QBDM-MR-MF 1869 1869/000395 AH SUE George MILLSMary-Ann , 02.03.1869
QBDM-MR-MF 1869 1869/000104 SING John , HEFFERNAN Ellen, 10.06.1869
QBDM-MR-MF 1869 1869/000131 LUCK Samuel, SEWELL Mary, 14.09.1869
QBDM-MR-MF 1869 1869/000462 DAVIS William , SEE Ann, 20.06.1869
QBDM-MR-MF 1870 1870/B002928 ANG Charles, EVANS Margaret , 26.03.1870
QBDM-MR-MF 1870 1870/B002927 SING James, ROBERTSON Mary-Ann , 26.03.1870
QBDM-MR-MF 1870 1870/000518 JUNG ONG LI, JACOBS Emma , 15.07.1870
QBDM-MR-MF 1870 1870/000441 AH YOU W. HARRIS Catherine, 7.09.1870
QBDM-MR-MF 1870 1870/000067 AH DEEN W. FLYNN Catherine, 5.02.1870
QBDM-MR-MF 1870 1870/000298 GEE William, SHARP Kate, 28.08.1870
QBDM-MR-MF 1870 1870/000442 GONG SEE, KRAATZ Caroline, 20.09.1870
QBDM-MR-MF 1870 523.70 HONG Frederick, BURKE Catherine
QBDM-MR-MF 1871 1871/B003430 AH CHOW, BROWN Lily Mary, 12.12.1871
QBDM-MR-MF 1871 1871/B0003347 GNOON SEEN FUNG, CURRY Elizabeth, 5.09.1871
QBDM-MR-MF 1871 1871/B003152 MOODY W., HOW Julie Ann Keen, 12.01.1871
QBDM-MR-MF 1871 1871/B003300 ZILLMAN John, HOWS Ann M., 29.06.1871
QBDM-MR-MF 1871 1871/000297 GEE T. S., WILLMAN Elizabeth, 01.06.1871
QBDM-MR-MF 1871 1871/000091 KIM SANI LUNY, GIBSON Annie, 15.08.1871
QBDM-MR-MF 1871 1871/000595 SAMP SON, HEWITSON Sarah, 22.09.1871
QBDM-MR-MF 1871 1871/000145 TAY Thomas , HANNET Jemima, 6.7.1871
QBDM-MR-MF 1871 1871/000579 CHING SUE Charles, SHAW Maria, 20.09.1871
QBDM-MR-MF 1871 1871/000501 AH YIN, STEWART Sarah Jane, 26.04.1871
QBDM-MR-MF 1871 1871/000095 PEE SEE, BODDY Mary, 13.08.1871
QBDM-MR-MF 1871 1871/000591 SEE W., ROWLEY Mary Ann, 4.07.1871
QBDM-MR-MF 1871 1871/000102 LEE MAN, SCHOLFIELD Lucy, 23.09.1871
QBDM-MR-MF 1871 1871/000531 HING John Olsen, SIMENSEN Maren, 09.09.1871
QBDM-MR-MF 1872 1872/000531 TIN FOO, ARMSTRONG Mary Jane, 10.9.1872
QBDM-MR-MF 1872 1872/000414 MOE UNG HING George, WILKIE Christina, 27.10.1872
QBDM-MR-MF 1872 1872/000018 WATSON John, AH PAN Mary, 28.08.1872
QBDM-MR-MF 1872 1872/B003690 SAN YOU , MACHIN Mary, 30.9.1872
QBDM-MR-MF 1872 1872/000549 FOOK, ROBERTSON Elizabeth, 21.12.1872
QBDM-MR-MF 1872 1872/003041 AH KING William, EVANS Elizabeth, 03.08.1872
QBDM-MR-MF 1872 1872/000527 AH YOW Charles, GOYER Mary, 29.07.1872
QBDM-MR-MF 1872 1877/000719 LONG , LANNARTH Mary, 31.12.1877
QBDM-MR-MF 1872 1872/000310 JONG Jellie , BEYNON Elizabeth, 23.07.1872
QBDM-MR-MF 1872 1872/000591 UN SPECIFIED, DALLAGHIN Mary Ann, 27.02.1872
QBDM-MR-MF 1872 1872/000501 /SEE JONG , McGRATH Bridget, 11.04.1872
QBDM-MR-MF 1872 1872/000683 AH POO, MERCER Catherine, 07.12.1872
QBDM-MR-MF 1873 AH SHIN William, ANDERSON Margaretha, 15.09.1873
QBDM-MR-MF 1873 1873/B003786 AH TONG, FLETCHER Sarah, 1.01.1873
QBDM-MR-MF 1873 1873/B000933 LOO MENG, McKINLAY WOOD Mary, 8.05.1873
QBDM-MR-MF 1873 1873/000505 CHEW James, NEAL Jane, 26.12.1873
QBDM-MR-MF 1873 1873/B004067 LIHOU, PETIT Sophia, 26.07.1873
QBDM-MR-MF 1873 1873/B004045 SHUE George, FERRON Margaret , 27.08.1873
QBDM-MR-MF 1873 1873/000851 YAN John, RAY Anne Jane, 30.12.1873
QBDM-MR-MF 1873 1873/000725 ING YOUNG, SHOKAY Rebecca, 11.02.1873
QBDM-MR-MF 1873 1873/000924 PAGE John, KEONG Mary, 7.08.1873
QBDM-MR-MF 1873 1873/B004143 AH JOE Joseph, THORPE Frances, 30.10.1873
QBDM-MR-MF 1873 1873/000064 CEE/AH CHIT W., RYAN Mary, 5.09 1873
QBDM-MR-MF 1873 1873/000058 GHIT James, COLVIEALL Susan Ann, 10.07.1873
QBDM-MR-MF 1873 1873/000577 AH SING John, GLASER Emilie, 19.02.1973
QBDM-MR-MF 1873 1873/000633 AH GEE Thomas, HARVEY Fanny, 23.08.1873
QBDM-MR-MF 1873 1873/000044 LONG FOO J., HOWLING Sarah, 08.01.1873
QBDM-MR-MF 1873 1873/000040 FOM James, HURLEY Elizabeth, 1873
QBDM-MR-MF 1873 1873/000843 AHOY Allen, RYLE Jane, 20.11.1873
QBDM-MR-MF 1874 1874/000338 AH SAM Woold, PETERSON Mary, 08.01.1874
QBDM-MR-MF 1874 1874/B004210 PING Samuel, PARRON Jane, 1.01.1874
QBDM-MR-MF 1874 1874/B004310 HUGGER Owen, QUA Martha, 16.04.1874
QBDM-MR-MF 1874 1874/B004441 LONG SANG, ROBINSON Eliza, 26.07.1874
DM-MR-MF 1875 1875/000796 AH WAN Willie, GIBSON Ruth, 6.10.1875
QBDM-MR-MF 1875 252.75 YONG HIP, GREEN Sarah, J. 1875
QBDM-MR-MF 1875 1875/000857 AH HIN Jimmy, HARRIS Mary, 26.01.1875
QBDM-MR-MF 1875 1875/000749 AH MOI, MASON Emily Eleanor, 15.11.1875
QBDM-MR-MF 1875 1875/000306 WING James, SAYER Emma, 9.11.1875
QBDM-MR-MF 1875 1875/000124 CHING QUIE, TU YAN Mary Ellen, 28.09.1875
QBDM-MR-MF 1875 1875/000708 AH FOO, WARREN Phillis, 14.02.1875
QBDM-MR-MF 1876 1876/000305 HING WAUGH, O'HALLORAN Mary, 23.02.1876
QBDM-MR-MF 1876 1876/000117 LEN YOU, HUSSON Amelia, 26.12.1876
QBDM-MR-MF 1876 1876/000442 LAM PAN, McDONNELL Mary Jane, 8.08.1876
QBDM-MR-MF 1876 1876/000415 AH SUE William, FINN Ann, 8.01.1876
QBDM-MR-MF 1876 1876/004740 AP LEE SIN, SCHELKE Mina, 26.04.1876
QBDM-MR-MF 1876 1876/B004045 SHUE George, ELKIN Annie, 20.07.1876
QBDM-MR-MF 1876 1876/000509 AH POO Harry, BROWN Eliza, 3.05.1876
QBDM-MR-MF 1876 1876/000250 DON PON Charles, LINWOOD Eliza, 7.11.1876
QBDM-MR-MF 1876 1876/000908 YAP YAN, HARRIS Julia, 3.07.1876
QBDM-MR-MF 1876 1876/000685 MIN KIN, KEYES Suzannah, 4.03.1876
QBDM-MR-MF 1876 1876/000692 AH NEE Charles, EGAN Mary, 20.06.1876
QBDM-MR-MF 1876 1876/000073 AH SAM Tommy, O'DONNELL Rose, 9.06.1876
QBDM-MR-MF 1876 1876/000299 AH TONG, JONES Elizabeth, 2.10.1876
QBDM-MR-MF 1876 1876/000181 LOW YOU, REICHARDT Margaret, 22.01.1876
QBDM-MR-MF 1876 1876/000754 LUM QUIE, REID Sarah, 19.09.1876
QBDM-MR-MF 1876 35.76 CHRISTIE Robert, HOW Charlotte, 1879
QBDM-MR-MF 1877 1877/000138 AH LING, ROSE Julia Harriet, 25.09.1877
QBDM-MR-MF 1877 1877/B005217 SOY WANG, REACH Eliza, 1.04.1877
QBDM-MR-MF 1877 1877/B005834 TEW Arthur, LIPPIART Elizabeth, 18.11.1877
QBDM-MR-MF 1877 1877/B005655 AH GIN T., CULLUM Annette, 12.05.1877
QBDM-MR-MF 1877 1877/B005892 CHEN TOY C., CLARKE Esther, 20.12.1877
QBDM-MR-MF 1877 1877/B005558 WONG CHOW , CHAVASSE Francis Edith, 17.03.1877
QBDM-MR-MF 1877 1877/000396 AH YOUNG, COE Mary Anne, 13.12.1877
QBDM-MR-MF 1877 1877/000583 SING MON, PELON Elizabeth, 6.03.1877
QBDM-MR-MF 1877 893.77 TEE Adam, MYERS Mary Ann
QBDM-MR-MF 1877 1877/000049 SUE John, GOOEY Jenny, 10.02.1877
QBDM-MR-MF 1877 1877/000008 AH QUEY , SCOTT Emma, 3.10.1877
QBDM-MR-MF 1877 1877/000933 AH LEE, CHURCH Annie, 4.10.1877
QBDM-MR-MF 1877 A CHUM , TAYLOR Ann, 29.03.1877
QBDM-MR-MF 1877 1877/000947 CHOWN Thomas, GRIFFITHS Caroline, 18.12.1877
QBDM-MR-MF 1877 1877/00074 KIM W. J., HADDICK Sarah, 7.05.1877
QBDM-MR-MF 1878 1878/000098 CHEIN POW, PAN SHONG, 19.07.1878
QBDM-MR-MF 1878 1878/001042 AH CHING James, HADLEY Sarah, 7.05.1878
QBDM-MR-MF 1878 1878/000482 ROBERTS J. T. , AH PAN Elizbeth, 29.03.1878
QBDM-MR-MF 1878 1878/B006083 AH YOUNG, CONDLY Kate, 22.05.1878
QBDM-MR-MF 1878 1878/002348 LIHOU J., MOLONY Margaret , 21.09.1878
QBDM-MR-MF 1878 1878/000927 CRAVINO Emile, YAN Eliza , 3.09.1878
QBDM-MR-MF 1878 1878/000866 HERMAN J., SHO KAY Rebecca, 6.07.1878
QBDM-MR-MF 1878 1878/000066 WONG CHAN, HOY Sophie, 1.03.1878
QBDM-MR-MF 1878 1878/000166 AH CHOW, LEE Mary Elizabeth, 8.11.1878
QBDM-MR-MF 1878 1878 000752 AH WAN J., ARMSTRONG Margaret, 9.03.1878
QBDM-MR-MF 1878 1878/000214 SOP George , STERLING Mary M., 25.04.1878
QBDM-MR-MF 1878 1878/000325 SAM YET, COLLARD Bertha, 4.07.1878
QBDM-MR-MF 1878 1878/000648 TOM Jack, CAIL Maria , 5.09.1878
QBDM-MR-MF 1879 CHUNG CHANG, CHANG LIME, 3.04.1879
QBDM-MR-MF 1879 FONG SUE, AH LOW Chang Sue , 5. 07.1879
QBDM-MR-MF 1879 1879/B006605 DOHAN John von , HOW Harriet , 4.09.1879
QBDM-MR-MF 1879 1879/b006671 WING James, ENGLAND Caroline, 3.11.1879
QBDM-MR-MF 1879 1879/000926 AH DEE, PEARSON Elizabeth, 18.08.1879
QBDM-MR-MF 1879 1879/000968 SAM YOUNG , CONGDON Annie, 9.12.1879
QBDM-MR-MF 1879 1879/000969 KING YEEN, MATHEWS Margaret , 11.13/1879
QBDM-MR-MF 1879 1879/000931 AH MOY, WILTON Jane Ann, 11.09.1879
QBDM-MR-MF 1879 1879/000449 AH KOY James, O'CALLAGHAN Winifred, 10.11.1879
QBDM-MR-MF 1879 1879/000851 AH KWI John, HUBER Maria , 17.02.1879
QBDM-MR-MF 1879 1879/000993 HIP YOUNG, GREEN Sarah, 11.03.1879
QBDM-MR-MF 1879 1879/001008 LIMSON JIM KICHI, TANI Fanny, 12.01.1879
QBDM-MR-MF 1879 1879/000450 WING Charley, PAGE MaryAnn, 10.11.1879
QBDM-MR-MF 1879 730.79 MAH HOP, MULVERHILL Bridget, 1879
QBDM-MR-MF 1880 1880/B006754 GEE Robert Bromley, LEE Fanny, 6.01.1879
QBDM-MR-MF 1880 1880/000161 LEONG MUN , DONG SEE, 19.06.1880
QBDM-MR-MF 1880 1880/000162 JAK GEE, NEE HOW, 16.06.1880
QBDM-MR-MF 1880 1880/001071 HOO SING, THORPE Mary Nell, 19.05.1880
QBDM-MR-MF 1880 1880/000579 SAM Jimmy, PING Jane Clare , 11.09/1880
QBDM-MR-MF 1880 1880/001047 AH TONG , MULLIGAN Annie , 8.10.1879
QBDM-MR-MF 1880 1880/000126 AH LONG , O'BRIAN Bridget , 22.08.1880
QBDM-MR-MF 1880 1880/000581 SHAY John, BROWN Mary-Ann, 08.01.1880
QBDM-MR-MF 1881 1881/000114 AH HEE, COOEY Louisa, 29.03.1881
QBDM-MR-MF 1881 1881/001267 WONG FONG, DOLAN Maggie , 01.04.1881
QBDM-MR-MF 1881 1881/001109 SEE Harry, LORD Lucy, 10.01.1881
QBDM-MR-MF 1881 1881/000159 AH CUM Tommy, KEYES Alice, 08.02.1881
QBDM-MR-MF 1881 1881/001051 SING YEEN WAH, LAURIE Annie , 21.05.1881
QBDM-MR-MF 1881 1881/000173 SAM James, STRINGER Harriet, 30.07.1881
QBDM-MR-MF 1881 1881/001271 SAM WAH, DONNELY Delia , 18.09.1881
QBDM-MR-MF 1881 1881/000286 SING Johnnie, SAM Mary, 14.02.1881
QBDM-MR-MF 1881 1881/000817 CHOW Peter, JENSEN Annie, 11.02.1881
QBDM-MR-MF 1881 1881/000879 AH BUN T., HACKER Winifred, 08.09.1881
QBDM-MR-MF 1881 1881/000095 TYNG Jim , REWATA Annie, 05.11.1881
QBDM-MR-MF 1881 1202.81 TOY Albert, HASE Esther Rebecca, 1881
QBDM-MR-MF 1881 1881/000291 TIN WAH, PUNSHON Ellen, 08.09.1881
QBDM-MR-MF 1882 1882/000253 AH BUE, SCOTT BROWN Margaret, 02.07.1882
QBDM-MR-MF 1882 1882/000837 SIN PUE, COBLEY Bessie, 19.09.1882
QBDM-MR-MF 1882 1882/001235 SING YEEN WAH, FORSTER SMITH Mary-Ann,
24.07.1882
QBDM-MR-MF 1882 1882/000312 AH SHUE, TUCKER Mary, 29.11.1882
QBDM-MR-MF 1882 1882/000281 CHIN PACK, JU SIN, 16.05.1882
QBDM-MR-MF 1882 1882/000296 AH COW, CHING HOW, 3.10.1882
QBDM-MR-MF 1882 1882/000314 AH CHUNG, SCARISBRICK Fanny, 30.12.1882
QBDM-MR-MF 1882 1882/001195 SEE CHONG HOMES, SMITH Grace Gallant,
21.02.1882
QBDM-MR-MF 1882 1882/B007960 CHONG BOW, KING Emily-Jane, 6.10.1882
QBDM-MR-MF 1882 1882/B007878 MENG John, KELLY Bridget, 15.08.1882
QBDM-MR-MF 1882 1882/001326 TONG KUE F., CLARKE Harriett, 12.08.1882
QBDM-MR-MF 1882 1882/000727 BASKET J., AH PAN Catherine, 21.09.1882
QBDM-MR-MF 1882 1882/001426 FUN Joseph, WARD Mary, 19.10.1882
QBDM-MR-MF 1882 1882/000905 QUEY LANG, RICHARDSON Jane, 20.12.1882
QBDM-MR-MF 1882 455.82 BEATZ Julius E., MING Elizabeth, 1882
QBDM-MR-MF 1882 1882/000320 LYE Charles, WYNN Minnie, 28.07.1882
QBDM-MR-MF 1882 1882/000158 PHOW, GOVEY Lucy, 19.04.1882
QBDM-MR-MF 1882 1882/000238 AH KYONG, CHRISTENSEN Else, 06.02.1882
QBDM-MR-MF 1883 1883/000310 AH YOU James, SOMMERVILLE Agnes, 09.10.1883
QBDM-MR-MF 1883 1883/000451 LEE CHONG, FOWLER Elizabeth, 07.05.1883
QBDM-MR-MF 1883 1883/000294 CAN TING J., VAUGHAN Ellen, 05.06.1883
QBDM-MR-MF 1883 1883/000354 WOOD James, LING Joanna, 23.09.1883
QBDM-MR-MF 1883 1883/001637 SUE James, HOW-CHONG Agnes , 08.05.1883
QBDM-MR-MF 1883 1883/001590 AH SUE J., O'DWYER Bridget , 15.01.1883
QBDM-MR-MF 1883 1883/001010 KONG BOW, DOYLE Rose, 4.12.1883
QBDM-MR-MF 1883 1883/B008382 HOW Joseph, HOWES Mary, 14.07.1883
QBDM-MR-MF 1883 1883/B008172 CAMPBELL William, CHUE Harriet Jane, 2.03.1883
QBDM-MR-MF 1883 KOCHO Joseph , SPALDING Sarah Jane, 17.10.1883
QBDM-MR-MF 1883 1883/B003286 CHONGHAI, O'DONNELL Norah, 23.05.1883
QBDM-MR-MF 1883 1883/001426 SING John , PUGH Mary Ann, 09.07.1883
QBDM-MR-MF 1883 1883/000255 McKenzie Robert, ANG WONG Frances Madeline,
22.04.1883
QBDM-MR-MF 1883 1883/000051 AH DEN Jimmy, GARN Hanna Elizabeth, 05.03.1883
QBDM-MR-MF 1883 1265.83 SIBLEY John C., MEE Jane Maude ,1883
QBDM-MR-MF 1883 1883/000394 OPHIR John, KIM Sarah, 13.12.1883
QBDM-MR-MF 1883 1883/001623 TEN WAH, GODDEN Emily, 3.04.1883
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/000333 AH HOIN/ AH HONG, LOTHIAN Jane, 21.03.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/000348 AH CHOW, CHURCHER Annie, 10.05.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/001886 LEE WAH SHANG, NOON Jane, 21.02 1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/000902 NICHOLSON Jens Christian, AH CHIN Martha Ann,
20.12.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/000317 LONG THEE/ LONG KEE, AH LUK, 05.01.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/000387 HANN Charley, SULLIVAN Mary Josephine, 4.12.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/000341 AH CHUNG, SCARISBRICK Fanny, 20.04.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/001445 TAM GEE KEE, HANG FANN, 28.07.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/000321 YET HOY/YET FOY, AH HO/LUK YET HO,
17.01.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/000858 LAM PAN W., MALONEY Sarah, 08.07.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/001700 AH PONG , AH SEE, 14.02.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/001753 LONG KEY, CUDDEFORD Amelia Sarah, 14.05.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/001712 FEE/FIE/FOY Tommy, MAY Catherine, 10.3.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/000391 LIN HEE Tom, PATTERSON Jessie Ann , 24.12.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/000873 KUM SING, FEENDELY Mary, 09.09.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/001649 CHI Henry, OLE Mary Annie, 28.07.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/B008962 SING KING, WHELAN Ellen, 02.06.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/000448 AH SAM , SMITH Unity, 28.06.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/001200 MAH HING, KOK SEE, 21.05.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/000176 PING John /JONG PING, DEIAN Mary Jane, 15.10.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/000180 CHAY John, DAVIS Elizabeth, 31.12.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/001666 AH SUE, NEWMAN Bridget, 12.12.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/001735 LING Henry, THOMPSON Jessie, 12.04.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/000521 SEE/YOUNG SEECharles, DIBBLES Catherine,
05.07.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/000464 NG OUIE William, SPAWTON Zillah, 21.01.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/001679 NEE James, DAVIS Elizabeth, 1.01.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/001914 HOLMES Henry Ambrose, SUE Mary, 4.11.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/000014 SEE Charles, BASSETT Ann, 04.10.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1884 1884/001582 LOU Edward, RIORDAN Mary Margaret, 08.10.1884
QBDM-MR-MF 1885 1885/001315 AH /LETT Charles, PAYNE Martha Mitchell 28.01.1885
QBDM-MR-MF 1885 1885/000339 QUANN TIM John, LOO SING Jane, 16.06.1885
QBDM-MR-MF 1885 1885/001829 TAYLOR Albert, AH PAN Agnes, 30.07.1885
QBDM-MR-MF 1885 AH CHEE William, HOLLAND Annie, 14.07.1885
QBDM-MR-MF 1885 1885/001808 SIP TOM /TOM TIP, AH FOO/ AH FOOK, 08.06.1885
QBDM-MR-MF 1885 1885/000162 AH SING Jim, BLACK Mary, 07.05.1885
QBDM-MR-MF 1885 1885/B009815 AH THOI, CARLYLE Caroline, 13.07.1885
QBDM-MR-MF 1885 1885/000510 LI YOU AH, GIN Annette, 1885
QBDM-MR-MF 1885 1885/000199 GUIE SAM, HOOPER Isabella, 3.10.1885
QBDM-MR-MF 1885 1885/001736 AH SEE, DUNN Maggie/Margaret, 1.05.1885
QBDM-MR-MF 1885 1885/001286 CHEU /CHEN LOW, GRAY/SAY Emma Jane,
8.08.1885
QBDM-MR-MF 1885 729/85 LEE Charles, DATSON Kezia Jane, 1885
QBDM-MR-MF 1885 1885/001958 FOO SAM, LOCK Hannah, 24.02.1885
QBDM-MR-MF 1885 1885/000118 AH SHEW, MARTIN Alice, 24.12.1885
QBDM-MR-MF 1885 1885/001223 BENG Thomas, KINANE Bridget, 12.01.1885
QBDM-MR-MF 1885 1885/001516 CHOWNE Walter, FORRESTER Emmeline, 26.11.1885
QBDM-MR-MF 1885 1885/001117 AH GOON, LOY Minnie, 24.08.1885
QBDM-MR-MF 1885 1885/000094 CHONG QUORK William, O'GORMAN Mary
31.03.1885
QBDM-MR-MF 1885 1885/001980 SEE Thomas, COCKING Elizabeth Jane, 10.06.1885
QBDM-MR-MF 1886 1886/000020 SMITH William Henry, YOUNG SING Adeline Mary,
31.12.1885
QBDM-MR-MF 1886 1886/001023 QUONG KEE/ KWONG KEE, DYKES Elizabeth,
15.11.1886
QBDM-MR-MF 1886 1886/001808 SING DAK Thomas, CROFTON Louisa, 13.12.1886
QBDM-MR-MF 1886 1886/000876 AH SOU/AH SUE James, HARSTOFF Alice Maria,
14.08.1886
QBDM-MR-MF 1886 1886/001655 AH CHING Charles, CRANG Agnes, 20.01.1886
QBDM-MR-MF 1886 1886/001478 AH YOUNG Tommy, CHUE QUEE Lucy, 13.05.1886
QBDM-MR-MF 1886 1886/001812 VIRACHT John Herman, LING Jessie, 24.12.1886
QBDM-MR-MF 1886 1886/000038 AH SAM, EGAN Bridget, 14.09.1886
QBDM-MR-MF 1886 1886/000005 CHINN William Henry, SMITH Louisa Mary, 7.07.1886
QBDM-MR-MF 1886 830.86 CHICK William Walter, FARENDEN Mary, 1886
QBDM-MR-MF 1886 1463.86 LEE William, WOODHOUSE Isabelle, 1886
QBDM-MR-MF 1886 587.86 LEE Henry, DALE Margaret Jane, 1886
QBDM-MR-MF 1886 1886/000672 GEE William, MARSH Rachael, 8.03.1886
QBDM-MR-MF 1886 1886/001536 SING, BANKS Sarah, 13.09.1886
QBDM-MR-MF 1886 1886/001727 QUEE LAU, AH YING, 22.05.1886
QBDM-MR-MF 1886 1886/001302 POULSON Frederick Lovell, CHOWN Lucy Caroline
16.01.1886
QBDM-MR-MF 1886 1887/000905 AH PAN Henry Joseph, TAYLOR Marion, 12.01.1888
QBDM-MR-MF 1887 1887/000279 JAN BUNG CHONG, PLUMMER Harriett, 15.08.1887
QBDM-MR-MF 1887 1887/000976 WILKE John, WAN CHAP Mary Jane, 23.06.1887
QBDM-MR-MF 1887 1887/001635 LEWIN AH NIN/NIN LEWIN, SPARROW Grace
25.05.1887
QBDM-MR-MF 1887 1887/001016 SUN LEE SING/ LIM LEE SING/LEE SING Thomas,
HERLIHY Mary, 22.09.1887
QBDM-MR-MF 1887 1887/001750 AH SANG / AH SANGE, WHITE/ WHYTE Mary,
14.09.1887
QBDM-MR-MF 1887 1887/002016 AH FOU /AH FON James, MEACHAM Catherine,
31.08.1887
QBDM-MR-MF 1887 1887/B011329 YOU SAN, FORDHAM Annie, 21.03.1887
QBDM-MR-MF 1887 1887/000714 LEONG FOO, BUCKLER Elizabeth, 12.10.1887
QBDM-MR-MF 1887 1887/000023 SAM WAH, SHEPHERD Mary, 7.12.1887
QBDM-MR-MF 1887 1887/000238 APPO SAM , SINGH Alice, 13.06.1887
QBDM-MR-MF 1887 1887/001945 LOKHIN /LOK LIN, WATSON Daisy, 5.12.1887
QBDM-MR-MF 1887 1887/001769 GEE AH GEE Charles , RANDALL Harriet Sarah,
14.09.1887
QBDM-MR-MF 1887 1887/000069 MING WONG , GASCOINE Elizabeth, 13.01.1887
QBDM-MR-MF 1887 1887/001719 WAH HANG William, HELMSLEY FAIRFIELD Eliza
3.11.1887
QBDM-MR-MF 1888 1888/000435 WATSON William, AH WAY Kate , 01.03.1888
QBDM-MR-MF 1888 1888/000469 LIN CHONG/TIN CHONG, PARKER Annie, 21.12.1888
QBDM-MR-MF 1888 1888/000178 HARSTOFF Louis John Frederick, AH SUE Ellen
19.07.1888
QBDM-MR-MF 1888 1888/002223 MIN ON Joseph, AH SUE Elizabeth, 29.10.1888
QBDM-MR-MF 1888 1888/000689 LEE QUONG Alfred, JINKS Ada Elizabeth, 18.12.1888
QBDM-MR-MF 1888 1888/B02209 POCKINGTON Frank, HOW Miriam Julia Hinton, 1888
QBDM-MR-MF 1888 1888/B012620 SING CHOW George, AH NEE Jinny, 9.09.1888
QBDM-MR-MF 1888 1888/B012187 AH QUEE Walter, SMITH Margaret, 13.03.1888
QBDM-MR-MF 1888 1888/B0123369 KEONG Patrick Benjamin, ALLENS Caroline Amelia,
28.05.1888
QBDM-MR-MF 1888 1888/000515 AH John Charles, MOORE Kathleen, 11.06.1888
QBDM-MR-MF 1888 1834.88 AY LING Alfred George, STUBBINGS Kate, 1888
QBDM-MR-MF 1888 1888/000469 WAH CHONG, WERNICK Lillian Von, 10.07.1888
QBDM-MR-MF 1888 1888/001056 GEE George Henry, CLOCK Margaret Pringle,
22.12.1888
QBDM-MR-MF 1888 1888/001065 CHING Philip Michelmore, WILTSHIRE Ellen,
5.01.1888
QBDM-MR-MF 1888 1888/002089 CAMPBELL Alexander, QUEE Elizabeth , 13.02.1888
QBDM-MR-MF 1888 193.88 LEE Francis, LONG Elizabeth, 1888
QBDM-MR-MF 1888 1888/0002007 GRAY Thomas, CHAY Helen, 18.01.1888
QBDM-MR-MF 1888 1888/001006 TAYLOR Tomas , CHINN Violet, 8.08.1888
QBDM-MR-MF 1888 1888/000677 TUCK GWY Willie, WHITTLE Sarah Jane, 31.10.1888
QBDM-MR-MF 1888 1888/000235 GOR EN, SUEY Jane, 14.11.1888
QBDM-MR-MF 1889 1889/002161 CHING DO William, LEEDS Annie, 4.12.1889
QBDM-MR-MF 1889 1101.89 AH YOUNG, STEPHENSON Elizabeth, 1889
QBDM-MR-MF 1889 1889/000397 TAM George, WHITMAN Emily Kate, 21.09.1889
QBDM-MR-MF 1889 1889/002089 AH JOY Thomas, ROBERTSON Catherine, 15.06.1889
QBDM-MR-MF 1889 1889/001304 AH FOO, COWLAND Elizabeth, 4.09.1889
QBDM-MR-MF 1889 1889/001100 TAYLOR John, AH PAN Mary Ann, 16.05.1889
QBDM-MR-MF 1889 1889/000200 RIGBY William Henry, AH SUE Mary Jane, 23.12.1889
QBDM-MR-MF 1889 1889/B000038 SAM YIN TATHAM Annie 30.01.1889
QBDM-MR-MF 1889 1889/B013232 MAK Robert, WAI Ellen, 29.04.1889
QBDM-MR-MF 1889 1889/B013471 YOUNG Ernest Alfred, LEONARD Everslie Ada,
13.08.1889
QBDM-MR-MF 1889 SPEARITT Arthur, AH WHY Ellen, 1889
QBDM-MR-MF 1889 1889/000547 YEO Charles, SIN WON Esther, 3.07.1889
QBDM-MR-MF 1889 1889/001937 TONG SING, SEE YOUNG BOW, 23.07.1889
QBDM-MR-MF 1889 1889/001787 AH SING, PETERS Nikolena, 8.03.1889
QBDM-MR-MF 1889 1889/000744 ROWE Henry, ONGHEEN Mary Jane , 08.10.1889
QBDM-MR-MF 1889 1889/000646 LOW GINN James, COREY Annie Elizabeth, 28.10.1889
QBDM-MR-MF 1890 301.9 CHOW YIP Harry, ECCLES Sarah Ann, 1890
QBDM-MR-MF 1890 1890/001433 AH GEE, AH SUM/AH CUM, 16.08.1890
QBDM-MR-MF 1890 1890/001397 AH TIE /AH TYE, TIE YEE / TYE TEE, 15.03.1890
QBDM-MR-MF 1890 216.9 AH SING Charles, PUNNETT Margaret Jane, 1890
QBDM-MR-MF 1890 1890/000435 PAN AH WAY/PANG AH WAY, GOODWILLIE Jane,
20.08.1890
QBDM-MR-MF 1890 1890/001277 AH SING Charlie, LINTON Elizabeth, 19.11.1890
QBDM-MR-MF 1890 1890/B14545 AH FOOE Tommy, POWER Bridget, 12.11.1890
QBDM-MR-MF 1890 1890/002207 AH CHIN, THOMPSON Jane Simpson, 19.12.1890
QBDM-MR-MF 1890 1890/001882 AH CHONG, YIN Elizabeth Isabella, 1890
QBDM-MR-MF 1890 1890/002141 AH CHOW, TOWNSEND Emily, 25.06.1890
QBDM-MR-MF 1890 1890/001406 AH FOO, RITCHIE Charlotte, 9.05.1890
QBDM-MR-MF 1890 1987.9 AH FOO Henry , PRICE Sarah, 1890
QBDM-MR-MF 1890 1890/000752 AH GEE, BINGHAM Jeanie, 27.05.1890
QBDM-MR-MF 1890 1890/000752 WAY Ernest William, RUTHERFORD Sarah, 27.05.1890
QBDM-MR-MF 1890 1890/000089 AH HEA William Joseph, WALL Kate, 2.03.1890
QBDM-MR-MF 1890 1890/000150 AH KEET /LEES, STONE Julia 19.11.1890
QBDM-MR-MF 1890 1947.9 AH MAT, PARA, 1890
QBDM-MR-MF 1890 1319.9 LEE KEE, WELSH Anorah Beatrice, 1890
QBDM-MR-MF 1890 333.9 LOW SING, MORRISSY Bridget, 1890
QBDM-MR-MF 1890 760.9 COW LONG, KILDAY Elizabeth, 1890
QBDM-MR-MF 1891 1891/000352 LOOK HOP/LEE LOUK HOP, AH BOW Eliza Jane,
05.06.1891
QBDM-MR-MF 1891 2142.91 MOOK GOW Henry, POW Mary C.K. , 1891
QBDM-MR-MF 1891 1891/001846 AH WANG, SAVAGE Annie, 03.06.1891
QBDM-MR-MF 1891 1891/001850 WATUNABO TAKEO, AH YAH Katie, 31.07.1891
QBDM-MR-MF 1891 1891/001521 AH ZON/ AH YON, JACK Maria, 13.07.1891
QBDM-MR-MF 1891 609.91 CHING KUM/ WONG KUM CHING, SWEET Alice
1891
QBDM-MR-MF 1891 1358.91 HONG John, MEIR Mary, 1891
QBDM-MR-MF 1891 1797.91 FAT GIE Tommy, SHEPHERD Eliza, 1891
QBDM-MR-MF 1891 1891/001192 AH QUI, BROWN Julia, 8.08.1891
QBDM-MR-MF 1891 100.91 WONG CHONG, GRIGGS Sabrina, 1891
QBDM-MR-MF 1891 127.91 SEE James, TREVOR Eliza, 1891
QBDM-MR-MF 1891 1891/001190 AH CHONG Willie , O'BRIAN Mary, 29.7.1891
QBDM-MR-MF 1891 178.91 LAW SHUNG Tommy, O'REILLY Mary, 1891
QBDM-MR-MF 1891 315.91 YEE LEE Tommy, COX Eliza, 1891
QBDM-MR-MF 1891 1751.91 DING YAH, MARTIN Eleanor M., 1895
QBDM-MR-MF 1892 916.92 YORK SAM, LANGER Augusta Emma, 1892
QBDM-MR-MF 1892 1806 SAM NEE, HENRY Ada , 1892
QBDM-MR-MF 1892 1877 WAY GUM, ELLIOTT Eva Sarah Sophia, 1892
QBDM-MR-MF 1892 1291 CHUNG Thomas , WILLIAMS Lydia, 1892
QBDM-MR-MF 1892 882.92 AH FOO Charley/ SUM KUM WAH, McENROE Kate
4.04.1892
QBDM-MR-MF 1892 1041.92 FONG SAM, McKEY Mary Ann, 1892
QBDM-MR-MF 1892 1892/B015631 AH CHONG TOM, WILLIAMS Margaret Ellen, 1892
QBDM-MR-MF 1892 1406.92 JOE DUCK George, CAMPBELL Sophia Margaret, 1892
QBDM-MR-MF 1892 1381 LEE TUCK Charley, ANDERSON Catherine, 1892
QBDM-MR-MF 1892 166 LUM SING, MEACOCK Cecilia Eliza Marton, 1892
QBDM-MR-MF 1892 1892/001650 AH POO Henry Jublow, WHITMAN Elizabeth Ellen,
16.05.1892
QBDM-MR-MF 1892 1956 AH WAH, CARR Mary, 1892
QBDM-MR-MF 1892 29 DUE CHOO, YOUNG Emma, 1892
QBDM-MR-MF 1892 476 MOY Peter, RYAN Hannah, 1892
QBDM-MR-MF 1892 441 LOY TIN, MULLANEY Annie, 1892
QBDM-MR-MF 1892 1185.93 WAY Walter Edwin, WRIGHT Maggie Bell, 1892
QBDM-MR-MF 1892 1357.93 YIN WAH, HOPS Bridget, 1892
QBDM-MR-MF 1892 1050.93 YONG Tommy, COSTELLO Mary, 1892
QBDM-MR-MF 1892 1278.93 YOW Joseph, ISSOAN Eliza, 1892
QBDM-MR-MF 1893 123.93 CHOW YUEN, BYRNES Ellenor, 1893
QBDM-MR-MF 1893 264.93 KING QUONG YOCK/ QUAN YOCK, KING CASTELL
Emma May/ Mary Castell, 1893
QBDM-MR-MF 1893 1077.93 QUE SEE Thomas, BOWE Elizabeth, 1893
QBDM-MR-MF 1893 956.93 SUN KLINE KEE, BOATWRIGHT Minnie, 1893
QBDM-MR-MF 1893 1680.93 SAM YOUNG , HENNESSY Katherine, 11.11.1893
QBDM-MR-MF 1893 1644.93 LEUNG KING NAM, CHUN A YEE/ AYEE, 1893
QBDM-MR-MF 1893 152.93 LUM KING CROWE Polly 1893
QBDM-MR-MF 1893 1893/000478 AH DOY, CLARKE Delia, 6.02.1893
QBDM-MR-MF 1893 1893/000080 AH GEE, FOWLER Anne Louise, 4.05.1893
QBDM-MR-MF 1893 1893/001533 AH QUIN, HUN Margaret , 22.06.1893
QBDM-MR-MF 1893 1911.93 FRUITY JUNG/JANG FUTTY, PARKER Margaret
1893
QBDM-MR-MF 1893 1613.93 LING Wilfred Henry, TRIFFITT Margaret Louisa, 1893
QBDM-MR-MF 1893 1569.93 CHIEN, LLOYD Kate, 1893
QBDM-MR-MF 1893 993.93 MEE, BARRETT Lizzie, 1893
QBDM-MR-MF 1893 1893/001084 WILLIAMS Charles, AH PAN Marion, 6.12 .1893
QBDM-MR-MF 1893 1893/000197 GILMOUR Peter, AH SUE Sarah Emily, 27.05.1893
QBDM-MR-MF 1894 1894/000382 AH SHAY, Charles CAMERON Ada, 17.09.1894
QBDM-MR-MF 1894 660.94 CHUN TIE, YUEN QUI FA, 1894
QBDM-MR-MF 1894 438.94 WONG HING George, SMALES Elizabeth, 1894
QBDM-MR-MF 1894 1615.94 CHEW James, JONES Asenath C. , 1894
QBDM-MR-MF 1894 1768.94 CHOWN Harry, STILLMAN Fanny S., 1894
QBDM-MR-MF 1894 319.94 SAM LAY QUE, CARTER Margaret, 1894
QBDM-MR-MF 1894 1624.94 TONG SEE William, MINKIN Suzannah H., 1894
QBDM-MR-MF 1894 1894/001910 PHILLIPS John, AH YOU Fanny, 2.10.1894
QBDM-MR-MF 1895 447.95 LOW CHONG William, CASEY Lizzie, 1895
QBDM-MR-MF 1895 1895/001295 AH YUEN, STEEL Mary Ellen Victoria, 3.07.1895
QBDM-MR-MF 1895 1895/001126 BURBRIDGE James, AH MOOK Margaret, 16.06.1895
QBDM-MR-MF 1895 102.95 YEUN CHAN Willie/CHAN YAN, JEFFERY Alice M.,
1895
QBDM-MR-MF 1895 1895/001331 AH CHIN Jimmy , BOOT Hannah M., 16.11.1895
QBDM-MR-MF 1895 1139.95 AH LUM Charles, FINNISEY Eugene R., 1895
QBDM-MR-MF 1895 509.95 MOW WONG, DICKINSON Emily, 1895
QBDM-MR-MF 1895 1895/000195 DOYLE Alfred Harford, AH SUE Isabella, 22.12.1895
QBDM-MR-MF 1895 1895/000019 CAMERON Peter, AFFOO Annie Maria, 8.06.1895
QBDM-MR-MF 1896 1896/001095 PARR William Richard, AH MOOK Mary Jane,
19.07.1896
QBDM-MR-MF 1896 430.96 SUM CHEW /LUM CHEW William, ARCHIE Harriet.
1896
QBDM-MR-MF 1896 972.96 DE LONG Thomas, WALSH Mary A., 1896
QBDM-MR-MF 1896 1896/001306 AH YOUNG/AH YUN, COLING/COOLING Mary Ann,
23.05.1896
QBDM-MR-MF 1896 1896/000759 AH WUN, WATT Sarah T., 4.05.1896
QBDM-MR-MF 1896 1896/002067 AH SAM , HUGHES Ester Jane , 27.02.1896
QBDM-MR-MF 1896 1896/000216 WARWICK Robert, AH SUE Emma, 22.01.1896
QBDM-MR-MF 1896 1896/001764 BARRY John Michael, AH YOU Eliza, 17.09.1896
QBDM-MR-MF 1897 1897/000002 McINERNEY Peter, AFFOO Mary Ann, 26.12.1896
QBDM-MR-MF 1897 1897/000302 LEONG/AH LEONG /LEE LEONG, SAM CHEUNG
Mary, 12.06.1897
QBDM-MR-MF 1897 1897/001071 AH HEE William, BAILEY Mary R. (Rodda),22.02.1897
QBDM-MR-MF 1897 1897/001095 BALL Samuel, AH CHIN Louisa, 13.04.1897
QBDM-MR-MF 1897 1891.97 LEON KING NAM, WONG SAM, 1897
QBDM-MR-MF 1897 1887.97 ON TONG Charley, POWER Katie, 1897
QBDM-MR-MF 1897 1666.97 GUN MOON, REVIERIE Beatrice M., 1897
QBDM-MR-MF 1897 1897/001317 AH FAT MORKS, HOLLANDS Birdalane, 3.06.1897
QBDM-MR-MF 1898 898.98 YOUNG James, DYKES Bella, 1898
QBDM-MR-MF 1898 C224 AH MOY/KOM MOYJimmy, MOOROONABE Violet,
8.07.1898
QBDM-MR-MF 1898 1898/000210 AH SAM, LOUIE, 13.06.1898
QBDM-MR-MF 1898 1898/000218 SAM AH BOW, MAGINMARM Opal, 14.11.1898
QBDM-MR-MF 1898 1898/000221 AH MOI Jimmy, Maggie, 8.08.1898
QBDM-MR-MF 1898 1898/001174 RAISCH Gottlob, AH MOOK Catherine Lilly, 23.04.1898
QBDM-MR-MF 1898 B19033 AH FOO Henry Sydney, MURPHY Katherine Aline, 1898
QBDM-MR-MF 1898 1898/B019547 AH MOY, WARBY Esther, 26.10.1898
QBDM-MR-MF 1898 1898/000649 WAY DICK William, AH POON Agnes, 10.08.1898
QBDM-MR-MF 1898 1898/001960 AH YOUNG Tommy, WEYFAR/WEYFER Maria,
24.11.1898
QBDM-MR-MF 1898 1898/001914 AH SIN Joseph, MUTCH/MORNING/MITCH Annie,
23.11.1898
QBDM-MR-MF 1898 1898/002262 JOYCE Peter, AH YON Mary, 09.07.1898
QBDM-MR-MF 1898 1898/000213 AH HOUSSAN, Dolly, 25.05.1898
QBDM-MR-MF 1898 315 CHIN CHOY, MULGRAM Nelly, 1898
QBDM-MR-MF 1898 1898/001801 AH QUEE , AH FOO Rosie , 30.03.1898
QBDM-MR-MF 1898 1898/000212 AH QUAY, Annie , 27.05.1898
QBDM-MR-MF 1898 1898/000062 TAYLOR Walter , AH WAN Elizabeth Annie, 3.02.1898
QBDM-MR-MF 1899 347 PANG YOUNG/ Pang Muen Young, BEECHLEY Annie,
1899
QBDM-MR-MF 1899 1899/001432 MITCHELL Patrick, AH CHIN Sarah, 22.11.1899
QBDM-MR-MF 1899 1899/5.000242 AH KEE James NG KEE, YET FOY Margaret,
4.10.1899
QBDM-MR-MF 1899 1899/000375 MUNSON, AH BOW Ellen Bridget Florence, 14.03.1899
QBDM-MR-MF 1899 1899/000232 AH FONG , Lizzie, 2.06.1899
QBDM-MR-MF 1899 LEE KOO, SEE CHONG HOMES Elizabeth, 3.6.1899
QBDM-MR-MF 1899 1899/000514 AH LONG Thomas, DON PON Eliza, 7.11.1899
QBDM-MR-MF 1899 1899/001988 AFFOO James Henry, JONES Elizabeth, 4.02.1899
QBDM-MR-MF 1899 1899/000162 AHMAT Charlie, JOHNSON Bridget, 15.06.1899
QBDM-MR-MF 1900 1900/000218 AH MOOK John, KASHIYAMA Onatsu, 15.05.1900
QBDM-MR-MF 1900 1900/001247 LIMKIN Edgar Victor, AH MOOK Mary Jane,
11.03.1900
QBDM-MR-MF 1900 1900/001214 GORISS George Francisco, AH Fie 24.01.1900
QBDM-MR-MF 1900 1900/001301 GEE WAH, TI YU, 28.06.1900
QBDM-MR-MF 1900 1900/002155 HOR LIN SING, AH BOW, 07.09.1900
QBDM-MR-MF 1900 1900/B000201 AH FOO Charles Frederick, TIDY Harriet Elizabeth
28.03.1900
QBDM-MR-MF 1900 1900/000032 BAUER Joseph Anton, AH WAN Florence Maud
25.10.1900
QBDM-MR-MF 1900 1900/001971 HIE SAM, MARSHALL Katherine Caroline , 07.02.1900
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/000279 CHEN FONG YAN , AH HEE Georgina, 29.07.1901
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/000283 O'NEILL Joseph, AH CHING Cornelia Daisy Harris,
21.08.1901
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/000288 SUN SHUM LEE, HEE SUM, 12.06.1901
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/000296 CHAN TINCHIN, TINAH YIN , 7.10.1901
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/000285 AH LIN Jimmy, MA SEE, 26.08.1901
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/001036 GOON GOO, Kitty , 04.10.1901
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/000270 TOM SEE POY/TAAM SZE PUI, TUE CHUNG HAN
SEE /POY CHIU CHAN HAN, 01.07.1901
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/000166 AH MAN, Lucy , 04.03.1901
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/000449 AH YOU Jimmy, AH GOW Lillie, 18.10.1901
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/B001463 FOOK MEE FOOK, MOON QUEN /QUIN, 28.11.1901
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/000454 AH NUM, Maggie, 16.12.1901
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/001478 SEE SAM KEE, CASEY Theresa, 02.04.1901
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/B001464 SHOW PAN, FONG SEE, 27.11.1901
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/B001308 QUAY SUE WAH, CHOONG TONG HING, 11.09.01
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/B000870 CHAN MARK William, AH GIN Margaret Jane
25.02.1901
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/000140 CHING SUM / C.S. HOP KEE, SIN SEE, 06.12.1901
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/001417 BUE OM BUE/OM BUE, FENNER Charlotte Bertha,
16.01.1901
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/000282 KUM YUCK Tommy, LUM SEE, 15.08.1901
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/002357 SAM LAN , Fanny, 1.10.1901
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/000840 KEE Charlie, MEE HOW, 23.09.1901
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/000061 POON Charley, TANNA Mina, 05.02.01
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/000895 McLEOD Alexander, AH CHAY Loretto, 2.04.1901
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/001940 AH LIM, LONG Maude Elizabeth, 12.03.1901
QBDM-MR-MF 1901 1901/000454 AH NUM Tommy, Maggie, 16.12.1901
QBDM-MR-MF 1902 1902/000259 JAN SEE CHIN, AH YOUNG Maud, 18.02.1902
QBDM-MR-MF 1902 1902/000255 WONG FONG, LON SEE, 10.03.1902
QBDM-MR-MF 1902 1902/000246 SAM SING, GUE LUN, 14.01.1902
QBDM-MR-MF 1902 1902/000278 HUSSEY Gilbert Frank, AH CHING Evelyn, 15.05.1902
QBDM-MR-MF 1902 1902/000265 AH TONG, AH WARN /LEONG AH WAN, 6.04.1902
QBDM-MR-MF 1902 1902/000379 LAI FOOK, YONG LEONG Mary, 17.05.1902
QBDM-MR-MF 1902 1902/000249 JONG QUAN POW/JONG QUAN PO, LEONG GEE
02.01.1902
QBDM-MR-MF 1902 1902/000402 WONG SEE HOE, AH TIY /LUN WAI MUI, 22.07.1902
QBDM-MR-MF 1902 1902/000403 AH SAM, YUN SAM, 22.07.1902
QBDM-MR-MF 1902 1902/002052 TAI YET HING, WONG SHEE, 14.05.1902
QBDM-MR-MF 1902 1902/001363 METCALFE Christopher, AH MOOK Evelina,
19.10.1902
QBDM-MR-MF 1902 1902/B001898 CHAN LOW, SEE AH, 11.06.1902
QBDM-MR-MF 1902 1902/000026 CHIN AH COY, LAM SEE/ LEE CHONG, 01.07.1902
QBDM-MR-MF 1902 1902/000704 KWONG SANG, AH ENG LONG, 7.10.1902
QBDM-MR-MF 1902 1902/000355 AH LEE, Biddy, 20.06.1902
QBDM-MR-MF 1902 1902/002229 AH ONE Charles, DONE Mary Elizabeth, 01.05.1902
QBDM-MR-MF 1902 1902/000157 HEE George, Dinah, 9.04.1902
QBDM-MR-MF 1902 1902/000539 MOW Patrick, COSTIGAN Elizabeth, 09.01.1902
QBDM-MR-MF 1902 1902/000020 WALSH James, AH BEN Mabel Jessie Turnbull,
22.10.1902
QBDM-MR-MF 1903 1903/000252 LEE CHIN, AH LIE YOUNG/ AH LIE YOUNG AH TIE,
07.02.1903
QBDM-MR-MF 1903 1903/000253 TAM GEE WAH, SAN GOCH LAN, 11.02.1903
QBDM-MR-MF 1903 1903/000397 AH SING Charlie, AH SAM Helen / Ellen, 14.10.1903
QBDM-MR-MF 1903 1903/000299 CHEN QUING BOO, AH FOO Margaret, 14.09.1903
QBDM-MR-MF 1903 1903/B002989 HOW CHIN Charley, LIN FAY, 29.12/1903
QBDM-MR-MF 1903 1903/002132 MAR GEE, AH GANG, 17.12.1903
QBDM-MR-MF 1903 1903/000817 FERGUSON Thomas Douglas, AH CHAY Gertrude,
10.01.1903
QBDM-MR-MF 1903 1903/B002528 AH LEONG, AH PAT, 29.04.1903
QBDM-MR-MF 1903 1903/B002721 CULVERHOUSE Clement George, AH SAM Catherine,
13.08.1903
QBDM-MR-MF 1903 1903/000351 B JANSEN West Henry, AH SAM Phoebe, 10.01.1903
QBDM-MR-MF 1903 1903/000335 GOON BOW, TURNER Minnie Helena, 19.02.1903
QBDM-MR-MF 1903 1903/001900 AH BOO LASS, SEDAN Amber, 30.01.1903
QBDM-MR-MF 1903 1903/000249 AH KUM LEONG HOONG, LEONG HOONG,
24.01.1903
QBDM-MR-MF 1903 1903/001/898 AH MAT, GEATA Flora, 17.01.1903
QBDM-MR-MF 1903 1903/000050 HEE Tommy, MARTIN Annie Hilda, 11.06.1903
QBDM-MR-MF 1903 1903/002204 AH MAN, TUN WAH Amelia, 12.05.1903
QBDM-MR-MF 1903 1903/001777 AH KEE, AH QUCE Rosie, 12.06.1903
QBDM-MR-MF 1904 1904/000410 FAT KEE, LEU SEE (LI HA), 14.10.1904
QBDM-MR-MF 1904 1904/000406 CHIN HOCKTEIN, AH KIEN, 13.07.1904
QBDM-MR-MF 1904 1904/000407 ONE KING, GOO MAY/MAY GOO, 13.07.1904
QBDM-MR-MF 1904 1904/000409 AH LIN, CHOY YING, 14.10.1904
QBDM-MR-MF 1904 1904/001986 WAH SANG, LIN FAH, 18.04.1904
QBDM-MR-MF 1904 1904/000161 AH GIM, Minnie, 13.02.1904
QBDM-MR-MF 1904 1904/002088 POOK Percy William, CAHILL Mary, 11.02.1904
QBDM-MR-MF 1905 1905/000208 LEE ON LEON /AH SAM/ SAM LEON, AH BOW
Lorna, 25.05.1905
QBDM-MR-MF 1905 1905/B003824 SHAY Bernard, CRUIKSHANK Elizabeth Grey,
24.04.1905
QBDM-MR-MF 1905 1905/B003947 YIT SUEY, GRANT Georgina, 12.06.1905
QBDM-MR-MF 1905 1905/002052 AH MOO Charles Joseph, MORAN Kate, 30/01.1905
QBDM-MR-MF 1905 1905/000466 AH SAM Thomas, MASTERS Lily Ada, 04.11.05
QBDM-MR-MF 1905 1905/000455 SPRING Philip Walter Johnson, AH SAM Alice,
12.07.1905
QBDM-MR-MF 1906 1906/001675 WONG KEE Charles, AH CHING Florence Lucy,
19.12.1905
QBDM-MR-MF 1906 1906/000193 SOO TOO TEN/HING Charlie, AH QUORN/AH SAM
Emma, 27.10.1906
QBDM-MR-MF 1906 1906/B004320 AH FOO, ALBERTSON Beatrice May Fedora
31.01.1906
QBDM-MR-MF 1906 1906/B004392 LEE CHONG, LOW SEE, 27.02.1906
QBDM-MR-MF 1906 1906/001789 AH CHONG Tommy, Mc GAW Amy , 05.03.1906
QBDM-MR-MF 1906 1906/000038 AH YOU, MAH HING Mary, 14.04.1906
QBDM-MR-MF 1906 1906/001661 AMOUK, COLLINS Norah , 20.10.1906
QBDM-MR-MF 1906 1906/000348 ANDERSON Frederick McComb, AH YOU Emma,
24.04.1906
QBDM-MR-MF 1906 1906/000169 CHOY Willie, LARSEN/LARSINE Christina, 1.11.1906
QBDM-MR-MF 1906 1906/001526 TONGUE Charles, CHANNELLER Maude, 14.07.1906
QBDM-MR-MF 1906 1906/001841 WONG GONG, Lizzie, 14.06.1906
QBDM-MR-MF 1906 1906/001591 AFFOO Frederick Alexander, CHIPPENDALE Ivy
Herberta, 15.10.1906
QBDM-MR-MF 1907 1907/001409 HENDY James Melbourne, AH CHOW Lena,
21.04.1907
QBDM-MR-MF 1907 1907/B005348 CHIN Charlie, EDGAR Ethel Alice, 14.03.1907
QBDM-MR-MF 1907 1907/B005803 LOW FOON, BUN Elizabeth, 23.08.1907
QBDM-MR-MF 1907 1907/B005829 BATES George, AH GIN Ada Elizabeth, 21.08.1907
QBDM-MR-MF 1907 1907/B05228 AH KONG Jim, FEDORA Beatrice May, 23.01.1907
QBDM-MR-MF 1907 1907/001758 JON LEE, THICK Annie Isadora, 24.07.1907
QBDM-MR-MF 1907 1907/001940 SOLOMON John, AHOO Elizabeth, 7.03.1907
QBDM-MR-MF 1908 1908/001016 MARNOCH David, AH CHOW Elizabeth Francis,
6.06.1908
QBDM-MR-MF 1908 1908/000460 LEE ON, AH MOY KWONG, 2.11.1908
QBDM-MR-MF 1908 1908/002775 LEE WOOD George, AH FOY Christina Mary,
20.10.1908
QBDM-MR-MF 1908 1908/B006673 JANG CHONG HOON, HAY Minnie Ada, 14.07.1908
QBDM-MR-MF 1908 1908/B007085 LEE KOO James, GORDON Elizabeth Jane, 2.12.1908
QBDM-MR-MF 1908 1908/001563 AH MIT / AH MAT, GUNDA Louisa, 14.02.1908
QBDM-MR-MF 1908 1908/002226 AH MOO Charles Joseph, MILLS Albertina, 21.09.1908
QBDM-MR-MF 1908 1908/000239 CHONG Tommy, AH QUOM Sarah, 17.11.1908
QBDM-MR-MF 1909 1909/B007168 YOUNG Walter, AH FOOV Elizabeth Alice, 30.12.1908
QBDM-MR-MF 1909 1909/001223 SUE SEE Charlie, AH SING Beatrice, 02.12.1909
QBDM-MR-MF 1909 1909/001604B HEWETSON William John, AH HEE Susan, 25.03.1909
QBDM-MR-MF 1909 1909/000113 AH GEIM MAY FUM/FUM Theresa May 15.02.1909
QBDM-MR-MF 1909 1909/000661 BING CHEW Tommy, AH SOO Minnie, 11.09.1909
QBDM-MR-MF 1909 1910/000569 AH GAIN Thomas, AH COW Rose, 23.12.1909
QBDM-MR-MF 1909 1909/000941 YONG FAT Charlie, AH GEE Ethel, 17.06.1909
QBDM-MR-MF 1909 1909/B007622 QUOCK YUN , OWENS Lily May, 13.05.1909
QBDM-MR-MF 1909 1909/002704 WAR LEE Willie, THOMAS Ada Louise, 20.01.1909
QBDM-MR-MF 1909 1909/001229 AH LIN Jimmy, COE Harriet, 11.12.1909
QBDM-MR-MF 1909 1909/000618 AH SAM/ SAM AH SAM, Wari Yegami, 08.05.1909
QBDM-MR-MF 1909 1909/000513 AH WIN Jack, Polly, 14.10.1909
QBDM-MR-MF 1909 1909/000159 SEE CHIN , HOY HIP, 25.01.1909
QBDM-MR-MF 1909 1909/002321 SAM YAPP William, HURLEY Mary Bridget20.01.1909
QBDM-MR-MF 1909 1909/000258 MASON William James, AH CHING Georgina Mamuer,
16.11.1909
QBDM-MR-MF 1909 1909/002797 LOW LEONG James, AH KAY Mary Ellen Cecilia,
13.05.1909
QBDM-MR-MF 1910 1910/001823 AH GEE, FONG Mary Ann, 14.12.1910
QBDM-MR-MF 1910 1910/000671 AH YEN Jimmy, KEMPSON Katie, 15.08.1910
QBDM-MR-MF 1910 1910/0006721910 C672 TIM SEE FOO, AH SAM Annie, 26.09.1910
QBDM-MR-MF 1910 1910/003174 QUONG CHONG, AH FOY Maud, 15.02.1910
QBDM-MR-MF 1910 1910/001706 AH SEE William Henry, AH FOY Susan Grace,
21.04.1910
QBDM-MR-MF 1910 1910/003083 AH MOW Thomas, BALL Annie, 20.09.1910
QBDM-MR-MF 1910 1910/001083 AH CHAY Stephen, HEMMLING Laeticia Emilina,
5.01.1910
QBDM-MR-MF 1910 1910/000027 GLASSON Lister/Lisle Walton, AH BEN Rosanna
Isabella, 20.08.1910
QBDM-MR-MF 1911 1911/001304 ALBRIGHT Thomas Andrew, AHCHOW Annie May,
08.02.1911
QBDM-MR-MF 1911 1911/B009827 YIN Jim, SUE SEE, 27.02.1911
QBDM-MR-MF 1911 1911/003592 GARVEY James Henry Christopher, AH LOY Margaret
Elizabeth, 6.02.1911
QBDM-MR-MF 1911 1911/001770 NAKASHIMA Itaro, AH FOY Ellen, 25.05.1911
QBDM-MR-MF 1911 1911/002/034 STEINDL Ernest Emmanuel, AH CHING Henrietta,
27.07.1911
QBDM-MR-MF 1911 1911/000740 AH TIE, AH SIN Lucy, 29. 07.1911
QBDM-MR-MF 1911 11/000541 YUEN Willie, CHUN YOOK LUN Bessie, 19.10.1911
QBDM-MR-MF 1912 12/B012486 SUE KING KOI, AH YEE, 26.10.1912
QBDM-MR-MF 1912 1912/B012575 AH CHOW William Thomas NEAVE Nellie Ellen
20.11.1912
QBDM-MR-MF 1912 1912/001178 BRENNAN William Edward, AH CHAY Lilian,
14.12.1912
QBDM-MR-MF 1912 1912/001399 AH MAT , CARTO Mary Ann, 03.08.1912
QBDM-MR-MF 1912 1912/000732 BEARD William, AH FOO Cecilia Violet, 26.11.1890
QBDM-MR-MF 1912 1912/003132 HOPKINS Arthur, AH SEE Annie, 3.01.1912
QBDM-MR-MF 1913 1913/001137 YO YEN Charles, YUEN KEE (widow), 26.02.1913
QBDM-MR-MF 1913 1913/003105 AH FAT Tommy, CUTTIA Ada, 25.04.1913
QBDM-MR-MF 1913 1913/001201 AH CHAY Thomas, KITTO Grace Helen, 7.05.1913
QBDM-MR-MF 1913 1913/004097 AH GONG Charlie, AH SAM Ethel May, 26.11.1913
QBDM-MR-MF 1913 1913/000009 STEPHENSON John Leslie Maxwell, AH WAN
Georgina, 27.01.1913
QBDM-MR-MF 1914 1914/000540 YEE TUNG YEP, LEONG HONG Maggie, 28.08.1914
QBDM-MR-MF 1914 1914/B015502 AH SING Albert Edward Hazel, CLOHERY Eileen,
31.08.1914
QBDM-MR-MF 1914 1914/000544 AH YIPP, Annie, 25.08.1914
QBDM-MR-MF 1914 1914/003079 AH BU Tommy, Rosie, 1.04.1914
QBDM-MR-MF 1914 1914/000303 AH MANN, AH QUAY Sarah, 20.01.1914
QBDM-MR-MF 1920 1920 C70 AH KUM Charlie, DICKSON Nellie, 1920
ii.) Death Register – Microfiche (QBDM- DR-MF)
QBDM-DR-MF 1859 1859/001813 Susan SHING
QBDM-DR-MF 1868 1868/002322 William AH YEEN
QBDM-DR-MF 1871 1871/000848 Ann AH SAM
QBDM-DR-MF 1871 1871/000851 AH HING
QBDM-DR-MF 1871 Mary Ann AH FONG
QBDM-DR-MF 1872 1872/001270 Mary AH CHING
QBDM-DR-MF 1874 1874/001045 James HING
QBDM-DR-MF 1875 1875/000581 Louisa LING
QBDM-DR-MF 1875 1875/000796 Janey SING
QBDM-DR-MF 1875 1876/B010294 Margaret SUE FERN
QBDM-DR-MF 1875 1875/003255 unnamed male baby GOE
QBDM-DR-MF 1876 76/003583 unnamed male baby SAM ACHY
QBDM-DR-MF 1878 1878/000376 Tommy PAT GIN
QBDM-DR-MF 1880 1880/002210 Unnamed child AH THONG
QBDM-DR-MF 1880 1880/B013504 Samuel Arthur WING
QBDM-DR-MF 1880 1880/001343 Jimmy AH FOO
QBDM-DR-MF 1880 1880/000702 Edgar HOW
QBDM-DR-MF 1881 1881/004069 Samuel William LIN
QBDM-DR-MF 1881 1881/001138 Ivy CHY NAN
QBDM-DR-MF 1881 81/006555 Emily AH SAM ZEE
QBDM-DR-MF 1881 1881/002018 Alfred LEE QUONG
QBDM-DR-MF 1882 1882/001418 Mary Louise SING
QBDM-DR-MF 1884 1884/001791 Margaret MOORE
QBDM-DR-MF 1884 1884/004137 Selina SING
QBDM-DR-MF 1884 1884/005740 Flora Gin SIN
QBDM-DR-MF 1884 1884/000951 Mary CHENLY
QBDM-DR-MF 1885 1885/004190 Ah ONE
QBDM-DR-MF 1886 86/007533 Ellen Norah CHONG
QBDM-DR-MF 1886 1886/000125 William YOUNG SING
QBDM-DR-MF 1887 1887/000182 Henry FAT AH FAT
QBDM-DR-MF 1887 87/004854 Annie AH LUI/LIN
QBDM-DR-MF 1887 1887/010243 Frederick Ernest SUE
QBDM-DR-MF 1887 1887/003672 Catherine AH FOO
QBDM-DR-MF 1888 1888/004002 AH BOW
QBDM-DR-MF 1889 1889/001585 Ellen FAW HOP
QBDM-DR-MF 1892 1892/012397 William AH BOO
QBDM-DR-MF 1893 1893 /004130 Tommy AH FAT
QBDM-DR-MF 1894 1894/003914 AH BOW
QBDM-DR-MF 1896 1896/000164 Annie AH SAM
QBDM-DR-MF 1898 1898/004343 AH FAT SAM
QBDM-DR-MF 1898 1898/010028 May AFFOO
QBDM-DR-MF 1898 1898/004662 unnamed (m) AH SAM
QBDM-DR-MF 1900 1900/0033396 Charles Henry AH CHEE
QBDM DR-MF 1900 1900/000805 Herbert Low Key MING
QBDM-DR-MF 1903 Maggie AH SIN
QBDM-DR-MF 1908 1908/003339 Willie AH FOO
QBDM-DR-MF 1911 1911/005040 William Hector AH SING
iii.) Birth Register –Microfiche (QBDM-BR -MF)
QBDM-BR-MF 1847 Robert WING
QBDM-BR-MF 1859 1859/001571 Albert HOW
QBDM-BR-MF 1860 1860/000540 Samuel Thomas CHEEK
QBDM-BR-MF 1865 1865/000410 James CHI TAN
QBDM-BR-MF 1865 1866/001550 Agnes AH PAN
QBDM-BR-MF 1865 1865/000983 James MOW
QBDM-BR-MF 1865 1865/000077 Annie HING
QBDM-BR-MF 1866 1866/000221 William LING
QBDM-BR-MF 1866 1866/001435 Ann Jane GHEE James
QBDM-BR-MF 1867 1867/001816 Joseph AH JUNG
QBDM-BR-MF 1867 1867/001537 William Lawrence TONG
QBDM-BR-MF 1868 1868/002287 John SUE
QBDM-BR-MF 1868 1868/001474 Honora LEE
QBDM-BR-MF 1868 1869/001587 George AH PAT
QBDM-BR-MF 1869 1869/002425 Emma TAN WATT
QBDM-BR-MF 1870 1870/000565 Charles William WAY James
QBDM-BR-MF 1871 1871/003607 Esther AUNG SAM YAUP
QBDM-BR-MF 1871 1871/003009 Henry KIM William
QBDM-BR-MF 1871 1872/000364 Ian KIN
QBDM-BR-MF 1871 1871/003051 Mary Matilda Catherine AH REN
QBDM-BR-MF 1872 1872/000166 Mary Ann AH YET
QBDM-BR-MF 1872 1872/002659 Thomas AH YOU
QBDM-BR-MF 1872 1873/000002 Mary KYE
QBDM-BR -MF 1872 1872/00395 Charles Frederick YAN
QBDM-BR-MF 1873 1873/000587 Albert AH PIN
QBDM-BR-MF 1873 1873/002490 William AH SIN
QBDM-BR-MF 1874 1874/004601 Kate SING
QBDM-BR-MF 1874 1874/003433 Amoy Henry JYE
QBDM-BR-MF 1875 1875/003123 Alexander YEEN TUNG
QBDM-BR-MF 1875 1875/000446&1875/00044Charles Alyung and Samuel Foong FOU/
SAN FOU
QBDM-BR-MF 1875 1875/003579 Richard Davis LEON
QBDM-BR-MF 1876 1876/005290 Patrick Martin LEE CHUNG
QBDM-BR-MF 1877 1877/000654 Lote Toy HING WONG
QBDM-BR-MF 1877 1877/000676 Sue To You CHUNG
QBDM-BR-MF 1877 1877/003217 Bridget LEE LAN
QBDM-BR-MF 1878 1878/003381 Lai Foo TAI WAROO
QBDM-BR-MF 1878 1878/003426 Amy Louisa TONG
QBDM-BR-MF 1881 1881/003793 Edith AH SAM
QBDM-BR-MF 1880 1880/000829 James AH KOY
QBDM-BR-MF 1881 1881/003194 Phillip FOY
QBDM-BR-MF 1882 1882006252 Catherine Jane HONG
QBDM-BR-MF 1882 1882/004864 Mathilda LINGS
QBDM-BR-MF 1883 1883 /005422 Ada LONG
QBDM-BR-MF 1883 1883/000482 Laura SAM
QBDM-BR-MF 1883 1883/000708 James AH SING
QBDM-BR-MF 1883 1883/007249 Hang James FOO
QBDM-BR-MF 1883 1883/007248 Elizabeth Kate SING QUAY
QBDM-BR-MF 1884 1884/007897 Frances Elizabeth WONG KANG
QBDM-BR-MF 1884 1884/001620 See LOO CHAN YOU
QBDM-BR-MF 1884 1884/005175 Annie Elizabeth YEBON
QBDM-BR-MF 1884 1884/004274 Sarah Jane AH SEE
QBDM-BR-MF 1884 1884/004278 James Sydney Edgar FOY
QBDM-BR-MF 1884 1884/001206 Gua COWALL
QBDM-BR-MF 1884 1884/005819 Jim TUNG CHU
QBDM-BR-MF 1885 1885/004942 Jack VIN
QBDM-BR -MF 1885 Maude WING
QBDM-BR-MF 1885 1885/000553 Fanny AH SUE
QBDM-BR-MF 1885 1885/000027 Ernest Sam WAH SAM
QBDM-BR-MF 1885 1885/005709 Florence May HIE
QBDM-BR-MF 1885 1885/000706 Frank Cheu Yuen Bong CHEU WAUGH
QBDM-BR-MF 1886 1886/009346 Bernard BOW
QBDM-BR-MF 1886 1886/003509 William Frederick Low CHEU
QBDM-BR-MF 1886 1886/005314 Peter SHUE
QBDM-BR-MF 1886 1886/000644 Sarah LING
QBDM-BR-MF 1887 1887/010476 Harry WHANG HOWRA Harry
QBDM-BR-MF 1888 1888/011547 William AH FOU
QBDM-BR-MF 1888 1888/011784 William HOW
QBDM-BR-MF 1888 1936/008503 Anna Beatrice SAM (late register)
QBDM-BR-MF 1891 1891/002172&1891/002171 Alfred and Charles AH MAT/AHMET
(twins)
QBDM-BR-MF 1891 1891/000189 Alfred AH YOUNG
QBDM-BR-MF 1892 1906/000946MB Fred AH YOE
QBDM-BR-MF 1892 1892/011034 George AH TOO
QBDM-BR-MF 1895 1895/010429 William Ernest AH QUEE
QBDM-BR-MF 1895 1895/010825 Yat Foon AH HOO
QBDM-BR-MF 1897 Margaret AH ZUEE
QBDM-BR-MF 1898 1900/001119 LR Willie AH DUCK (late register)
QBDM-BR-MF 1898 1898/006670 Sophia AH LIN
QBDM-BR-MF 1899 1899/008940 Sim Choy AH GEE / AH KEE
QBDM-BR -MF 1900 1900/001711 Ruby Beatrice AH MOON
QBDM-BR-MF 1901 1901/001428 Eva Maud AH SHEW
QBDM-BR-MF 1901 1901/002818 Tommy AH HOW
QBDM-BR-MF 1901 1901/004325 May Agnes AH PAN
QBDM-BR-MF 1902 1902/001601 Alma AFFOO
QBDM-BR-MF 1905 1905/001925 Agnes Maria AH FOO
QBDM-BR-MF 1905 1905/000801 William AH GOW
QBDM-BR-MF 1906 1906/000061 Elsie Beatrice AH QUEE
QBDM-BR-MF 1907 1907/010038 Harold AH GOW CHANG SAM
QBDM-BR-MF 1907 1907/007326 Joseph William BARNES
QBDM-BR-MF 1909 1909/000132 John Oliver AH WAN
QBDM-BR-MF 1909 1909/002475 Jane AH QUAN
QBDM-BR-MF 1911 1911/010764 Alvera Patresa Wall mother Gertrude AH SANG
QBDM-BR-MF 1913 1913/000194 Walter AH WAN
QBDM-BR-MF 1914 1914/000709 James AH LUN
b.)Queensland -Births Deaths and Marriages (QBDM) Online (ONL)
i.) Marriage Register QBDM-MR-ONL
QBDM-ONL: 1874 C571 Thomas Sin Kin (Lim Kin) and Naomi Brittain
QBDM-ONL: 1875C72 See Wah Ah Nee and Elizabeth Ann Thomas
QBDM-ONL: 1876 C442 Lam Pan and Mary Jane McDonnell
QBDM-ONL: 1877 B5701 James Underwood and Kate Connelly
QBDM-ONL: 1881 C159 Tommy Ah Cum and Alice Keyes
QBDM-ONL: 1884 C858 Sarah Maloney and William Lam Pan
QBDM-ONL: 1885 C321 Emily Ann Henly and Ah Foo
QBDM-ONL: 1885C297 Annie Holland and William Ah Chee
QBDM-ONL: 1890 C1208 Eliza Hing and Willie Que Fook
QBDM-ONL: 1892 C1041 Sam Fong and Mary Ann McKey
QBDM-ONL: 1892 C1041 Sam Fong and Mary Ann McKey (second marriage)
QBDM-ONL: 1892 C882 Kate McEnroe and Charley Ah Foo
QBDM-ONL: 1892 C1087 Charlotte Hing and Tommy Chai Hong
QBDM-ONL: 1894 C660 Chun Tie and Qui Fa
QBDM-ONL: 1897 C300 Jessie Hing and Tam Sie
QBDM-ONL: 1899 C232 Ah Fong and Lizzie
QBDM-ONL: 1900 C218 John Ah Mook and Kashijama Onatsu
QBDM-ONL: 1901 C166 Ah Man and Lucy
QBDM-ONL: 1910 C448 Sou and Annie Sou
QBDM-ONL: 1912 C289 Maggie and Charlie Ah Chong
QBDM-ONL: 1915 C3232 Bessie Sam and Tommy Ning
QBDM-ONL: 1915 C2274 Charles Sing and Gwendoline Mary Look Hop
QBDM-ONL: 1924 C192 Zilla Erba and Joseph Casey
QBDM-ONL: 1925 C2206 Nellie Casey and Rupert Daly Lee
QBDM-ONL: C3014 Clim Ye Dak, otherwise known as Ah Wing, and Dora Ah Fat
QBDM-ONL: C3016/1862 Chin A, and Sarah, NSW, Sofala
QBDM-ONL: 1930 George Henry Sue and May Henrietta James
QBDM-ONL: Harry Chun Tie and Dolly Houng Lai
QBDM-ONL: William Lum Mow and Agnes Hubertine Bruer
QBDM-ONL: George Chun Tie and Ann Yun Gil
QBDM-ONL: George Chun Tie (second marriage) and Ivy Grace Wong
QBDM-ONL: 1918 C1888 Bow and Kup
ii.) Death Register QBDM-DR-ONL
QBDM-DR-ONL: 1896 C441 Kate Connelly
QBDM-DR-ONL: 1882 C1606 Ada Maria Postill
QBDM-DR-ONL: 1892 C408 Kate Ah Muck
QBDM-DR-ONL: 1901 C166Lucy Ah Man
QBDM-DR-ONL: 1917 C724 Antonia Law Yee nee Salkieurisz
QBDM-DR-ONL: 1952 C/1650 John Chong Man Foo
iii.) Birth Register QBDM-BR-ONL
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1854 BBP2678 Robert Wing
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1854 BBP295 David Wing
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1854 BBP354 William Wing
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1863Emily Mary
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1875 C2837 Milly Liy Lee
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1875 C2844 Sarah Ah Chin
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1877 C654 Loie Toy Hing
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1878 B23682 James Underwood
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1881 C6292 Mary Ann Ah Ming
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1882 C3861 Ada Maria Postill
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1883 C6616 Melend Ah Fun
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1883 C6617 Quon Chong Ah Fun
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1886 C752 Kate (twin) Connelly
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1886 C753 Mary (twin) Connely
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1886 C9346 Bernard Kong Bow
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1888 C7138 William Kong Bow
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1892 C969 Kate Ah Muck
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1895 C12840 John Peters
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1896 C6289 Bessie Lin
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1900 C171, Ruby Beatrice Ah Moon
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1900 C6227 George Lun
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1901 C6300 Gem Lum Kee
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1901 C6790 Lee Hem Lee Gow
QBDM-BR-ONL: 1902 C2109 Dolly Ah Sin
Queensland -Births, Deaths and Marriages – Family History (QBDM-FH)
NOTE: Hardcopy provided by families and other individuals- loose sheets: (LS) QBDM-FH-LS
QBDM-FH 1890, Birth Register, Cecilia Violet 26.11.1890 Hardcopy original, Burke District
1890/898 AH FOO HENLY Emily 1890
QBDM-FH 1890, Birth Register, Alice 28.11.1890 Hardcopy Original, Burke District 1891/895
AH CHEE William HOLLAND Annie 1890
QBDM-FH 1890, Birth Register, Beatrice Eveline 4.12.1890 Hardcopy original, Burke District
1890/899 AH SING James BLACK Minnie 1890
QBDM-FH 1898, Birth Register, Robert Samuel 26.03.1898 hardcopy original, 1918/01397 AH
SAM Louie (Aboriginal [sic]) 1898
QBDM-FH 1900, Birth Register, Annie 20 .09.1900 hardcopy original, 1918/01400 AH MOI
Jimmy Maggie (half caste Aboriginal [sic]) 1900
QBDM-FH 1901, Birth Register, Nellie 18.04.1901 hardcopy original, 1918/01399 AH SAM
Louie (Aboriginal [sic]) 1901
QBDM-FH 1905, Birth Register, Kitty 26.03.1905 hardcopy original, 1918/01402 AH MOI
Jimmy Maggie (half caste Aboriginal [sic]) 1905
QBDM-FH 1907, Birth Register, George 18/01/1907 hardcopy original, 1918/01403 AH MOI
Jimmy Maggie (half caste Aboriginal [sic]) 1907
QBDM-FH 1907, Birth Register, Charlie 20.07.1902 hardcopy original, 1918/01401 AH MOI
Jimmy Maggie (half caste Aboriginal [sic]) 1907
QBDM-FH 1910, Birth Register, George 29.03.1910 hardcopy original, 1918/01399 AH SAM
Louie (Aboriginal [sic]) 1910
QBDM-FH 1871 Death Register, Hardcopy original sighted 1871/000848 AH SAM Ann, 1871
QBDM-FH 1915 Death Register, Hardcopy original sighted 1915 C460/5227015, HANN Charley
QBDM-FH 1929 Death Register, Hardcopy original sighted, 1929/C4108 GEE OHY Jimmy,
Cloncurry, 1929
QBDM-FH 1932 Death Register, Hardcopy original sighted 1932/C3788 SAM AH BOWLawn Hill
QBDM-FH 1955 Death Register, Hardcopy original sighted 1955/368/1773 AH GOW Tommy
QBDM-FH 1961 Death Register, hardcopy, 1961/C370/1 HOOK Yuen Kim Cloncurry 1961
QBDM-FH 1979 Death Register, Hardcopy original sighted 1979/523/6956 AH GOW
GeorgeNormanton
QBDM-FH: 1898 Marriage Register 8. 08. 1898Hardcopy original, Burke District 1898/221 AH
MOI Jimmy and Maggie (Aboriginal half-caste [sic])
QBDM-FH 1900 Marriage Register, 22.02.1900 hardcopy 1900/777 AH LOW Tommy and Dora
1900
QBDM-FH 1901 Marriage Register, 16 .12.1901 hardcopy 1901/454 AH NUM Tommy and
Maggie
QBDM-FH 1914 Marriage Register 20/01/1914 hardcopy original, Burke District, 1914/303, AH
MANN (widower) and AH QUAY Sarah 1914
QBDM-FH 1923Marriage Register 10/01/1923, Hardcopy Original, Burke District 1891/895
WATSON GeorgeWilliam and AH QUEY Sadie1923
QBDM-FH-LS 1884, 84/000333. Marriage Certificate of Ah Hoin and Jane Lothian
QBDM-FH-LS Birth Certificate 51908, Jing Way, supplied by Sadie Fong On, Atherton, 2002
Historical Surveys and Plans
Accessed by permission from Department of Environment and Heritage 2005-2013
Atherton RP702464, 1902
Atherton RP702465, 1903
Atherton NR5026, 1968
Atherton, Chinese Hut N15728, 1882
Atherton, Chinese Huts N157319, 1887
Atherton, Cultivation N157326, 1886
Burketown B1364, 1884
Burketown B1365, 1884
Burketown B13611, 1895
Burketown IS71790, 1978
Cairns, Edge Hill C19810, 1877
Cairns, Edge Hill N157222, 1885
Cairns, Edge Hill C153131, 1886
Cairns, Edge Hill C19842, 1899
Cairns, Edge Hill, AH CHING C157276, 1883
Cairns, Edge Hill, AH CHING RP7183888, 1961
Cairns, Edge Hill, AH HON RP70958, 1937
Cairns, Edge Hill, AH HON C153287, 1891
Cairns, Edge Hill, AH HON RP701462, 1914
Cairns, Edge Hill, Botanic Gardens C157275, 1883
Cairns, Edge Hill, S. AH CHING NR339, 1907
Cairns, Redlynch C157231, 1883
Cairns, Redlynch RP703137, 1886
Cairns, Redlynch C153203, 1887
Cairns, Redlynch C153289, 1891
Cairns, Redlynch RP703155, 1905
Cairns, Sachs Street C19820, 1885
Cairns, Stratford, Chinese garden 87 NR1384
Cairns, Stratford, Chinese garden N157362, 1888
Cairns, Stratford, Lily Bank N157472, 1891
Camooweal C3933, 1895
Camooweal C3932, 1896
Camooweal C3934, 1914
Camooweal W04, 1917
Camooweal W013, 1948
Camooweal, Chinese Gardens C3931, 1888
Carrington K103619, 1892
Carrington N157522, 1894
Carrington MPH24785, 1909
Carrington MPH24793, 1909
Carrington, Chinese Gardens C2921, 1884
Charters Towers, Bluff Road CT1822, 1874
Charters Towers, Bluff Road MPH21012, 1892
Charters Towers, Bluff Road MPH21129, 1896
Charters Towers, Bluff Road MPH1144, 1914
Charters Towers, Bluff Road MPH 13536, 1894
Charters Towers, Brilliant Deeps, CH garden MPH 13708, 1899
Charters Towers, Deane Street CT1824, 1872
Charters Towers, Deane Street RP700196, 1876
Charters Towers, Deane Street CT18217, 1878
Charters Towers, Deane Street CT18218, 1878
Charters Towers, Deane Street CT18227, 1881
Charters Towers, Lee Street CT1824, 1876
Charters Towers, Lee Street RP720880, 1965
Charters Towers, Mossman Street RP700193
Charters Towers, Mossman Street CT1824, 1872
Charters Towers, Mossman Street CT18227, 1881
Charters Towers, Mossman Street RP700192, 1891
Charters Towers, Mossman Street RP720880, 1965
Charters Towers, Mossman Street CT182115, 1977
Charters Towers, SWEE SANG 20248, GFH.80, 1878
Charters Towers, SUE FONG 20237, GFH. 75, 1878
Charters Towers, HONG SHING PONG 13015, RA.2579 1893
Charters Towers, AH FOO Jimmy 00320, GFH2774, 1892
Charters Towers, SIN ON LEE 13013 RA. 2571, 1893
Charters Towers, AH POO 13006, RA. 2568, 1893
Charters Towers, AH HON 13005, RA. 2569, 1893
Charters Towers, L & S. AH CHIN 13565, RA 3525,1893
Charters Towers, CHINAMAN 00582, GFL.4108, 1894
Charters Towers, Minni TANG YEE 00575, GFL. 4106,1894
Charters Towers, GA. AH SAM 21159, GFL. 5046, 1896
Charters Towers, LUM SIK; AH KEE 01197, RA. 2671, 1896
Charters Towers, E. WONG SHUN 08900, GFL.5062.98, 1896
Charters Towers, Charlie AH SING 00653, GFL.4676, 1896
Charters Towers, CHINAMAN HUT 00720, GFL. 4539, 1897
Charters Towers, Sam Street, JIM SANG 13080 RA. 2685, 1898
Charters Towers, LUM SIK 13097, RA, 2684, 1898
Charters Towers, AH FUNG 13083, RA. 1506 1899
Charters Towers, CHINAMAN GARDEN MA. 41 1900
Charters Towers, Brisk Street 13097, R.A. 2703.4.5 1901
Charters Towers, George HING 00821, GFL.6689, 1901
Charters Towers, S.TANGYEE 01018, MHL.4150, 1907
Charters Towers, CHINAMANS GRDN 01022, GFL.7433 1907
Charters Towers, CHINAMAN 01038, GFL. 7567 1908
Charters Towers, S. TANG YEE 01018, GFL. 7385, 1908
Charters Towers, C. PHI 01083, 7764 GFL. 1910
Charters Towers, E.WONG SHUN 01093, GFL. 7803.4, 1911
Charters Towers, CHINESE GARDEN 13766, GFL 7867, 1911
Charters Towers, AH TUNG 13780, MGA. 225/230, 1913
Charters Towers, E.WONG SHUN 01146, MHL, 7986, 1914
Charters Towers, SAM LEE 01320, MGA 246, 1923
Charters Towers, CHINESE GARDEN 01353, MPH 9218, 1927
Charters Towers, BLUFF ROAD 21012, GFL 2813, 1892
Charters Towers, AH GUI, MGA.1 MP16754, GFL2248, 1892
Charters Towers, SAM STREET 13536, GFL. 2589, 1893
Charters Towers, BLUFF ROAD 21129, MHL.21129, 1896
Charters Towers, AH LIN, CHINESE GARDEN MA. 171, 1900
Charters Towers, CHINESE GARDENS MPH16731, 1900
Charters Towers, WONG KING GML. 521, 1900
Charters Towers, CEMETERY MP16729, 1900
Charters Towers, SAM STREET 01144, MHL.8060, 1914
Cloncurry C196.4, 1883
Cloncurry 196.5, 1883
Cloncurry C196.19, 1907
Cloncurry C196.20, 1907
Cloncurry C196.23 1909
Cloncurry C196.21, 1909
Cloncurry C196.20 1911
Cloncurry C196.27, 1934
Cooktown, Charlotte Street C17965, 1882
Croydon MP15914, 1888
Croydon MPH15915, 1888
Croydon MPH22328, 1888
Croydon MPH22298, 1890
Croydon MPH22301, 1891
Croydon SY28, 1898
Georgetown G1884
Georgetown G1885
Georgetown MPH14038, 1882
Georgetown IS204094, 1965
Georgetown MPH22959, 1968
Georgetown GB111,1987
Gilberton VR1, 1906
Gilberton VR3, 1906
Halifax CWL 293
Halifax RP703785, 1808
Halifax K124395, 1874
Halifax CAR12420, 1882
Halifax H2841 1883
Halifax CAR124142, 1885
Halifax RP703786, 1885
Halifax RP703779, 1886
Halifax RP703790, 1886
Halifax RP703792, 1886
Halifax RP703793, 1888
Halifax H2843, 1892
Halifax CAR124254, 1894
Halifax H2842 1894
Halifax H2844, 1895
Halifax H2847, 1906
Halifax H2848, 1909
Halifax CWL293, 1910
Halifax RP703782, 1913
Halifax RP709294, 1936
Halifax CWL1327 1951
Halifax RP14565, 1953
Halifax, adjoining Chinatown RP709996,1938
Halifax, adjoining Chinatown K124834, 1880
Halifax, adjoining Chinatown RP703780, 1905
Halifax, adjoining Chinatown RP703784, 1922
Halifax, adjoining Chinatown RP703784, 1930
Halifax, Old cemetery H2845, 1896
Herberton H2531, 1881
Hughenden H2031, 1877
Hughenden RP700432, 1891
Hughenden RP700434, 1892
Hughenden, Cemetery C8150, 1885
Hughenden, Tie Hop shop H2036, 1880
Ingham RP70369, 1882
Ingham RP703700
Ingham K124216, 1876
Ingham 12242V0, 1872
Ingham 12243V0, 1881
Ingham, Cordelia K12498, 1877
Innisfail, Edith Street I28126, 1897
Innisfail, Edith Street RP710261, 1936
Innisfail, Edith Street, See Poy I2812, 1884
Innisfail, Edith Street, See Poy RP706804, 1925
Innisfail, Edith Street, See Poy RP707397, 1926
Innisfail, Edith Street, See Poy RP706804, 1927
Innisfail, Edith Street, See Poy RP710838, 1941
Innisfail, Edith Street, See Poy RP711731, 1946
Innisfail, Edith Street, “Joss House” I28136, 1904
Innisfail, Edith Street, Tam Sie, Q. Fook I28133, 1903
Innisfail, Edith Street, Temple I28124, 1895
Innisfail, Lily Street I281115, 1891
Innisfail, Lily Street, precinct I28133, 1903
Innisfail, Lily Street, precinct, Temple RP711875, 1946
Innisfail, Owen Street I28171, 1926
Innisfail, Owen Street RP707772, 1926
Innisfail, See Poy 12817, 1884
Innisfail, See Poy RP 716736, 1956
Irvinebank I3142, 1885
Kairi N157169, 1885
Kairi, Huts and Barns N1246, 1919
Mackay M.91.2, 1863
Mackay M.91.8, 1865
Mackay, Victoria Street M914, 1864
Mackay K124636, 1878
Mackay, Macalister Street RP700757, 1898
Mackay, Albert Street RP 700795, 1898
Mackay, Wood Street RP 700793, 1898
Mackay, Wood St, Lane RP 700842, 1900
Mackay, Sydney Street RP 700837, 1900
Mackay, Victoria Street RP 700823, 1900
Mackay, Section 13, all 2& 3, Yuen Geut RP 700745, 1900
Mackay, Nelson Street, Lane RP 700744, 1900
Mackay, Macalister Street RP 700763, 1900
Mackay, Macalister Street RP 700762, 1900
Mackay, Victoria Street, You Gee RP 700756, 1900
Mackay, Nelson Street, Ah Sue RP 700746, 1900
Mackay, Section 28, Lane RP700850, 1909
Mackay, Nelson Street, Lane RP700732, 1910
Mackay, Wellington Street RP700709, 1913
Mackay, Victoria Street, Lane RP700840, 1918
Mackay, Lane RP700753, 1922
Maytown MP14383, 1855
Maytown M1951, 1879
Maytown M1955, 1884
Maytown MP282285, 1884
Maytown MP282286, 1884
Maytown RA2455, 1981
Millchester M1756, 1876
Millchester MP15104, 1876
Millchester MP28707, 1877
Millchester MP29366, 1896
Millchester 15104, CT 1385, 1873
Millchester, Lease 163 28682, 1876
Millchester, Huts 28707 GFL191, 1877
Millchester 29234, GML 1273, 1890
Millchester, Special Lease 477 D124.2 1893
Millchester, Chinese Cemetery 15171, 1895
Millchester, Chinese Cemetery 29255, GML1317 1897
Millchester, Chinese Garden MGA57 MP16390, 1900
Millchester, Ah Sam MA.31. MP16683, 1900
Millchester 15404, GML.1934, 1903
Millchester, Chinese cemetery MP29234, 1890
Millchester, Chinese cemetery MP29255, 1891
Millchester, Chinese cemetery MP15409, 1902
Millchester, Chinese cemetery MP29396, 1902
Millchester, Chinese cemetery MP29440, 1904
Millchester, Chinese cemetery MPH1315, 1923
Millchester, Chinese cemetery MP293 94, 1902
Millchester, Lam Pan MP28644, 1875
Millchester, Lam Pan MP28703, 1877
Millchester, Lam Pan M1758, 1888
Millchester, Lam Pan MP29211, 1889
Millchester, Lam Pan MP29327, 1892
Millchester, Lam Pan MP15444, 1906
Millchester, Lam Pan MP29528, 1906
Millchester, townscape MP15171, 1895
Normanton N1486, 1862
Normanton N1483, 1880
Normanton RP857730, 1998
Normanton, Brown Street precinct N14811, 1884
Normanton, Mookie’s garden N1485, 1889
Normanton, Mookie’s garden IS70434, 1963
Normanton, township N14833, 1887
Normanton, township ,CHUNG FUNG N1481, 1867
Queenton CT18212, 1877
Queenton MP29307, 1892
Queenton MP29333, 1892
Queenton MP29351, 1892
Queenton MP29361, 1893
Queenton MP15430, 1904
Queenton MP29446, 1904
Queenton MP29552, 1907
Queenton MP29651, 1914
Ravenswood R16218, 1885
Ravenswood R16220 1886
Ravenswood MPH25916 1890
Ravenswood MPH25907, 1890
Ravenswood MPH4657, 1894
Ravenswood MPH4716, 1901
Ravenswood MP15827, 1901
Ravenswood MP15814, 1901
Ravenswood MP15826, 1902
Ravenswood MP15830, 1903
Ravenswood MP15825, 1903
Ravenswood MP15829, 1904
Ravenswood MP15836, 1914
Ravenswood MP15845, 1936
Ravenswood, Chinaman Huts, Chinatown MP17951, 1884
Ravenswood, township, Ah Pong R16210, 1880
Richmond RT121, 1901
Richmond, Lum Sing RT116, c.1900
Richmond, Lum Sing RT120, 1900
Roma, Cemetery reserve, town edge M5320, 1871
Roma, Reserve Area R 867, 1886
Townsville, Flinders Street West RP701839, 1918
Townsville, Flinders Street West T11823. 1873
Townsville, Flinders Street West T11853, 1880
Townsville, Flinders Street West RP707864, 1906
Townsville, Flinders Street RP701720
Townsville, Flinders Street T1181, 1865
Townsville, Flinders Street T11823, 1874
Townsville, Flinders Street T11864, 1882
Townsville, Flinders Street T11853, 1885
Townsville, Flinders Street RP707864, 1904
Townsville, Flinders Street MP17906
Townsville, Flinders Street, Flinders Lane T11860, 1881
Townsville, Kissing Point, Chinese Gardens RP701820
Townsville, Kissing Point, Chinese Gardens T1186, 1867
Townsville, Kissing Point, Chinese Gardens T118104, 1887
Townsville, Kissing Point, Chinese Gardens T118112, 1889
Townsville, Monkey Island, Chinese Gardens T118105, 1881
Townsville, Monkey Island, Chinese Gardens K1143, 1865
Townsville, Monkey Island, Chinese Gardens T118106, 1888
Townsville, Monkey Island, Chinese Gardens T118116, 1889
Townsville, Ogden Street, Chinese Precinct T118133, 1890
Townsville, Ogden Street, Chinese Precinct T118212, 1921
Townsville, Ross Island, South Townsville T118136, 1895
Townsville, Ross Island, South Townsville T118653, 1983
Winton RP706680, 1927
Winton RP880561, 1994
Winton, Special Lease W2408, 1917
Winton, Town map W2401, 1880
Winton, Town map W2402, 1881
Queensland State Archives (QSA)
i.)Queensland Public Records Historical Resource Kit
Application for Naturalisation, Ah Shay COL/74, 03/8015
Application for Naturalisation, Gee Kee SCT/CF 34, No. 84/3581
Application for Naturalisation, Jang Lum COL/72 after 01/18843
Application for Naturalisation, Kom Moy COL/74, 03/6473
Application for Naturalisation, Laen Yaen COL/74, 03/6595
Application for Naturalisation, Lee Gun COL/72, 01/12750
Application for Naturalisation, Pang Ah Young COL/72 see after 01/18843
Application for Naturalisation, Tam Gee Wah COL/74, 03/6845
Application for Naturalisation, Thomas Hong COL/72 No.84 & No.85
Certificate of Naturalisation, Andrew Leon, Bowen SCT/CF 34, No.861
Certificate of Naturalisation, Chin Pack SCT/CF 34, No. 152
Certificate of Naturalisation, Chung Chang SCT/CF 34, No. 132
Certificate of Naturalisation, Lee Gong SCT/CF 10, 3218
Certificate of Naturalisation, Lee Liy SCT/CF 10, 3030
Certificate of Naturalisation, Louy Ah Moy SCT/CF 34, No. 123
Certificate of Naturalisation, Thomas Lin Kin SCT/CF 34, No. 122
Crown vs Willie Ah Duck, CPS 12E/P9
Enquiry by Cairns solicitor to the Home Secretary’s Office COL/72 No. 00086
Internal memo, “Issuing Certificates to Chinese”COL/72, No.275
Internal memo, “Re-issuing Certificate to Chinese”COL/72, No. 276
Oath of Allegiance, Chun Tie A/17813, No. 117
Oath of Allegiance, James Ah Lin A/17813, No. 110
Oath of Allegiance, Jimmy Lee Koo A/17813
Oath of Allegiance, Kwong Kee A/17813, No. 86
Oath of Allegiance, Sun Shum Lee A/17813, No. 113
Oath of Allegiance, Tom See Poy A/17813, No. 89
Oath of Allegiance, Willie Ming A/17813, No. 97
ii.) Immigration - Register of Arrivals
Ann Messervoy, “Samerang”, 1867, IMM/113, P10
Bridget Tierney, “Golden City”, IMM/113 P49
Christina Wilkie “Polmaise”, 1872, IMA3/4 P39
Emma Mary Costall, “Tara”, 1892, IMM/124 P360
Fanny Scarisbrick “Durham”, 1881, IMM/113 P271
James Dillon and wife and 7 children, “Saldanha”, 1863, Z31 P272
Jane Mathieson, “Bounty”, 1884, Z1960 IMM/117 P117
Lucy Lord, “Scottish Lassie”, 1879, IMM/116 P264
Margaret Hennesy “Wansfell”, 1863IMM/113 P40
Mary Boddy, “Ramsey”, 1869, IMM/113 P27
Minnie Boatwright, “Nerkara”, 1891, Z1965 IMM/123 P295
Sara & Mary Brophy, “Clarence”, 1867, IMM/113 P47
Sarah & Alice Emery, “Queen of the Colonies”, 1861, Z31 P906
Sarah & Eliza Moloney, “Duke of Buckingham”, 1882, Z1960 IMM/117
Sarah Cox, “Queen of the Colonies”, 1865, IMM/113 P2
Sarah Hadley, “Scottish Prince”, 1878, IMM/116 P162
iii.)School Registers
Cape River School Admission Register, 1915-1938, SRS 3016/1.
Charters Towers Boys School Admission Register, SRS1806/1/1.
Charters Towers Girls School Admission Register, 1896-1903, SRS1808/1/1.
Cloncurry State School Admission Register, 1896-1919, A/46065.
Cooktown Girls School Admission Register, 1919-1921, SRS 1630/1/1.
Halifax (formerly Herbert River) Admission Register, 1883-1939, A/43653.
Queenton State School Admission Register, 1907-1951, SRS3213/1/1.
Ravenswood School Admission Register, 1876, SRS1613/1/1.
Richmond School Admission Register, 1897-1918, SRS1542/1/1.
Winton State School Admission Register, 1888-1927, SRS 5546 M/F: 89402.
i.) Land Files, Divisional Board, Mining, Market Garden and Machine Area Registers
Burketown Hospital Admission Register, 1909-1923, B/3098.
Burketown: Register of Licences to occupy Crown Land in the Land Agent’s District of
Burketown under part III of the Land Act, 1910: April 1915-October 1931, LAN/S23.
Cairns Municipal Rate Book, 1885-1888, SRS4646-1-1.
Cairns Municipal Rate Book, 1889-1893; SRS4646-1-2.
Cairns Municipal Rate Book, 1891-1893, SRS4646-1-3.
Cairns Municipal Rate Book, 1893-1895, SRS4646-1-4.
Cairns Municipal Rate Book, 1896-1897, SRS4646-1-5.
Cairns Municipal Rate Book, 1902-1902, SRS4646-1-6.
Cairns Municipal Rate Book, 1903-1903, SRS4646-1-7.
Cairns Municipal Rate Book, 1904-1904, SRS4646-1-8.
Cairns Municipal Rate Book, 1905-1905, SRS4646-1-9.
Cairns Municipal Rate Book, 1908-1908, SRS4646-1-10.
Cairns Municipal Rate Book, 1909-1909, SRS4646-1-11.
Cairns Municipal Rate Book, 1910-1910, SRS4646-1-12.
Cairns Municipal Rate Book, 1916-1916, SRS4646-1-15.
Cairns Town Council, Valuation and Rate Registers, 1922-1922, SRS4704-1-6.
Cairns Town Council, Valuation and Rate Registers, 1923-1923, SRS4704-1-7
Cairns Town Council, Valuation and Rate Registers, 1926-1926, SRS4704-1-10.
Charters Towers City Council Valuation Register. 1917-1918, 11 CHA/N23.
Charters Towers Joint Health Committee Minute Book, 1901-1916, 11 CHA/17.
Charters Towers Mining Warden, Register of Claims, Homestead & Cape River Claims, 1887-
1890, A/20704.
Charters Towers Municipal Council Valuation Register, 1877-1884, 11 CHA/N1.
Charters Towers Municipal Council Valuation Register, 1881-1884, 11 CHA/N2.
Charters Towers Municipal Council Valuation Register, 1885-1887, 11 CHA/N3.
Charters Towers Municipal Valuation Register, 1888-1892, 11 CHA/N4.
Charters Towers Municipal Valuation Register, 1893-1898, 11 CHA/N5.
Charters Towers Municipal Valuation Register, 1899-1902, 11 CHA/N6.
Charters Towers Town Council Valuation Register, 1904-1905, 11 CHA/N7.
Charters Towers Waterworks Board, 1887-1893, WBD 11A/2.
Ingham Minute Books: Small Debts Court 1897-1929, A/22975-A/22978.
Laidley Valuation and Rate Book, 1902-1908, SRS479-1-3.
Laidley Valuation and Rate Book, 1904, SRS479-1-2.
Letterbook, Hughenden Divisional Board, Correspondence 1889-1912, COL/036 (PRV 7186/1/82).
Mackay Divisional Board Valuation Register, January 1899-December 1900, SRS4944/1.
Mackay Divisional Board Valuation Register, January 1901-December 1901, SRS4944/1-2.
Mackay Shire Council Valuation Register, January 1904-December 1904, SRS4944/1-3.
Mackay Shire Council Valuation Register, January 1905-December 1905, SRS4944/1.
Mackay Shire Council Valuation Register, January 1910-December 1910, SRS4944/1.
Mining Homestead Lease granted to Louisa Augusta YUNG, 1902, EXE/D87.
Mining Warden, Croydon: Register of applications market garden areas,1887-1890,
MWO14A/65/162.
Mining Warden, Croydon: Register of applications market garden areas, 1890-1911,
MWO14A/67.
Mining Warden, Etheridge and Croydon: Index to register of applications for market garden and
tailings areas, 1886-1911, MWO14A/69.
Mining Warden, Etheridge, Register of applications various; market garden areas 1880-1912,
MWO/14B/41 (PRV10316).
Mining Warden, Etheridge: Register of applications, various; market garden areas, Etheridge
District, 1888-1907, MWO/14B/31.
Mining Warden, Georgetown, Register of applications various; market garden areas 1887-1890,
MWO/14B/40.
Mining Warden, Maytown, 1889, MWO 13B/9-17.
Mulgrave Shire Council Correspondence, Cairns, 1940, A/62799.
Petition for Police Magistrate to be appointed to town as well as Construction of Dam & Wells
between Cloncurry and Boulia, and Cloncurry and Hughenden, COL/A338/82/3735.
Pine Divisional Board, Rate Book, 1888-1893, SRS623-1-1.
Pine Divisional Board, Rate Book, 1894-1897, SRS623-1-2.
Postage Book and Registration of Applications for Market Gardens, Ravenswood, 1881-1882,
MWO 11/15(PRV10576-1–2).
Ravenswood Divisional Board Correspondence, 1880-1883, COL/063.
Ravenswood Divisional Board Correspondence, 1883-1914, WOR/N14-N16.
Ravenswood Divisional Board, Form of Valuation Return, 1882, WOR/N14-N15-N16.
Ravenswood Divisional Board, Form of Valuation Return, 1882, WOR/N14-N15-N16.
Ravenswood Divisional Board: Form of Valuation Return, 1882, COL/063.
Ravenswood Register of Business Licences, 1888-1908, MWO11/N3.
Ravenswood Register of Miners Rights, 1888-1890, MWO11/N6.
Ravenswood Register of Miners Rights, 1900-1908, MWO11/N5.
Register of Businesses and Residence areas, Gympie, 1872-1875, RSI 1640-1-2
Register of Businesses and Residence areas, Gympie, 1877-1886, RSI 1640-1-4.
Register of Businesses and Residence areas, Gympie, 1886-1889, RSI 1640-1-5.
Return of Miners Rights & Business Licences, Ravenswood, 1870, MWO 11/N1.
Sale of Crown Land, AH CHING, Cairns, 1882, LAN/AW10.
Sale of Crown Land, AH YOU, Springsure, 1890, LAN/AW22.
Sale of Crown Land, Charlotte HONG, Geraldton, 1904, LAN/AW29.
Sale of Crown Land, Eliza Carr QUE FOOK, Geraldton, 1904, LAN/AW29.
Sale of Crown Land, Elizabeth GAITER, Cloncurry, 1907-1908, LAN/AW28.
Sale of Crown Land, Margaret AH WON (widow), 1912, LAN/AW30.
Sale of Crown Land, MONG SING, Roma, 1874, LAN/AW1.
Sale of Crown Land, OTTO KHAN, Cloncurry, 1907-1908, LAN/AW28.
Sale of Crown Land, Sarah AH CHING, LAN/AW24.
Sale of Crown Land, YONE- CHINAMAN, Maryborough, 1881, LAN/AW8.
Sale of Crown Land, YOUNG KIN, Winton, 1882-1883, LAN/AW12.
Valuation Registers, Queenton Shire Council, QUE/N2 (PRV11288/1/2)
ii.) Colonial Secretary, Naturalisations, Home Office and Other
Aboriginal Lizzie Smith co habituating with Lee Soy, 1901, COL/145/01/17649.
AH CHIN, application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Cooktown, 1875, COL/B1 1872/3451.
AH CHIT HOBSON, application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Cumberland, 1898,
JUS/A82/94/2195.
AH CHOW, application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Cairns, 1884 COL/A379/84/4370.
AH KIT, AH KIT Julia. A/40118.
AH MING, Request for Exhumation remains for wife Wah Quay and baby, COL/A435.
AH SUE, A/18963.
AH TONG Memorial, application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Cairns, 1901, COL/72 01/210.
AH WOOD George, Certificate of Naturalisation, 1901, COL/7/0118843.
Andrew LEON Certificate of Naturalisation, Bowen, 1869, COL/A208/69/861.
Batch File, Correspondence relating to 1891 Shearers Strike, COL/422.
Benjamin INGHAM, Certificate of Naturalisation, Warwick, 1861, SCT/CF/84.
Charley AH FOO- Japanese Prostitutes, HOM /A22/99/3266.
Charley Ah Foo, HOM A22/99/3266
Charlie AH LETT, application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Cairns, 1887, COL /A521/87/8284.
Child Polly WON YOUNG 1897, HOM A7/97/3293.
CHIN PACK, application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Cooktown, 1882, COL/A338/82/3166.
CHUNG CHANG, Certificate of Naturalisation, Cooktown, 1879, SCT/CF10 1879.
Correspondence regarding White Children with Chinese man in transit, 1877, COL/A250/77/5899.
DAN HAWK, Certificate of Naturalisation, 1874, COL/A208/74.
Died Intestate Jimmy AH MOY, late of Avon Downs, 1912, CUR/0 180.
Died Intestate, ASHNEY, Gayndah, 1898, CUR/017.
Died Intestate, Estate of AH LIN, 1912CUR/0 149 47-54.
Ecclesiastical (will) File, George HOON, Townsville, SRS6220/2.
Ecclesiastical (will) File, ING YEE- Charlie CHUN TIE, Home Hill, 1973, SRS 6220/6769.
Ecclesiastical (will) File, SUE YEK –Fred SING LUM, Innisfail, 1960, SRS6220/2/4248.
Ernest SUE in service to George Adams Aloomba from Reformatory, Lytton, 1888,
COL/A541/88/3009.
Exhumation Jane Mar, 1929, Cunnamulla, HOM /J72529/5208 (ID848344).
Exhumation Millchester, HOM/A22/04405/29.
George FOW, Certificate of Naturalisation, Drayton, 1861, COL/B1 1859-1860 Z4904.
GONG SING, Oath of Allegiance, Gympie, 1872, COL/B1 1872/1255/1232.
Henry LEE of ON WAR LOONG & CO, application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Cairns 1901,
COL/72 01/246.
Henry LEE of ON WAR LOONG & CO, application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Cairns, 1901,
JUS/A872/01/12774.
HOM YUEN, gardener, Marbuiag Island, HOM/J259/19.
HOP LEE, application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Bundaberg, 1901, COL/72/01/259.
Insolvency File, James AH CHING, Cairns, 1893-1897, CUR/T52.
Jane Mary LOW CHOY vs William STEWART, Supreme Court Townsville, 1916, A/28823.
John HOP, Certificate of Naturalisation, Eton Vale, 1860, COL/B1 1859-1860.
John SING, application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Gayndah, 1875, COL/A208/75/1237.
KOM MOY, Application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Burketown, COL/74 /0031.
KWONG KEE, Oath of Allegiance, Cairns, 1901, COL/72 01/4684.
LEE GUN, application for Naturalisation Refused, 1901, COL/72 1901/190.
LEE LIY, Butts of Oaths of Allegiance 1874-1874, Supreme Court Charters Towers 1874,
SCT/CF10 3030.
LEM BOSUN, Certificate of Naturalisation, Warwick, 1860, COL/B1 1859-1860 Z4904.
Letter of support for AH HON for application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Charters Towers,
1901COL/72 /221.
Letter to King Nam, Merchant Firm, and Thursday Island, COL/B36 6/7/96 3881 Item 8728.
Marriage of a Chinaman (Tommy Ah Low) with Aboriginal female granted, 1900. A/58764
(RSI15038/1/21).
Mr. and Mrs. GUIE, Letter to Colonial Secretary, St George, 1888, COL/A541/88/3139.
Petition for police magistrate to be appointed to Croydon 1882, COL/A338/82/3735.
Register of Pauper Relief 1892-1893, COL/466 (PRV 7152-1-1).
Removals and Deportations D- O 1922/1244, A/59005.
SAM AH BOW, Burketown, Application for Naturalisation, COL/72/01/18843.
Sam ASHEW application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Cooktown, 1882, COL/A338/82/3150.
SAM FONG, application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Pentland, 1895, JUS/A87/95/7207.
SEEN FUNG GOON, Oath of Allegiance, Brisbane, 1875, COL/B1 1872/1255/3369.
SUE YEK, Certificate of Naturalisation, 1877, COL/A306/81/285.
TIM AH SING, application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Brisbane, 1875, COL/A209/75/1541.
TOM TIP, application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Georgetown, 1885, COL/A435/85/6412.
Tommy AH CUM, application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Muttaburra, 1888,
COL/A532/88/499.
TONG letter to Home Secretary Office re client, Cairns, 1899, COL/72 1899/0086.
TONG MOW, application for release of son from Reformatory, 1887, COL/A529/87/10075.
William SHIN, application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Townsville, 1885, COL/A428/85/2590.
William SING BUNDERIN, Application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Roma 1883,
COL/A365/83/3390.
William SING, Windorah, 1883, COL/A365/83/3590.
William YEK LOONG, Certificate of Naturalisation, Brisbane, 1872, COL/A437/85/6960.
Wills 3441 – 3443: Fanny Scarisbrick, Herberton, 1927, CUR/W773.
WONG HING, application for Certificate of Naturalisation, Cooktown, 1876, COL/B1 1876/3769.
iii.) Police, Court of Petty Sessions, Justice Records, Inquests, Dunwich Asylum
Ah Sang vs Bridget Ah Sue, Thursday Island, JUS/A59.
Assault by CHIAM on Ann Price, Brisbane, 1858, CRS/ 157/ 58.
Book 1/2: Cloncurry: Police Summons Sheet 1897, A/70475-A/70498.
Book 2/2: Cloncurry: Police Summons Sheet 1909, A/70475-A/70498.
Brown vs SEE CHIN, Cairns, 1922, CRS/156/36/3661.
Charters Towers Clerk of Petty Sessions, Alphabetical Register of Bills of Sale, April 1892-
January 1916, CPS 11A/8.
Charters Towers Mining Warden Register of Claims 1887-1890, A/20704.
Chin Fat, Letter to Protector of Aborigines, A/58735.
Chinese Disturbances, POL/J29.
Clerk of Petty Sessions, 10 February 1885-23 May 1888, Ingham, CPS 12B/U2.
Clerk of Petty Sessions, 1900-1909, Ingham: bench records and summons book sheets, A/22705.
Clerk of Petty Sessions, Ah Chong, Kennedy River, Cooktown, CPS 13E/R 2.
Clerk of Petty Sessions, Ah Ting, Kennedy River, Cooktown, CPS 13E/R 2.
Clerk of Petty Sessions, Bench Records and Summons Book sheets, Halifax, 1917-1927, CPS
12H/S4.
Clerk of Petty Sessions, Cash Book, Tabletop, 30 July 1888-12 Sept 1890, CPS 14 H/M1.
Clerk of Petty Sessions, Ingham, 10 February 1885-23 May 1888, CPS 12B/U1.
Clerk of Petty Sessions, Police Summons Sheets Halifax, 1896-1906, CPS 12H/S1.
Clerk of Petty Sessions, Police Summons Sheets Halifax, 1906-1917, CPS 12H/S2.
Clerk of Petty Sessions, Register of Business licences, Cooktown, 1889-1912, CPS 13 E/ R2.
Clerk of Petty Sessions, Register of Firms, Cooktown, April 1906- August 1915, CPS 13 E/6.
Clerk of Petty Sessions, Register of Proceedings, Thornborough, CPS 129/U1.
Cloncurry: Police Summons Sheet 1897, A/70475-A/70498.
Correspondence including “Black trackers”, Richmond District, 1894-1935, A/44884.
Correspondence, Register of Firms, Winton, 1902, CPS9H/AC1-3.
Court of Petty Sessions Record Book, Gayndah, 1850-1857, A/4870.
Court of Petty Sessions, Irvinebank, 1899-1914, CPS 12C/51.
Court of Petty Sessions, Maryborough, 1894, PRV 6750-1-20.
Criminal Deposition, Ah Hing, Springsure, 1876, JUS S2 91.
Criminal Deposition, Ah Jung alias Ingham, Clermont, 1870, JUS S2 164.
Criminal Deposition, Ah Kin, Blackall, 1885, JUS S2 185.
Criminal Deposition, Ah Ming, Brisbane, 1880, JUS S2 118.
Criminal Deposition, Ah Sam, Roma, 1880, JUS S2 272.
Criminal Deposition, Ah Wah, Maytown, 1881, JUS S2/221.
Criminal Deposition, Ah Young, Brisbane, 1877, JUS S2 217 & 94.
Criminal Deposition, Chan Quay Chan, Cooktown, 1880, JUS S2 203.
Criminal Deposition, George Toe, Toowoomba, 1872, JUS S2 60.
Criminal Deposition, Ing Beechere Dabee, Brisbane, 1877, JUS S2 111.
Criminal Deposition, Nora Chong Hoi (alias Nora O’Donnell), Brisbane, 1880, JUS S2 303.
Criminal Deposition, Pon Don, Linwood, Dalby, 1878, JUS S2 156.
Criminal Deposition, Tee Kong, and Toowoomba 1877, JUS S2 100.
Crown Solicitors Office, Briefs Transcripts and Depositions involving Chinese and Aborigines,
1858-1908, CRS/ 157.
Crown vs Vera Gray, Cairns, 1920, A/28838.
Croydon Petty Cash Book, CPS14A/M20.
Croydon Register BDM sent to Normanton District Office by Court House Registrar, 1900-1908,
CPS 14A/44.
Croydon, June 1892-August 1893, CPS 14A/M20.
Enquiry into death of Florence Small, 1938, JUS/1056.
Enquiry into Fire at Wong Hoy’s, Cairns, 1927, JUS/N837.
Evidence by Gee Hoy and Gail Lottie, Charlie Gee Hoy, Cherbourg, 1931, File 2,
JUS/N1251/55/90.
Gee Hoy and Gail Lottie, Charlie Gee Hoy, Cherbourg, 1931, File 1, JUS/N1093/40/864.
Halifax Clerk of Petty Sessions, 1919-1923, Insolvency, CUR 12 A/G1.
Im vs Im & Wong Gyp, Brisbane, 1895, JUS/A90/95/4708.
Index to Register of Liquor Licenses, 1913-1935, Ingham, A/35850.
Inquest into death of Emily (baby), Alibilbah Station, 1907, JUS/N381/07/454.
Inquest into death, ‘old Chinese Man’, Mackay, 1935, JUS/N997/35/415.
Inquest into death, “Kathleen”,Alibilbah, 1955,JUS/N1234/54/37.
Inquest into death, Ah Sing, Auburn Station, Chinchilla, 1885, JUS/N119/85.
Inquest into death, Annie Skehan, “Chinese Quarter”, Port Douglas, 1891, JUS/N190/91/201.
Inquest into death, Arnold Lee Bow, Innisfail, 1931, JUS/N923/31/111.
Inquest into death, Ayee Chun, Thursday Island, 1894, JUS/N226/94/337.
Inquest into death, baby daughter of Din Dek and Bijelli, Nebo, 1919,JUS/N683/19/83.
Inquest into death, baby Shang, Innisfail, 1932, JUS/N41/32/106.
Inquest into death, Bridget Ah Sue, Waverly Station, St Lawrence, 1886, JUS/N129/86/114.
Inquest into death, Cape River, 1913, JUS/N541/13/667.
Inquest into Death, Charlie Ah Kee, Babinda, 1936, JUS /N1016/36/590.
Inquest into death, Charlie Gee Hoy, Ingham, 1955,JUS/N1251/55/90,
Inquest into death, Charlie Hong, 1936, JUS/N1141/36/5/1135.
Inquest into death, Charlie Sing, Winton, 1924,JUS/N773/24/43.
Inquest into death, Eva Fong, Richmond, 1937, JUS/N1021/37/21.
Inquest into death, George See Hoe, Atherton, 1920,JUS/N704/20/194.
Inquest into death, Georgetown, 1918, JUS/N657/18/113.
Inquest into death, girl, Brisbane, 1910, JUS/N437/10/54.
Inquest into death, Go Lum, Cloncurry, 1939, JUS/N1073/39/770.
Inquest into death, Grace See Chong, Chillagoe, 1923, JUS/N763/23/509.
Inquest into death, infant, Maryborough, 1887, JUS/N139/87.
Inquest into death, Jimmy Ah On, Le Quay’s garden, Burketown, 1918, JUS/N666/18/329.
Inquest into death, Julia Eliza Hargraves, Brisbane, 1900, JUS/N289/00/438.
Inquest into death, Kathleen Ah Sam, Cloncurry, 1955, JUS/N1254/55/223.
Inquest into death, Kim Sing at Bamford, 1926, Mareeba, JUS/N817/26/323.
Inquest into death, KOCHO, Toowoomba, 1884, JUS/N104/85.
Inquest into death, Lee Fong, 1917, JUS/N624//17/92.
Inquest into death, Lee Fong, Cloncurry, 1917, JUS/N624//17/92.
Inquest into death, Lily Ah Kim, Glen Isa homestead, Cloncurry, 1934, JUS/N977/34/172.
Inquest into death, Lily Tam See, Innisfail, 1920,JUS/N714/20/654.
Inquest into death, Lim Kin, Normanton, 1918, JUS/N679/18/735.
Inquest into death, Maggie Gee Hoy, Augustus Downs, Cloncurry, 1932, JUS/N943/32/224.
Inquest into death, Margaret Buckingham, Cairns, 1926, JUS/N817/26/314.
Inquest into Death, Mary Rodda Ah Hee, Pentland, 1912, JUS/N513/12/694.
Inquest into death, Omasse Frank, Mackay, 1891, JUS/N199/92/145.
Inquest into death, Percy So Choy, Townsville, 1937, JUS/N1037/37/712.
Inquest into death, Peter King Lee, Mackay, 1937, JUS/N1021/37/21.
Inquest into death, Phillip Kum Yuen, Mossman, 1917, JUS/N625/17/157.
Inquest into death, Rosie Bing Chew, Oakland Park Station, 1918, JUS/ N678 /18/684.
Inquest into death, stockman, Morestone Station, 1938, JUS/N1040/38/40.
Inquest into death, Susan Fet, Sandy Creek, Clermont, 1893, JUS/N263/93/213.
Inquest into death, Vincent See Poy, Innisfail, 1931, JUS/N923/31/110.
Inquest into death, William Ah Hee, Pentland, Upper Cape, 1937, JUS/N1027/37/267.
Inquest into death, William JACKSON, Lolworth Diggings, 1914, JUS/N1118/42/418.
Inquest into death, William John Phillips, Jericho, 1935, JUS/N990/35/68.
Inquest into death, woman, Halifax, 1907, JUS/N376/07/309.
Inquest into Fire, Ada Ah Shay, Innisfail, 1927, JUS/N841/27/262.
Inquest into Fire, Bridget Ah Sue, Townsville, 1908, JUS/N398/08/253.
Inquest into Fire, Chinatown Cloncurry, 1922, JUS/N739 /22/345.
Inquest into Fire, Criminal Deposition Ang Wong, Rockhampton, 1881, JUS S2 232.
Inquest into Fire, evidence by Jimmy Ning and wife Bessie, Lawn Hill Station, 1917,
JUS/N648/17/689.
Inquest into murder/suicide, Japanese wife/husband, Ingham, 1914, JUS/N548/14/150.
Inquest, Ah Fat, Townsville, 1929,JUS/N896/29/743.
Inquest, Ah Sing, JUS/A87/ 95/ 7207.
Inquest, Croydon, 1926,JUS/N816/26/274.
Inspector of Nuisances Report re Disease Outbreaks, Queenton, 1910-1914, PRV 11286-2
(QUE/17)
Inspector of Nuisances Report, Queenton, 1906, PRV 11286-1(QUE/16)
Japanese Prostitutes – Inquiry into Japanese women, 1897, POLJ1.
Kondo, Thomas, married to Wright Nellie, 1919, JUS/N701/20/3.
Lee Liy Wing On, Millchester, SCT/CF10 3030
Mary Ann Ah Cum, PRE/A616 (SRS5402/1/605)
Mary Young vs Regina, Charters Towers, 1892, JUS /A62/92/726.
Mrs. Charlotte Ah Bow, JUS/A59.
Murder Jack See Kar, Charleville, 1895, JUS N341/05/348.
Northern District Court, Minute Book, Croydon, 1889-1910, DCT/14 A /D1.
Police Court Record - Eliza Jane Ferris, JUS/ 96.
Police Department, Cairns Station, Letterbook 20 June 1899-20 June 1906, POL 12M/G3.
Police Department, Commissioner’s Office: Miscellaneous Correspondence Report 1898 (number
of Chinese in districts) POL/J2.
Police Diary of Duty and Occurrences, Aramac District, 1888-1933, A/5111-A/5116.
Police Magistrates Book, Ingham, 1924-1926, A/22979.
Queensland Police investigation into immoral behavior, Brisbane Botanical Gardens, A/44848.
Rape of Eliza Ferris by Thomas Lester, Charters Towers, 1896, CRS/157/96.
Regina vs Annie Lang, Deposition, Cooktown, 1884, A/18484.
Register of Firms, Gayndah, 1922-1949, A /24864.
Register of Firms, Hughenden, 1903-1933, A/73399.
Register of Firms, Mackay, 1903-1933, CPS 10B/26.
Register of Firms, Thursday Island, 1903-1961, OS 744/1.
Register of Licences, Irvinebank, 1895-1901, CPS12C/R2.
Report by Police Magistrate Pennefather on Ingham, and Report by Dr. W.C.C. Macdonald on
Ingham gaol , JUS/N120/85.
Return of Chinese in Several Police Districts of Queensland April-May 1909, (Via Circular
Memorandum No. 534), POL/J1.
Return of work performed by the police at Laura in connection with Aborigines for month of
October 1903, POL/J1/7.
Sam Yick vs Vera Gray, Cairns 1921, A/28842.
Small Debts Court, Draft Minute Book, Croydon, 1886-1887, CPS 14A/U1.
The King vs Lillie Thomas, Innisfail, 1929, A/28872.
Treasury Department, Licensing Matters: postage and petty cash, 1901-1920, A/67975-A67979.
Watch house Charge Book, Taroom, 1875-1893, A/36342.
Photographs of Prisoners, 1899-1891, Z26843.
iv.) Maps, Queensland State Archives
Town of Port Kennedy, Thursday Island, 1907, SRS 2022-1-11.
Torres Strait Island and Somerset, 1894, SRS 2175-1-1.
Halifax, 1915, PRV 14282-1-776
Queensland census and sub district, Mackay, 189, SRS 4949-1-225.
Cape River, 1868, SRS 2029-1-60.
Survey of Crocodile Creek Goldfields, 1866, SRS 1761 -1-202.
Cania Goldfield by W.H.Rands, 1890, SRS 2029-1-57.
Town of Gayndah, 1852, SRS 4314-1-6.
Occupation Licenses, Gayndah, 1923, RSI 3427-1-20.
Town of Miles, 1900, SRS 1869-1-69.
Roma, 1865, SRS 1860-1-73.
Town of Dalby, 1864, SRS 1754-1-30.
Census Districts, Queensland, SRS 4949-1.
State Library of Queensland: John Oxley Library (JOL)
i.) Documentary Records
OM 81-53: Foot Family, Private Letters between sisters
OM 75-91: H. Ferguson, Personal Book/Diary
OM 92-78: John Kerr Cutting Book
OM 80-7/20: Kathleen Bruce, Folder
Unnumbered
“Chinese in Queensland”, Blackall’s Chinatown, loose pages
“Chinese in Queensland”, obituary of W. Forday, Rockhampton Morning Bulletin, Tuesday
22/7/1969, cutting
Local Government Authority Records –by Town
i.) Cairns ( Held at Cairns Historical Society, Cairns)
Minutes, Cairns Municipal Council, 1885-1890.
Minutes, Cairns Municipal Council, 1898.
Minutes, Cairns Town Council, 1916.
ii.) Cloncurry (Held at Cloncurry Historical Society, Cloncurry)
Cloncurry Ambulance Attendance Records, 1931
Cloncurry Ambulance Attendance Records, 1932
Cloncurry Shire Council, Sanitary Register and Charge Book, 1924-1926
Cloncurry Shire Council, Sanitary Register and Charge Book, 1927-1928
Cloncurry Shire Council, Sanitary Register and Charge Book, 1929-1931
Cloncurry Shire Council, Sanitary Register and Charge Book, 1931
Cloncurry Shire Council, Sanitary Register and Charge Book, 1932
Cloncurry Shire Council, Sanitary Register and Charge Book, 1934
Cloncurry Shire Council, Sanitary Register and Charge Book, 1948
Cloncurry Shire Council, Register of Notices, 1939
Cloncurry Shire Council, Valuation Register & Rate Book, 1913
Cloncurry Shire Council, Valuation Register & Rate Book, 1913a
Cloncurry Shire Council, Valuation Register & Rate Book, 1916-1918
Cloncurry Shire Council, Valuation Register & Rate Book, 1918-1919
Cloncurry Shire Council, Valuation Register & Rate Book, 1920-1922
Cloncurry Shire Council, Water Authority, 1922
Cloncurry Shire Council, Water Authority, 1943
iii.) Croydon (Held at Croydon Shire Council, Croydon)
Croydon Divisional Board/Croydon Shire Council Amended By-Laws. 1898, 1903, 1905, 1907
Croydon Shire Council, Rate Cash Book, 1935-1955
Croydon Shire Council, Register of Miner’s Right Listings, 1917-1928
Croydon Shire Council, Sanitary Charges Register, 1913
Croydon Shire Council, Sanitary Fees and Receipts, 1916-1936
Croydon Shire Council, Sanitary Fees and Receipts, 1936-1955
Croydon Shire Council, Sanitary Ledger, 1951-1953
Croydon Shire Council, Valuation Register and Rate Book, 1921-1937
iv.) Hughenden & Richmond (Held at Flinders Shire Council, Hughenden)
Hughenden Divisional Board, General Ledger, 1882-1887
Hughenden Divisional Board, General Account Ledger, 1896-1899
Hughenden Divisional Board/Flinders Shire Council, Valuation Register, 1888-1903
Hughenden Divisional Board/Flinders Shire Council, Rate Register, 1888-1903
Hughenden Divisional Board/Flinders Shire Council, Rate Register, Rates received, 1888-1907
Hughenden Divisional Board/Flinders Shire Council, Valuation & Rates Register, 1901-1908
Flinders Shire Council, Valuation Register, Richmond Water Authority, 1905-1906
Flinders Shire Council, Minute Book, 1911-1916
Flinders Shire Council, Valuation & Rate Register, 1943-1945
Flinders Shire Council, Valuation & Rate Register, 1948-1953
Wyangerie Shire Council, Water Authority Minute Book, 1913-1915
Wyangerie Shire Council, Richmond Minute Book, 1921-1923
v.) Georgetown (Held at Etheridge Shire Council, Georgetown)
Einasleigh Divisional Board Register, 1882
Einasleigh Divisional Board, Rate Register, 1882-1884
Einasleigh Divisional Board, Rate Register, 1888-1896
Einasleigh Divisional Board, Rate Register, 1889
Einasleigh Divisional Board, Rate Cash Book, 1882-1886
Einasleigh Divisional Board, Rate Cash Book, 1888-1896
Einasleigh Divisional Board and Shire Council, Letterbook, 1883-1914
Einasleigh Divisional Board, Valuation Register, 1887
Einasleigh Divisional Board, Letterbook, 1892
Einasleigh Shire Council, Rate Register, 1904-1905
Einasleigh Shire Council, Rate Register, 1906-1908
Einasleigh Shire Council, Rate Cash Book, 1906-1908
Einasleigh Shire Council, Valuation Register and Rate Book, 1911
Einasleigh Shire Council, Letterbook, 1911-1913
Einasleigh Shire Council, Valuation Register and Rate Book, 1916
Einasleigh/Etheridge Shire Council, Market Garden Areas. 1915-1920
Einasleigh Shire Council, Mining Homestead Leases, Etheridge & Oak fields, 1914-1918
Etheridge Shire Council, Valuation Register and Rate Book, 1921
vi.) Innisfail/ Geraldton (Held at Cassowary Coast Regional Council, Innisfail)
Johnstone Shire Council, Valuation Register and Rate Book, 1910
Johnstone Shire Council, Valuation Register and Rate Book, 1920
Johnstone Shire Council, Valuation Register and Rate Book, 1922
vii.) Normanton (Held at Carpentaria Shire Council, Normanton)
Carpentaria Divisional Board, General Cash Book and Bank Account, 1883-1889
Carpentaria Divisional Board, General Cash Book, 1886-1891
Carpentaria Divisional Board, Rates Received, 1883-1887
Carpentaria Divisional Board and Shire Council, Rate book, 1886-1903
Carpentaria Divisional Board, Ledger, 1886-1889
Carpentaria Divisional Board, Cash Book, 1897-1899
Carpentaria Shire Council, Account Book, 1910
Carpentaria Shire Council, Rate Cash Book, 1914-1919
Carpentaria Shire Council, General Ledger and Rate Register, 1920
Carpentaria Shire Council, Carpentaria Improvement Board, 1934
Carpentaria Shire Council, General Cash Book, 1927-1942
Carpentaria Divisional Board and Shire Council, Rate Register, 1887-1903
Carpentaria Shire Council, Rate Register, 1906-1908
Carpentaria Shire Council, Rate Register, 1940-1941
Carpentaria Shire Council, Rates and Valuations, 1926-1929
Carpentaria Shire Council, Sanitary Rate Register, 1932
Carpentaria Shire Council, Sanitary Rate Register, 1942-1959
Carpentaria Shire Council. Sanitary Rate Register, 1955
Carpentaria Shire Council, Valuation Register and Rate Book, 1914-1916
Carpentaria Shire Council, Valuation Register and Rate Book, 1917-1919
Carpentaria Shire Council, Valuation Register and Rate Book, 1922
Carpentaria Shire Council, Valuation Register and Rate Book, 1923-1924
Carpentaria Shire Council, Valuation Register and Rate Book, 1926-1928
Carpentaria Shire Council: Valuation Register and Rate Book, 1948-1949
viii.) Townsville City Council (held at the Townsville City Council CityLibraries,
(Microfilm, Family History Association of NQ and Townsville City Council
Millennium Project 2000)
Townsville Municipal Council, Council Minute Book, 19 October 1876 - 24 January 1879
Townsville Municipal Council, Council Minute Book, 9 January 1879- 11 April 1881
Townsville General Rate Book, Book 1, 1879.
Townsville Municipal Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 2, 1881, 1882, 1883, 1884,
1885, North Ward
Townsville Municipal Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 4, 1884, 1885, 1886, 1887,
1888, 1889, 1889/90, West Ward
Townsville Municipal Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book3, 1884, 1885: 1888, Ross
Island
Townsville Municipal Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 6, 1886, 1887, 1888, West
Ward
Townsville Municipal Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 7, 1884, 1885, West Ward
Townsville Municipal Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 13, 1900, West Ward
Townsville Municipal Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 14, 1900, East Ward
Townsville Municipal Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 15, 1900, South Ward
Townsville Municipal Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 18, 1901, West Ward
Townsville Municipal Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 19, 1901, East Ward
Townsville Municipal Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 20, 1901, South Ward
Townsville Municipal Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 23, 1901, North Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 25, 1902, East Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 26, 1902, West Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 29, 1903, West Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 31, 1903, South Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 32, 1903, East Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 39, 1904, West Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 40, 1904, South Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 46, 1905, West Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 47, 1905, East Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 48, 1905, North Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 49, 1905, South Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 54, 1906, North Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 58, 1907, East Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 59, 1907, South Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 60, 1907, West Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 81, 1909, North Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 82, 1909, South Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 87, 1910, North Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 88, 1910, West Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 89, 1910, East Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 90, 1910, South Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 95, 1911, West Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 97, 1911, East Ward
Townsville City Council, Townsville General Rate Book: Book 119, 1915, South Ward
ix.) Winton - (Held at Winton Shire Council, Winton)
Winton Divisional Board, Rate Book, 1888-1896
Winton Shire Council, Rate Book, 1910-1912
Winton Shire Council, Rate Book, 1915-1915
Winton Shire Council, Rate Book, 1916-1918
Winton Shire Council, Rate Book, 1928-1931
Winton Shire Council, Rate Book, 1946-1947
Winton Shire Council, Sanitary Rate Register 1939-1940
Winton Shire Council, Sanitary Rate Register, 1909-1910
Winton Divisional Board, Valuation Books, c. 1882
Winton Shire Council, Valuation Register, 1904-1905
Winton Divisional Board and Shire Council, Water Rate Book, 1900-1904
Winton Shire Council, Water Rate Book, 1911- 1917
Winton Shire Council, Water Rate Book, 1925-1929
Winton Shire Council, Water Rate Book, 1933
Winton Shire Council, Water Rate Book, 1941-1942
Burial Records
Held in local towns and districts.
Carpentaria Shire Council Burial Register, held at Carpentaria Shire Council, Normanton
Cloncurry Shire Council Cemetery Records, 1917-1970, held at Cloncurry Shire Council
Croydon Burial Registers, Select Pages, held at Croydon Information and Historical Centre,
Croydon
Etheridge Shire Council Burial Register & Monumental Inscription Database, Georgetown, held at
Etheridge Shire Council
Goondiwindi Cemetery Records, held at Dalby Family History Society
Hughenden Burial Register, held at Hughenden Historical Society
Richmond Shire Council Burial Register, 1886-2002, held at Richmond Family History Society
Richmond Shire Council, Index A-Z,Burial Register, held at Richmond Shire Council
Richmond Shire Council Old Cemetery Register, 1970s, held at Richmond Shire Council
Richmond Shire Council Pioneer Cemetery Records, 1886-1921, held at Richmond Shire Council
Townsville Cemetery West End, Cemetery Index 1874-1997, held at QSA, Item 1460222
Townsville Cemetery West End, Cemetery Register 1874- 1972, held at QSA, Item 1460220
Townsville Cemetery West End, Cemetery Register 1951-2008, held at QSA, Item 1460221
Townsville Cemetery West End, Cemetery Register of Interments 1873- 1998, held at QSA, Item
1460219
Winton Shire Council Burial Register, 1820-1980, held at Winton Shire Council
Winton Divisional Board and Shire Council, Burial Register 1890-1919
Winton Shire Council Index A-Z, Burial Register, held at Winton Shire Council
Banking Records
i.) Held at Cloncurry Historical Society, Cloncurry
Bank of New South Wales, Cloncurry : 1905-1911
Queensland National Bank, Burketown, 1885-1928
Queensland National Bank, Cloncurry Branch, 1884-1945
ii.) Held at Winton Historical Society, Winton
Queensland National Bank: QNB register Winton, 1881-1890
Queensland National Bank: QNB register Winton, 1890-1898
Queensland National Bank: QNB register Winton, 1898-1912
Queensland National Bank: QNB register Winton, 1916-1923
iii.) Held at Hughenden Genealogical Society, Hughenden
Queensland National Bank: QNB Signature Register, Hughenden, 1880-1883
Queensland National Bank: QNB Signature Register, Hughenden, 1884-1888
Almanacs and Directories
Queensland Post Office Directories, 1860-1910
Willmetts North Queensland Almanac, Willmetts and Co, Townsville, 1883, 1885, 1888, 1892,
1898.
Church Records
i. Methodist Church: 1891-1960, Marriage Registers, Cairns Methodist Church, Cairns, accessed
2002
ii. Anglican Church (Church of England):Northern Registers held at the St James Cathedral
Archives, accessed 2002, as follows:
 Townsville Marriage Records
 Townsville Baptism Records
 Charters Towers Baptism Records
 Normanton Marriage Register
 Normanton Baptism Register
Northern Churchman, 1904-1910
Year Book of the Diocese of North Queensland; 1901-1902, The BishopsRegistry, 1902, Townsville
Year Book of the Diocese of North Queensland; 1904-1905, Church of England Book Department,
1905, Townsville
Year Book of the Diocese of North Queensland; 1907-1908, Church of England Book Department,
1908, Townsville
Other
Andrew, Cedric, Recollections, undated ms held at Mackay Historical Society and Museum Inc.
Court of Petty Sessions, Register of Stock, Register of Brands, Croydon, 1920-1940, held by
Croydon Shire Council
Department of Public Instruction, Admission Register, Golden Gate School, held by Croydon Shire
Council
Keong Family Records, Assorted papers, Queensland, date unknown, in possession of Steven
Keong.
O’Neil, Allen, Bowman Family Records, Assorted Papers, Northern Territory and Northern
Queensland.
Ravenswood State School, “Ravenswood State School Admission Register”, Information held at
Ravenswood Historical Society, accessed 2005.
Register of Corporal Punishment, Croydon State School, 1923-1936, held by Croydon Shire
Council
School Document, Croydon No. 165, 1 May 1922-31 December 1930, held by Croydon Shire
Council
Birth Register in the District of Burke in the Colony of Queensland, Registered by Clement Arnett
Collard District Register numbers 895, 899,898, held by Carpentaria Shire Council
Report and diary of the Government Medical and Health Officer, Thornborough Police District
1888-1889,held by J. Wegner, James Cook University
Oral History Interviews
2001, Arleen Lee Long, Cairns, 25 April 2001
2001, Estelle Kingsley, Cairns, 2 May 2001, Tape 1
2001, George Gong, Cairns, 5 April 2001
2001, George Wah Day, Cairns, 5 April 2001
2001, Greta Yin Foo, Norma Lee and Thyra Lin Foy, Cairns, 21 March 2001
2001, Jenni Campbell, Cairns, 8 May 2001
2001, Phoebe Mow, Daphne Wong Hoy and Judith Chiu Chong, Cairns, 3 May 2001
2001, Roma Leong See, Cairns, 20 May 2001
2002, Amelia Wah Day, Cairns, 22 July 2002
2002, Bethel Barton, Melbourne, 14 March 2002
2002, Bill Sue Yek, Innisfail, 29 July 2002
2002, Bishop Tung Yep, Cairns, 9 May 2002.
2002, Carl Richardson, Mareeba, 8 August 2002
2002, Des Leswell, Mareeba, 8 August 2002
2002, Dr. Lindsey Jue Sue, Atherton, 8 May 2002
2002, Gordon Markey, Cairns, 22 July 2002
2002, Greta Yin Foo, Cairns, 27 February 2002
2002, Janie Edwards, Cairns, 24 May 2002
2002, Len Leon, Tolga, 6 June 2002
2002, Major General Darryl Low Choy, Brisbane, 8 July 2002
2002, Neelima Lee, Melbourne, 15 March 2002
2002, Vincent Lee, Cairns, 9 May 2002
2002, Jeanie Whelan, Cairns, 16 May 2002
2002, Marilyn McDonald, Cairns, 5 August 2002
2002, Mary Lee, Cairns, 16 May 2002
2002, Mrs. Dawn Stiff, Cairns, 21 June 2002
2002, Mrs. Go Sam, Atherton, 6 May 2002
2002, Mrs. Mabel Garvey, Cairns, 26 June 2002
2002, Neil Lee Leong, Atherton, 8 May 2002
2002, Eleanor Chun Tie, Townsville, 21 May 2002
2002, Ena and Arthur Chu Lun, Townsville, 21 May 2002
2002, Val Kum Yuen, Cairns, 9 May 2002
2002, Sadie Fong On and Ruby Cahill, Atherton, 8 May 2002
2002, Tiger See Hoe, Innisfail, 29 July 2002
2002, Vincent Lee, Cairns, 14 August 2002
2002, Vincent Lee, Cairns, 9 May 2002
2004, Interview, Merleen Freedman, Miles, 2004
2004, Heather and Stanley Ping, Gayndah, 2004
b.) Personal Communications (Pers. comm.)
2000, Alice Robb, Sandford.
2002-2017, Ray Poon, various topics.
2002-2018, Kevin Rains, Various topics.
2002, Keith Shang, 28 August 2002.
2002, Mona Brown, 26 September 2007.
2002, Norma King Koi, 6 September 2002.
2002, Professor Yuen-Fong Woon, 18 August 2002.
2004, Jim Harris, Gladstone and Eidsvold, letter 21 March 2004; artefacts.
2007, Una Playford and Colleen Murdoch, 24 September 2007.
2007, Betty Asmus, Richmond, 26 September 2007.
2007, Marie O’Sullivan, Singleton, Richmond, 26 September 2007.
2007, Chris Wierman, Croydon 5 October 2007.
2007, Dawn and Ray “Bidge” Bennett, Hughenden, 25 September 2007.
2007, Gerry Tim, Cloncurry 27 September 2007.
2007, Jack Smeardon, Normanton, 2 October 2007.
2007, Maddy Smith, Cairns, 26 September 2007.
2007, Mrs Connolly, Cloncurry, 28 September 2007.
2007, Nola Gallagher, Historical Society, Normanton, 1 October 2007.
2007, William Butler, 8 October 2007.
2009, Merle Douglas, Townsville, 2009.
2012, Myra Timmerman, Cairns, 2012.
2012-2014, Claire Faulkner, Ayr
2012-2015, Gordon Grimwade, Yungaburra.
2013, Marilyn Dooley, Sydney.
2014, Glenda Morris.
2015, Ely Finch, email translation of Mackay Temple couplets, 22 October 2015.
2016-2018, Juanita Kwok, various dates.
2014-2018, Paul Macgregor, 4 March 2018, Townsville and other conversations.
2018, Shirley Hune, Wuyi, 10 December 2018.
2018, Anthony Leong, Caobian village, China, 3 December 2018.
2018, Mrs Chen, former Head of Overseas Chinese Bureau, Zhongshan Province, China,
Zhongshan, 4 December 2018.
2018, Jenni Campbell, 14 December 2018.
Newspapers
Microfilm
Brisbane Courier, Brisbane
The Cairns Argus
Cairns Post, Cairns
The Cleveland Bay Express, Townsville
The Cooktown Courier, Cooktown
The Cooktown Herald, Cooktown
Croydon Mining Register, Croydon
The Herbert River Express, Lower Herbert, Ingham
The Mining Register, Charters Towers
Morning Post, Cairns
North Queensland Herald, Charters Towers
North Queensland Register, Charters Towers
The Northern Miner, Charters Towers
The Port Denison Times, Bowen
The Queenslander, Brisbane
Online through TROVE
The Argus, VIC.
The Australian News for Home Readers, VIC
Australian Town and Country Journal, NSW
Bathurst Free Press and Mining Journal, NSW
The Border Watch, SA
Brisbane Courier, QLD
Bendigo Advertiser, VIC.
Cairns Post, QLD
The Canberra Times, ACT
The Capricornian, Rockhampton QLD
Daily Mercury, QLD
The Daily Northern Argus, Charters Towers, QLD
Darling Downs Gazette and General Advertiser, QLD
The Evening Telegraph, Sydney, NSW
The Goulburn Herald and Chronicle, NSW
The Gregory News, QLD
Illustrated Australian News for Home Readers, Melbourne, VIC.
Illustrated Sydney News, NSW
The Inquirer and Commercial News, WA.
The Kapunda Herald, SA.
Mackay Mercury and South Kennedy Advertiser, QLD
Maryborough Chronicle, Wide Bay and Burnett Advertiser, QLD
The Mc Ivor Times and Rodney Advertiser,Heathcote, NSW
The Morton Bay Courier, Brisbane, QLD
Newcastle Chronicle, NSW
The North Australian, QLD
North Queensland Register, Charters Towers, QLD
Northern Argus, Charters Towers, QLD
The Northern Mining Register, Charters Towers, QLD
Ovens and Murray Advertiser, Beechworth, VIC
Queensland Times, Ipswich Herald and General Advertiser, QLD
The Queenslander, Brisbane, QLD
Rockhampton Bulletin and Central Queensland Advertiser, QLD
South Australian Advertiser, SA
South Australian Register, Adelaide, SA
South Australian Weekly Chronicle, SA.
The Sydney Morning Herald, NSW
The Sydney Mail and New South Wales Advertiser, NSW
Telegraph, Brisbane, QLD
Townsville Daily Bulletin, QLD
Truth, QLD
Warwick Examiner and Times, QLD
The Western Champion and General Advertiser for the Central-Western Districts, QLD
The World News, NSW
Worker, QLD
Zeehan and Dundas Herald, TAS
Photographs and Images: Selected Sources
“Cairns Chinatown, c. 1895”, Cairns Historical Society, Image: P03743
“Chinatown Geraldton / Innisfail. 1910”, University of Queensland Image: UQ375190.
“Chinese Garden, Hughenden” in E. J. Brady, Australia Unlimited, G. Robertson and Company,
Melbourne, c.1918, pp. 462-463.
“Chinese Gardener, Bowen”, JCU Library Image 15892.
“Chinese Orchards, Charters Towers”. JCU Library Image 11263
“Cooktown” c. 1887 [crop], JOL: Negative No. 38755
“Cooktown Chinatown”: Recreational and Social Activities, 1884, Town and Country Journal, 2
August 1884, p. 27.
“East Ingham Chinese precinct showing Houng Yuen& Co: 1916” in "Ingham", The Northern
Herald, 30 July 1915, p. 30.
“Edwardstown, later renamed Maytown”, “Edwardstown, Palmer River Goldfield”, in Australian
Town and Country Journal, 2 June 1877, p. 28.
“Grave of Ah Hee Cape River”, JCU Library Image 11147
“Grave of Mary Rhoda Ah Hee, Cape River”, JCU Library Image 11150
“Greetings from Ravenswood”, JOL: Negative No. 164766
“Hon. J. Mullan visiting Chinese market gardens in Normanton, 1935”, JOL Image Number: APE-
074-0001-0013, former ID picqld-2006-05-18-14-30.
“Interior of Mackay Temple, 1908”. “Our Illustrations”, North Queensland Herald, 4 April 1908, p.
7.
“Japanese girl in the Chinese/Japanese section of Cairns, ca. 1902”, 5564 Bertie Family
Photographs,
JOL Image Number: omp00006, former ID picqld-2004-07-30-14-22.
“Japanese woman, Gard’s Lane”, North Queensland Register, 4 May 1903, p. 39.
“Lit Sung Goong & community children” in Cathie May, “The Chinese Community in North
Queensland” in B.J. Dalton (ed.), Lectures in North Queensland History Series 1, Department of
History, James Cook University, Townsville, 1984, p.126a.
“Memorial image taken at Chinese Cemetery, Cloncurry”.Private Collection, S. Robb, 2007.
“Open-air theatre on Douglas Street, Thursday Island, 1920s”, JOL: Negative No. 69844
“Offices and Works of the New Ravenswood Mines Ltd., Ravenswood”, JOL: Negative No.
108627
“Palmerville Chinatown area on Lower Palmer”, State Library of Victoria Image mp004690: 1876.
“Queensland Blacks Attacking Chinese Diggers on the Gilbert River”, Illustrated Australian News
for Home Readers, 30 January 1873, p. 5.
“Reception to honour the Chinese Consul in Townsville, 1913”.Townsville City Council Image,
No. 303144
“Sketches about the Palmer, North Queensland”, “Burking a Chinaman”, The Australasian Sketcher
with Pen and Pencil, 13 April 1878, p. 5.
St. James Cathedral, Rectory and Chinese Church after Cyclone Leonta, Townsville,
1903.Townsville City Council Image.
“Tim See Too”, Cloncurry, date unknown. Private Collection, Pearl Connolly, Cloncurry, 2007.
“Tommy Ah Fat”, Cloncurry, date unknown. Private Collection, Pearl Connolly, Cloncurry, 2007.
“Townsville Chinese district Flinders Lane and Hanran Street, c.1890”, University of Queensland
Image: UQFL243_b1_0189a & UQFL243_b1_0188a, Fryer Library
“Yet Hoy, Luk Yet Ho and family”, Croydon, date unknown. Private Collection, Estelle Kingsley.
SECONDARY SOURCES:
Books, Articles, Journals, Websites, etc
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Research.pdf
___. Hawkins Creek State School, 75 Years 1912- 1987, Hawkins Creek State School, held at
Hinchinbrook Shire Council Library Local History Collection, Ingham.
___. Ingham State School Centenary 1885 – 1995, Ingham State School, 1995 held at Hinchinbrook
Shire Council Library Local History Collection, Ingham.
___. “Mary Ann Cooling”, Roma Family History Society, ms. 2002.
___. Our Heritage, Recollections and Reunions, Gayndah and District Historical Society Inc.,
1991.
___. “Our Heritage, Through Early Eyes”, typescript Gayndah and District Historical Society
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___.Cuttings Book of Ravenswood, undated, held at Ravenswood Court House Museum
___. “Souvenir Charters Towers, 1872-1950”, author, date and publisher unknown.
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