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American Merchants and the China Opium Trade, 1800–1840

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 June 2012

Jacques M. Downs
Jacques M. Downs
Affiliation:
Professor of History, St. Francis College, Biddeford, Maine
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Abstract

Although much has been written about the British opium trade, American traffic in the drug has received little attention. Professor Downs' article reveals that American merchants played a significant innovating role in developing new sources of supply and expanding the market. These activities forced the monopolistic British East India Company to protect its opium trade to China and led to the Opium War in 1839, when the Chinese government attempted to stop importation of the narcotic.

Type
Research Article
Information
Business History Review , Volume 42 , Issue 4 , Winter 1968 , pp. 418 - 442
Copyright
Copyright © The President and Fellows of Harvard College 1968

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References

1 Lest there be misunderstanding, it should be abundantly clear that the British trade was very substantial. Indeed, Michael Greenberg states, “Opium was no hole-in-the-corner petty smuggling trade, but probably the largest commerce of the time in any single commodity.” See British Trade and the Opening of China, 1800–1842. (Cambridge, 1951), 104.Google Scholar Earlier, Greenberg noted, “In the last decade before 1842, opium constituted about two-thirds of the value of all British imports into China.” (Ibid., 50). The American trade was probably about one-tenth as large overall, though the proportion was more sizeable in the dozen or so years following the War of 1812.

2 Bailey, Frank Edgar, British Opium Policy and the Turkish Reform Movement, 1826–1853 (Cambridge, Mass., 1942), 97–98Google Scholar, and Hershlag, Z. V., Introduction to the Modern Economic History of the Middle East (Leiden, 1964), 18–19Google Scholar.

3 When the missionary Pliny Fisk arrived there on January 15, 1820, around 100 vessels were in the harbor. See Bond, Alvan, Memoir of the Reverend Pliny Fisk (Boston, 1828), 109Google Scholar.

4 [Fuller, John], Narrative of a Tour Through Some Parts of the Turkish Empire (London, 1829), 43Google Scholar.

5 Literally the name means “Opium Black Castle.” The town was originally called Kara Hisar, or “Black Castle,” but the Afyon (Turkish afyun, meaning opium) was added to distinguish it from other Kara Hisars in Turkey. Of course, it was so called because of the principal commercial crop of the surrounding area. See Encyclopaedia of Islam (Leiden, 1960), new edition, I, 243Google Scholar.

6 By far the best sources I have found to date are Bey, Salaheddin, La Turquie a Pexposition universelle de 1867 (Paris, 1867) 48–56Google Scholar, and Scherzer, Carl von, Smyrna (Vienna, 1873), 136–140Google Scholar. Scherzer was Austrian Consul at Smyrna for many years and should know his subject. See also O. Blau, “Etwas über das Opium” in the Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft (1869), 280–281. The latter article, though very brief, cites several earlier sources in German and French. Unfortunately, neither Blau nor many of his references are readily available in this country.

7 One donüm (2½ acres) produced about four pounds of opium.

8 Thomas H. Perkins to John P. Cushing, January 15, 1825, Samuel Cabot Collection, Massachusetts Historical Society, Boston.

9 The United States had no formal agreement with the Porte until the Rhind Treaty of 1830. For further information, see Morison, Samuel Eliot, “Forcing the Dardanelles in 1810,” New England Quarterly, I (April, 1928), 208–225CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

10 Stelle, Charles C., “American Opium Trade to China prior to 1820,” Pacific Historical Review, IX (Dec, 1940), 430–431Google Scholar. See also R. Wilkinson to James Madison, January 15, 1806, U.S. Department of State, Despatches from Consuls in Smyrna, I, National Archives, Washington, D.C.

11 The Wilcockses sailed for their kinsmen, William Wain and R. H. Wilcocks of Philadelphia, who continued to send ships to Canton consigned to the brothers. See Wilkinson to Madison, January 15, 1806; Despatches from Consuls in Smyrna. Benjamin Wilcocks remained in Canton until 1807 or 1808. He then returned home and established a business in Philadelphia but “was obliged to return … in 1811.” See Latimer, John R. to Mary R. Latimer, March 30, 1830, John R. Latimer Papers, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.Google Scholar

12 See letters from the supercargo, William Read, in the Willings & Francis Collection, Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia. The brig Eutaw, Captain Christopher Gantt, of Baltimore was in Smyrna from July to November, 1805, and then sailed for Canton with 26 chests and 53 boxes of opium aboard.

13 Girard to Mahlon Hutehinson, Jr., & Myles McLeveen, January 2, 1805, Stephen Girard Papers, Girard College Library, Philadelphia, Pa. (on microfilm at the American Philosophical Society Library, Philadelphia).

14 Extracts from two letters from J. & T. H. Perkins to John P. Cushing June 19, September 23, 1805, quoted in J[ames] E[lliott] C[abot], “Extracts from the Letterbooks of J. & T. H. Perkins …” (typewritten Ms., Massachusetts Historical Society, n.d.). John Cushing had gone to Canton as clerk to Ephraim Bumstead, a former apprentice in the Perkins house. Bumstead fell ill and died, and Cushing, age 16, took over. When he came of age, he was made a partner in the firm, Perkins & Company, which he had organized and run since his arrival. He proved to be a merchant of rare ability and amassed a fortune of nearly one million dollars before he finally sailed for home in 1831.

15 Mahlon Hutehinson, Jr., & Myles McLeveen to Girard, March 30, 1806, Girard Papers.

16 Blight to Girard, March 4, November 21, 1807, Girard Papers.

17 Letter dated June 24, 1807, quoted in Morse, Hosea B., Chronicles of the East India Company Trading to China, 1836–1834 (Cambridge, Mass., 1926–1929), III, 72–73Google Scholar.

18 Greenberg, British Trade and Opening of China, 110. For a description of opium production and marketing in India at this time, see Owen, David, British Opium Policy in China and India (New Haven, Conn., 1934), 18–48Google Scholarpassim.

19 At the time, the product was called “Turkey opium” or, more simply, “Turkey.” By the late 1820's at least four American commission houses existed. David Offley, of the Philadelphia firm, Woodmas & Offley, established himself there in 1811. Two brothers from Boston, named Perkins, both of whom had been in Smyrna for years, organized another firm, Perkins Brothers, in 1816. See Morison, “Forcing the Dardanelles,” 209, fn 4, and Tibawi, A. L., American Interests in Syria, 1800–1901 (Oxford, 1966), 2Google Scholar. Other early settlers were John Walley Langdon and Francis Coffin, both of Boston. Joseph W [alley?] Langdon (of Langdon & Co., Smyrna) was another, although he appears most importantly after the War of 1812. The Boston concern dealt with most of these firms and individuals at one time or another, but Joseph Langdon seems to have been its principal agent at Smyrna in the 1820's. Not unexpectedly, the Perkins' first recorded contact in Smyrna was George Perkins. See J. & T. H. Perkins to George Perkins, December 27, 1796, quoted in Cary, Thomas G., A Memoir of Thomas Handasyd Perkins (Boston, 1856), 282–283Google Scholar. By 1827 a fourth American firm appears, Issaverdes, Stith & Co. Actually, this enterprise seems to have been an international partnership consisting of two Greeks, John B. and George Issaverdes, and Griffin Stith, nephew of the premier Baltimore China merchant, John Donnell. See Stith's letters in the Dallam Collection, Maryland Historical Society, Baltimore. Probably the best source of information on the American community at Smyrna is to be found in the pathbreaking new study of Americans in the Middle East, Finnie, David H., Pioneers East (Cambridge, Mass., 1967), 20–35CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

20 One resident, Captain William Fairchild Megee, a colorful Providence merchant who had made and lost a fortune in the China trade, ran a hotel. For more complete information on Megee, see Jacques M. Downs, “The Merchant as Gambler: Major William Fairchild Megee” (MSS to be published).

21 Residents rarely got caught until the chaotic period of the late 1830's. Before that time, whenever a major incident occurred, it involved a transient.

22 Morse, Chronicles of East India Company, III, 237.

23 See Edward Hayes & LaFontaine to Girard, September 20, 1818, Girard Papers.

24 The five-year annual average for the seasons 1809–1810 to 1813–1814 was 4,815 chests, while the average for the period from 1814–1815 to 1818–1819 was 3,873 chests.

25 Morse, Chronicles of East India Company, III, 238.

26 Arthur Grelaud to Girard, October 28, 1816, Girard Papers.

27 Law to Byrnes & Harrison, December 22, 1816, William Law Papers, New York Public Library.

28 Wilcocks to Secretary of State, September 22, 1817, Despatches from Consuls in Canton, I; and Morse, Chronicles of East India Company, III, 318–320.

29 “Squeezing” was an accepted form of official extortion. Since a Chinese official was supposed to extract his remuneration from the area he administered, the device was common. Moreover, the Chinese doctrine of group responsibility also sanctioned it. Of course, this doctrine was the root of a great many evils for the Chinese later. Holding all the members of a group responsible for the actions of any individual thereof was a practice which no Western code recognized. Moreover, in Chinese eyes, responsibility was particularly binding upon those in authority. Hence the leader of the Co-hong, the guild of Chinese merchants at Canton, or a foreign consul was especially vulnerable.

30 Morse, Chronicles of East India Company, III, 318–320.

31 J. & T. H. Perkins & Co. to Woodmas & Offley, February 11, 1818, quoted in Briggs, L. Vernon, History and Genealogy of the Cabot Family, 1475–1927 (Boston, 1927), II, 561Google Scholar. See also J. E. C., “Extracts from Letterbooks of J. & T. H. Perkins.”

32 Howqua was by this time an indispensable ally of Perkins & Co., and he refused to have anything to do with the drug trade, except perhaps through his investments with Perkins & Co.

33 Circular dated October 26, 1818, and letter from Perkins & Co. to Edward Carrington & Co., same date, Carrington Collection, Rhode Island Historical Society, Providence.

34 The words are Charles Magniac's, quoted in Greenberg, British Trade and Opening of China, 121.

35 There are several accounts of this incident. Probably the best and most complete is Wilcocks' report to the State Department in Despatches from Consuls in Canton, I, especially his letter of November 1, 1821. Also useful is the version allegedly reported from Baltimore which appeared in the North American Review, XL (January, 1835), 58–68Google Scholar. Another narrative is the Select Committee's report, found in Morse, Chronicles of East India Company, IV, 23–27.

36 Morse, Chronicles of East India Company, IV, 48; Greenberg, British Trade and Opening of China, 121 and Stelle, , “American Trade in Opium to China, 1821–39,” Pacific Historical Review, X (March, 1941), 58Google Scholar.

37 Owen, British Opium Policy in China and India, 115.

38 Stelle, “American Trade in Opium to China, 1821–39”, 59–61.

39 Ibid., 73.

40 Ibid., 70–72.

41 William Sturgis, one of the partners in this firm, was a nephew and former employee of the Perkinses.

42 Bates, born in Weymouth, Massachusetts, always credited Thomas H. Perkins with giving him his start in business. He was sent to London by William Gray after the War of 1812 to act as Gray's agent, but from the beginning of his residence in London he seems to have acted for the Boston Concern as well. Samuel Williams of London had acted as the Concern's banker until he failed in 1825. Bates founded a house with John Baring in 1826, and immediately inherited the Concern's business. When he joined Baring Brothers in 1828, that firm became the Concern's agents, with Bates as the partner who handled its affairs. In 1851, by which time Bates was ill and over 60, he persuaded a cousin, Russell Sturgis, to join the Barings. Thus, the Boston Concern's influence in the great London house was preserved for many years after Bates was no longer active. See Heaton, Herbert, “Benjamin Gott and the Anglo-American Cloth Trade,” Journal of Economic and Business History, II (November, 1929), 158–159Google Scholar.

43 Howqua was head of the Co-hong and probably the richest merchant in the world at this time. He and the Boston Concern complemented each other and were able to give mutual aid at crucial junctures. Cushing wrote letters for the great Chinese merchant and conducted his vast overseas trade, as did later representatives of the Boston Concern in China (Augustine Heard, John Murray Forbes, and others).

44 See the correspondence from Girard's supercargoes at Canton at the time, especially Arthur Grelaud to Girard, October 29, 1815, and Edward George in several letters in the fall of 1821, Girard Papers. Thereafter, Girard never sent opium again. He continued his practice of sending a ship a year in 1824 and 1825, but apparently the voyages were not successful enough to induce him to continue his China trade thereafter. For information on Astor see Porter, Kenneth Wiggins, John Jacob Astor, Businessman (Cambridge, Mass., 1931), II, 613–614, 666Google Scholar.

45 “During the existence of the house of Perkins & Company, they completely commanded the market for Turkey. If they were advised of a quantity coming to others, they put the market down by forcing a sale at something under their selling prices – when the new parcel arrived the agent had to come into some arrangement with them to sell conjointly, … or be obliged to dispose of it, at much below what the quotations just previous to his arrival led him to expect, and then immediately after he has sold out, and before his Drug has been delivered, greatly to his mortification the market rises without any apparent cause. Perhaps the whole parcel has become the property of one of the foreign residents purchased through the agency of a Chinese broker — this generally excites a spirit of speculation among the brokers, who do not confine themselves to their calling, but so far as they command the means are the boldest speculators.” John R. Latimer to G. G. & S. Howland and Elisha Tibbets, September 12, 1833, Latimer Papers.

46 This was dated January 2, 1826. See J. E. C., “Extracts from Letterbooks of J. & T. H. Perkins,” 313. See also T. H. Perkins to J. P. Cushing, July 16, 1824, January 15, 1825, Samuel Cabot Papers, Massachusetts Historical Society, Boston.

47 Stelle estimates about the same, apparently. He says, “an irreducible minimum of 1,733 piculs [was] shipped to Canton between January, 1824, and August, 1825.” See his “American Trade in Opium to China, 1821–39,” 67–68, fn 42.

48 Morse was far too careful a scholar to have made such a gross error casually. He warned his readers about the inaccuracy of Turkey opium figures and later revised his totals upward. See his International Relations of the Chinese Empire (London, 1910), I, 211Google Scholar, and Chronicles of East India Company, III, 323, 339. Central to the problem of obtaining accurate figures on the commerce is the fact that both Perkins & Co. and its successor, Russell & Co., guarded their commercial intelligence very closely, especially information on Turkey opium. Indian opium deliveries on the other hand were promptly and precisely published by a press aboard one of the British storeships at Lintin, Magniac & Company's Hercules. Latimer even accused Russell & Co. of giving out short figures deliberately (see letter cited in fn 45 above). With resources somewhat better than Morse's we can still judge only roughly. Americans must have sold over 1,000 cases of Turkey opium every year from the early 1820's until the cancellation of the East India Company's charter. This may be low, especially if one believes a letter sent to Stephen Girard by Baring Brothers, who estimated in 1815 that 2,000 chests went to China every year! (letter dated August 17, 1815, Girard Papers). Cf. Phipps, John, A Practical Treatise on the China and Eastern Trade … (Calcutta, 1835), 236, 238 and 240Google Scholar; Forbes, Robert Bennet, Remarks on China and the China Trade (Boston, 1844), 27Google Scholar, and T. H. Perkins' Memo Book (Perkins Collection), quoted in Stelle, “American Trade in Opium to China, 1821-39,” 67-68, fn 42. See also miscellaneous figures in letters quoted in Briggs, History of Cabot Family, II, 563–578.

The Smyrna Consular Despatches give the following information on American vessels carrying away opium:

The 1829 report notes that an additional 1,320 cases went to England on American account for shipment to China. Of course, this raises the question of how many had gone by that route in other years (quoted partially in Stelle, “American Trade in Opium to China, 1821–39,” 66). Cases, chests and piculs were used interchangeably. Each contained about 133 pounds of opium.

49 Perkins & Co. to J. & T. H. Perkins, July 15, 1821, Perkins & Company Records, Baker Library, Harvard University, Boston, Mass.

50 T. H. Perkins to J. P. Cushing, January 15, 1825, Cabot Collection; J. & T. H. Perkins & Sons to Perkins & Co., April 28, 1824, T. H. Perkins Collection; J. & T. H. Perkins to F. W. Paine, March 24, 1818, and to Woodmas & Offley, October 13, 1818, June 16, 1819, J. E. C., “Extracts from Letterbooks of J. & T. H. Perkins.”

51 While Owen states that increased Malwa shipments to China dated from 1816 (Owen, British Opium Policy in China and India, 86), the really important increase dated rather from the mid-1820's, unless the figures he uses are in error. Of course, this updating places the growth of the Malwa trade half a decade after American dealers in Turkey opium had expanded their trade. The inference is that British private traders (as well as such Americans as the partners of Russell & Co. and perhaps Wilcocks) may have been drawn into the Malwa trade as a result of the American Turkey smugglers' success.

52 The average annual shipment of British opium to Canton for the years 1811–1821 was 4,264 chests and for the period 1821–1828, 9,667 chests. Morse, International Relations of the Chinese Empire, I, 209–211.

53 Lambert, Roland, “The Treaty of Whangia: an Attempt to Abolish the Traffic in Opium” (unpublished M. A. thesis, American University, School of International Service, 1960)Google Scholar. Cf. Owen, British Opium Policy in China and India, 68–69, for an opposing view.

54 Morse, Chronicles of East India Company, III, 72–73. See also despatch No. 1 (May 10, 1816), from the Secret Committee of the Directors of the East India Company to the Governor General, and No. 7 (extract letter, January 30, 1822) from the Court of Directors to the Governor General in Bengal, Parliamentary Papers, House of Commons, 1831, Reports from Committees, VI, Report on the Affairs of the East India Company, Appendix IV. In the latter message, the Court complains that Turkey opium “has proved, since the peace, a formidable rival, from the very high price of the Company's Opium, and the inadequacy of its supply.…”

55 Owen, British Opium Policy in China and India, 133–189.

56 Greenberg, British Trade and Opening of China, 164. See also Joseph Archer to G. & S. Higginson, October 21, 1833, Joseph Archer Letterbook, Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia.

57 It is just possible that another Philadelphia family, the Blights, was in the trade still earlier. In 1811, Cushing wrote that “[George] Blight has all the business of India upon his shoulders and has scarcely time to remit his property to America, where he considers it safer than in China.” Cushing to Edward Carrington, November 15, 1811, Carrington Collection. George Blight's brother Charles later became a partner in Dent & Company, one of the leading British dealers in Indian opium in the 1820's. He was one of the first merchants to go up the China coast with an opium smuggling vessel. See Greenberg, British Trade and Opening of China, 138.

58 Indeed, one of the Wilcockses was in Bengal as early as 1809. See Edward Carrington to B. & J. Bohlen, September 28, 1809, Carrington Collection.

59 Such of Wilcocks' records as are still extant are in the Latimer Papers. Unfortunately they begin after Latimer's arrival in China in 1824. That year, Wilcocks did $113,621.72 worth of business for Hormuzjee Dorabjee, a Bombay opium shipper (See Wilcocks' account sales in Latimer Papers). On opium commissions alone for Alexander and Company, Calcutta, he netted $21,825.12 in 1825, $45,487.54 in 1826 and $25,738.70 in 1827 (ibid). Nevertheless, Wilcocks could not have retired without an extraordinary act of generosity by Howqua, who cancelled an enormous and long overdue debt contracted in 1819 following the failure of Wilcocks' Philadelphia agent, sometime employer, and later father-in-law, William Wain.

60 He wrote Philip Ammidon on December 6, 1831, that his share of the Indian trade was “equal to what theirs [Russell & Company's] was when you left,” in 1827. Latimer Papers.

61 Latimer to Benjamin C. Wilcocks, February 10, 1831, Latimer Papers.

62 This group was led by Edward Carrington and included Cyrus Butler and Carrington's brothers-in-law, T. C. and Benjamin Hoppin.

63 Ammidon apparently was one of those residents who speculated in the drug even before the war. In 1812, his ship, the President Adams, was wrecked in the China Sea with opium aboard. Again, in the first season after the war, he was selling opium.

64 See fn 60 above.

65 Sturgis also operated the storeship at Lintin from 1823 until the arrival of Robert Bennet Forbes in the ship Lintin in November, 1830. Russell & Co., of course, took over all Perkins & Co.'s business at about the same time. Forbes continued to operate the storeship until April, 1832, when he sailed for home, having amassed a small fortune. Low, who should have known, reported to Russell on January 8, 1832, that Forbes cleared over $30,000 in 1831 alone. Moreover, when he sold the ship to Russell & Co. he received $20,000 for a one-half interest, and one-quarter of the firm's share of the proceeds were to go to his brother, John Murray Forbes. Truly, this was a dramatic illustration both of the profitability of the commerce and of the cohesiveness of the family. See Russell Collection, Library of Congress.

66 See Latimer to Cushing, November 10, 1833, Latimer Papers, and any number of letters in the Russell Collection for the same period.

67 The junior partner, Augustine Heard, was a well-known Ipswich captain, but his countinghouse experience was small. He was 45 when he joined Russell & Co., and although he was very industrious and well liked in Canton, he apparently did not have the managerial background necessary to accomplish the task of reorganization.

68 Although his sturdy constitution had withstood many strains before, Heard was at the point of exhaustion. His health was so broken that he was forced to sail for home in the summer of 1834. Both William C. Hunter and John Murray Forbes left Canton on doctor's orders, and Low, who had contracted tuberculosis, died en route home.

69 John C. Green to Samuel Russell, September 29, 1835, Russell Papers. Cf. Joseph Archer to John Cryder, October 24, 1833, Archer Letterbook.

70 Latimer to James Latimer, October 21, 1833, Latimer Papers.

71 Coolidge (Harvard 1817) was a very attractive, socially brilliant young man who had apprenticed with Robert Gould Shaw and married a favorite granddaughter of Thomas Jefferson. His very considerable talents were seriously compromised, however, by a personality defect. Eventually, he alienated everybody. He split Russell & Co. in 1839 to form Augustine Heard & Company, but he encountered virtually the same problems with his new firm, and even Heard ultimately had to admit his error in admitting Coolidge to partnership.

72 This was a crucial period for Indian firms. In the early 1830's all the largest houses in Calcutta failed. Therefore, except for its effect in short-handing the Canton countinghouse, a trip to India might well have been prudent.

73 Latimer to Matthew C. Ralston, October 16, 1831, cf. Latimer to James Latimer, October 23, 1831, Latimer Papers. The difference in Latimer's attitude and tone in the two letters is difficult to account for. It is possible that Cushing and Latimer discussed the possibility of entering the trade independently of the Perkins. See Cushing's letters to Thomas T. Forbes in the fall of 1828 in J. P. Cushing's Letterbook, Bryant & Sturgis Collection, Baker Library, Harvard University.

74 Later Green became a major New York capitalist and was possibly the richest member of the group of investors in Western railroads headed by John Murray Forbes. See Johnson, Arthur and Supple, Barry, Boston Capitalists and Western Railroads (Cambridge, Mass., 1967)CrossRefGoogle Scholarpassim. Green was also the most generous philanthropist in the history of Princeton University up to the end of the 19th century.

75 Green's leadership probably saved Russell & Co. He forced through the rigorous reorganization the firm needed. Thereafter, the work of the countinghouse was rationalized. Clerks did clerical work, freeing partners for more important matters. Letters went out promptly, in triplicate, and were devoted strictly to business. Ships' officers were no longer quartered at the factory, and in general the firm was put on a markedly more efficient basis. When Green left in the late spring of 1839, Russell & Co. was a lean and muscular concern which proved well able to handle the flood of business that the opium crisis brought — both commission and, for the first time, on its own account.

76 Joseph Archer, a Philadelphia merchant resident in Canton at the time noted, “…the Combination which has subsisted [sic] for some time between the two great holders Jardine Matheson & Co. & Russell & Co. has been broken up.” (Archer to John Cryder, January 11, 1834; Archer Letterbook.) Presumably Archer was referring either to the opening of the trade to British private merchants by the termination of the East India Company's monopoly, or to Latimer's coup mentioned above. However it is possible that there was an otherwise unrecorded falling out between Jardine Matheson and Russell & Co.

77 Chinese Repository, VI (October, 1837), 281 & 284. The figures given are 446 piculs for the American vessels and 292 for the British. Of course, it is necessary to exercise the same degree of distrust for the 1837 data as it is for earlier material. Russell & Co. had probably not changed its policy of secrecy, after all. But even making allowances for inaccuracy, the large growth credited to the British is remarkable.

78 When the firm surrendered its opium to Commissioner Lin in 1839, it gave up 1,437 33/100 piculs of Indian and only 4 33/100 piculs of Turkey opium. In addition, there were 50 cases of Turkey not turned over, according to William C. Hunter's “Journal of Occurrences at Canton during the Cessation of Trade at Canton, 1839,” Boston Athenaeum, Boston, Mass.

79 Olyphant & Co. was the Canton branch of Talbot & Olyphant of New York. The role of David W. C. Olyphant in the founding of the American Protestant Mission to China is well known as is his crusade against the opium trade.

80 Wetmore & Co. was the successor to Nathan Dunn & Co., a Quaker firm, which included Joseph Archer, son of the great Philadelphia merchant, Samuel Archer. Archer became one of the charter members of Wetmore & Co. which appeared early in 1834. In this writer's experience, Quakers rarely traded in opium. Ultimately, probably after Archer left the firm, Wetmore did handle some opium. The concern surrendered 104 chests to Commissioner Lin in 1839, but one of the Wetmore family was probably not far off when he wrote that the head of the house, William Shepard Wetmore “was opposed… to trading in opium or any other contraband article. If any opium came consigned to his house, it was received and taken care of, until after the destruction of the opium by the government, subsequent to which the house received none.” Wetmore, James C., The Wetmore Family of America (Albany, 1861), 358.Google Scholar Whatever the case, it seems clear that Wetmore & Company made no great effort to capture a share of the drug trade.

81 Ammidon to Latimer, June 25, 1831, Latimer Papers.

82 Possibly one of the many reasons for the extraordinarily rapid advancement of the twenty-year-old John Murray Forbes, Col. Perkins' nephew, was a desire to cement the alliance with the Boston Concern at a time when this connection may have seemed in peril.

83 J. B. Higginson, to Heard, January 4, and June 6, 1834; Heard Collection, quoted in Stelle, “American Trade in Opium to China, 1821–39,” 73.

84 See the list of partners in the appendix to Forbes', Robert B.Personal Reminiscences (Boston, 1892).Google Scholar Of the 37 partners admitted between 1840 and 1879, 13, or over 1/3, bore Boston Concern names. Another six were Delanos, Lows, or Newport Kings, making a total of over half who were obviously members of the families allied by the reunion of 1840.

85 Bryant & Sturgis was already far along the road toward becoming a private investment brokerage house. See Larson, Henrietta M., “A China Trader turns Investor — A Biographical Chapter in American Business History,” Harvard Buisness Review, XII (April, 1934), 345–358Google Scholar. This article is to be found in revised form in Norman Gras, S. B. and Larson, Henrietta, Casebook in American Business History (New York, 1939), 119–133.Google Scholar

86 Or so he said. See Forbes, Personal Reminiscences, 150.

87 At almost the same time, Joseph Coolidge and Augustine Heard, both of whom were disaffected, formed Augustine Heard & Co. creating another break among the Bostonians and another house which would pursue the drug trade very vigorously once the treaties following the Opium War had removed the danger of apprehension either by Chinese or Western authorities.

88 The figure given by Morse is 35,445 chests for the years 1835–36 to 1838–39. International Relations of the Chinese Empire, I, 210.

89 Owen, British Opium Policy in China and India, 122–123 and Morse, Chronicles of East India Company, IV, 93–94. Perkins & Co. evidently had considered entering the coasting trade shortly after it was begun, but Col. Perkins had written that such a course seemed unnecessary because “no one will have such means in the implements you use for affecting [sic] your plans.” J. & T. H. Perkins to J. P. Cushing, July 16, 1824, Samuel Cabot Papers.

90 See Lubbock, Basil, The Opium Clippers (Boston, 1933)Google Scholar.

91 Owen, British Opium Policy in China and India, 114, 139.

92 R. B. Forbes to Samuel Russell, January 12, 1839, Russell Papers.

93 Circular dated February 27, 1839, Forbes Papers, Baker Library.

94 His employment of the doctrine of group responsibility would have caused trouble under any imaginable circumstances. Since the stakes were lower in the 1820's, however, presumably the damage would have been lessened.