Strong to Save: Maritime Mission in Hong Kong from Whampoa Reach to the Mariners’ Club

　　Tracing its origins back to 1822 in Whampoa, the Mariners’ Club in Hong Kong was established to meet a specific need for an Anglo-Chinese society defined by that most dubious of activities, seafaring. Its creation was anything but straightforward, and in this can be seen the mutable and often tortuous relations between the various religious bodies, the local population, the transient sailors, the emerging captains of industry, and the growing regulatory reach of the colonial government. The club evolved through many embodiments and witnessed the growth of Hong Kong from a collection of mat-sheds on the foreshore, through colony to its current status. Throughout its turbulent past it has been occasionally marginalized but has always served as an important base for the key actors in the main commercial activity in Hong Kong: seafarers.

　　This is a history of one of the most enduring institutions of Hong Kong, and the first of its kind. Using the Club’s own records as well as a wide range of sources both from within Hong Kong and from the seafaring world at large, this is a comprehensive account of the life of the Missions, the tenancy of the different chaplains, managers, and stewards, the changes in seafaring practices and shipping, and the transformation of Hong Kong itself.
 

Part I: Making a Departure
1 From Whampoa to Hong Kong
2 The View from the Harbour Master’s Office
3 A Snug Harbour in West Point

Part II: Church and Mission
4 A Seamen’s Church
5 Uneasy Berth and the Demon Drink
6 Parting Brass Rags
7 Meanwhile Down on the Waterfront
8 Separate Moorings
9 Headwinds and Adverse Currents
10 One Ship, but Still Two Cap Tallies
11 An Interesting Launching on the Wan Chai Waterfront
12 Threatening Times

Part III: War and Recovery
13 Destruction and Occupation
14 Recovery and the Dawning of a New World

Part IV: Adapting to a New World
15 The New World Dawns
16 Cross-Currents
17 Sea Changes
18 Passage Planning Part V: Definitive Moves
19 The Mariners’ Club: Laying the Foundations
20 Who is Captain?
21 The Mariners’ Club: Ironing Out the Wrinkles
22 Many Shepherds, One Flock
23 On Course for the Future Epilogue
 

作者簡介



Stephen Davies

　　Stephen Davies is the author of East Sails West: The Voyage of the Keying, 1846–1855 (2013) and many other articles on Hong Kong’s maritime history. He opened the Hong Kong Maritime Museum and served as its first director 2005–2011. He is currently an honorary research fellow at the Hong Kong Institute for the Humanities and Social Sciences and an honorary professor in the Department of Real Estate and Construction, in the Faculty of Architecture, The University of Hong Kong.