China Trade and Empire: Jardine, Matheson & Co. and the Origins of British Rule in Hong Kong, 1827-1843

Abstract

This volume is the latest instalment (the thirty-eighth) of the Records of Social and Economic History series published for the British Academy. The series has been acclaimed for exposing some fascinating histories behind business papers normally inaccessible to non-specialists. The papers of Jardine, Matheson & Company (hereafter Jardine) are included in the series on account of the prominent role the firm played in the development of British interests in the Far East in the nineteenth century. Historians, including the editor of this present volume, Alain Le Pichon, have extensively consulted Jardine's archives, conserved in Cambridge University Library, and have contributed much to our understanding of the history of the China trade in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries as well as outlining Jardine's role in the Opium War (1839–42)—which has been considered as a turning-point in modern Chinese history. Hence, readers will certainly appreciate the insight into Jardine's history brought out by Dr Le Pichon, given his experience as a former banker.