Description

Alexander BOWERS (1826 – 1887).

Rangoon: American Mission Press. C. Bennett, 1869.

 

During the mid-19^th century, Yunnan was amongst China’s wealthiest and fastest growing provinces, producing luxurious silks, minerals and agrarian cash crops.  Europeans had longed for centuries to gain closer access to its products, while hoping to sell their manufactured goods to its burgeoning internal market.  However, Yunnan, located deep in the interior, in China’s far southwest, was physically very difficult to access.  Moreover, the province was best by many ethnic and religious cleavages, making it one of the most politically unstable regions of China.  As such, Yunnan’s exports travelled through the hands of innumerable middlemen, over unbelievably rugged mountain passes, though lands inhabited by bandits and warlords.  By the time Yunnan’s riches reached European merchants their prices had been marked up so dramatically there was very limited profit to be made.  Going the other way, for the same reasons, Europeans had no way to sell their goods within Yunnan’s internal market.

In the 1860s, Britain and France embarked upon a rivalry to gain direct access to Yunnan and its riches.  There were a series of factors that gave both powers novel hopes of achieving this goal.

Importantly, during this period, Yunnan was overwhelmed by the Panthay Rebellion (1856-73), during which the forces of the Hui Muslim minority took over much of the province.  The Europeans hoped that the Hui regime would be more amenable to their entreaties than the Imperial Chinese court.

Moreover, both Britain and France had recently gained influence over lands that directly bordered Yunnan, which would supposedly auger well for opening trade routes into the province.  Britain had conquered Lower Burma during the Second Anglo-Burmese War (1852-3), leaving the once proud Burmese Empire as a weak rump state.  In this context, Britain pressured the Burmese to give its merchants and agents free passage through Upper Burma, towards Yunnan.  Meanwhile, France had conquered Cochinchina (southernmost Vietnam) and was extending its influence northward into Laos and Annam, which bordered Yunnan.

For Britain, the obvious staging point for any expedition into Yunnan was the Burmese city of Bhamo, which lay at the head of the Irrawaddy River navigation, not far from the Chinese border.  Bhamo, traditionally a busting market town, lay at the foot of the main caravan routes that climbed into the Yunnan plateau.

The ‘Bhamo Expedition’ of 1868

In 1868, British commercial interests in Rangoon sponsored the so called ‘Bhamo Expedition’, which was to be the first British mission from Bhamo to Yunnan, launched in the hopes the reaching the great trading city of Momein (Tengchong).  If such a mission could succeed in forging close ties with the Hui rebel regime, then it was thought that Britain could gain direct access to the Yunnan market, cutting out the middlemen.  While the voyage was fraught with danger and uncertainty, the potential rewards were great, as it was estimated that over £500,000 in trade (then an astounding sum) flowed between Bhamo and Yunnan.

At the beginning of 1868, a British expedition party formed in Mandalay with the objective of opening the Bhamo-Tengchong trade route.  It was led by Captain Edward Bosc Sladen (1831 – 1890), a Madras-born Indian Army veteran who, on paper, had the ideal resume for the job.  After serving with distinction during the Second Anglo-Burmese War, he was made the British Assistant Commissioner in Tenasserim, before, in 1866, becoming the British Chief Commissioner at the Burmese Court of Mandalay.  In that role, he famously and heroically saved the city’s Europeans and Christians from being slaughtered by insurgents.  Much later, Sladen would gain fame for accepting the surrender of King Thibaw, at the end of the Third Anglo-Burmese War.

The other principals of the mission were Captain Alexander Bowers, a seasoned ‘China hand’ and the author of the present work; Dr. John Anderosn, a physician and naturalist, and the engineer Captain J.M. Williams.  They led a multi-ethnic team of 80-90 men that included translators for the languages of the various ethno-polities they expected to encounter.

Ominously (and prophetically), the British governor of Lower Burma warned that the expedition was unlikely to meet with success, as various forces would seek to impede its progress.  However, the Rangoon Chamber of Commerce, thirsting for the riches of Yunnan, encouraged and supported the endeavour.

While Sladen and his lieutenants were experienced Asia hands and backcountry trekkers, they embarked upon their mission under several dangerously naive misconceptions.

First, the leaders of the Bhamo Expedition assumed that the Hui rebel regime would permanently endure, excluding the influence of the Chinese Imperial court and the ethnic Han merchants who were its adherents.  Second, it grossly overestimated the influence of the Burmese crown in the Shand-Dai ethnic areas that lay between Bhamo and the Yunnan border.  Thirdly, it seemingly ignored the fact that everyone in Bhamo deeply resented any European attempts to cut directly into their lucrative trading systems, such that, at almost all junctures, Burmese officials, Han merchants, Shan-Dai tribal leaders and Chinese warlords acted (either covertly or overtly) to derail the Bhamo Expedition.  Only the Hui rebels seemed to (at least superficially) welcome the British mission.

If all that was not enough, the British embarked upon their trek to Yunnan during the monsoon season, when the mountain trails were deluged with rain.  This was not good, to say the least, as the mission had to traverse rugged territory from Bhamo (at 100 metres above sea level), up to Maofu, Yunnan (at 1,600 metres).

It was through this cloud of naivety that Sladen’s party set out from Bhamo on February 26, 1868.  They were armed with letters of introduction from the Burmese royal court that they assumed would secure them safe passage to the Yunnan border, where they expected to be warmly welcomed by the Hui rebels.  Once the mission had departed Bhamo, they entered the Shani-Dai ethnic zone, whereupon the British expedition started to suffer from all kinds of problems, from being suddenly deserted by their hired local porters, intentionally given wrong directions, the stealthy theft of their gear and provisions, and the kidnapping of their main interpreter.  Moreover, it became clear that not only did the Burmese royal letters count for nothing, but that Burmese officials were secretly working to sabotage their progress.

Once the Bhamo Expedition crossed into China, passing by the market towns of Ponsee, Manwyne and Maofu, they found that the area’s commerce was still under the control of Han merchants, who effectively blocked them from meaningfully visiting any markets or making any business contacts in the area.  However, the mission made many important observations on the region’s cultures, architecture, archaeology, topography and natural wonders, of which the present work is perhaps the finest record.

As Sladen’s party approached Momein (Tengchong), it was met with great hospitality and ceremony by the Hui leadership, who threw a massive banquet in their honour.  Yet, while professing enthusiasm about opening trade with the British, they offered few concrete opportunities for practically enabling commerce.  The British seemed to have departed Tengchong nonetheless wiser than when they arrived, and only the strenuous efforts of the Hui agents prevented the party from being slaughtered by the infamous Chinese highwayman Li-Hsieh-Tāi’ who was then screening the routes towards the Burmese border.

Sladen’s party arrived back at Bhamo on September 5, 1868, having proven that opening a trade route was geographically viable (even if the terrain was rugged, it was not overly severe), while proving that immense riches were available in Yunnan’s markets (even if they failed to score any meaningful connections there).  While the civil authorities in Rangoon and Calcutta considered the Bhamo Expedition to be a flop, the mercantile community in Rangoon wore rose-coloured glasses, believing that Sladen’s endeavour had shown the way to untold riches, relegating the obvious barriers and dangers to the realm of minor details.

Captain Alexander Bowers’s Richly Illustrated Account in Focus

The present work is the earliest published comprehensive account of the Bhamo Expedition, written by one of its principals, Captain Alexander Bowers.  Sponsored by the Rangoon Chamber of Commerce, the work was published in that city by the American Mission Press, only months after the mission.  Graced with 96 plates, it has the distinction of being one of the most lavishly illustrated books published in Burma during the 19^th century.  [The other mission principals’ reports were E. B. Sladen, Official Narrative of the Expedition to Explore the Trade Routes to China via Bhamo (Calcutta, 1870) and John Anderson, A Report on the Expedition to Western Yunan via Bhamo (Calcutta, 1871)].

Alexander Bowers (1826 – 1887) was a master sailor, who skippered fast clippers for the British merchant marine, as well as a skilled cartographer and amateur artist.  Spending years in China, he famously ventured further up the Yangtze River than any other Westerner.  A pious Christian, along his travels he provided vital assistance to missionaries, and was instrumental in helping them to set up stations, such as that at Swatow.  He served as the Commercial Agent attached to the Bhamo Expedition, responsible for making connections to Yunnan’s mercantile community and facilitating trading arrangement with the local authorities.

Bowers, in his introduction, assumes an unapologetically acerbic tone, being very open about the Bhamo Expedition’s travails and failures, which he, in good part, blames on the lack of support from the British Indian government and the treachery of the Burmese crown:

“The project of establishing a direct communication with Western China, never has received (and it is doubtful if it ever will receive), that cordial support from the Indian Government which the importance of the subject requires; whether from a total disregard for the great Commercial interests of Burma, or a lack of that interest in the welfare of the finest Province of India, or a disgraceful deference to the King of Burma’s prejudices…

The Chief Commissioner, in his uphill work of starting the Bhamo Expedition, solicited and obtained the apparently active co-operation of the King of Burma… he gave orders that one of his Steamers should convey the party to Bhamo, ordered the Ministers, Woons, and officers to give us every facility in passing through the country; at the same time secretly doing everything in his power to counteract what he had done, and so arranging it, that even assassination was to be resorted to, to prevent our return, sooner than the expedition should succeed. Of this we have ample proof, which will be shewn at the proper time and place.

With the passive want of cordiality of our own Government, the restrictions and cautions conveyed in the instructions to the Governor of his Province, and to Capt. Sladen, the Head of the Expedition, it is surprising that the whole affair did not collapse at the beginning.”

Bowers’s narrative provides a valuable and faithful record of the expedition and the people, lands and observations on the economy gained along the way.  The section headings include: Description of the Country; Character and Climate of the Country; Description of Manners and Customs of the People; Description of the Trade, Agriculture and Manufactures of the People; Detailed Description of the Journey in Narrative Form, containing the names of places and the distance travelled over; An Account of the Agreement entered into by the Tsaubwas [Shan Chiefs], with a description of the Irrawaddy and the Towns between Bhamo and Mandalay; List of Tsaubwas; List of the Towns from Bhamo to Mandalay; Statement of Moung Moh, Kakhen Interpreter (The original in Burmese); and the Price Current of Goods at Momein, and in the Shan States; Catalogue of Articles, specimens, samples & c.

Concluding text is an Appendix, which provides an authoritative general overview of the state of Burma, ‘Preface to the Administration Report of British Burmah for 1867-68, by Major General A. Fytche, C. S. I. Chief Commissioner, and Agent to the Governor General’

The extraordinary highlights of the work are the 96 lithographed plates, including topographical views of Upper Burma and Yunnan, portraits of local peoples, images of religious/archaeological sites, decorative arts masterpieces, textile patterns and 2 large original maps, all by the hand of Bowers, a skilled cartographer and amateur artist.

While many travellers decide to publish a selection of their drawings, unusually here, Bowers seems to have published his entire sketchbook!  This makes his work perhaps the most lavishly illustrated book published in Burma during the 19^th century.  Indeed, the delightfully crude quality of the lithographs is indicative of the fact that the demands of producing them would have taxed the outer limits of the capabilities of the Rangoon printing establishment.  While it would have been easier and cheaper to have the work printed in Calcutta, or even London, the publication of Bowers’s book was sponsored locally, in Rangoon, while he was eager to ensure that his account of the expedition was the first out the door.

The plates, many of which are folding, are often signed or initialled by Bowers, and feature views of cities and natural wonders, portraits of local peoples, and magnificent religious sites and idols, many of which had never been captured by Westerners.  Additionally, there are numerous plates of patterns taken from the local textiles, that Bowers hoped would be of interest to the cloth-making industry in British Burma and Bengal.  Impressively, the work concludes with two large, fascinating folding maps showcasing the greater region and the specific routes of the Bhamo Expedition.

As Bowers explains in a text leaf that proceeds the plates [although this leaf is not included in the present example of the work]:

NOTE. – The following imperfect sketches are from the different objects of interest that came under my observation during the progress of the expedition. The copies of the mosaic and arabesque work were taken mostly from ornamental work in the different Kyoungs visited, and some from books; the object in introducing them in the work was, that they might be in some measure useful to manufacturers and others, as patterns to whom, new designs might be an acquisition. The imperfect means at disposal in getting them properly lithographed, has in a measure taken much from the effect of the sketches, and in some of them quite altered the idea intended to be produced.

 

The plates are as follows (1 portrait + 93 plates + 2 maps = 96 images):

 

After title: Portrait of ‘Cap.tn E.B. Sladen’.

 

[1]. Kachyan Girls, 1 p.

[2 – 44 inclusive]. Textile Patterns, 1 p.

[45-46]. Textile Patterns, folding.

[47-57]. Textile Patterns, 1 p.

[58-59]. Textile Patterns, folding.

[60]. Thayetmo from the Opposite Bank., folding, signed ‘Bowers’.

[61]. Village of Ponsee (2,800 ft. above sea level) with Camp., folding.

[62]. Ornamental Scroll Work (Momein)., folding, signed ‘Bowers’.

[63]. [Untitled Textile Pattern]., folding.

[64]. Shan Women giving daily food to Pooghees / Manwine., long folding (clean partial tear along one vertical fold).

[65]. Women of the Hotha / Kawoon valleys., folding.

[66]. Panthay Officers (Momein)., folding, signed ‘A.B.’.

[67]. Chinese Idea of the Devil sending forth his imps on the earth, from a picture., folding, signed ‘A.B.’.

[68]. Burmese Bullons or Nats (Bhamo)., folding, signed ‘A.B.’.

[69]. Waterfall at Momein 100 Feet high., folding, signed ‘A.B.’.

[70]. Proma from the Pagoda. folding.

[71]. S.W. Suburb of Momein from the City Wall., folding, signed ‘A.B.’.

[72]. Buddhist Temple, Shewogee., folding, signed ‘Bowers’.

[73]. Part of the Buddhist Temple Shein Pagah., folding, signed ‘A.B.’.

[74]. Minjan on the R. Irrawaddi from the Deck of the Steamer., folding, signed ‘Bowers’.

[75]. Pumpkin Pagoda (Pagan)., folding, signed ‘Bowers’.

[76]. Ruined Pagoda and Gigantic Griffins / Myanoung., folding, signed ‘Bowers’.

[77]. A Street in the Bazaar at Momein. folding, signed ‘Bowers’.

[78]. Miadoung on the Irrawaddy., folding, signed ‘Bowers’.

[79]. Ruined Monastery / Momein. & Graves., folding.

[80]. Kyoung at Momein in which we resided., folding, signed ‘AB’.

[81]. Panthay Officers / Momein., folding.

[82]. Ruined S.W. Suburb and City of Momien in the Distance from the Kyoiung on the Hill., folding.

[83]. Entrance to the Ruined Monastery / Momein., folding.

[84]. Bhamo from the opposite side of the river., folding.

[85]. Shan women of the Sanda and Manwine valleys., folding, signed ‘AB’.

[86]. N.E. Suburb from the City Wall (Momien)., folding.

[87]. Massive Stone Entrance to Ruined Kyong (Momien)., folding.

[88]. Gigantic Griffins (Shalay Myo)., folding.

[89]. [Untitled Ornamental Designs], folding.

[90]. Gigantioc Idol (Momien)., folding, signed ‘AB’.

[91]. [Untitled Ornamental Designs], folding.

[92]. Mussulman Graveyard from the City Walls with ruined towns in the distance.

[93]. N.W. Angle of City Wall / Momein from a Kyoung.

Bowers’s Two Fine Original Maps

The final plates are 2 large original maps executed by Bowden, a professionally trained cartographer, printed in charmingly crude Rangoon-style lithography.

The first map, A Comprehensive Map of Further India and China on Mercators Projection By Alex.r Bowers. R.N.R. (48.5 x 65.5 cm), showcases the general geographical context of the Bhamo Expedition, embracing a vast expanse of Asia, that while centred upon Burma and Siam, includes coverage of Northeastern India, Southern China, the northern bulk of Indochina (its parameters being from 5° to 33° North Latitude and 80° to 123° East Longitude).  The map grants the impression that opening a direct trading route from Upper Burma to Yunnan would be the ultimate nexus of trade, an exclusively British-controlled backdoor into China.

 

The second map, Sketch Map of the Route of the Expedition from Bhamo to Western China under the Command of Capt. E.B. Sladen, H. Britannic Majestys Political agent at Mandalay (48 x 64.5 cm), is far more focussed.  In considerable detail, it shows the route of the Sladen Expedition from Bhamo to Momein, and back, with measurements between the main points taken during the mission by use of a perambulator.  It also shows, in skeletal form, the connections emanating from Momein much deeper into Yunnan, to places such as ‘Talifoo’ and ‘Yunchan’, with the estimated travel times, by marching in days.

 

A Note on Rarity and ‘Completeness’

 

Bowers’s Bhamo Expedition (1869), which was issued in only a single edition, is extremely rare.  This is consistent with all 19^th century Rangoon imprints, which tended to have small print runs, while the local tropical climate ensured a low survival rare.

 

We can trace 8 institutional examples of the work, held by the British Library (2 examples); Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin; King’s College London Library; National Library of Scotland; SOAS Library; Yale University Library; and the University of California-Berkeley.  Moreover, we are aware of only 2 other examples as appearing on the market over the last 30 years, the Brooke-Hitchings example (Sotheby’s 2014) and the other at (Bonham’s 2012).

To be clear, while the present example of the work features a complete main text block, it is lacking the unnumbered text leaf that is meant to follow the main text and which precedes the suite of plates.  The text on the leaf describes the plates and “The imperfect means at disposal in getting them properly lithographed” in Rangoon.  However, otherwise, the present example includes the maximum number of plates of any catalogued example of which we are aware.

 

Due to the challenging conditions of printing such a lavishly illustrated, complex book in Rangoon, where the publishing industry possessed limited technical means, it seems that the book was compiled in an improvised fashion.  As such, examples were issued with varying contents, often ‘lacking’ some leaves, as perhaps the printer (C. Bennett, of the American Mission Press) may have run short of said components.  This situation is not uncommon with imprints made in colonial or frontier environments.  As such, for Bowers’s Bhamo Expedition (1869), the notion of ‘completeness’ perhaps needs to be taken liberally.

 

For context, from the available catalogue descriptions of the 8 institutional examples of which we are aware, at least 3 seem to be ‘incomplete’, in some cases lacking many plates or maps.  Moreover, both of the other examples of Bowers’s work that have appeared on the market in the last 30 years are ‘incomplete’: the Brooke-Hitchings example (Sotheby’s 2014) lacked the portrait of Sladen and had only 90 plates; the Bonham’s 2012 examples had 91 plates and was missing 1 of the maps.

 

In is worth noting that an unillustrated German version of Bowers’s memoir was published as Bhamo-Expedition: Bericht über die Möglichkeit einer Wiedereröffnung der Handelsstrasse zwischen Birma und West-China (Berlin, 1871).

 

Provenance: The British Foreign Secretary, the Earl of Derby; The Binding, made by a Female Bookbinder

 

The present example of Bowers’s work features the contemporary armorial bookplate of the ‘Earl of Derby’, who was, in this case, Edward Henry Stanley, 15^th Earl of Derby (1826 – 1893), a leading stateman who served as India Secretary (1858-9), Colonial Secretary (1858, 1882-5) and Foreign Secretary (1866-8, 1874-8), notably serving in the latter office during the period of the Bhamo Expedition.  Undoubtably, Bowers’s work would have deeply interested him.  The Earls of Derby were renowned bibliophiles, who kept most of their library at their family seat, Knowsley Hall, Merseyside, near Liverpool.

 

The binding of the present book features the handstamp of ‘Hodgson Binder Liverpool’, being Sarah E. Hodgson, who was advertised in city directories as working as bookbinder in Liverpool from 1870 to 1900.  A highly competent artisan, the Earls of Derby turned to Ms. Hodgson to bind many of their most precious books, many of which are today in leading institutional collections.  

Epilogue

The Bhamo Expedition’s stunning ignorance of local politics in northeastern Burma and Yunnan ensured that subsequent British endeavours to open the Bhamo-Momein trade route met with disaster.  First, the tide decisively turned against the Hui Muslim rebels in 1869, such that by 1873 they had been utterly vanquished by the Imperial Chinese government, which reasserted complete control over Yunnan.

In 1874, Britain made another push to open the Bhamo-Yunnan trade route.  They dispatched a diplomat, Raymond Maragary, on a 2,900 km 6-month-long odyssey from Shanghai to Bhamo.  There, he rendezvoused with an expeditionary party led by Colonel Horace Browne, composed of Burmese and Sikh soldiers and supported by surveyors, which planned to retrace Sladen’s 1868 route to Momein.

Margary then set off, back into Yunnan, in advance of Browne, to reconnoitre the route.  Along the way, he heard that his intended path was not secure, yet upon altering his route, on February 21, 1875, he and his party were ambushed and murdered by Li-Hsieh-Tāi’’s bandits, allegedly with the approval of the local Chinese authorities.

Naively, despite this, Browne decided to proceed with his expedition, whereupon his party was attacked by Li-Hsieh-Tāi’’s men.  Although they managed to escape the ambush, the mission was forced to return to Burma, with their efforts being an unmitigated disaster.  The outward hostility of the Chinese governor of Momein towards the British had poisoned the atmosphere.

The ‘Margary Affair’ and the violence shown to Browne’s expedition motivated Whitehall to place severe pressure upon Beijing, such that the latter was forced to agree to the Chefoo Convention (1876), an unequal treaty, whereupon China had to grant Britain reparations and trading concessions.

As it turned out, the French won the race to open a secure, direct link into Yunnan, when they built the Yunnan–Haiphong Railway (the Chemin de Fer de L’Indo-Chine et du Yunnan), between 1904 and 1910, which ran from Vietnam’s main port to Kunming, the capital of Yunnan.  However, the British also eventually managed to establish an effective commercial presence in Yunnan, although their main route of access was by way of Yangtze, as the Burma-Yunnan connection would always prove tenuous.

References: British Library (2 examples): 10056.g.17. and Tr. 881(a); Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin: Uk 4266<a>; King’s College London Library: HF3770.7 BOW; National Library of Scotland: NE.554.b.30; SOAS Library: EC86.82 /332959; Yale University Library: K B67;OCLC: 660059710, 26365883; Gunnel CEDERLÖF, ‘Imperial Competition in the Late-nineteenth Century Burma-China Borderlands’, in Gunnel Cederlöf and Willem van Schendel (eds), Flows and Frictions in Trans-Himalayan Spaces: Histories of Networking and Border Crossing (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2022), pp. 77 – 103, esp. pp. 80 and 101; John LeRoy CHRISTIAN, Modern Burma: A Survey of its Political and Economic Development (2023); John Foster KIRK, A Supplement to Allibone’s A Critical Dictionary of English Literature and British and American Authors (Philadelphia, 1897), p. 188; Marie de RUGY, Imperial Borderlands: Maps and Territory-Building in the Northern Indochinese Peninsula (1885-1914) (2021), p. 33; Dorothy WOODMAN, The Making of Burma (1962), p. 188.