Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition/Hankow

HANKOW (that is, the “Mouth of the Han”), the great commercial centre of the middle portion of the Chinese empire, and since 1858 one of the principal places opened to foreign trade. It is situated on the northern side of the Yang-tse-kiang at its junction with the Han river, about 450 miles west of Shanghai in 30° 32′ 51″ N. lat. and 114° 19′ 55″ E. long., at an absolute height of 150 feet. By the Chinese it is not considered a separate city, but as a suburb of the now decadent city of Hanyang; and it may almost be said to stand in a similar relation to Wu-chang the capital of the province of Hupeh, which lies immediately opposite on the southern bank of the Yang-tse-kiang. Hankow extends for about a mile along the main river and about two and a half along the Han. It is protected by a wall 18 feet high, which was erected in 1863 at an expense of £250,000, and has a circuit of about 4 miles. In 1861 the port was declared open by James Hope and Sir Harry S. Parkes, C.B., and the site of a British settlement was selected in the east end of the town, with a river frontage of 2400 feet, and a depth of from 1200 to 1500. The building area, divided into 108 lots, was as quickly bought up, and houses after the Shanghai style were erected. Leases were granted to foreigners as well as to British subjects. A municipal council was formed, and by 1863 a great embankment and a roadway were completed along the river, which has the awkward fashion of rising as much as 50 feet or more above its ordinary levels, and not unfrequently, as in 1849 and 1866, lays a large part of the town under water. On the former occasion little was left uncovered but the roofs of the houses. The success of the foreign settlement has not been so great as was anticipated: even in 1866 the number of foreign residents was 125 instead of 150 as in 1863. Chinese merchants have rapidly got even the foreign trade into their hands: in 1873 they began to run steamers on the river; in 1875 they purchased the property of the Shanghai Steam Navigation Company; and in 1876 they had 57 steamers flying the national flag. Besides tea, which is the staple, the exports of Hankow are leaf tobacco, of which 6,700,000 ℔ was sent to Europe in 1876, raw silk mainly obtained from Szechuen, rhubarb, gall-nuts, and musk. Of this last the quantity was as much as 2937 ℔ at ₤20 sterling per ℔. Tea was first sent direct to London in 1864–65; in 1876 this market received from Hankow no less than 34,540,000 ℔ out of a total export of 86,402,271 ℔. The Russian merchants, who are fixing their brick-tea factories in the town, obtained 12,844,476 ℔ in the same year. They send their goods by water to Tientsin, and thence to Kalgan partly by land and partly by water. A public assay office was established at Hankow in 1864. The Roman Catholics, the London Missionary Society, and the Wesleyans have all missions in the town; and there are two missionary hospitals. Before the Taiping wars, the full brunt of which fell on this part of the country, the sister cities of Hankow, Hanyang, and Wu-chang-fu had a population, it is said, of over 5,000,000. At present Hankow has from 600,000 to 800,000 (Sossnoffsky says only 300,000), and the other two from 400,000 to 700,000.