Who's Who in China (3rd edition)/Ts'ai T'ing-kan

Admiral Tsai Ting-kan

蔡英幹字耀堂

(Ts'ai T'ing-kan)

Admiral Tsai Ting-kan was born at Hsiang-shan Hsien, Kuangtung province, in 1861. He received his early education at a country school, and afterwards studied at the Chinese Educational Mission School in Shanghai from 1872-73, which was organized by Mr. Yung Wing, pioneer of China's modern education. He was one of the students of the first batch sent to America in 1873, as arranged by Mr. Yung Wing. Admiral Tsai was assigned to Hartford Grammar School upon his first arrival. Later he was transferred to the New Britain High School. He returned to China in 1881, together with the other students, in consequence of a memorial, endorsed by Chin Lan-pin, the Chinese Minister at Washington, complaining of the course of study pursued by these youths "as including Latin and Greek and other unnecessary subjects; of the disrespectful behavior of the boys when brought before their chiefs; of their deplorable lack of patriotism; of their forgetting their mother-tongue, and other sins of omission and commission.” Soon after his return to China, Admiral Tsai Ting-kan joined the Torpedo School at 'Taku, where he stayed for three years. Upon his graduation he was made captain of a torpedo boat. In 1892 he was promoted to be commodore of the Torpedo Fleet. This Fleet played a very active part in the Gulf of Chihli during the Sino-Japanese War, 1894-5. In 1910 he was made a Rear-Admiral. In 1911 he was appointed a Departmental Director of the Board of Navy under the Ching government. In 1912 Admiral Tsai became a High Military Advisor to President Yuan Shih-kai and was made a Vice-Admiral. In September 1913 he was appointed Co-Director of the Inspectorate General of the Salt Administration. In May 1914 he received concurrently as Master of Ceremony in the Presidential Palace. When Yuan Shih-kai was President, Admiral Tsai was his Chief English Secretary and he handled all foreign matters for his chief. In 1906 he was awarded the Fourth Order of Merit and also the Second Class Chiaho decoration. In December 1917 he was appointed Associate Director of the Customs Administration which position he is still holding. In January 1919 Admiral Tsai was commissioned to be associate director of the office of the Repatriation of Enemy Subjects in connection with the European War. In April 1919 he was appointed vice-president of the Chinese Red Cross Society. In September 1919 he received the First Class Tashou Chiaho and in January 1920 the First Class Tashou Chiaho and in January 1920 the First Class Tashou Paokuang Chiaho. In February 1922 he was commissioned to be Chairman of the Tariff Revision Commission and was largely responsible for arranging a new tariff for China that has been put into operation. In August 1922 he was again appointed Vice-President of the Chinese Red Cross Society. In October 1922 he was awarded the Third Order of Merit. In May 1923 he became a member of the Commission for the Reorganization of the Domestic and Foreign Debts. In June 1923 he was ordered to hold concurrently the post of Assistant Chief of the Bureau for the preparation of the New Customs Tariff Revision Conference to readjust the tariff according to the understandings reached at the Washington Conference. In April 1924 he was again appointed Peking vice-president of the Chinese Red Cross Society. In September 1924 he was appointed Director General of the Cantonse Administration. Admiral Tsai devotes his leisure time to the translation of Chinese poems into English and made his naine well known through these translations at the St. Louis Exhibition in America. He has been chairman of the American College Club for a number of years and for a time was actively identified with a number of social activities in the Capital.