Goldrush Chinese a rich lode

SMOKE-FILLED opium dens populated the tiny lanes and alleys running off Little Bourke Street in Melbourne's Chinatown during the late 19th century. Frequented by Chinese, European and Australian gold-diggers, they were the archetypal dens of iniquity so beloved by crime writers and their followers.

SMOKE-FILLED opium dens populated the tiny lanes and alleys running off Little Bourke Street in Melbourne's Chinatown during the late 19th century. Frequented by Chinese, European and Australian gold-diggers, they were the archetypal dens of iniquity so beloved by crime writers and their followers.

One character who caught the public's attention in the 1880s was Fook Shing, the detective. A notorious figure, he led police investigators and reporters through the dark and murky streets and fantan gambling houses in pursuit of criminals. But he was no figment of the imagination.

Fook Shing, a headman of the Chinese community in Bendigo, was Victoria's longest serving Chinese detective, a man called on to help hunt the notorious Ned Kelly after rumours circulated that the Chinese community was hiding the Kelly gang in Beechworth.

Today, Fook Shing is just one of the subjects being studied by Benjamin Mountford as part of a PhD that looks at the position of China in the West's imagination. The recipient of a Rae and Edith Bennett Travelling Scholarship from the University of Melbourne, he has been at the University of Oxford since October last year.

"One area of Australian history I have been particularly interested in for the past few years is the history of Melbourne's Chinatown, which in the late 19th century inspired a series of novels, detective stories and newspaper articles published in Australia and overseas," he tells the HES.

"As I delved deeper into popular depictions of Chinese-Australian communities, I began to think about the broader resonance of Australian perceptions of China in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, particularly in the context of empire."

Mountford says that, surprisingly, for someone who commanded so much newspaper space, the only known picture of Fook Shing is from The Graphic, a London illustrated newspaper, from 1880. Mountford says Fook Shing's story is especially important because the Victorian police employed him for about 20 years, and he left behind one of the richest archival trails for researching colonial-era Chinese-Australians.

For much of the latter part of the 19th century the Victorian police employed Chinese detectives because of the difficulties thrown up by language and cultural differences.

Mountford, who began his academic career at the University of Western Australia, then Melbourne University, says Oxford is an inspiring place to study. With a scholarship that covers tuition fees of about pound stg. 10,000 ($22,500) a year and pound stg. 3000 to pound stg. 4000, in college fees, he is able to concentrate on research from his base at Exeter College. He says the Chinese community is particularly interesting because it had connections throughout the world and, by studying it, one receives a better understanding of what the gold rush, for example, wasabout.

"I'm interested in finding out more about Australia's cultural history, particularly in terms of thinking about our place in the wider world," Mountford says.

"I think, too often, we feel compelled to consider colonial-era history simply in terms of bushy beards, uncomfortable clothes, billabongs and bush poets. It is important to recognise history is multi-layered, and needs to be able to accommodate a range of perspectives to be relevant and engaging."

One interesting aspect of Chinese-Australian history is the extent to which stories about Australia's Chinatowns appeared in books and newspapers published overseas. London newspapers followed closely debates on subjects such as Chinese migration and published reports on places such as Little Bourke Street, comparing them with London's much smaller Chinese enclaves.

Mountford says Chinese-Australian history is just one of these many avenues to be further explored and that in places such as Bendigo there was an important role for native-place associations that were set up to help Chinese migrants who came for the gold rushes.

Most Chinese in Victoria came from Canton, often via Singapore, helped along the way by Chinese community leaders. According to census records, in 1859 more than 42,000 Chinese gold seekers could be found across Australia.

Mountford says travelling abroad was not a respected part of China's culture. Those who left tended to come alone to make their fortune or in a small group from a village. Like many Europeans, most came to make money and take it back home, but a large number did stay.

"Australia was a beacon of hope," he says.

"But there is no doubt that there was racism in the goldfields. It's a part of our history that casts a fairly dark shadow. However, having said that, on the ground it was a much more complicated relationship."