foreign-concessions-in-tianjin

"For three or four Chinese coppers, I could ride in a rickshaw from my home, in England, to Italy, Germany, Japan, or Belgium. I walked to France for violin lessons; I had to cross the river to get to Russia, and often did, because the Russians had a beautiful wooded park with a lake in it."

"The beginning of the first two concessions, the British and the French, were “foul and noxious swamps, around them, on the dryer grounds, were the numerous graves of many generations of people”."

"The foreign areas look for all the world like modern Western cities, with great modern Temples of Finance, massive business premises, and well-built residences."

"Although China attracted Belgian investors and missionaries from the 1860s, it is especially after 1900 that major investments began to take place in various industrial, financial and commercial sectors, such as banking, railways, metallurgy and real estate. The most famous companies were the Banque sino-belge, the Compagnie financière belgo-chinoise, the Société belge d’entreprise en Chine, the Compagnie générale des chemins de fer en Chine and the cfeo. The Beijing-Hankou (present Wuhan) railway line, the mines of Lincheng, the trams of Tientsin and the steel mills of Hanyang were among the most successful results of the Belgian “informal empire.”"

"Japanese actions during the Tianjin incident is part of its 'new order' policy meant to completely squeeze out British influence in China"

"The British Municipal Council was empowered to install gas, water, and electric supply; tramways, or other means of facilitating transit of wayfarers or goods, or to grant concessions to others to do so”."

"As the chairman of the Municipal Council of the British Concession in Tianjin, W. W. Dickinson, reported to the consul in Tianjin, these regulations were “based on those which obtain in Shanghai and in the British Concession, and the committee made modifications and additions as past experience and present exigency seem to justify."

"I was detailed with the 15th Infantry to rescue missionaries that were being trapped there. It was like they were prisoners — they couldn't even come out of their billets without getting fired on or having rocks thrown at them."