香港醫學博物館 Hong Kong Museum of Medical Sciences
In July 1894, Plague swept through Hong Kong, while Taipingshan was hit the hardest with 3,500 people killed over the epidemic. The Swiss-born bacteriologist Dr. Yersin was sent to Hong Kong to investigate the source of the epidemic, and he is the first person to identify the pathogen of the disease. Later, he recognized the importance and necessity of having a formal laboratory to continue his investigation, thus to eradicate the continuous outbreak of Plague from wiping out the vast, dense population. The then government promised him to establish a medical institute for his investigation.This is the first bacteriological institute built for the public health control, aiming to conduct bacteriological examinations to contain the widespread of Plague in Victoria, and later also functioned as a base of vaccine development and production under the same premises.In order to facilitate the assessment of plague transmission, the then government proactively hired senior students and graduates from the Hong Kong College of Medicine to assist the tasks delivered by the government bacteriologists. Their job duties include mice dissections, and data collection of both the infected and non-infected mice. Those dead mice in dissections were gathered by the citizens in the rat bins, and they would be collected twice a day. If the results of the dissected rats were confirmed infected, relevant officials would trace the routes of transmissions utilizing the number written on the bins and arrange mass cleansing for the sake of disinfection.
Blake Garden
Since Hong Kong opened its port in 1841,the colonial government implied their jurisdiction by dividing the living places of Westerners and the Chinese, therefore, majority of Chinese people were moved to the Tai Ping Shan districts and the Westerners dwelled in the north-coast of Hong Kong Island, which was present-day Central (Chan, 2019) .With the congested and unhygienic living environment, such as handled the sewage and disposal of garbage in improper ways, Tai Ping Shan district was bore the brunt of the outbreak of bubonic plague in 1984 and most of the infected patients were the underprivileged Chinese residents from that district. Owing to the in-depth investigations on the root causes of the plague which were intimately tied with the crowd and insanitary living conditions in Tai Ping Shan by the medical departments and suggestions of dismantling the whole districts raised by the sanitary board and medical experts, Tai Ping Shan was criticized as “a source of grave danger to public health” (Hong Kong Telegraph, 1894). Meanwhile, A. J Leach, who was the Acting Attorney General, pointed out that the unhygienic condition was undesirable to reside, and the only way to keep the district clean was to devastate all 384 housings there (Hong Kong Hansard, 1894). The government consequently adopted the Tai Ping Shan Resumption Ordinance to compel the removal of residents, demolish all the tenants and decontaminate the soils proposed by Dr. James Alfred Lowson, he deemed that the soils and materials underneath of Ta Ping Shan were infected by the bacteria, to prevent the spread and relapse of bubonic plague (Cheng, 2019).Moreover, to prevent Chinese people’s residential, the government razed the district to the ground of Tai Ping Shan (Law, 2018) and redeveloped the peripheral area nearby Tai Ping Shan market (Po Hing Fong) as a park and engaged with afforestation for children that beneficial to the residential area beneath Tai Ping Shan street in 1903 (Report of the Medical Officer of Health, the Sanitary Surveyor, and the Colonial Veterinary Surgeon, for the year 1903, 1904).In October 1904, the park was named as Blake Garden to commemorate Sir Henry Arthur Blake, who was the 12th Governor of Hong Kong (The Hong Kong Government Gazette, 1904).Reference:鄭宏泰: 《永泰家族：亦政亦商亦逍遙的不同選擇》(香港 : 中華書局，2020年）。楊祥銀：《殖民權力與醫療空間：香港東華三院與中西醫服務變遷（1894-1941年）》（北京：社會科學文獻出版社，2018年）。陳天權: 《城市地標：殖民地時代的西式建築》(香港 : 中華書局(香港)有限公司，2019年）。羅婉嫻：《香港西醫發展史》（香港：中華書局，2018年）。
Pound Lane Public Toilet
Built in 1904. Located at Junction of Pound Lane & Tai Ping Shan Street, Sheung Wan. The living condition in the Chinese area was extremely poor and highly intensive. There were seldom public toilets. There are lots of hygiene problems in hospitals too.This is the first public toilet that provides a bathhouse and is separated into male and female in Hong Kong. The toilet was designed with hygiene awareness that was a ventilation system in order to keep inside dry and fresh. It provides hot water when burning coal in the past.Before the bubonic plague, there had been malignant malaria fever that suffered people. The crowded and grubby living environment became the main factors that why the plague was out of control. This toliet was a sign of raising Hong Kong people hygiene awarness, also the adjustment of policies of the colonial government. Although it was built after ten years of the plague, it was better than never. Which acting an important role to improve the situation. In recent years, the Pound Lane Public toilet had been evaluated as one of the Grade II historic buildings in Hong Kong. The toilet witnessed the changes of the city in around 95 years.
Tung Wah Hospital
With the support of Governor MacDonnell and Chinese elites, Tung Wah Hospital was established in the year of 1870 - according to the Tung Wah Hospital Incorporation Ordinance, the colonial government provided land for building the hospital, and Chinese elites would provide money for supporting the hospital’s operation, and Tung Wah Hospital was responsible for providing Chinese medicine services (Law, 2018; Sinn, 1989). Tung Wah Hospital played an important role in Hong Kong public healthcare system during the late nineteenth century - when Chinese people felt unwell, they would only seek help in Tung Wah Hospital (Law, 2018; Sinn, 2003).As aforementioned, during the bubonic plague, many Chinese in Hong Kong believed that western doctors are demons, and they will kill patients for their organs (Chan-Yeung, 2020). Therefore, they refused to go to western medicine hospitals, and most of them went to Tung Wah Hospital for Chinese medicine treatment (Law, 2018; Sinn, 2003). However, Chinese medical practitioners lacked expertise in dealing with plague, many patients died in Tung Wah Hospital - Dr James A. Lowson, a colonial surgeon from the government, in his investigation of Tung Wah Hospital in May 1894, he particularly blamed that Tung Wah Hospital did not isolate the patients in proper manner, and no disinfectant measures were taken, which made the hospital become a hotbed for the bubonic plague (). Therefore, the government decided to transfer all patients in Tung Wah Hospital to Hygeia for isolation treatment in May 1894 (Law, 2018).After the bubonic plague of 1894, the government established a investigation committee on February 1896, and the committee critically evaluated Tung Wah Hospital’s contribution in fighting the bubonic plague - they considered that Tung Wah Hospital should not just focus on providing Chinese medicine consultation, western medicine shall also be introduced in the hospital, as Chinese medicine may not be effective (Ting, 2010; Chan-Yeung, 2020; Law, 2018). Therefore, Tung Wah Hospital is forced to provide western medicine service (Ting, 2010; Chan-Yeung, 2020).Reference:1. Sinn, Elizabeth. Power and Charity : the Early History of the Tung Wah Hospital, Hong Kong. Oxford University Press, 1989.2. Sinn, Elizabeth. Power and Charity : a Chinese Merchant Elite in Colonial Hong Kong. Hong Kong University Press ; Eurospan, 2003.3. Moira M. W. Chan-Yeung. (2020). A Medical History of Hong Kong. The Chinese University of Hong Kong Press. 4. 丁新豹：《善與人同 : 與香港同步成長的東華三院, 1870-1997》（香港：三聯書店，2010年）。羅婉嫻：《香港西醫發展史》（香港：中華書局，2018年）。
Kwong Fuk Ancestral Hall
Owing to Taiping Rebellion in 19th century, a great number of Chinese immigrants from Southern and coastal area of China moved to Hong Kong whom seeking for refuge and job opportunities , the precarious workplaces and Hong Kong’s humid weather in summer have caused lots of the deprived Chinese workers died of illness (Lo, 2019). With the deep-rooted tradition on burial in Chinese society, Tam Choi, who was one of the influential Chinese community leader in early Hong Kong, he led 14 local merchants and residents founded Kwong Fuk Ancestral Hall in 1856 to temporally entomb the deaths of the Chinese by seating their spirit tablets until their family took back the remains to hometown (Wong, 2017) . It was also a clinic for the disadvantaged Chinese community due to the deficiency of medical facilities for Chinese (Ding, 2008). Amid the bubonic plague in 1894, the Tung Wah Hospital provided the service of funeral and coffins to the Chinese grassroot classes as the Chinese society attached a great importance on funeral rituals and traditions, for instance, they were not willing to die at home due to the signs of bringing bad fortune and persisted that the deceased people should be buried in ceremonial ways but not the rash arrangements of burial that sprinkled with the lime for sterilization by the British government (Law, 2019). Therefore, the patients would be sent to the Kwong Fuk Ancestral Hall when they were lying in a coma and waiting to be properly buried after their deaths (Society of Hong Kong History, 2014). There were also free public cemeteries in Lai Chi Kok and Tung Wah coffin homes that provided for temporary sanctuary of the Chinese cadavers of bubonic plague and being (Chow, 2020). After the plague, the Hong Kong government demolished all the housing in Tai Ping Shan district to eradicate the recurrence of bubonic plague. Considering Kwong Fuk Ancestral Hall was located between Tai Ping Shan and Pound Lane, the ancestral hall was rebuilt by the colonial government after the demolition of Tai Ping Shan district and commissioned in 1895 (Chan, 2017).
Kennedy Town Temporary Police Station
In 1894 May, the Hong Kong government established a permanent committee in the sanitary board for handling everything related to the bubonic plague (Law, 2018). However, the sanitary board had no experience in dealing with plague outbreaks, all they knew was the plague is highly contagious (Chan-Yeung, 2020). To control the bubonic outbreak effectively, they invoked the Public Health Ordinance 1887 to give a legal basis for the decision of isolating all infected patients in the hospital ship Hygeia, and western medicine treatment would be provided there (Law, 2018; Pryor, 1975). However, many Chinese patients refused to receive medical treatment in Hygeia, as there were rumors floating around that doctors in Hygeia would kill Chinese children for their liver to produce a ‘cure for the plague’ (Chan-Yeung, 2018). To avoid the compulsory isolation on the ship Hygeia, those Chinese patients tended to not report to the government that they were infected (Pryor, 1975; Starling, 2003). The Chinese communities even expressed their discontent with the sanitary measures by protests - on 20 May 1894, a group of sanitary officers were stoned and locked in a house (Chan-Yeung, 2020; Yang, 2018). On 22 May 1894, Tung Wah Hospital representatives and government officials held a emergency meeting - they understood that Chinese people distrusted western medicine, but isolation is necessary for controlling the plague, so they asked Tung Wah Hospital to establish new hospitals in Kennedy Town Temporary Police Station and Kennedy Town Glasswork Factory for housing new Chinese patients (Chan-Yeung, 2020; Yang, 2018). However, the Chinese community was still dissatisfied with the arrangement, Chinese elites even held a deputation on May 20 1894, and they requested the government to allow all Chinese patients on Hygeia to transfer back to hospitals in Kennedy Town (Chan-Yeung, 2020; Yang, 2018). Governator Robinson initially denied their suggestion, but the relationship between the colonial government and Chinese was getting intensified, so the government eventually allowed all patients on the ship to transfer back to hospitals in Kennedy Town (Chan-Yeung, 2020; Yang, 2018; Law, 2018).Reference:Pryor, E. G. (1975). THE GREAT PLAGUE OF HONG KONG. Journal of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, 15, 61–70.Starling, & Hong Kong Museum of Medical Sciences. (2006). Plague, SARS and the story of medicine in Hong Kong. Hong Kong University PressMoira M. W. Chan-Yeung. (2020). A Medical History of Hong Kong. The Chinese University of Hong Kong Press. 羅婉嫻：《香港西醫發展史》（香港：中華書局，2018年）。楊祥銀：《殖民權力與醫療空間：香港東華三院與中西醫服務變遷（1894-1941年）》（北京：社會科學文獻出版社，2018年）。
堅尼地城鼠疫墳場 The Plague Cemetery, Kennedy Town
The outbreak of Plague in Hong Kong took away approximately 2,500 lives in the city. As the transmission routes of plague remained unclear in the early stage of the outbreak, the British Hong Kong government designated a particular area on Mount Davis as the cemetery, that is the relic now to segregate the infected dead bodies from the others to prevent the continuity of the widespread until 1904. While they could not manage to know the characteristics of Plague that time, they assumed that burial was the most suitable solution of the infected dead bodies. In accordance with their standardized burial procedures, every infected body should be covered with a layer of lime powder before putting into their own coffin, another lime powder layer pouring on the coffin was necessary. The coffins should be placed in an at least 9-inch depth tomb, to ensure the coffins would not reveal from the ground. The cemetery closed and renovated to Kennedy Town for the sake of the construction of the Mount Davis Cottage Area to settle the influx of people in 1952, and later demolished in 2002. The original site of the cemetery remained disused till now.
