James Davies: A Blind Eye to Revolution
James Davies
James Davies was a hard-working man involved in the foundation of the Commercial Travellers’ Association. He wrote a diary of his expeditions, describing his experiences and thoughts on the new places that he was visiting. One such expedition was his journey around Australia by way of some Indonesian islands and Singapore. Seen from the eyes of someone unaccustomed to South East Asia, Davies’ diary balances wonder with his intention of doing business.
Davies was born April 25, 1865, in Daylesford, Victoria.[1] It is said that he devoted all his working life to the Commercial Travellers’ Association, and from the immense detail he put into the descriptions of his travels, it is fair to say that his efforts produced good results.[2] In 1895, when the different Travellers’ Associations of the different states united to form the United Commercial Travellers’ Association of Australasia, Davies was made General Secretary. In 1910, Davies was offered the chance to “see new places and new people” by making the voyage around Australia through South East Asia.[3]
The Purpose of the Commercial Travellers’ Association (CTA) was to make sure that the accommodation and reception were safe and comfortable for Australian commercial travellers.[4] In this sense, the association acted almost as a rating system for hotels and the like that travelling businessmen could trust, providing benefits to both the certified accommodations, and to the weary businessman.[5] The purpose of Davies’ trip was an extension of this, no longer concerned with accommodation in towns and cities in Australia, the CTA wanted Davies to assess the accommodation and safety of the cities and towns of Java and the city of Singapore. Excited at the prospect of seeing new things, Davies agreed and set off from Melbourne on December 18, 1910. Davies first arrived in Sydney, then to Port Darwin and, finally, across the ocean to arrive in Java in 1911.[6]
New Places and New People
After a month exploring and investigating the towns and cities of Java, Davies left the island and arrived in Singapore just as Chinese New Year was beginning. While Davies seemed to enjoy Java, he didn’t seem to enjoy Singapore as much, yet many aspects of life there stuck with him.[7] Upon arriving at the wharf in Singapore, Davies took a carriage into town to his hotel, one of three reputable British hotels at the time.[8] He immediately remarked on the worn-down look of the limestone buildings, including his hotel, despite it only being a few years old. When asking about this, Davies was told that the humidity was the culprit, and no amount of attention could keep a building mould-free on the outside.[9] Throughout the rest of his time around Singapore, Davies remarked on many different aspects of life for those in Singapore, from the pervasive heat, to the sporty nature of the locals, resulting in the average person looking fitter than those he had seen in Java.[10] On a particularly hot day, Davies took a rickshaw and felt he had to mention the strangeness of being towed in a vehicle by another person, especially on such a hot day that demanded he not walk himself.[11] Davies also took note of the amount of white people in the streets, and of the abundant commercial opportunities due to the fact that Singapore was a thriving port city.[12]
A Blind Eye
Most of Davies’ observations can be traced back to the purpose of his trip: to analyse the accommodation and safety of the city for Australian commercial travellers. Because of this, the diary spends a lot of time talking about elements of Davies’ job, while leaving a little room for his own exploring of a new place. In this sense, it can be seen that Davies misses a lot of the issues that were building up in Singapore at the time. Later on, in 1911, the Chinese Revolution took place, leading to a huge disruption of power in China.[13] As noted by Davies, the British-colonial port of Singapore had seen large amounts of Chinese immigration in the late 19th century, and so the unrest leading to the revolution was felt in Singapore as well.[14] Debates between loyalist and revolutionary newspapers raged in Singapore in the years leading up to the revolution, and a divide was created between Chinese people overseas that supported revolution, and those that didn’t.[15] Along with this, British Malaya (Current day Malaysia and Singapore) had become a haven for revolutionary Sun Yat-sen, despite British colonial authorities wishing to remain neutral and respect the current Emperor’s authority.[16] With 600 of Sun Yat-sen’s Chinese revolutionaries imprisoned in Singapore up until 1910, Singapore was very much seeing the effects of the turmoil caused by the ongoing revolution.[17]
With the final, successful attempt at revolution mere months away, Davies was situated in a world that was about to change. The Chinese New Year celebrations that Davies witnessed would be the last ever to take place purely during the Qing Dynasty, yet Davies seems completely unaware of any of this. Davies seemed content with describing the hotels he needed to assess, and exploring the city that was unknown to him. In this diary we see Davies explore Singapore with the eyes of a part tourist, part businessman, yet he fails to notice the political distress that the Chinese people were experiencing at that time. Davies’ story is one of blissful ignorance as he is so blown away by the cultural and natural differences between Singapore and Australia, that he is unable to notice the subtle clashing opinions of the Chinese people in Singapore.
Davies was focused on telling the story of his work, and therefore is unable to truly analyse what he is seeing, or properly explore all facets of his subject. Narrative forms of history share this issue, yet can still be useful if it follows proper historical method.[18] In Davies’ case, he doesn’t seem to be deliberately obfuscating the issues of the revolution, but simply telling the story of his travels how he sees them.
[1] “Mr. J. Davies Dead,” News-Pictorial.
[2] “Mr. J. Davies Dead.”
[3] James Davies, Flying Trip ‘Round Australia via Java and Singapore, Diary, 1.
[4] “Fifty Years of Development: The United Commercial Travellers’ Association of Australia Limited,” State Library of Victoria, United Commercial Travellers' Association of Australia, 7.
[5] “Fifty Years of Development,” 7.
[6] Davies, Flying Trip, 1.
[7] Davies, Flying Trip, 124.
[8] Davies, Flying Trip, 124-5.
[9] Davies, Flying Trip, 130.
[10] Davies, Flying Trip, 138.
[11] Davies, Flying Trip, 134.
[12] Davies, Flying Trip, 145.
[13] C.F. Yong, and R.B McKenna, “The Kuomintang Movement in Malaya and Singapore, 1912-1925,” Journal of Southeast Asian Studies 12, no. 1 (March 1, 1981) 118.
[14] Marilyn Lake, ‘Colonial Australia and the Asia Pacific region’, in Alison Bashford and Stuart Macintyre (eds.), Cambridge History of Australia Vol. 1 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013): 537.
[15] Qinghuang Yan, The Overseas Chinese and the 1911 Revolution, with Special Reference to Singapore and Malaya, East Asian Historical Monographs, Oxford University Press, 1976, 243.
[16] Marie Claire Bergère, and Janet Lloyd, Sun Yat-Sen, Stanford University Press, 1998, 193.
[17] Yat-sen Sun, and Leonard Shih-lien Hsü, Sun Yat-Sen: His Political and Social Ideals: A Source Book. HeinOnline World Constitutions Illustrated, University of Southern California Press, 1933, 70.
[18] Hayden White, “The Question of Narrative in Contemporary Historical Theory,” History and Theory 23, no. 1 (1984): 3.