Collaboration Process between the Chinese Customs and England's De La Rue in 1877

Focusing on the three questions in the May 1, 1877 letter of inquiry, as relayed by Campbell, De La Rue began the process for implementing stamp designs and printing arrangements for stamp production. A few clues concerning the progress of this process can be found in the Archives of China's Imperial Maritime Customs: Confiden-tial Correspondence between Robert Hart and James Duncan Campbell, 18741907. In the following paragraphs, we will rearrange its relevant contents, along with our latest findings, in a chronological manner to facilitate a better interpretation of this part of the history.

May 5 was the fourth day after Campbell had made his first official contact with De La Rue. He provided Detring with the preliminary answers in his telegram to Hart. Instead of forwarding the message directly to Detring, he relayed it through Hart. This was an explicit indication that Campbell did not want to bypass his superior, Hart, about the matter. By means of this small gesture, he simultaneously hinted all subsequent activities would proceed smoothly only by gaining Hart's support and approval. By May 11, Campbell submitted another report to Hart and mentioned the document, as requested by Detring, would only be completed in the coming week. He particularly commented that Henry C. J. Kopsch, the then-Inspector of Kiukiang Customs, also wanted information for a “postage system” he was “trying to get up.”

On both May 22 and 23, Campbell sent a letter to De La Rue. These letters were meant to assist De La Rue with the stamp designs. Additionally, Campbell attached the “two sketches I received from Peking” and “a sketch of the Dragon”, according to his first letter, to be used as references. In his letter of May 23, Campbell made an explanation on the symbol of “Yin & Yang” as it appeared in the sketches furnished on the 22nd.

De La Rue submitted a 42-page confidential report by June 8. The original date of this report, June 8, was crossed out in pencil and with a note at the left “Mr. Campbell altered this date to the 18th, see his letter of June 29, 1877.” De La Rue was asked to change the date of its report, and this might be due to Campbell's not accomplishing his portion of the work within the time originally planned. Campbell in his June 22 letter to Hart mentioned Detring's request again, stating “I am writing you an official on the subject of the reference made to me by Detring on postal matters, more than two months ago, and I hope that the information will be useful.” The “official” mentioned in this letter should be related to De La Rue's June 8 report.

On July 5 and 6, De La Rue and Campbell each sent two letters to the other party. The contents were mainly centered on requisitions soliciting tenders presented by Campbell. There were a total of six different requisitions, without indication of a due date, consisting of to-be-purchased items, comprising surface-printing machines, perforating machines, printing inks, paper, gum and letter scales, respectively. This might have been the wishful thinking on the part of Campbell that De La Rue would fully cooperate in fulfilling these orders, if the Inspectorate General decided to pro-duce its stamps in China. On the other hand, De La Rue repeatedly emphasized the items listed in the orders were unable alone to fulfill the requirements for printing stamps. At the same time, De La Rue clearly stated, from the anti-counterfeiting point of view, its Compa-ny would be the best possible choice for manufacturing the stamps needed by the Chinese Customs.

Analyzing the contents of these letters, De La Rue should have received the requisitions by July 2. On July 4 or two days later, both parties had a meeting on the implementation of these orders, but De La Rue was reluctant to tender. After this unpleasant meeting, Campbell telegraphed Hart: “Postal requisition impracticable Machine Paper Ink all unsuitable Elaborate report mailed twenty second June If you send immediately design for last stamp British postage size and telegraph instructions upon receipt report all kinds can be delivered here ten weeks afterwards price fifty five Pound per Million Special experience required Time expense saved & protec-tion from forgery ensured by starting manufacture here transferring to China afterwards.” Moreover, the telegram was copied and sent to De La Rue on July 5. Comparing the English texts in these two copies of the telegram, the contents were basically the same, except for two small differences. In the telegram sent to Hart, the cost per million for producing stamps was quoted at £55, and, on the other hand, it was written as £54 in the copy for De La Rue. If this interesting phenomenon was not caused by a slip of the pen, the underlying reason is indeed worth thinking about deeply. For those who may be interested, please refer to Archives of China's Imperial Maritime Customs: Confidential Correspondence between Robert Hart and James Duncan Campbell , 18741907, Volume I, p.320. The letter No. A/144 in the section, focusing on commissions, may provide some hints. The other discrepancy was the line “design for last stamp British postage size” mentioned in the telegram to Hart, with the wording changed instead to “design for each stamp” in De La Rue's copy. No documents have been found related to the so-called “design for last stamp British postage size.” However, one thing is certain that Campbell did not want De La Rue to have knowledge on this particular matter.

In his July 6 letter to Hart regarding the previously mentioned requisitions, Campbell wrote: “I have been put in a fix by Detring's Requisition for postage stamps.——Even if I were to order the things, they would be ready for 3 or 4 months. Shall not be able to send Detring as I wished copy of my dispatch which I have to write very hurriedly.” On July 13, Campbell addressed another letter to Hart, concerning the requisitions again: “I have but little to add to my despatches, in re Postage Stamps. The delay will, no doubt, cause your disappointment,—— but even if I had ordered the things from the firms named in the Requisitions, six months would prob-ably elapse before they all reached Shanghai ——leaving a margin for contractors' delays, accidents, etc. etc. etc. By employing De La Rue's, not only will the order be properly executed, but time and expense will be saved. If you decide upon the manufacture being commenced here, it may be well perhaps to send the perforating machine to China, so that the stamps could not be issued until they had undergone this last process, ——and check ——in China.”

The above two letters clearly indicate that the six requisitions included in De La Rue's Archives were made at Detring's request. In fact, Detring had remitted £1,000 to the London Office of the Inspectorate General of the Imperial Maritime Customs in May to purchase the items. According to the July 4 telegram, De La Rue, in terms of specific implementation time, would take about 10 weeks, or two and half months, to complete the stamp production. If these stamps were manufactured in China, the time required for acquiring related materials and equipment would be three to four months, according to Campbell's July 6 letter. Nonetheless, Campbell did not make any suggestions on which to select between the two. However, in Campbell's July 13 letter, he was straightforward enough to state that employment of De La Rue for stamp production might save manpower. He also emphasized the possible delay caused by other suppliers, and the items would take a possible period of six months before reaching Shanghai. Although Campbell seemed to make a regular progress report, his inclination was obvious. Surely, Hart would also be fully aware of the situation.

On July 20, Campbell wrote in his letter to Hart, “Receiving your Z/6 of 2 June, but your Z/5 must have gone down in the Meikong, also with, I fear, Detring's explanatory Memo. on postal matters.” In fact, Campbell had already informed De La Rue of the shipwreck on July 5.

Hart, on October 25, wrote to Campbell and stated as follows, “Many thanks for De La Rue's long report. We'll get our stamps made there, but I don't want to follow the sanguine Detring too rashly. I must feel my footing to be secure before attempting to push on.” The “long report”, as stressed by Hart, should be De La Rue's June 8 confidential letter. Although Hart expressed the stamps would be manufactured by De La Rue, he did not give Campbell any clear instructions on the next step in the following two months or so.

In mid-December 1877, the London Office of the Chinese Imperial Maritime Customs finally had its first collaboration, in a real sense, with De La Rue, for the order of “1,000 dark green cloth boards”, which would be the exquisite covers for housing the hardback French version of Le Saint Edit, translated by A. T. Piry. Based on information gathered from the Archives, the order was delayed until 1878, and the other details have yet to be discovered. The copies of Le Saint Edit, published in 1879 and kept in libraries, such as the National Library of China, British Library, etc., were the results of this Sino-British collaboration. Was it Campbell's idea of interspersing this requisition order, as a matter of expedi-ency, to maintain the status quo with De La Rue while waiting for Hart's further instructions? Was it eventually related to the failure of the postage stamp production venture? The answers are difficult to discern.

Not having received any explicit instructions from Hart, Campbell telegraphed Hart on January 4, 1878, urging him to take action: “Detring has sent order postage stamps Shall I proceed with order.” After sending the telegram to Hart, Campbell forwarded a letter to Hart on the same day, numbered A/147, writing: “Mr. De La Rue has frequently enquired if I had heard from you in reference to his memo. I have conveyed to him your thanks for the same.” Later in the day, Campbell wrote another letter, numbered A/148, to Hart, reporting Detring's reactions on De La Rue's report, and Detring had written concerning the postage stamps: “now send you enclosed four designs which have been adopted by the Inspector General for the various Haikuan values required. The designs are of course to be reduced to ordinary postage stamp dimensions. The colours to be used are, you will observe, sufficiently explained in the enclosure.” Detring's letter was accompanied by four sketches of the stamp designs. From late December 1877, when Hart received De La Rue's report, to early January 1878, when Campbell telegraphed to urge him to authorize the postage stamp production in London, Hart did not specifically express his position on when production should be initiated. Al-though Campbell had always been reporting about Detring's latest sentiments in his letters, his feelings of anxiety and impatience were also well reflected reading between the lines. To avoid any possible misunderstanding from Hart and at the same time prove his loyalty, Campbell added, before ending the letter: “The Enclosure is an ‘order for Postage Stamps to be transmitted through the Non-Resi-dent Secretary London'——and after the observation made in your A/46 that you must feel your footing to be sure before attempting to push on and shall not give the order for the quantities required, until receipt of your instructions.”

On February 24, Hart replied to Campbell's January 4 tele-gram and announced: “Defer Postage stamp order.” This message from Hart basically put a complete stop to the preparatory work for postage stamp production in London, as well as to the poten-tial collaboration between the Chinese Customs and England's De La Rue.

As recorded in the literature, the four sketched stamp designs sent from China by Detring were actually submitted and approved in May 1877. They were then forwarded to Campbell in November. The designs were those of “Dragon Couchant”, “Phoenix”, “Elephant with Wang Nian Ching Flowers” and “Pagoda”, respectively. Based on the described design contents, the essays of the following three designs, the “Dragon Couchant”, “Elephant with Wang Nian Ching Flowers” and “Pagoda”, should be the ones from the Mizuhara collection. The “Dragon Couchant” was the design finally approved for the Large Dragon Issue. The word “couchant” was used as an expression to describe the coiled shape of a dragon, with its body resting on the four legs and its head raised above the shoulders. After receiving the detailed report and stamp designs submitted by De La Rue, why did Detring reciprocally furnish De La Rue with the Customs' own designs? Why did Hart unexpectedly terminate the collaborative process with De La Rue? Further studies may be needed to search for the reasons behind these actions.