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Event

Seizure of opium at Canton, 1839

In 1839 at Canton, opium held by foreign merchants was surrendered to Commissioner Lin and destroyed; the treaty of 1842 says the British merchants and superintendent had been imprisoned and threatened with death.

3 links, 3 backed by primary records

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Dates
1839

Connections 3

interventions

  • Lin Zexu 1839 imperial commissioner at Canton Primary record 1

involved

  • Lin Zexu took the opium and had it destroyed Primary record 1

located in

Timeline 2 dates
  1. 1839 Seizure of opium at Canton, 1839
  2. 1839 Lin Zexu intervened in Seizure of opium at Canton, 1839
Proof 3 sources
  1. Commissioner Lin, letter to Queen Victoria, 1839 (English translation of 1840), Internet Modern History Sourcebook, Fordham University, 1839. Primary record
    especially dispatched me, the commissioner, to Canton, that in conjunction with the viceroy and lieut.-governor of the province, means might be taken for its suppression
    they took 20,283 chests of opium piled up in their store-ships, and through Elliot, the superintendent of the trade of your said country, petitioned that they might be delivered up to us, when the same were all utterly destroyed
  2. Treaty of Nanjing (Nanking), 1842, USC US-China Institute, 29 Aug 1842. Primary record
    the value of Opium which was delivered up at Canton in the month of March 1839, as a Ransom for the lives of Her Britannic Majesty's Superintendent and Subjects, who had been imprisoned and threatened with death by the Chinese High Officers.
  3. War with China, adjourned debate (Hansard, House of Commons, 9 April 1840), UK Parliament (Historic Hansard), 9 Apr 1840. Primary record
    under the greatest durance, and under the threat of their being suffered to die by starvation
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