Charles Elliot

Charles Elliot was a Royal Navy officer and colonial administrator who became chief superintendent of British trade in China during the crisis that led to the First Opium War. He attempted to protect British merchants while negotiating with Qing officials and authorised the surrender of opium that Lin Zexu destroyed at Humen.

During the war he negotiated the Convention of Chuenpi, but the British government rejected its terms as inadequate. He later served as governor in several colonies. Charles Elliot was born in Dresden and died in Withycombe Raleigh.

In Stephen R. Platt’s Imperial Twilight, beginning decades before the fighting of 1839, Imperial Twilight traces the commercial and diplomatic system that connected Qing China with Britain through Canton. Tea imports, the silver trade and the East India Company’s dependence on opium created a relationship in which British merchants demanded wider access while Qing officials attempted to preserve legal authority and control over foreign commerce. Platt follows Chinese and British decision-makers as negotiation gives way to coercion. Lin Zexu’s campaign against the opium trade, Charles Elliot’s responsibility for British subjects and William Jardine’s advocacy of military pressure all contributed to the crisis. Further fictional perspectives on Charles Elliot can be found in Amitav Ghosh’s Flood of Fire and Amitav Ghosh’s River of Smoke.