Early Treaty Port Shanghai, 1843–1863

Shanghai opened to foreign trade in 1843 under the settlement imposed after the First Opium War. The British land regulations of 1845 created a foreign residential and commercial district north of the Chinese walled city, followed by an American settlement in 1848 and a French concession in 1849. Wharves, warehouses, roads and merchant houses developed along the Huangpu River, and the Bund became the visible centre of the new port.

The city’s growth rested on tea, silk, shipping, property speculation and the opium trade supplied from British India. Foreign consuls and merchants exercised extensive legal and administrative power while Qing officials retained formal sovereignty. The Taiping Rebellion and the Small Swords uprising pushed refugees into the settlements and accelerated urban expansion. In 1863 the British and American settlements merged to form the Shanghai International Settlement, ending this first phase of treaty-port development.

Historical fiction set in early treaty-port Shanghai can examine commerce, migration, extraterritorial privilege, maritime technology and the moral compromises of imperial expansion. Andrew Wareham’s ‘Twas on the China Station series follows George Mayhew as he builds a hong during the Taiping crisis, linking his private fortune to steam shipping, opium revenue, land development and the unstable relationship between the Qing state and the foreign powers.