Population of Singapore in 1819
This short note by W. Bartley challenges the widely held view that Singapore was entirely undeveloped at the time of its founding in 1819, presenting documentary evidence of pre-existing Chinese inhabitants and agricultural activity.
Summary
Bartley argues that, contrary to the accounts of Raffles and the Munshi Abdullah—which mention only Malays—and despite Captain Newbold’s unsubstantiated 1839 claim of a small Chinese presence, there was in fact a Chinese population and a degree of agricultural development on the island before the British purchase of the settlement (p. 177).
To support this, Bartley cites three categories of primary evidence from the Straits Settlements records: two letters from Resident W. Farquhar to Lt. L. W. Hull (dated 23 and 28 December 1822) describing Chinese gambier plantations already established on the western and north-eastern sides of Government Hill prior to the British establishment; and three acknowledgments of sale registered before the Registrar of Lands in May 1822, in which Tan Ngun Ha, Tan Ah Loo, and Heng Tooan each confirmed the sale of gambier plantations they had planted before the English settlement (p. 177).