FIRST OPIUM WAR.

Inquire · Offered by Peter Harrington

Parliamentary Papers Relating to the Opium Trade; viz. Extracts from Reports, &c., of Committees of the Houses of Lords and Commons; 1821 to 1832. Collected for the Use of the Committee of the House of Commons on China Trade; 1840. First edition of this informative collection of documents on China and India, issued contemporaneously to the parliamentary censure vote that effectively authorized military action in China.The reports, statements, and letters contain a large quantity of data on imports and exports by Britain and America through Canton from the early 19th century onward. Much to the chagrin of William Jardine and other merchants, the committee on the China trade was too divided on the question of compensation for financial losses, and its final report, issued in June 1840, made no specific recommendations. Nonetheless, the evidence it obtained from witnesses provided retrospective justification for the dispatch of forces to Asia.

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