Nowadays you know Hong Kong to be a part of the People’s Republic of China but did you know that at one point it was under British control? Not too many people talk about it anymore and you’re not likely to see any specials about it on your Directv New Jersey service or the like – perhaps due to some mild shame shared between both the UK and the PRC, but history never goes away.
The long short of it is that China lost Hong Kong to the British during the Opium Wars. In the nineteenth century, tea-obsessed Britain was absolutely in love with all the tea in China. However, there was a problem: Britain wanted China’s tea but they didn’t want to exhaust their stock in golds and silvers to get it. Another problem: the Qing Dynasty didn’t want anything Britain was willing to trade. This prompted Queen Victoria to redirect their opium exports to China in an attempt to get the Chinese people addicted and willing to trade their precious tea. When the Chinese government learned of this, the narcotics were destroyed prompting the First Opium War.
China was defeated and Hong Kong was seized by British control. A Second Opium War began and ended, giving Britain full control over the entire tea trade by granting them possession of the neighboring territories surrounding Hong Kong’s port. It was all on the condition of a 99-year lease which has since expired, returning all British-held land to the PRC.
