Union Insurance Society of Canton's Birthday May 24 will see the centenary celebration of one of the oldest companies formed in China by foreign ers, the Union Insurance Society. of Canton, Ltd. A reception will be held in the Company's old offices in the Union Building, in memory of the first days after the Society" was established in Shanghai following its Initial foundation in Canton and removal to Hongkong.
In 1895 the Society was formed, tone year after the monopoly of the East India Company in Canton was terminated. It was composed of a group of British merchants, who realized that without insurance, business in foreign countries would never flourish. Trade had been handicapped by the fact that mer~ chants never dared bring out more than small shipments at a time, and to face this difficulty the merchants founded the Society under the guldance of the old firm of Dent & Ca.
1841, when Hongkong was ceded to the British Crown, the Union was transferred to thai city and its headquarters have remained there ever since. Growth, however, was amazingly rapid even' for those "boom" times, When Dent & Ca, came to grief in the financial up: heaval of 1864, the Union remained unshaken, A British Committee of Management was appointed, and Mr. C.D. Williams was named as Secretary. His successors to the post general manager have been Mr. Robert Watmore, Mr. Nathaniel J. Ede, Mr, Douglas Jones, Mr. W. J. Saunders, Mr. C. Montague Ede, Mr. Paul Lauder, and, since last year, Mr. A.W, Hugh
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.