PIRATES OF THE SOUTH CHINA SEA

Hang · Post time 9-7-2007 10:58 AM

Kat mana agaknya harta-harta lanun ini disembunyikan.....?

Shipping losses to piracy in the South China Sea

(Aleko E. Lilius. I Sailed with Chinese Pirates. London: Arrowsmith, 1930.)

keep88 · Post time 9-7-2007 11:02 AM

aku rasa harta-harta lanun ni ada di tangan dengan kumpulan2 kongsi gelap......

bayan_budiman · Post time 10-7-2007 02:02 PM

Chinese Pirates - Pirates of the South China Sea
An attack of Chinese pirates on a passanger boat in 1856

Chinese Pirates - Pirates of the South China Sea

On the morning of the 22nd October, between nine and ten, a lorcha was attacked of Winchew (a place said to be between 100 and 200 miles on the Hong Kong side of Ningpo), by five west-coast boats, containing about 40 men each, and three Ningpo boats, with 20 men in each. The master of the lorcha was killed by a grape-shot passing through his head before the pirates boarded; a European, Portuguese, jumped overboard, and was not seen afterwards; three Chinese were killed, and three others have died since their arrival at Hong Kong; while five or six more are lying in the Civil Hospital scorched by stinkpots.

An English corvette attacking a Chinese pirate junk. A 19th century book illustration.
As the pirates boarded, the crew ran below, but the Chinese master was called upon deck and flogged repeatedly, the crew all the time remaining below. The pirates took the lorcha to Mee-chow, where they fired a gun, as a signal apparently for some boats, which accordingly came out of the harbour, took in a portion of the cargo, and returned to the shore. After lying at Mee-chow for 36 hours, the pirates again got under weigh and came further down the coast. They anchored off King-how between five and six p.m. on Sunday the 28th of October, and took the guns out at once.
Nothing more was done for two or three days, after which they took out as much of the cargo of sugar as they seemed to want in one day, and then, at the request of one or two of the pirates who could speak English, allowed the lorcha to leave with about 200 people still on board. King-how is about 20 miles distant from Hong Kong in a regular piratical haunt.
Last year about this time two lorchas, sugar-laden, were captured by pirates, also off Winchew, while on a voyage from Amoy to Ningpo, and taken to Mee-chow, where their cargoes were sold, and the vessels were then set adrift with no one in them. One, it was afterwards reported, went right out to sea, and the other was dashed to pieces on the rocks, - at all events, nothing more was ever heard of them by their owner. On that occasion eight Chinese were killed.

bayan_budiman · Post time 10-7-2007 02:09 PM

Ask any Italians :" Who is Sandokan?" They will enthusiastically tell you he is a popular Malay pirate known as " The Tiger of Malaysia".

Don't worry, this is not any negative publicity. You see, Sandokan is portrayed as a kind of Robin Hood who fights against colonial powers. Apparently the Italian author Emilio Salgari based his most enduring creation on the exploits of Dayak Chieftain Libau, resisting James Brooke, the White Rajah of Sarawak from his hideout at Mount Sandok.

You might regard Salgari's imagination hilarious as I did. But mind you, when Indian actor Kabir Bedi played the role of Sandokan in 1976, it took Europe by storm and this was followed by a series of sequels in the late 90's. So it was a pirate from Malaya who shot to international stardom before the Pirates of Caribbean.

Salgari's Sandokan even though fictitous, is an eye-opener for me : an outsider's notion of the orang Melayu.