British Concession of Jiujiang

The British concession of Jiujiang was a foreign concession on the Yangtze in the Chinese city of Jiujiang, formerly romanised as Kiukiang. It was established in 1861, in the aftermath of the Second Opium War, when the Qing official Zhang Jixin signed a land lease with the British diplomat Harry Parkes. The concession occupied a narrow strip of about 150 acres between the Yangtze and Gantang Lake, with a port on the river. A resurvey in 1862 led to a minor confrontation with local residents, and in 1891 the authorities reclaimed land for a park and racecourse. The concession housed a sizeable European community and was the only foreign concession in the city. In 1909 the acquittal of a police inspector over the death of a local merchant, Yu Facheng, triggered a three-month boycott of British shipping. Nationalist agitation grew after 1919, and in January 1927 National Revolutionary Army troops occupied the concession during the Northern Expedition. Britain retained de jure control until 1929, when the Chen-O'Malley Agreement ceded it to the Republic of China.