Asian Studies Program

Chinese Australia

An overview of the life of Cheok Hong CHEONG

Cheok Hong Cheong was a significant missionary, businessman, landowner and political lobbyist. He was born in 23 November 1851 in Guangdong Province, China. His family village was in the northern Taishan District of the Siyi (Four Districts or See Yup). He came to Australia in 1863 following the conversion of his father, Cheong Peng-nam at Beechworth in 1860. His father was employed the same year by the Presbyterian Church to act as a Cantonese interpreter in the Presbterian Chinese Mission at Ballarat. He decided, unusually for the time, to bring his entire family to Australia as permanent settlers which he achieved by 1863.

Cheok Hong CHEONG (he changed his name order to the European style) studied at the Ballarat East Common School and at Scotch College Ballarat. In 1872 the family moved to Melbourne and Peng-nam became a fruit merchant. Cheok Hong was enrolled at Scotch College, Victoria Parade. He matriculated into the University of Melbourne in 1875. He passed the entrance examinations for the part-time Presbyterian Theological Hall and was also appointed part-time English teacher at the Presbyterian Missionary Institution, a shortlived attempt to provide training for Chinese catechists. After disagreements with the Presbyterian Chinese Mission Committee he withdrew from theological studies and worked in the family business.

In 1879 he joined the leading Chinese merchants, Lowe Kong Meng and Louis Ah Mouy in writing and publishing a Chinese response to anti-Chinese actions in the shipping industry. He became secretary of the Melbourne Chinese Residents Committee/Association and served for many years. In that role he wrote most of the English-language material dealing with anti-Chinese discrimination in immigration and employment. He was the founder of the Victorian Chinese Anti-Opium Society and Australian corresponding committee member of the British Anti-Opium Society, on whose behalf he visited Britain in 1892.

In 1882, he became a Presbyterian ruling elder at Napier St Church (now a Uniting church) in Fitzroy. During this period, he was consulted by the Anglican Chinese Mission and in 1885 was offered the post of Superintending Missionary of the Anglican Mission. A forced amalgamation brought the mission under the control of the Church Missionary Association. Following a series of disagreements Cheong and the majority of Chinese Anglicans rejected the amalgamation and 're-formed' the Anglican mission. A period of considerable difficulty followed with two Anglican missions but in the end it was 'Cheong's Mission' that survived and continues as the Anglican Chinese Mission of the Epiphany at 123 Little Bourke St, Melbourne.

Cheong owned a number of properties in inner Melbourne and in Croydon where he lived. In 1925 he was one of a number of Chinese who invested in Walter Burley Griffin's development of the suburb of Castlecrag in Sydney. He was one of five shareholders who commissioned Burley Griffin to design them a house in the development.

In June 1928 Cheong died at his home at 'Pine Lodge' in Croydon, Victoria. He was survived by his wife who he had married in an arranged marriage and nine children. Rev. James Cheong, one of his children became a well known public figure in his own right.

 

Summary of Cheok Hong Cheong's Activities

Presbyterian Church of Victoria
- Baptised (1866) and confirmed member.
- Elected ruling elder of Napier St Fitzroy congregation.
- Theological Student, Presbyterian Theological Hall.
- English Tutor, Chinese Missionary Institution, Fitzroy.

Anglican Church of Victoria
- Communicant Member
- Appointed Lay Superintending Missionary of the Church Missionary Society of Victoria, 1885 (No direct connection to CMSE).
- Dismissed 1898 following 'amalgamation of CMSV with the Church Missionary Association of Victoria, the Victorian auxiliary of the Church Missionary Society, London (CMSE).
- Formed Church Missionary Society of Victoria, Re-formed 1898 (CMSVR) now known as the Anglican Chinese Mission of the Epiphany.

The Chinese Christian Union Victoria
(A fellowship of Chinese Anglican, Methodist, Presbyterian, Church of Christ and Baptist Churches).
- China Famine Relief Appeals
- Poon Gooey Deportation Case
- Liaison with Chinese Consulate General

The Victorian Chinese Residents Association
- English language assistance to merchants
- The ASN Affair and Chinese Response 1879
- Chinese Imperial Commissioners, 1887
- Intercolonial Conference on the Chinese Question, 1888
- The Afghan and Burrumbeet Cases, 1888
- Goot Chee Deportation Case, 1915
- Chinese Republic Newspaper Editors: (Ng Hung Poi; Chiu Kwok-chun)
- Poon Gooey Deportation Case, 1911

Other Commitments
- Australian Chinese Residents Committee 1920
- Chinese Empire Reform Association
- Victorian Temperance Alliance (anti-opium)
- Victorian Peace Society (anti-militarism) -Visiting Lecturer in China, 1906
- Anti-Sweating League (protection of workers from exploitation)
- Melbourne Famine Relief Committees
- Victorian Anti-opium Committee
- British Society for the Suppression of the Opium Trade. Australian corresponding member of the Committee. - Visiting Lecturer in Great Britain, 1902

See: Welch, Ian, (2001), Alien Son: A Life of Cheok Hong Cheong, 1851-1928, PhD thesis, Australian National University