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People · comprador, property investor, steamship manager

Xu Run

徐润Xú Rùn · 1838–1911

Comprador of Dent and Co. who became deputy head of China Merchants in 1873 and a large Shanghai property investor.

Xu Run (徐润, Xú Rùn) rose from apprentice to comprador at Dent & Co. (宝顺洋行) and then to the management of the China Merchants Steam Navigation Company. He came from a Guangdong comprador family and entered Dent’s Shanghai office in 1852; Yen-p’ing Hao lists him as the firm’s comprador from 1861 to 1868.

In 1873 Li Hongzhang made him deputy director of the new China Merchants company under Tong King-sing. Chinese Wikipedia credits him with one of the largest property holdings in Shanghai, over 3,000 mu of land, which are figures from his own chronicle as relayed by modern writers. A failed speculation in the early 1880s left him owing the company money, and he was dismissed in 1883 (another source says 1884). He returned to the company’s management in 1903 and left again in 1907. He died in 1911.

China Merchants’ Bund head office (China Merchants Steam Navigation Building) was built in 1901, during his later association with the company.

Timeline

  1. 1838Born in Guangdong (14 December)1
  2. 1852Becomes an apprentice at Dent & Co. in Shanghai1
  3. 1861Dent & Co. comprador at Shanghai (to 1868, per Hao)1
  4. 1873Appointed deputy director of China Merchants1
  5. 1883Property losses force him out of China Merchants1
  6. 1911Dies on 9 March1

Connections

  • Dent & Co.宝顺洋行Apprentice from 1852 and comprador of Dent & Co. at Shanghai
  • Black-and-white portrait of a man with a moustache wearing a skullcap and a dark silk jacket with toggle buttons.Tong King-sing唐廷枢Deputy to Tong King-sing at China Merchants from 1873

Places

Stories

Sources

  1. 1.Xu Run (Chinese Wikipedia) (徐润), Wikimedia Foundation — 徐润, infobox; early career; 招商局 section; real estate sectionwikipedia
  2. 2.A 'New Class' in China's Treaty Ports: The Rise of the Comprador-Merchants (A 'New Class' in China's Treaty Ports: The Rise of the Comprador-Merchants), Yen-p'ing Hao, Business History Review 44(4), pp. 446-459, 1970 — fns. 17, 25article