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2. Population Growth and Distribution
- ISEAS–Yusof Ishak Institute
- Chapter
- Additional Information
7 2 Population Growth and Distribution In studying the history of the population in Singapore, it is best to commence with the year 1819 when Stamford Raffles first landed on the practically uninhabited island. To trace back to the period before this date, which is shrouded in myths and legends and with no reliable records, would be difficult and treading on unsafe ground. Even for the early nineteenth century, the data compiled from the various head counts are not completely accurate. Prior to World War II, the growth of the population was essentially through immigration as the indigenous inhabitants were few in number and contributed little to this growth. After the war, immigration was subjected to increasingly tighter control, and natural increase became the principal factor of population growth. EARLY SETTLEMENT In 1811 a band of about one hundred Malays from Johor, led by the Temenggong who was an officer of the Sultan of Johor, migrated southwards and settled on the banks of the Singapore River.1 At that time, however, the country was already populated by a small group of natives known as the orang laut, or sea gypsies, who were fishermen and pirates living exclusively in their boats along the small rivers.2 According to T.J. Newbold, when Raffles landed on the island on 28 January 1819, the population numbered about 150, living in a few shabby huts under the rule of the Temenggong.3 About 120 of them were said to be Malays and the rest Chinese. These figures are probably nothing more than an informed guess, but they cannot be far off the mark since the population then was extremely small. In any case, it is known for sure that during the next few months the population increased very rapidly through a great influx of immigrants. The first people to be attracted by the many opportunities for making profits in the new trading post of Singapore were inhabitants from the older Dutch 8 POPULATION OF SINGAPORE settlement of Malacca on the west coast of Peninsular Malaysia. In spite of the severe measures adopted by the Dutch to prevent their subjects from sailing to Singapore and the petty pirates in the waters of the Straits of Malacca, hundreds managed to find their way to the new settlement.4 Among these new arrivals, the majority were Malays and the rest were Chinese. By the middle of 1819, Raffles claimed that the population had risen to about 5,000, as stated in his letter to the Duchess of Somerset on 11 June 1819. His famous words were, “My new colony thrives most rapidly. We have not been established four months and it has received an ascension of population exceeding 5,000 principally Chinese, and this number is daily increasing”.5 According to the same source, the population was said to have numbered between 10,000 and 12,000 by August 1820. However, a completely different account is presented by Thomas Braddell, who gives the figure of 5,874 as the total population in 1821.6 In the absence of a perfect method of verifying this figure, it can perhaps be surmised that the enthusiasm of Raffles had led him to exaggerate somewhat, and it is more likely that Braddell, writing with the detachment of a decade later, is nearer the truth. Besides, Raffles had also erred in overestimating the proportion of Chinese when he remarked that they formed the majority. Braddell estimated that the Chinese numbered 1,150 and the Malays 4,724 in 1821, and in fact it was not until the early 1830s that the former did outnumber the latter. The news about the establishment of the free port of Singapore in the centre of an area rich in trade soon spread far and wide, and traders and settlers from places outside Peninsular Malaysia began to flock to the island. The news soon reached the southern parts of China and Chinese traders, who had previously travelled to such places as Malacca, Brunei and Manila, found it safer and more profitable to visit Singapore instead.7 The first junk arrived from Amoy in February 1812 and ushered in a series of such voyages, normally ending at the close of the Northeast Monsoon in March or April, which brought the Chinese traders and settlers into the country.8 At about the same time, news of the British trading centre in Singapore reached the Indian sub-continent, and Indian traders soon came to the island in fairly large numbers...