Source 8: Adapted from a historian’s account on Chinese secret societies in colonial Singapore.

The main function of the Chinese secret societies was to organize the coolie trade. The distribution of coolie immigrants was handled by brokers who were senior secret-society members. They performed many useful social functions. They protected young immigrants, arranged their employment and admitted them to a brotherhood, which provided a sense of belonging in a strange foreign land. They settled disputes among their own people, who found the British justice system unfamiliar, complicated and difficult to understand.

Source Origin: C.M. Turnbull. (2009) A History of Modern Singapore, 1819-2005. Singapore: NUS Press. P.71

Use Record: Nan Chiau High School, 2015