Page 40 - Merchants and Mandarins China Trade Era

26.

of attempts by adventurous Americans to expand the range of

commodities in the China trade. But events across the At­

lantic Ocean also stimulated the growth of American trade to

China. The Napoleonic Wars opened up new markets on the Euro­

pean Continent to neutral American vessels and their Canton

cargoes. In 1805 forty-one American vessels anchored at Can­

ton. But by 1807 the stimulus given the American China trade

by the Napoleonic Wars had a reverse effect. Instead, the

belligerents threatened the destruction of all American trade.

England's Orders-in-Council and France's Berlin and Milan

Decrees had embroiled the United States in a controversy over

neutrality on the high seas. Seeking to force a resclution

without declaring war, President Thomas Jefferson responded to

Europe with an embargo on the American export trade. In stop­

ping all shipping to Canton, the Embargo virtually ended

American trade with China. The number of American vessels at

Canton plunged from thirty in 1807 to eight in 1808. Although
there was another surge after the removal of the Embargo in

1809, the American China trade did not recover fully until after

the War of 1812.

American commerce suffered from England's policy of

impressment as well as the Embargo. This issue had remained

unsettled since the Revolution. The English really never had

stopped impressing American seamen. Of course, the problem in­
1
creased in magnitude after England s involvement in war with

France. American vessels in the China trade faced this problem

even at Canton. As early as 1805, Americans at Canton with the