The+Crown+Colony+(1867+-+1942+)

=**The Crown Colony (1867 - 1942 )**=

As Singapore grew, the flaws of the Straits Settlements became obvious and it was difficult to pass new laws. Singapore's merchant community wanted to establish Singapore as a seperate colony of Britain. The British government finally agreed to make the Straits Settlements a Crown Colony on 1 April 1867, receiving orders directly from the Colonial Office rather than from India. As a Crown Colony, the Straits Settlements was ruled by a governor, based in Singapore, with the assistance of councils. Although the councils were not elected, more representatives for the local population were gradually included over the years.

Chinese Protectorate
The colonial government embarked on several measures to address the serious social problems facing Singapore. For example, a Chinese Protectorate under Pickering was established in 1877 to address the needs of the Chinese community, including controlling the worst abuses of the coolie trade and protecting Chinese women from forced prostitution. In 1889 Governor Sir Cecil Clementi Smith banned secret societies. Nevertheless, many social problems persisted up through the post-war era, including an acute housing shortage and generally poor health and living standards.

Tong Meng Hui
In 1906, the Tong Meng Hui, a revolutionary Chinese organization dedicated to the overthrow of the Qing Dynasty led by Sun Yat-Sen, founded its Nanyang branch in Singapore, which was to serve as the organization's headquarters in Southeast Asia. The Tong Meng Hui would eventually be part of several groups that took part in the Xinhai Revolution and established the Republic of China. Overseas Chinese like the immigrant Chinese population in Singapore donated generously to groups like the Tong Meng Hui, which would eventually evolve into the Guomintang. Today, this founding is commemorated in the Sun Yat-Sen Nanyang Memorial Hall - previously known as Sun Yat-Sen Villa or Wang Qing Yuan (meaning "House of the Heavens above" in Chinese) - in Singapore where the branch operated from. According to George Yeo, the Foreign Minister of Singapore, in those days the Kuomintang party flag, which later became the flag of the Republic of China, was sewn in the Sun Yat-Sen Villa by Teo Eng Hock and his wife.

Singapore Mutiny 1915
Singapore was not much affected by World War I (1914–18), as the conflict did not spread to Southeast Asia. The only significant event during the war was a 1915 mutiny by the British Muslim Indian sepoys garrisoned in Singapore. After hearing rumours that they were to be sent off to fight the Ottoman Empire, which was a Muslim state, the soldiers revolted. They killed their officers and several British civilians before being suppressed by troops arriving from Johor and Burma.

Singapore in the 1920s and 1930s
The population was less than a million and most of Singapore was covered by mangrove swamps, rubber plantations, and secondary forest (fully regrown forests) because the rubber plantations had failed and forests around Mandai/Bukit Timah grew in its place. After the war, the British government devoted significant resources into building a naval base in Singapore, as a deterrent to the increasingly ambitious Japanese Empire. Originally announced in 1923, the construction of the base proceeded slowly until the Japanese invasion of Manchuria in 1931. When completed in 1939, at the very large cost of $500 million, it boasted what was then the largest dry dock in the world, the third-largest floating dock, and having enough fuel tanks to support the entire British navy for six months. It was defended by heavy 15-inch naval guns stationed at Fort Siloso, Fort Canning and Labrador, as well as a Royal Air Force airfield at Tengah Air Base. Winston Churchill touted it as the "Gibraltar of the East." Unfortunately, it was a base without a fleet. The British Home Fleet was stationed in Europe, and the British could not afford to build a second fleet to protect its interests in Asia. The plan was for the Home Fleet to sail quickly to Singapore in the event of an emergency. However, after World War II broke out in 1939, the fleet was fully occupied with defending Britain.