Discovery of granite marker sheds light on pioneer's estate

When he was young, Professor Walter Tan would hear comments while in his parents' car about how "the whole of Queenstown used to be ours", but it was not until this year that the full extent of his ancestor's estate became clear.

The discovery of a granite boundary marker in Dover Forest in January sparked months-long research that proved that his philanthropist great-great-great-grandfather Tan Kim Seng's landholdings in the 1860s was far larger than imagined.

Overlaid on today's map, the area encompasses Singapore Polytechnic, the National University of Singapore's Kent Ridge Campus, a long stretch of the Ayer Rajah Expressway, One-North, Queensway and the Southern Ridges.

"It stretched from Clementi Avenue 2 in the west to Dawson Road in the east, the School of Science and Technology in the north to Southern Kent Ridge Park in the south," said Ms Sharon Lim, senior manager of heritage research and assessment at the National Heritage Board (NHB).

"The whole parcel was handed over to the state in 1947, apparently due to a squatter problem."

The realisation of the sheer scale of Tan Kim Seng's erstwhile estate came about after the spotting of the inconspicuous - and moss-covered - granite boundary marker at the forest. Two-thirds of it were buried. It was later found to weigh 62kg and measure 90cm in length.

National Development Minister Desmond Lee had come across it on one of his walkabouts in Dover Forest at the start of the year. He posted about it on Facebook as a curio, quickly attracting the attention of the Tan family, who made a formal request to the authorities to preserve the marker.

On Oct 27, it was extracted from the ground, wrapped and transported to the Heritage Conservation Centre (HCC), where it is undergoing cleaning, and will be added to the National Collection under the purview of the Asian Civilisations Museum.

"It is the only known boundary marker associated with Tan Kim Seng," said Mr Alvin Tan, deputy chief executive of policy and community at NHB. "It is also unique because it is one of the few bilingual markers engraved with English and Chinese characters.

"It will receive the necessary care and be used as a resource to educate... Singaporeans about the life and contributions of one of the early pioneers of Singapore."

Tan Kim Seng, who lived from 1806 to 1864, was a prominent Peranakan businessman known for his philanthropic work, including a donation of over $13,000 in 1857 to improve the community's freshwater supply through the construction of MacRitchie Reservoir.

Kim Seng Road and Kim Seng Bridge were named after him, and the Victorian-style Tan Kim Seng Fountain, erected in Fullerton Square in 1882 by the colonial government for his contributions to waterworks, still stands after being moved to Esplanade Park in 1925.

In 1854, he was one of the chief mediators in the Chinese community who quelled the Great Riot between Hokkiens and Teochews.

He made his wealth from the spice trade, and was one of only a handful of businessmen who refused to peddle opium.

Prof Tan's wife, Mrs Vivienne Tan, who wrote a biography of Tan Kim Seng published in 2019, said the Chinese inscription on the granite marker, pronounced "Hong Hin" in Hokkien, was a well-known moniker for Tan Kim Seng in the 19th-century Chinese community.

Tan Kim Seng's initials, T.K.S, were also carved on the marker, which delineated the estate's northernmost frontier. Landowners at the time were legally responsible for putting these markers up as "the government simply didn't have the resources", Mrs Tan said.

"He already owned all this land in 1862... Opium was the easiest way to make money then, but the family said no. He was a very nice man whom everyone wanted to do business with," she said.

Since its discovery, the marker has been wiped down with alcohol, swabbed with cotton buds and washed with de-ionised water, said Ms Berta Manas Alcaide, senior conservator of objects at HCC.

It was important to extract the stone, as the carvings were worn from exposure to the elements. Fine cracks in its structure would have led to its disintegration.

For now, there is the slight problem of the marker having traces of either "98" or "9B" painted in black over the originally red inscription. It is unknown when or why this was added. Whether it should be removed from the marker is still being debated by the conservator and museum curators.

Mrs Tan said of this later addition: "Was it for an administrative survey? Was it done by the Japanese? Was it done for the other boundary markers? There must have been a reason."