To promote more open trade with China, a first British Superintendent of Trade, Lord Napier, was sent to China in 1834. On August 16 of that year, Lord Napier called a meeting of British merchants in Canton and it was in this meeting that the formation of a chamber of commerce was first suggested.

The chamber was to provide a medium of communication between the merchants and the superintendent in order to ensure joint action vis-a-vis the Cohong and the Chinese authorities. This suggestion was adopted and on August 24, 1834, when a British Chamber of Commerce was formed by, amongst others, Jardine, Matheson & Co, R Turner & Co, and J Watson, with James Matheson heading the committee.

One of the early campaigns of this chamber was to oppose the continual monopoly of the East India Company in China trade, the company having already been disenfranchised thanks to the efforts of free trade lobbyists in England.

To extend the influence of the merchant community and to allow other nationalities to also be represented, a General Chamber of Commerce was established on November 28, 1836. Merchants in both Macau and Canton were involved. The mixture of nationalities caused a great deal of friction.

Nevertheless, according to E J Eitel, an early historian of Hong Kong, the committee of the General Chamber, re-elected on November 4, 1837, succeeded in redressing grievances through arbitration, built a clocktower, arranged a Post Office, fixed the regulations of the port and supervised the sanitary arrangements of the Thirteen Factories.

With the outbreak of the Opium War, the British merchants were forced to leave Canton for Macao and the Chamber appeared to have been disbanded. In 1839, amidst hostilities between China and Britain, the British Chamber was revived by the formation of a provisional committee in Macao, with James Matheson acting as chairman. The committee was consulted by Captain Elliot, British Plenipotentiary, and was in daily contact with Governor Pinto of Macao on matters relating to the merchant community there.

After the Opium War and the Treaty of Nanking, the foreign merchants were established in Hong Kong and they immediately formed themselves into a tightly knit group.

On matters ranging from policies on China trade to local administration, they combined and sent collective petitions to the governor of Hong Kong as well as to the Colonial Office in Britain.

They organised, for instance, a petition involving the local Chinese against a registration bill (which amounted to the imposition of a poll tax) put forth by Sir John Davis, the second governor of Hong Kong, who was forced by public pressure to drop the bill.

The merchants also opposed Governor Davis' taxation policy and succeeded in persuading the British Government to appoint a Parliamentary Select Committee on China trade to intervene. The finding of the Select Committee in-cluded, among other things, the suggestion that the merchants should be given a share in the administration of Hong Kong. This suggestion was put into practice in 1850 when two merchants were appointed to the Legislative Council of Hong Kong, which up to then were made up of officials only.

In 1845, according to a notebook of Donald Matheson's, a Hong Kong Club was formed to "assist in producing a greater community of feeling among the merchants and officials."