The Lost Wine Cellars of Shanghai

“What happened to the wine cellars of Shanghai?”– perhaps a question you never thought to ask yourself, but having thought on the subject for a few moments you may well want to know the answer…

The Shanghai of the 1920’s and 1930’s, then the world’s fifth-largest city,  was one of the world’s most prosperous and bustling commercial entrepots – it was observed in 1935 Fortune magazine,

“If, at any time during the Coolidge prosperity, you had taken your money out of American stocks and transferred it to Shanghai in the form of real estate investments, you would have trebled it in seven years.”

It is well to remember that not long before the Great Depression was playing itself out across a large part of the world. Shanghai seemed impervious… 

Simply put Shanghai in its first ‘Golden Age’ was more or less awash with disposable incomes and there quickly developed multiple avenues for disposing of said income. Dancing at private clubs, gambling at the races, lavish dinners, night time entertainments of all descriptions (from magic acts and performing animals at the Great World Entertainment Centre, to prostitution and opium dens… and beyond) were all available, day and night to the private individual. But what of the disposable income of larger bodies? Private clubs, hotels, restaurants, banks, insurance firms, import-export groups? It should surprise no one that the large edifices of stone and marble that were built on the Bund as temples to capital were mostly built during this period (the 1920’s and 1930s). 

Sassoon House under construction

In many ways the Shanghai of the collective imagination is a symbol and exemplar of conspicuous consumption and it is fair to suppose that a fair amount of this consumption took the form of alcohol. So while a large part of the world was sunk in a depression of both finance and spirits, Shanghai partied on. 

And when America tried the ‘noble experiment’ of Prohibition, Shanghai barely paused – if anything it probably took advantage of a surplus of liquor intended for the American market and bought up big at discount prices – like it’s sister ports of Hong Kong and Singapore, Shanghai’s status as a ‘freeport’ meant that large quantities of goods and materials passed through daily – it’s docks never silent, and it’s warehouses (or ‘go-downs’ in the local parlance) always bustling. Much of Shanghai’s character of free-living and decadence is the result of these twin forces – excess wealth in a time of Depression and global belt-tightening, and a glut of cheap alcohol intended for the American market.

Alcohol was available everywhere, and of all varieties (Shanghai often promoted its own myth that anything could be sourced and delivered for the right price) – in All About Shanghai: A Standard Guidebook (1934-35) it is noted,

 “Good food can be found everywhere, at any hour; good liquor is the pride and boast of the first class resorts – at the others stick to bottled beer, and open the bottles yourself.”

 Yes, all types of alcohol were available, even bad beer… some things never change.

27 The Bund - former Hdqtrs of Jardine, Matheson & Co.

For the finer quality end of the market you could apply to large import-export companies like Jardine, Matheson & Co. – their headquarters at 27 The Bund was backed by a warehouse that extended the depth of a city block. Here, along with quantities of silks, tea, Tung oil, frozen eggs, and machinery, they also dealt in wine and whisky. Or you could apply to smaller independent wine merchants such as H. L. Menken, a Jewish trader who moved from St. Petersburg in 1933 to a small premise in the French Concession where he both lived and traded.

[Interestingly the former white stone building at 27 The Bund has been remade into House of Roosevelt, containing a private club, offices, bedrooms, restaurants and what is said to be the largest wine cellar in Shanghai – meanwhile the home of H.L. Menken is now a beauty parlour, spa, and chocolate shop with the former brick-lined wine cellar being used as a reception space.]

From all of this we can conclude that within Shanghai’s more lavish spaces could be found well-stocked wine cellars. In private clubs, restaurants, bars, hotels, wine merchants, and in the homes of private individuals would be bottles of fine wine, slumbering in the dark.

I can perhaps almost sense your interest building at this juncture as I ask again: "where are these bottles now?"

The answer to that is mostly based on supposition, inference and a measure of imaginative deduction.

One key factor to remember is the unsettled times in which Shanghai existed and thrived. After the uncertainties felt by the foreign interests during the Boxer Uprising at the beginning of the 20^th Century – certain concessions had been won from the Imperial Court of China, literally. With new treaties guaranteeing the future of the Foreign Concessions along the coast of China, Shanghai grew rapidly, confident in its destiny. By the inter-war period this confidence had become shaky.

As civil war moved back and forth across China, washing up at the outskirts of Shanghai on a number of occasions, the foreign powers began to increase their military strength in the city – a sign of their nervousness. After the Japanese attack on parts of the city in 1932, damaging many factories in the Chinese sectors of the city and with bombs landing on the Bund itself, many foreign businesses closed up shop and left. Others stayed on, putting their faith in the warships floating on the river and the increasing size of the city’s garrisons (as well as a certain belief in their own entitlement and sense of destiny common at a time when The British Empire seemed set to endure forever, and American financial and military might knew few reverses).

Damaged shops, Nanjing Road, Battle of Shanghai, 1932

Those businesses that stayed on through the troubled years that were to follow also put their faith in certain practical measures, taking security into their own hands – windows and entrances were sand-bagged against bullets or shrapnel, and going about well-armed (either obviously or secretly) became the norm. Entrances to many venues (banks, private clubs, financial institutions, hotels) now came with a well-built doorman as standard - not of course to defend against the aggressions of nation-states, but as a deterrent to the criminal gangs that had begun to proliferate – most notably the Green Gang which had direct links to the Chinese Nationalists now fighting a brutal civil war by fits and starts in the interior of China.

Sixth floor windows sand-bagged for staff protection at the North China Daily News

Balanced against those people and businesses leaving the unsettled city was the arrival of a group who would have felt more at ease with the new business conditions. These were people impelled to leave America by the enactment of Prohibition and the wholesale closing of liquor-related premises – liquor traders, bartenders, entertainers… a Chicago bartender used to working in a bar protected by peep-holes, steel doors, and emergency escape routes would have been well-prepared for his new job in Shanghai where at least the city law enforcement weren’t the ones pursuing you.

These bar-professionals were well-versed in how to protect one’s own life, the venue in which they worked and the merchandise they carried.

As an example one can recount the 21 Club in New York which still exists to this day:

The concealed entrance to the cellar of the 21 Club, New York

In 1932, during Prohibition, the club was raided by the ten federal agents on the search for a store of liquor – after fruitless searching including tapping walls for hidden niches the authorities were forced to admit defeat and left. What they didn’t find was over 2,000 cases of wine hidden in the basement. This secret cache was concealed behind several smoked hams that hung from the basement ceiling and a shelved wall filled with canned goods.  This backed onto a false wall of 2.5 tonnes of cement and metal that could be made to revolve by inserting an 18” metal skewer into a crack in the cement, thereby releasing the catch. One can still visit this secret cellar today.

Another example of this method of business insurance comes from Paris, which experienced its own ‘unsettled times’ in the first half of the 20^th Century. The famous George V restaurant had constructed a secret cellar some 14 metres below the level of the street in which to keep its choicest vintages safe from the depredations and vicissitudes of history. This foresight protected the bottles from confiscation by the forces of the Occupation throughout the course of the Second World War. Other restaurants in Paris did similar things (most famously the Tour d’Argent), part of a series of concealments detailed in the book Wine & War: The Battle for France’s Greatest Treasure, by Don & Petie Kladstrup.

From examples such as these we can deduce that secret cellars were a common device used during turbulent times such as war. So what of Shanghai’s secret cellars? Did they exist? Do they still exist? 

It is quite probable that much personal property and business assets were concealed in this fashion prior to and during the occupation of Shanghai by the Japanese. Following the end of the war in 1945 a number of Shanghailanders returned to the city in the hope of picking up where they had been forced to leave off – the firm of Jardine, Matheson & Co., for instance, whom we mentioned earlier. 

This hoped return to 'business as usual' proved to be short-lived. Once the Communist authorities of China realised that this outpost of Capitalism was not going to wither as anticipated they required all foreign businesses to cease trading and sell off all assets before vacating the city (a task that took large firms like Jardine-Matheson almost four years). The decade after 1949 was a long, slow withdrawal of foreign businesses, giving ample time to remove any assets that had survived the preceding decades of conflict – this would have probably included any ‘assets’ concealed behind false walls… 

But what of those caches owned by businesses and people who did not return? Those who died in Japanese internment camps or elsewhere during the period? Did the secreted liquor remain undisturbed in its sleep? Are those secret rooms still there?

Consider the following: as Shanghai enters a second age of dramatic growth and financial prosperity, many of the buildings that remain from the Foreign Concessions are gaining a new lease of life. Renovation, restoration and retro-fitting are the current fashions – and as this work progresses it is being discovered that many architectural and decorative features of these once grand temples to capital have survived the intervening decades – including the wholesale destruction of the Cultural Revolution. 

Features like wood-panelling, gold-leaf, mosaics, tracery, frescoes have been discovered more or less unscathed, hidden behind plywood and cheap paint – often concealed by the former employees of these institutions before their handing over to the people of China during that long, slow withdrawal of foreign businesses after the war - [a fine example of this architectural archaeology is the interior features of the Cathay hotel, now the Peace Hotel. In the lobby a false ceiling was removed to reveal a breathtaking 15 metre atrium with a copper and yellow-tinted-glass skylight.]

Early restoration work at the Peace Hotel, Shanghai

The restored atrium

Perhaps, somewhere, in a 1920’s building, soon to be renovated, will be discovered a false wall that will lead to a cellar in which will be found the concealed wine stock of some long gone wine merchant or hotel owner… perhaps.