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The late “Benz Hung” Hui Shiu-hung might be best known in Hong Kong for his supporting roles in TV dramas and films over the past five decades, but his family came to play pivotal roles in China’s modern development. With celebrities and the public mourning Hui, who died on Tuesday at the age of 76 due to multiple organ failure caused by cancer, some also recalled his family’s colourful history. In an interview published last year, Hui revealed his ancestor was Xu Baiting, the most significant among Guangzhou’s four major salt merchants in the 19th century. Salt was essential to life in ancient China. Apart from being used for flavouring and preserving food, it was also used as a crucial ingredient in gunpowder. During the Qing dynasty, influential salt merchants were also given a monopoly over the trade. While Xu made a fortune in the trade, he also helped combat pirates with his self-funded naval forces, earning him awards and the government’s respect. He later bought properties along Gaodi Street in Guangzhou, where the family settled. The Xus living in that neighbourhood were hailed as the “number one family in Guangzhou”. Hui revealed that his great-grandfather Xu Yingkui was also an important official under Empress Dowager Cixi in the late Qing dynasty. “He was allowed to ride horses in the Forbidden City,” Hui said in another interview published in 2023, referring to the special status enjoyed by his great-grandfather at the imperial palace in Beijing. Other notable family members include Hui’s great aunt, Xu Guangping, who was the partner of Lu Xun, one of the most influential figures of modern Chinese literature. One of Hui’s great uncles, Xu Chongzhi, studied at the Imperial Japanese Army Academy in Japan, and was a strong supporter of Sun Yat-sen, who overthrew the Qing dynasty and founded the Republic of China. Xu was also one of the founders of the Whampoa Military Academy in Guangzhou, known as the cradle of modern China’s military leaders. Another great uncle of Hui’s, Xu Chongqing, served as the president of Sun Yat-sen University three times between the 1930s and the 1960s. But Hui had said he rarely spoke about his family’s history with other people. “There was nothing special as they were all just humans,” the actor said in the 2024 interview. “I seldom told others [about my background], and I don’t know why the others would later know about it.”
