anti-Chinese riot in 1918. In his book, Howard Johnson (1982) argued that, when compared to other anti-Chinese events, the 1918 event was a massive expression of anti-Chinese sentiments in Jamaica. It began in Ewarton and spread quickly to other parts of St Catherine, and other parishes such as St Mary, St Ann and Clarendon. The events were incited by a story that a Chinese shopkeeper in Ewarton caught a Jamaican off-duty policeman in a romantic liaison with his Jamaican "paramour". The shopkeeper and several of his Chinese friends brutally thrashed the Jamaican man. It was then rumoured that the policeman was killed which led to violence breaking out against the Chinese shopkeepers. During the late 1920s letters (22 September 1926) the colonial secretary L P Waison held meetings with the police. According to the letter, Waison accused the government for its failure to employ the law against Chinese immigrants: "such as the open exploitation of shop assistants; the breaking of the spirit and gambling laws" (peaka-pow). Waison's threats were drastic. He advocated extreme violence against Chinese, "that their shops will be burnt down". Newspaper reports in January and March 1934 described this "pernicious" drug traffic by the Chinese and expressed concern that it was spreading among the lower class of that community who were becoming "chronic opium addicts". Religion Early Chinese migrants to Jamaica brought elements of Chinese folk religion with them, most exemplified by the altar to Lord Guan which they erected in the old CBA building and which remains standing there, even as the CBA moved its headquarters. However, with the passage of long decades since their ancestors first migrated from China, traditional Chinese religious practices have largely died out among Chinese Jamaicans. Some traditional practices persisted well into the 20th century, most evident at the Chinese Cemetery, where families would go to clean their ancestors' graves during the Qingming Festival in what was often organised as a communal activity by the CBA (referred to in English as Gah San, after the Hakka word 掛山); however, with the emigration of much of the Chinese Jamaican community to the North American mainland, the public, communal aspect of this grave-cleaning died out and indeed it was not carried out for more than a decade before attempts by the CBA to revive it in 2004. Christianity has become the dominant religion among Chinese Jamaicans; they primarily adhere to the Catholic Church