據史載,新加坡最早發生私會黨引發的格鬥最初發生在1824年,當時的新加坡政治家萊佛士的私人秘書,著名馬來作家文西阿都拉(英语:Abdullah Abdul Kadir)(筆名:Munshi Abdullah,1796—1854),於1824年冒險參觀新加坡市郊天地會的入會儀式。1825年,衆多私會黨中,英殖民政府就發現了「義興」、「海山」、「合成」、「華記」四個派別。
^Triad Societies: Western Accounts of the History, Sociology and Linguistics of Chinese Secret Societies By Kingsley Bolton, Gustaaf Schlegel, Herbert Allen Giles, Christopher Hutton, J. S. M. Ward, Mervyn Llewelyn Wynne, W. P. Morgan, William Stanton, W. G. Stirling; Contributor Kingsley Bolton, Chris Hutton; Published by Taylor & Francis, 2000; ISBN0-415-24397-1, ISBN978-0-415-24397-1
^Straits Settlements Factory Records Vol 101 (1825) Page 1476-1480 and 1604
The secret fraternities in which they (the Chinese settlers) enroll themselves for mutual protection and support, prove powerful engines for political combinations, as the Dutch have repeatedly experienced during their long administration in Java and in the Malay States. In China itself, these societies are deemed so dangerous to the Government as to be interdicted under penalty of death. At Pinang in 1799, they set the administration in defiance and strong measures were necessary to reduce them to obedience. Even in the present-day, the ends of justice are frequently defeated both at Pinang, Malacca, and Singapore: by bribery, false swearing, and sometimes by open violence, owing to combinations of these fraternities, formed for the purpose of screening guilty members from detection and punishment. In European Settlements, they are under the general control of an officer, or headman styled "Capitan", who receives a salary from the Government and is responsible in some measure, for the orderly conduct of his countrymen, whose representative and official organ he is. Their interior affairs, disputes, and private interests are arranged by the heads of their respective "Kongsis" or fraternities.
”
——Thomas John Newbold (1807–1850), an officer in the 23 Regiment, Madras Light Infantry, in Malacca
^Political and Statistical Account of the British Settlements in the Straits of Malacca, Viz: Pinang, Malacca, and Singapore By Thomas John Newbold, Published by J. Murray, 1839, Pages 13-14