Beleaguered in Pekin 6

Beleaguered in Pekin 6

The monumental idiocy of the idea that China could successfully defy

the whole civilized world was only possible to such brains as those

possessed by the densely ignorant Manchus who surrounded the Empress

as her cabinet. Several of the tsung-li-yamen ministers, like Prince

Ch’ing and Liao Shou Heng, weakly tried to reason them out of it, and

were promptly given back seats.

 

Of the others remaining in the tsung-li-yamen after their retirement,

none dared say anything against the movement for fear they also would

be shelved. But as they were not strong enough to please the Empress

in her final dealings with the foreigners, she, a few days before

the commencement of the siege, appointed Prince Tuan as head of the

yamen, in place of Prince Ch’ing, and at the same time appointed two

fire-eating foreign-haters, Chi Shui and Na T’ung, to seats in that

obstructive body. These men, with Tung Fu Hsiang and the cabinet, must

be held responsible for the murders of Baron von Ketteler, F. Huberty

James, David Oliphant, H. Warren, Ed Wagner, and the other civilians

and guards killed during the siege, as well as for many missionaries in

the province that have doubtless perished, but of whose fate we, being

besieged, had no certain knowledge.

 

That the Powers, in the settlement of their crimes, will treat them as

murderers, as they are, we can scarcely doubt, and we hope none of them

in any way implicated will be allowed to escape capital punishment.

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER III

 

_CABLES TO AMERICA DESCRIBING GROWTH OF BOXER MOVEMENT FROM JANUARY TO

JUNE, 1900_

 

 

[Illustration: CHUNG LI

 

Manchu Boxer Chief]

 

THE murder of the Church of England missionary, Brookes, in Chinanfu

prefecture, Shantung province, by the Boxers, was the beginning of

the explosion. On January 4, 1900, I cabled home the occurrence of

the murder. On January 5 I cabled that the Americans in Taianfu,

two days’ journey by cart south of the scene of the murder, were in

danger, and that the United States minister had requested that they be

protected; also that the Empress Dowager had expressed to Sir Claude

MacDonald, through the tsung-li-yamen, her horror at the deed, and from

thenceforth, under the respective dates given below, I sent cables

recording the Boxer progress.

 

January 13. Christians in Shantung are being constantly pillaged by

marauding parties of Boxers. The Taianfu district is especially

dangerous, as the prefect will not allow them to be interfered with.

Dr. Smith, of Pang Chuang, in northern Shantung, has also written and

telegraphed the United States legation that matters in his district are

in the same condition. Christians murdered, chapels burned and looted,

and no redress obtainable from the officials.

 

January 15. An imperial edict was issued yesterday which really

commends the Boxers, and is sure to cause trouble. Upon Baron von

Ketteler representing this to the tsung-li-yamen he was given no

satisfactory answer to account for it.

 

January 24. Boxer movement is rapidly spreading, and the situation

fills many with alarm. Prince Tuan’s son has been chosen as the

successor to the Emperor, which is an unfavorable omen.

 

January 25. An edict has been promulgated apparently from the Emperor,

but really from the Empress Dowager, stating that, because of his

childless condition and infirm health, he has decided for the good of

the state to appoint Pu Chun, son of Prince Tuan, as his successor.

 

February 5. Although the Boxer movement continues to increase in the

northern provinces, Peking remains quiet.

 

February 10. The anti-foreign crusade is proceeding apace. Jung Lu, Hsu

Tung and Kang Yi have assumed great power, and are constantly with

the Empress. The Boer successes in the Transvaal are being used to

show the masses that a very little country can defy a big government

if only the hearts of the people are in the struggle. British prestige

here declining rapidly as a consequence. A Boxer mob has attacked the

Germans building the railway in Shantung, and driven the foreigners

away from their work. As Baron von Ketteler insists upon their going on

with the work, the tsung-li-yamen finds it difficult to please both the

throne and the foreigners.

 

February 12. A letter received from a Presbyterian missionary in

Chinanfu states that over seventy families of Christians have been

mobbed and looted in his district, and that they can obtain no redress

from the local officials, and that the Boxers, knowing this, are

rapidly increasing and growing bolder.

 

February 15. Imperial edict orders the suspension of any native papers

showing reform tendency, and the editors to be imprisoned.

 

February 19. The annual audience with the foreign ministers took place

with most scant ceremony and in a shabby apartment. This was done with

the direct purpose of insulting them, but none remonstrated.

 

February 23. A French priest from Tientsin informs me that all that

district is pervaded by the Boxers, who openly avow they are drilling

to come to Peking and drive out and exterminate all foreigners.

 

February 25. Several thousand armed Boxers have possession of the

German railway building at Kaomi in Shantung, and state their purpose

is to drive out the foreigner.

 

February 28. Yuan Shih Kai, Governor of Shantung, has sent a private

messenger, an ex-drillmaster in his army corps, to Baron von Ketteler,

the German minister, to say he will disperse the Boxers at Kaomi and

restore quiet.

 

March 14. The man who obtained for the British syndicate the concession

known as the Peking syndicate’s Shansi concessions to mine and build

railways, was arrested for assisting foreigners to obtain concessions

in China. Upon Sir Claude MacDonald’s demanding his release, the

Empress promptly sentenced him to imprisonment for life. This will

deter others from helping foreigners in any capacity.

 

March 15. United States Minister Conger, having protested against

the Empress using Yu Hsien, ex-governor of Shantung, in any province

where American interests are great, is greatly displeased to learn

to-day that, so far from heeding, the Empress has actually appointed

him Governor of Shansi, in which are not only a number of American

missionary stations, but the interests of the Peking syndicate.

 

[Illustration: ANCIENT ASTRONOMICAL INSTRUMENTS

 

These peculiar instruments, which are of great astronomical merit, were

made during the reign of Kublai Khan, A. D. 1264. An especial interest

attaches to this illustration, on account of the attempt of the Germans

to remove these instruments to Berlin, and the protest made against

it by General Chaffee, of the U. S. Army. The engraving shows the

instruments just as they were used for hundreds of years, before they

were taken apart for removal to Europe.]

 

April 24. Boxers aggregating nearly 10,000 have collected in one

place near Paotingfu, and are very disorderly. The outlook is very

threatening, not only there but at Tungchow, thirteen miles south of

Peking, and at Tsunhua, to the east of Peking. At all these places

there are large American missionary stations.

 

May 17. Boxer movement has now assumed definite shape and alarming

proportions. They have destroyed several Catholic villages east of

Paotingfu, and are moving on the property of the American Board’s

mission at Choochow at Kung Tsun. They have also looted the London

mission’s premises, and killed several Christians. Boxers are now daily

to be seen practicing in Peking and the suburbs. Situation is growing

serious here.

 

May 18. I have been warned by one of the princes that I should take my

family from Peking, as he states his own elder brother is a Boxer, and

that foreigners are no longer safe in Peking. Have fully informed the

United States minister of the situation, but he believes the official

promises that all is well.

 

May 21. Foreign ministers have held a meeting and discussed question of

bringing legation guards to Peking. The French minister favored this,

but Conger opposed, stating he believed the government resolutely means

to suppress the Boxers. No action was taken, it being decided to await

further developments.

 

May 24. The tsung-li-yamen has not yet replied to the joint note sent

them by the foreign ministers four days ago, requesting that the

Boxers be dealt with summarily. Unless an immediate and vigorous

foreign pressure is applied, a general uprising is sure.

 

May 25. General Yang was killed at Ting-hsing, Hsien, near Paotingfu,

either by his own soldiers or the Boxers. The soldiers then joined the

Boxers.

 

May 26. The tsung-li-yamen has sent a vague and temporizing reply to

the foreign ministers’ demand requiring the suppression of the Boxers.

They are now regularly enrolled at the residences of several of the

princes in this city.

 

May 28, A.M. The foreign ministers held another meeting to-day, but

still deferred any action looking toward defense, as the tsung-li-yamen

promises that it will shortly issue a strong edict that will suppress

the Boxers. Pichon distrusts the Chinese promises and again advocates

strong legation guards.

 

May 28, 4.10 P.M. Boxers have burned the bridge and destroyed the track

at Liuliho, forty-five miles west of Peking, on the Lu Han railway, and

are advancing toward Marco Polo bridge, twelve miles from here. The

foreigners employed on the railway have all fled. The Tientsin train is

overdue, and our communication with the coast threatened. The legations

are just beginning to wake up to the fact that the Boxer movement is a

perilous one.

 

[Illustration: FAMOUS ARCH OF THE MING TOMBS

 

A celebrated traveler has said that it was worth encircling the earth

to see this beautiful piece of architecture. Were it in the middle

of Paris or New York, it would arouse great admiration and wonder;

but, situated as it is in the midst of a wild and barren landscape,

with huge mountains for a background, and representing as it does,

the burial place of a mighty dynasty that for ages ruled a stupendous

nation, it fills the beholder not only with wonder and admiration, but with awe.]