Human Rights The Boxer Rebellion Fails to Remove Foreign Control in China The Boxer Rebellion Fails to Remove Foreign Control in China 1900 The Boxer Rebellion marked the final attempt of the and Central Asia; France seized control of Indochina in 1900 Chinese of the Ch’ing Dynasty to throw off the yoke of 1884; and a newly modernized Japan humiliated China foreign imperialism in a war over influence in Korea in 1894-1895 and took Taiwan as a prize. In the wake of the Korean defeat, Category of event: Revolutions and rebellions the older treaty powers redoubled their efforts, and new Time: June-September, 1900 players, especially Germany, entered the race for con- Locale: North China, especially Shantung and Chihli cessions. Provinces Despite persistent attempts at modernization, most notably the “self-strengthening movement” led Key Figures: by the officials Li Hung-chang and Chang Chih-tung, Chang Chih-tung (1837-1909), the governor-general imperial armies and fleets routinely found themselves of Hunan-Hupei, famous advocate of “self- overmatched. Additionally, the great Taiping Rebellion strengthening” and ardent opponent of the Boxers (1850-1864) and the Nien and Muslim uprisings in the Jung-lu (1836-1903), the principal adviser to Empress 1860’s and 1870’s—which by some estimates collec- Dowager Tz’u-hsi Kuang-hsü (1871-1908), the tively took upward of thirty million lives— stretched Chinese emperor imprisoned by his aunt Tz’u-hsi resources to the limit and devastated much of the most in the wake of the “One Hundred Days of Reform” productive land in the empire. By the late 1890’s, se- of 1898 cret societies and antiforeign militia had proliferated, Li Hung-chang (1823-1901), an influential Chinese particularly in the northern provinces of Chihli, Shan- official and a leading advocate of conciliation with tung, and Shensi, where Christian missionary activity foreign powers and foreign encroachment had most recently become Tz’u-hsi (1835-1908), China’s Empress Dowager who, prominent. following the coup d’etat of 1898, became sole In November, 1897, Germany, as part of a com- ruler prehensive program of naval expansion, had demanded Count Alfred von Waldersee (1832-1904), the commander and received a naval base and concession at Kiaochow of the international relief force sent to Beijing Bay in Shantung. The methods by which the Germans consolidated their position, including punitive forays Summary of Event into the surrounding countryside and demands for the After the First Opium War (1839-1842) with Great Brit- safety of their missionaries, increasingly inflamed the ain, China was continually subjected to foreign pres- sensibilities of local groups and officials. Among the sure. The Treaty of Nanking (1842), following the First most prominent of these was an association of secret Opium War, and the Tientsin Treaty (1858) and Peking societies called the I-ho ch’üan (the Association of Convention (1860), following the Second Opium War, Righteousness and Harmony), most commonly known allowed a system of foreign enclaves, the Treaty Ports, as the “Righteous and Harmonious Fists.” As part of to be set up in dozens of Chinese cities. Foreign diplo- its ritual exercises, this group practiced the ancient mats, not Chinese officials, controlled trade, administra- Chinese art of t’ai-chi ch’uan, which included a form tion, the collection of customs revenues, and the dis- of shadow-boxing, prompting the foreign nickname of pensing of justice in the Treaty Ports. By the late 1890’s, “Boxers.” this practice of extraterritoriality had been extended to The origin of the Boxers is obscure, but it is gener- cover all foreigners, and even Chinese subjects who had ally agreed that several of their constituent organizations converted to Christianity were exempt from the power had taken part in the White Lotus Rebellion of 1796- of Chinese courts. 1804. Their beliefs may be characterized as nativist and Starting with the cession of Hong Kong to the Brit- fundamentalist: a blend of Taoist naturalism, Buddhist ish in 1842, the Ch’ing (Man-chu) Dynasty had been spirituality, Confucian ethics and politics, and a strong forced to surrender territory and sovereignty as a result antiforeign bent. Previously, this had taken the form of of war or threat. Russia exerted pressure in Manchuria anti-Ch’ing activities because the Manchus, who had 1 The Boxer Rebellion Fails to Remove Foreign Control in China Human Rights founded the dynasty and still occupied the principal wounded and killed, often in deliberately gruesome court positions, were ethnically distinct from the Han fashion. A foreign relief force sent from Tientsin was Chinese majority and were thus depicted in the Boxers’ turned back by Boxers and Chinese army units in early iconography as “foreign.” Increasingly, however, the June. The German minister to China, Count Clemens 1900 emphasis shifted to antimissionary activity, especially von Ketteler, was shot down in the capital’s streets. On after the Germans extended their control over Shantung, June 21, 1900, the Ch’ing government declared war on the birthplace of Confucius, in 1898. all the treaty powers in China and commanded Boxer The Ch’ing government found itself in an increas- militia to besiege Beijing’s foreign legation quarter. ingly untenable position. On one hand, it faced pressure The edict of June 21 directed Chinese officials from the Boxers and other hostile secret societies to pro- throughout the empire to use their forces in conjunction tect the empire from foreign encroachment, while on the with the Boxers to attack foreign strong points. With other, it had to recognize increasingly strident foreign the exception of those in North China with close Box- demands to suppress antiforeign disorder. For a brief pe- er affiliations, however, provincial officials in the rest riod in the summer of 1898, it seemed as if some of these of the empire ignored, defied, or did their best to stall issues would be resolved. Emperor Kuang-hsü, having the implementation of the orders. Many of the army recently attained his majority, now attempted, under commanders, such as future Chinese president Yüan the guidance of his adviser K’ang Yu-wei, an ambitious Shih-k’ai, maintained a considerable skepticism about reform of Chinese governmental institutions along the the Boxers’ combat abilities and did their best to stay lines of the Meiji Restoration in Japan. However, this aloof from the fighting. Disillusionment with the seem- “One Hundred Days of Reform” came to an abrupt end ingly futile declaration of war and the leadership which in September, 1898, when Kuang-hsü’s aunt, the Em- implemented it, sympathy for the captive emperor and press Dowager Tz’u-hsi, prompted by her chief adviser, the expelled reformers, and the muted influence of more Jung-lu, and fearful of the consequences of extensive re- cosmopolitan Chinese officials all served to keep condi- form, staged a coup d’etat. Kuang-hsü was placed under tions in the capital chaotic and to blunt the force of the house arrest, K’ang Yu-wei barely fled with his life, and Boxers’ siege of the legations. Tz’u-hsi ruled outright, swinging the dynasty toward a By late July, a powerful international relief force much more narrowly antiforeign position. of twenty thousand men, including Germans, Japa- Encouraged by the tacit support of many local of- nese, Americans, British, Russians, French, Austrians, ficials in North China, including the governor of Shan- and Italians, had been assembled in Tientsin under the tung, the Boxers staged increasingly provocative attacks command of Count Alfred von Wal-dersee. After two on foreigners. By the summer of 1899, the major Boxer weeks of daily skirmishes and several intense fights, groups in Shantung, led by the Big Sword Society (Ta- the allied forces fought their way to Beijing, entered tao hui), had taken as their slogan “fu-Ch’ing, mieh- the city through an unguarded sewer gate, and ended yang” (support the Ch’ing, exterminate the foreigners) the siege of the legations on August 14. The court fled and with official support had now become the I-ho t’ to Sian, most government forces surrendered quickly, uan, or “Righteous and Harmonious Militia.” The for- and the Boxers, who had proven largely unreliable in eign powers, during the winter of 1899-1900, presented battle, melted quickly into the North China country- the Imperial Court with increasingly heated demands side. for suppression of the Boxers and threatened to send Incensed by the brutality meted out to foreigners troops. and Chinese Christians at the hands of the Boxers, The Empress Dowager, impressed with the success the allies launched continuous punitive expeditions of the militia in destroying foreign railroads and settle- into the suburbs of Beijing and Tientsin, burning, ments, and fascinated by their claims of invulnerabil- looting, and summarily executing suspected Box- ity to foreign bullets, called upon the army and people ers. International forces remained in occupation of to defend the country from an anticipated invasion by the capital until September, 1901, and the Empress the foreign powers. Emboldened by this outright impe- Dowager and her court did not return until the begin- rial support, Boxer groups in Beijing, the metropolitan ning of 1902. province of Chihli, and adjacent Shensi staged massive The final peace treaty, the Boxer Protocols, accepted antiforeign demonstrations of their own. Hundreds of by the Chinese on January 16, 1901, was the most severe missionaries and thousands of Chinese converts were of the many “unequal treaties” imposed on China during 2 Human Rights The Boxer Rebellion Fails to Remove Foreign Control in China the sixty years following the First Opium War. Among itself. Chinese officials toured the West, studying various its provisions were allied demands for the execution, legislative systems.