CLASHES BETWEEN
CHINA AND ENGLAND
 |
| The East India Company steamship Nemesis (right background) destroying Chinese war junks during the Second Battle of Chuenpi, 7 January 1841 |
The primary motive of British imperialism in China in the nineteenth century was economic. There was a high demand for Chinese tea, silk and porcelain in the British market. However, Britain did not possess sufficient silver to trade with the Qing Empire. Thus, a system of barter based on Indian opium was created to bridge this problem of payment. The subsequent exponential increase of opium in China between 1790 and 1832 brought about a generation of addicts and social instability. Clashes between the Qing government and British merchants ultimately escalated into the infamous Opium Wars. As a result, the British were given the island of Hong Kong and trading rights in the ports of Canton and Shanghai. Although British imperialism never politically took hold in mainland China, as it did in India or Africa, its cultural and political legacy is still evident today. Honk Kong remains a significant center of global finance and its government still functioned in much of the same ways as it did under British colonialism. Furthermore, the language of English and British culture highly impacted the society of Hong Kong and Southern China for over a century.
 |
| Opium ships at Lintin, China, 1824 |
Opium Wars, two armed conflicts in China in the mid-19th century between the forces of Western countries and of the Qing dynasty, which ruled China from 1644 to 1911/12.
The first Opium War (1839–42) was fought between China and Britain, and the second Opium War (1856–60), also known as the Arrow War or the Anglo-French War in China, was fought by Britain and France against China.
 |
| East India Company warehouse stocked with opium. |
In each case the foreign powers were victorious and gained commercial privileges and legal and territorial concessions in China. The conflicts marked the start of the era of unequal treaties and other inroads on Qing sovereignty that helped weaken and ultimately topple the dynasty in favour of republican China in the early 20th century.
The First Opium War
 |
| Lin Zexu's "memorial" (摺奏) written directly to Queen Victoria |
The Opium Wars arose from China’s attempts to suppress the opium trade. Foreign traders (primarily British) had been illegally exporting opium mainly from India to China since the 18th century, but that trade grew dramatically from about 1820. The resulting widespread addiction in China was causing serious social and economic disruption there. In spring 1839 the Chinese government confiscated and destroyed more than 20,000 chests of opium—some 1,400 tons of the drug—that were warehoused at Canton (Guangzhou) by British merchants. The antagonism between the two sides increased in July when some drunken British sailors killed a Chinese villager. The British government, which did not wish its subjects to be tried in the Chinese legal system, refused to turn the accused men over to the Chinese courts.
Hostilities broke out later that year when British warships destroyed a Chinese blockade of the Pearl River (Zhu Jiang) estuary at Hong Kong. The British government decided in early 1840 to send an expeditionary force to China, which arrived at Hong Kong in June. The British fleet proceeded up the Pearl River estuary to Canton, and, after months of negotiations there, attacked and occupied the city in May 1841. Subsequent British campaigns over the next year were likewise successful against the inferior Qing forces, despite a determined counterattack by Chinese troops in the spring of 1842. The British held against that offensive, however, and captured Nanjing (Nanking) in late August, which put an end to the fighting.
 |
| Contemporary Chinese depiction of the destruction of opium under Commissioner Lin. |
Peace negotiations proceeded quickly, resulting in the Treaty of Nanjing, signed on August 29. By its provisions, China was required to pay Britain a large indemnity, cede Hong Kong Island to the British, and increase the number of treaty ports where the British could trade and reside from one (Canton) to five. Among the four additional designated ports was Shanghai, and the new access to foreigners there marked the beginning of the city’s transformation into one of China’s major commercial entrepôts. The British Supplementary Treaty of the Bogue (Humen), signed October 8, 1843, gave British citizens extraterritoriality (the right to be tried by British courts) and most-favoured-nation status (Britain was granted any rights in China that might be granted to other foreign countries). Other Western countries quickly demanded and were given similar privileges.
The Second Opium War
 |
| The execution of the Paris Foreign Missions Society missionary Auguste Chapdelaine was the official cause of the French involvement in the Second Opium War. |
In the mid-1850s, while the Qing government was embroiled in trying to quell the Taiping Rebellion (1850–64), the British, seeking to extend their trading rights in China, found an excuse to renew hostilities. In early October 1856 some Chinese officials boarded the British-registered ship Arrow while it was docked in Canton, arrested several Chinese crew members (who were later released), and allegedly lowered the British flag. Later that month a British warship sailed up the Pearl River estuary and began bombarding Canton, and there were skirmishes between British and Chinese troops. Trading ceased as a stalemate ensued. In December Chinese in Canton burned foreign factories (trading warehouses) there, and tensions escalated.
 |
| Looting of the Old Summer Palaceby Anglo-French forces in 1860 |
The French decided to join the British military expedition, using as their excuse the murder of a French missionary in the interior of China in early 1856. After delays in assembling the forces in China (British troops that were en route were first diverted to India to help quell the Indian Mutiny), the allies began military operations in late 1857. They quickly captured Canton, deposed the city’s intransigent governor, and installed a more-compliant official.
In May 1858 allied troops in British warships reached Tianjin
 |
| Ruins of the "Western style" complex in the Old Summer Palace, burnt down by Anglo-French forces |
The British withdrew from Tianjin in the summer of 1858, but they returned to the area in June 1859 en route to Beijing with French and British diplomats to ratify the treaties. The Chinese refused to let them pass by the Dagu forts at the mouth of the Hai River and proposed an alternate route to Beijing. The British-led forces decided against taking the other route and instead tried to push forward past Dagu. They were driven back with heavy casualties. The Chinese subsequently refused to ratify the treaties, and the allies resumed hostilities.
In August 1860 a considerably larger force of warships and British and French troops destroyed the Dagu batteries, proceeded upriver to Tianjin, and, in October, captured Beijing and plundered and then burned the Yuanming Garden, the emperor’s summer palace. Later that month the Chinese signed the Beijing Convention, in which they agreed to observe the treaties of Tianjin and also ceded to the British the southern portion of the Kowloon Peninsula adjacent to Hong Kong.
 |
| Signing of the Treaty of Tientsin in 1858 |
Chronology of Events
Year Event
1600 Founding of The East India Company. The Royal Charter of the Company was approved by Elizabeth I
1644 Manchurian Qing Dynasty established in China
1680 Recreational Opium/Tobacco mix first introduced to China by the Dutch
1720 British Parliament bans Asian textile Imports to increase domestic production
1720-1839 Chinese Tea as one of the primary Commodities in the British market
1729 First government prohibition on the distribution of Opium in China (Not heavily Enforced)
1760 British began to use Opium as a Cash Crop for both Chinese commodities and silver
1773 1000 Chests of Opium imported into China.
1813 Increased Opium addicts in the Chinese bureaucracy causes concern in the Qing Courts
1815 End of the Napoleonic Wars, Britain consolidates imperial power in Asia and Africa
1832 20,000 Chests of Opium Imported into China
1836 Qing Court formally prohibits all imports of Opium and attempts to close the ports of Canton and Shanghai
1839 Commissioner Lin Zexu openly burned 1.2 million kilograms of confiscated opium
1839-1842 First Opium War: Qing Empire Vs. Britain and its allies in France, United States, and Russia
1842 Treaty of Nanjing opened the ports of Canton and Shanghai. Hong Kong became a British colony
1856 Chinese seizure of British Vessel “The Arrow” in suspect of piracy
1858 Tientsin Treaties, negotiations between Chinese, British, French and American diplomats
1859 British and French diplomats were refused entry into Beijing
1860-1862 Second Opium War, Looting of the Qing Imperial palace in Beijing
1898-1901 Chinese anti-Foreign uprising, Boxer Rebellion
1900 John Hay’s “Open Door Policy” calls for equal trade rights amongst Europeans in China
1912 Official collapse of the Qing Empire and establishment of the Republic of China
1912 London Missionary Society establishes Hong Kong College of Medicine, which later became the University of Hong Kong. First western institute of higher education in Hong Kong
1997 Hong Kong returns as territory of the People’s Republic of China
No comments:
Post a Comment