Sino-French War
Encyclopedia
The Sino–French War was a limited conflict fought between August 1884 and April 1885 to decide whether France should replace China in control of Tonkin
(northern Vietnam
). As the French achieved their war aims, they are usually considered to have won the war. Nevertheless, the French triumph was marred by a number of defeats in individual battles and the Chinese armies performed rather better than they did in China's other nineteenth-century foreign wars. In some quarters near Guangxi
and in Taiwan
the war is even regarded as a Chinese victory.
recruited French volunteers to fight for Nguyễn Ánh to start the Nguyễn Dynasty in an attempt to gain privileges for France and the Roman Catholic Church. In 1858, France began their colonial campaign and in 1862 annexed several southern provinces of Vietnam to become the colony of Cochinchina
, laying the foundations for its later colonial empire in Indochina
. French explorers followed the course of the Red River through northern Vietnam to its source in Yunnan
, arousing hopes that an extremely profitable overland trade route could be established with China, bypassing the treaty ports of the Chinese coastal provinces. The main obstacle to the realisation of this dream was the Black Flag Army
, a well-organized bandit force under a formidable leader, Liu Yongfu (Liu Yung-fu, 劉永福), which was levying exorbitant dues on trade on the Red River between Sơn Tây
and the town of Lào Cai
on the Yunnan border.
French intervention in northern Vietnam was precipitated by Commandant Henri Rivière, who was sent with a small French military force to Hanoi at the end of 1881 to investigate Vietnamese complaints against the activities of French merchants. In defiance of the instructions of his superiors, Rivière stormed the citadel of Hanoi on 25 April 1882. Although Rivière subsequently returned the citadel to Vietnamese control, his recourse to force was greeted with alarm in both Vietnam and China.
The Vietnamese government, unable to confront Rivière with its own ramshackle army, enlisted the help of Liu Yongfu, whose well-trained and seasoned Black Flag soldiers were to prove a thorn in the side of the French. The Black Flags had already inflicted one humiliating defeat on a French force commanded by Lieutenant de Vaisseau Francis Garnier
in 1873. Like Rivière in 1882, Garnier had exceeded his instructions and attempted to intervene militarily in northern Vietnam. Liu Yongfu had been called in by the Vietnamese government and ended a remarkable series of French victories against the Vietnamese by defeating Garnier's small French force beneath the walls of Hanoi. Garnier was killed in this battle and the French government later disavowed his expedition.
The Vietnamese also bid for Chinese support. Vietnam had long been a vassal state of China, and China agreed to arm and support the Black Flags and to covertly oppose French operations in Tonkin. The Qing court also sent a strong signal to the French that China would not allow Tonkin to fall under French control. In the summer of 1882, troops of the Chinese Yunnan and Guangxi armies crossed the border into Tonkin, occupying Lạng Sơn, Bắc Ninh, Hung Hoa and other towns. The French minister to China, Frédéric Bourée, was so alarmed by the prospect of war with China that in November and December 1882 he negotiated a deal with the Chinese statesman, Li Hongzhang, to divide Tonkin into French and Chinese spheres of influence. The Vietnamese were not consulted by either party to these negotiations.
Rivière was disgusted at the deal cut by Bourée and in early 1883 decided to force the issue. He had recently been sent a battalion of marine infantry from France, giving him just enough men to venture beyond Hanoi. On 27 March 1883, to secure his line of communications from Hanoi to the coast, Rivière captured the citadel of Nam Định
with a force of 520 French soldiers under his personal command. During his absence at Nam Định, the Black Flags and Vietnamese made an attack on Hanoi, but they were repulsed by Chef de Bataillon Berthe de Villers in the Battle of Gia Cuc
on 28 March. Rivière was jubilant: 'This will force them to take forward their Tonkin Question!'
Rivière's timing was perfect. He had expected to be cashiered for his capture of Nam Dinh
; instead he found himself the hero of the hour. There had recently been a change of government in France, and the new administration of Jules Ferry
was strongly in favour of colonial expansion. It therefore decided to back up Rivière. Ferry and Foreign Minister Paul-Armand Challemel-Lacour denounced Bourée's agreement with Li Hongzhang and recalled the hapless French minister. They also made it clear to the Chinese that they were determined to place Tonkin under French protection. In April 1883, realising that the Vietnamese were incapable of resisting the French effectively, the Chinese civil Mandarin Tang Jingsong (Tang Ching-sung
, 唐景崧) persuaded Liu Yongfu to take the field against Rivière with the Black Flag Army.
On 10 May 1883 Liu Yongfu challenged the French to battle in a taunting message widely placarded on the walls of Hanoi. On 19 May Rivière confronted the Black Flags in the Battle of Paper Bridge
. The result was a disastrous defeat for the French. Rivière's small force (around 450 men) attacked a strong Black Flag defensive position near the village of Cầu Giấy, a few miles to the west of Hanoi, known to the French as Paper Bridge (Pont de Papier). After initial successes the French were eventually enveloped on both wings, and were only with difficulty able to regroup and fall back to Hanoi. Rivière, Berthe de Villers and several other senior officers were killed in this action.
Rivière's death produced an angry reaction in France. Reinforcements were rushed to Tonkin, a threatened attack by the Black Flags on Hanoi was averted, and the military situation was stabilised.
, who had recently been appointed to the command of the newly formed Tonkin Coasts Naval Division, stormed the forts which guarded the approaches to the Vietnamese capital Huế in the Battle of Thuan An
, and forced the Vietnamese government to sign the Treaty of Huế
, placing Tonkin under French protection.
At the same time the new commander of the Tonkin expeditionary corps, General Bouët, attacked the Black Flag positions on the Day River. Although the French mauled the Black Flag Army in the Battle of Phu Hoai
(15 August) and the Battle of Palan
(1 September), they were unable to capture all of Liu Yongfu's positions, and in the eyes of the world the battles were tantamount to French defeats. Bouët was widely held to have failed in his mission, and resigned in September 1883. In the event, severe flooding eventually forced Liu Yongfu to abandon the line of the Day River and fall back to the fortified city of Son Tay, several miles to the west.
The French prepared for a major offensive at the end of the year to annihilate the Black Flags, and tried to persuade China to withdraw its support for Liu Yongfu, while attempting to win the support of the other European powers for the projected offensive. However, negotiations in Shanghai in July 1883 between the French minister Arthur Tricou and Li Hongzhang
were terminated by the Qing government on receipt of a naively optimistic assessment by Marquis Zeng Jize
, the Chinese minister to Paris, that the French government had no stomach for a full-scale war with China. Jules Ferry and the French foreign minister Paul-Armand Challemel-Lacour
met a number of times in the summer and autumn of 1883 with Marquis Zeng in Paris, but these parallel diplomatic discussions also proved abortive. The Chinese stood firm, and refused to withdraw substantial garrisons of Chinese regular troops from Son Tay, Bac Ninh and Lang Son, despite the likelihood that they would be shortly engaged in battle against the French. As war with China seemed increasingly likely, the French persuaded the German government to delay the release of Dingyuan and Zhenyuan, two modern battleships then being constructed in German shipyards for China's Beiyang Fleet
. Meanwhile, the French consolidated their hold on the Delta by establishing posts at Quang Yen, Hung Yen and Ninh Binh
.
The growing tension between France and China gave rise to anti-foreign demonstrations inside China during the autumn of 1883. The most serious incidents took place in Guangdong province, where attacks were made on the property of European merchants in Guangzhou and on Shamian island. Several European powers, including France, sent gunboats to Guangzhou to protect their nationals.
The French accepted that an attack on Liu Yongfu would probably result in an undeclared war with China, but calculated that a quick victory in Tonkin would force the Chinese to accept a fait accompli. Command of the Tonkin campaign was entrusted to Admiral Courbet, who attacked Son Tay
in December 1883. The Son Tay Campaign
was the fiercest campaign the French had yet fought in Tonkin. Although the Chinese and Vietnamese contingents at Son Tay played little part in the defence, Liu Yongfu's Black Flags fought ferociously to hold the city. On 14 December the French assaulted the outer defences of Son Tay at Phu Sa, but were thrown back with heavy casualties. Hoping to exploit Courbet's defeat, Liu Yongfu attacked the French lines the same night, but the Black Flag attack also failed disastrously. After resting his troops on 15 December, Courbet again assaulted the defences of Son Tay on the afternoon of 16 December. This time the attack was thoroughly prepared by artillery, and delivered only after the defenders had been worn down. At 5 p.m. a Foreign Legion battalion and a battalion of marine fusiliers captured the western gate of Son Tay and fought their way into the town. Liu Yongfu's garrison withdrew to the citadel, and evacuated Son Tay under cover of darkness several hours later. Courbet had achieved his objective, but at considerable cost. French casualties at Son Tay were 83 dead and 320 wounded. The fighting at Son Tay also took a terrible toll of the Black Flags, and in the opinion of some observers broke them once and for all as a serious fighting force. Liu Yongfu felt that he had been deliberately left to bear the brunt of the fighting by his Chinese and Vietnamese allies, and determined never again to expose his troops so openly.
In March 1884 the French renewed their offensive under the command of General Charles-Théodore Millot
, who took over responsibility for the land campaign from Admiral Courbet after the fall of Son Tay. Reinforcements from France and the African colonies had now raised the strength of the Tonkin Expeditionary Corps
to over 10,000 men, and Millot organised this force into two brigades. The 1st Brigade was commanded by General Louis Brière de l'Isle
, who had earlier made his reputation as governor of Senegal, and the 2nd Brigade was commanded by the charismatic young Foreign Legion general François de Négrier
, who had recently quelled a serious Arab rebellion in Algeria. The French target was Bac Ninh
, garrisoned by a strong force of regular Chinese troops of the Guangxi Army. The Bac Ninh campaign
was a walkover for the French. Morale in the Chinese army was low, and Liu Yongfu was careful to keep his experienced Black Flags out of danger. Millot bypassed Chinese defences to the southwest of Bac Ninh, and assaulted the city on 12 March from the southeast, with complete success. The Guangxi Army put up a feeble resistance, and the French took the city with ease, capturing large quantities of ammunition and a number of brand new Krupp cannon.
The defeat at Bac Ninh, coming close on the heels of the fall of Son Tay, strengthened the hand of the moderate element in the Chinese government and temporarily discredited the extremist 'Purist' party led by Zhang Zhidong
, which was agitating for a full-scale war against France. Further French successes in the spring of 1884, including the Capture of Hung Hoa
and Thái Nguyên
, convinced the Empress Dowager Cixi
that China should come to terms, and an accord was reached between France and China in May. The negotiations took place in Tianjin (Tientsin). Li Hongzhang, the leader of the Chinese moderates, represented China; and Captain François-Ernest Fournier, commander of the French cruiser Volta, represented France. The Tientsin Accord
, concluded on 11 May 1884, provided for Chinese recognition of the French protectorate over Annam and Tonkin and withdrawal of Chinese troops from Tonkin, in return for a comprehensive treaty that would settle details of trade and commerce between France and China and provide for the demarcation of its disputed border with Vietnam.
On 6 June the French followed up their accord with China by concluding a fresh Treaty of Hue
with the Vietnamese, which established a French protectorate over both Annam and Tonkin and allowed the French to station troops at strategic points in Vietnamese territory and to install residents in the main towns. The signature of the treaty was accompanied by an important symbolic gesture. The seal presented by the emperor of China several decades earlier to the Vietnamese king Gia Long was melted down in the presence of the French and Vietnamese plenipotentiaries, betokening the renunciation by Vietnam of its traditional links with China.
Fournier was not a professional diplomat, and the Tientsin Accord contained several loose ends. Crucially, it failed to explicitly state a deadline for the Chinese troop withdrawal from Tonkin. The French asserted that the troop withdrawal was to take place immediately, while the Chinese argued that the withdrawal was contingent upon the conclusion of the comprehensive treaty. In fact, the Chinese stance was an ex post facto rationalisation, designed to justify their unwillingness or inability to put the terms of the accord into effect. The accord was extremely unpopular in China, and provoked an immediate backlash. The war party called for Li Hongzhang's impeachment, and his political opponents intrigued to have orders sent to the Chinese troops in Tonkin to hold their positions.
Li Hongzhang hinted to the French that there might be difficulties in enforcing the accord, but nothing specific was said. The French assumed that the Chinese troops would leave Tonkin as agreed, and made preparations for occupying the border towns of Lang Son, Cao Bang and That Ke. In early June 1884 a French column under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel Alphonse Dugenne advanced to occupy Langson. On 23 June, near the small town of Bac Le, the French encountered a strong detachment of the Guangxi Army ensconced in a defensive position behind the Song Thuong River. In view of the diplomatic significance of this discovery, Dugenne should have reported the presence of the Chinese force to Hanoi and waited for further instructions. Instead, he gave the Chinese an ultimatum, and on their refusal to withdraw resumed his advance. The Chinese opened fire on the advancing French, precipitating a two-day battle in which Dugenne's column was encircled and seriously mauled. Dugenne eventually fought his way out of the Chinese encirclement and extricated his small force.
When news of the 'Bac Le Ambush
' reached Paris, there was fury at what was perceived as blatant Chinese treachery. Ferry's government demanded an apology, an indemnity, and the immediate implementation of the terms of the Tianjin Accord. The Chinese government agreed to negotiate, but refused to apologise or pay an indemnity. The mood in France was against compromise, and although negotiations continued throughout July, Admiral Courbet was ordered to take his squadron to Fuzhou
(Foochow). He was instructed to prepare to attack the Chinese fleet in the harbour and to destroy the Foochow Navy Yard. Meanwhile, as a preliminary demonstration of what would follow if the Chinese were recalcitrant, Rear Admiral Sébastien Lespès destroyed three Chinese shore batteries in the port of Keelung
in northern Formosa (Taiwan
) by naval bombardment on 5 August. The French put a landing force ashore to occupy Keelung and the nearby coal mines at Pei-tao (Pa-tou), as a 'pledge' (gage) to be bargained against a Chinese withdrawal from Tonkin, but the arrival of a large Chinese army under the command of the imperial commissioner Liu Mingchuan
(劉銘傳) forced it to re-embark on 6 August.
Negotiations between France and China broke down in mid-August, and on 22 August Courbet was ordered to attack the Chinese fleet at Fuzhou. In the Battle of Fuzhou (also known as the Battle of the Pagoda Anchorage) on 23 August 1884, the French took their revenge for the Bac Le Ambush. In a two-hour engagement watched with professional interest by neutral British and American vessels (the battle was one of the first occasions on which the spar torpedo was successfully deployed), Courbet's Far East Squadron
annihilated China's outclassed Fujian fleet and severely damaged the Foochow Navy Yard
(which, ironically, had been built under the direction of the French administrator Prosper Giquel
). Nine Chinese ships were sunk in less than an hour, including the corvette Yangwu
, the flagship of the Fujian fleet. Chinese losses may have amounted to 3,000 dead, while French losses were minimal. Courbet then successfully withdrew down the Min River to the open sea, destroying several Chinese shore batteries from behind as he took the French squadron through the Min'an and Jinpai passes.
Patriotic indignation spread to the British colony of Hong Kong
. In September 1884 dock workers in Hong Kong refused to repair the French ironclad La Galissonnière, which had suffered shell damage in the August naval engagements. The strike collapsed at the end of September, but the dock workers were prevented from resuming their business by other groups of Chinese workers, including longshoremen, sedan chair carriers and rickshawmen. An attempt by the British authorities to protect the dock workers against harassment resulted in serious rioting on 3 October, during which at least one rioter was shot dead and several Sikh constables were injured. The British suspected, with good reason, that the disturbances had been fomented by the Chinese authorities in Guangdong province.
Meanwhile, the French decided to put pressure on China by landing an expeditionary corps in northern Formosa to seize Keelung
and Tamsui, redeeming the failure of 6 August and finally winning the ‘pledge’ they sought. On 1 October Lieutenant-Colonel Bertaux-Levillain landed at Keelung with a force of 1,800 marine infantry, forcing the Chinese to withdraw to strong defensive positions which had been prepared in the surrounding hills. The French force was too small to advance beyond Keelung, and the Pei-tao coal mines remained in Chinese hands. Meanwhile, after an ineffective naval bombardment on 2 October, Admiral Lespès attacked the Chinese defences at Tamsui with 600 sailors from his squadron's landing companies on 8 October, and was decisively repulsed by forces under the command of the Fujianese general Sun Kaihua (孫開華). As a result of this reverse, French control over Formosa was limited merely to the town of Keelung. This achievement fell far short of what had been hoped for.
) and Takow (Kaohsiung
). In early January 1885 the Formosa expeditionary corps, now under the command of Colonel Jacques Duchesne
, was substantially reinforced with two battalions of infantry, bringing its total strength to around 4,000 men. Meanwhile, drafts from the Hunan and Anhui Armies had brought the strength of Liu Mingchuan's defending army to around 25,000 men. Although severely outnumbered, the French captured a number of minor Chinese positions to the southeast of Keelung at the end of January 1885, but were forced to halt offensive operations in February due to incessant rain.
Although the Formosa expeditionary corps remained confined in Keelung, the French scored important successes elsewhere in the spring of 1885. Courbet's squadron had been reinforced substantially since the start of the war, and he now had considerably more ships at his disposal than in October 1884. In early February 1885 part of his squadron left Keelung to head off a threatened attempt by part of the Chinese Nanyang Fleet
(Southern Seas fleet) to break the French blockade of Formosa. On 11 February Courbet's task force met the cruisers Kaiji, Nanchen and Nanrui, three of the most modern ships in the Chinese fleet, near Shipu Bay, accompanied by the frigate Yuyuan and the composite sloop Chengqing. The Chinese scattered at the French approach, and while the three cruisers successfully made their escape, the French succeeded in trapping Yuyuan and Chengqing in Shipu Bay. On the night of 14 February, in the Battle of Shipu
, the French attacked the Chinese vessels with two torpedo launches. During a brief engagement inside the bay, Yuyuan was seriously damaged by torpedoes and Chengqing was hit by Chinese artillery fire. Both ships were subsequently scuttled by the Chinese. The French torpedo launches escaped almost without loss.
Courbet followed up this success on 1 March by locating Kaiji, Nanchen and Nanrui, which had taken refuge with four other Chinese warships in Zhenhai Bay, near the port of Ningbo
. Courbet considered forcing the Chinese defences, but finally decided to guard the entrance to the bay to keep the enemy vessels bottled up there for the duration of hostilities. A brief and inconclusive skirmish between the French cruiser Nielly and the Chinese shore batteries on 1 March enabled the Chinese general Ouyang Lijian (歐陽利見), charged with the defence of Ningbo, to claim the so-called 'Battle of Zhenhai
' as a defensive victory.
In February 1885, under diplomatic pressure from China, Britain invoked the provisions of the 1870 Foreign Enlistment Act and closed Hong Kong and other ports in the Far East to French warships. The French government retaliated by ordering Admiral Courbet to implement a 'rice blockade' of the Yangzi River, hoping to bring the Qing court to terms by provoking serious rice shortages in northern China. The rice blockade severely disrupted the transport of rice by sea from Shanghai and forced the Chinese to carry it overland, but the war ended before the blockade seriously affected China's economy.
Meanwhile, the French army in Tonkin was also putting severe pressure on the Chinese forces and their Black Flag allies. General Millot, whose health was failing, resigned as general-in-chief of the Tonkin expeditionary corps in early September 1884 and was replaced by General Brière de l’Isle, the senior of his two brigade commanders. Brière de l’Isle's first task was to beat off a major Chinese invasion of the Red River Delta. In late September 1884 large detachments of the Guangxi Army advanced from Langson and probed into the Luc Nam valley, announcing their presence by ambushing the French gunboats Hache and Massue on 2 October. Brière de l’Isle responded immediately, transporting nearly 3,000 French soldiers to the Luc Nam valley aboard a flotilla of gunboats and attacking the Chinese detachments before they could concentrate. In the Kep Campaign
, (2 to 15 October 1884), three French columns under the overall command of General de Négrier fell upon the separated detachments of the Guangxi Army and successively defeated them in engagements at Lam
(6 October), Kép
(8 October) and Chu
(10 October). The second of these battles was marked by bitter close-quarter fighting between French and Chinese troops, and de Négrier's soldiers suffered heavy casualties storming the fortified village of Kep. The exasperated victors shot or bayoneted scores of wounded Chinese soldiers after the battle, and reports of French atrocities at Kep shocked public opinion in Europe. In fact, prisoners were rarely taken by either side during the Sino–French War, and the French were equally shocked by the Chinese habit of paying a bounty for severed French heads.
In the wake of these French victories the Chinese fell back to Bac Le and Dong Song, and de Négrier established important forward positions at Kep and Chu, which threatened the Guangxi Army's base at Lang Son. Chu was only a few miles southwest of the Guangxi Army's advanced posts at Dong Song, and on 16 December a strong Chinese raiding detachment ambushed two companies of the Foreign Legion just to the east of Chu, at Ha Ho. The legionnaires fought their way out of the Chinese encirclement, but suffered a number of casualties and had to abandon their dead on the battlefield. De Négrier immediately brought up reinforcements and pursued the Chinese, but the raiders made good their retreat to Dong Song.
Shortly after the October engagements against the Guangxi Army, Brière de l’Isle took steps to resupply the western outposts of Hung Hoa, Thái Nguyên and Tuyen Quang
, which were coming under increasing threat from Liu Yongfu's Black Flags and Tang Jingsong's Yunnan Army. On 19 November, in the Battle of Yu Oc
, a column making for Tuyen Quan under the command of Colonel Jacques Duchesne
was ambushed in the Yu Oc gorge by the Black Flags but was able to fight its way through to the beleaguered post. The French also sealed off the eastern Delta from raids by Chinese guerillas based in Guangdong by occupying Tien Yen, Dong Trieu and other strategic points, and by blockading the Cantonese port of Beihai (Pak-Hoi). They also conducted sweeps along the lower course of the Red River to dislodge Annamese guerilla bands from bases close to Hanoi. These operations enabled Brière de l’Isle to concentrate the bulk of the Tonkin expeditionary corps around Chu and Kep at the end of 1884, to advance on Lang Son as soon as the word was given.
French strategy in Tonkin was the subject of a bitter debate in the Chamber of Deputies in late December 1884. The army minister General Jean-Baptiste-Marie Campenon argued that the French should consolidate their hold on the Delta. His opponents urged an all-out offensive to throw the Chinese out of northern Tonkin. The debate culminated in Campenon's resignation and his replacement as army minister by the hawkish General Jules Louis Lewal
, who immediately ordered Brière de l’Isle to capture Lang Son. The campaign would be launched from the French forward base at Chu, and on 3 and 4 January 1885 General de Négrier attacked and defeated a substantial detachment of the Guangxi Army that had concentrated around the nearby village of Nui Bop to try to disrupt the French preparations. De Nègrier's victory at Nui Bop
, won at odds of just under one to ten, was regarded by his fellow-officers as the most spectacular professional triumph of his career.
It took the French a month to complete their preparations for the Lang Son Campaign
. Finally, on 3 February 1885, Brière de l’Isle began his advance from Chu with a column of just under 7,200 troops, accompanied by 4,500 coolies. In ten days the column advanced to the outskirts of Lang Son. The troops were burdened with the weight of their provisions and equipment, and had to march through extremely difficult country. They also had to fight fierce actions to overrun stoutly defended Chinese positions, at Tay Hoa
(4 February), Ha Hoa
(5 February) and Dong Song (6 February). After a brief pause for breath at Dong Song, the expeditionary corps pressed on towards Lang Son, fighting further actions at Deo Quao (9 February), and Pho Vy (11 February). On 12 February, in a costly but successful battle, the Turcos and marine infantry of Colonel Laurent Giovanninelli's 1st Brigade stormed the main Chinese defences at Bac Vie, several kilometres to the south of Lang Son. On 13 February, the French column entered Lang Son which the Chinese abandoned after fighting a token rearguard action at the nearby village of Ky Lua.
The capture of Lang Son allowed substantial French forces to be diverted further west to relieve the small and isolated French garrison in Tuyen Quang
, which had been placed under siege in November 1884 by Liu Yongfu's Black Flag Army and Tang Jingsong's Yunnan Army. The Siege of Tuyen Quang
was the most evocative confrontation of the Sino–French War. The Chinese and Black Flags sapped methodically up to the French positions, and in January and February 1885 breached the outer defences with mines and delivered seven separate assaults on the breach. The Tuyen Quang garrison, 400 legionnaires and 200 Tonkinese auxiliaries under the command of chef de bataillon Marc-Edmond Dominé, beat off all attempts to storm their positions, but lost over a third of their strength (50 dead and 224 wounded) sustaining a heroic defence against overwhelming odds. By mid-February it was clear that Tuyen Quang would fall unless it was relieved immediately.
Leaving de Négrier at Lang Son with the 2nd Brigade, Brière de l’Isle personally led Giovanninelli's 1st Brigade back to Hanoi, and then upriver to the relief of Tuyen Quang. The brigade, reinforced at Phu Doan on 24 February by a small column from Hung Hoa under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel de Maussion, found the route to Tuyen Quang blocked by a strong Chinese defensive position at Hoa Moc. On 2 March 1885 Giovanninelli attacked the left flank of the Chinese defensive line. The Battle of Hoa Moc
was the most fiercely fought action of the war. Two French assaults were decisively repulsed, and although the French eventually stormed the Chinese positions, they suffered very high casualties (76 dead and 408 wounded). Nevertheless, their costly victory cleared the way to Tuyen Quang. The Yunnan Army and the Black Flags raised the siege and drew off to the west, and the relieving force entered the beleaguered post on 3 March. Brière de l’Isle praised the courage of the hard-pressed garrison in a widely quoted order of the day. ‘Today, you enjoy the admiration of the men who have relieved you at such heavy cost. Tomorrow, all France will applaud you!’
on 23 February and cleared it from Tonkinese territory. For good measure, the French crossed briefly into Guangxi province and blew up the 'Gate of China', an elaborate Chinese customs building on the Tonkin-Guangxi border. They were not strong enough to exploit this victory, however, and the 2nd Brigade returned to Langson at the end of February.
By early March, in the wake of the French victories at Hoa Moc and Dong Dang, the military situation in Tonkin had reached a temporary stalemate. Giovanninelli's 1st Brigade faced Tang Qingsong's Yunnan Army around Hung Hoa and Tuyen Quang, while de Négrier's 2nd Brigade at Lang Son faced Pan Dingxin's Guangxi Army. Neither Chinese army had any realistic prospect of launching an offensive for several weeks, while the two French brigades that had jointly captured Lang Son in February were not strong enough to inflict a decisive defeat on either Chinese army separately. Meanwhile the French government was pressuring Brière de l'Isle to send the 2nd Brigade across the border into Guangxi province, in the hope that a threat to Chinese territory would force China to sue for peace. Brière de l'Isle and de Négrier examined the possibility of a campaign to capture the major Chinese military depot at Longzhou (Lung-chou, 龍州), 60 kilometres beyond the border, but on 17 March Brière de l'Isle advised the army ministry in Paris that such an operation was beyond his strength. Substantial French reinforcements reached Tonkin in the middle of March, giving Brière de l'Isle a brief opportunity to break the stalemate. He moved the bulk of the reinforcements to Hung Hoa to reinforce the 1st Brigade, intending to attack the Yunnan Army and drive it back beyond Yen Bay. While he and Giovanninelli drew up plans for a western offensive, he ordered de Négrier to hold his positions at Lang Son.
On 23 and 24 March the 2nd Brigade, only 1,500 men strong, fought a fierce action with over 25,000 troops of the Guangxi Army entrenched near Zhennanguan
on the Chinese border. The Battle of Bang Bo (named by the French from the Vietnamese pronunciation of Hengpo, a village in the centre of the Chinese position where the fighting was fiercest), is normally known as the Battle of Zhennan Pass in China. The French took a number of outworks on 23 March, but failed to take the main Chinese positions on 24 March and were fiercely counterattacked in their turn. Although the French made a fighting withdrawal and prevented the Chinese from piercing their line, casualties in the 2nd Brigade were relatively heavy (70 dead and 188 wounded) and there were ominous scenes of disorder as the defeated French regrouped after the battle. As the brigade's morale was precarious and ammunition was running short, de Négrier decided to fall back to Lang Son.
The Chinese advanced slowly in pursuit, and on 28 March de Négrier fought a battle at Ky Lua in defence of Lang Son. Rested, recovered and fighting behind breastworks, the French successfully held their positions and inflicted crippling casualties on the Guangxi Army. French casualties at Ky Lua were 7 men killed and 38 wounded. The Chinese left 1,200 corpses on the battlefield, and a further 6,000 Chinese soldiers may have been wounded. The battle of Ky Lua gave a grim foretaste of the horrors of warfare on the Western Front thirty years later.
The French had amply avenged their defeat at Bang Bo four days earlier, and if de Négrier had remained in command the 2nd Brigade would probably have chased the Guangxi Army back across the Chinese border. But towards the end of the battle de Négrier was seriously wounded in the chest while scouting the Chinese positions. He was forced to hand over command to his senior regimental commander, Lieutenant-Colonel Paul-Gustave Herbinger. Herbinger was a noted military theoretician who had won a respectable battlefield reputation during the Franco-Prussian War, but was quite out of his depth as a field commander in Tonkin. Several French officers had already commented scathingly on his performance during the Lang Son campaign and at Bang Bo, where he had badly bungled an attack on the Chinese positions.
Upon assuming command of the brigade, Herbinger panicked. Despite the evidence that the Chinese had been decisively defeated and were streaming back in disarray towards the Chinese frontier, he convinced himself that they were preparing to encircle Lang Son and cut his supply line. Disregarding the appalled protests of some of his officers, he ordered the 2nd Brigade to abandon Lang Son on the evening of 28 March and retreat to Chu. The Retreat from Lang Son
was conducted without loss and with little interference from the Chinese, but Herbinger set an unnecessarily punishing pace and abandoned considerable quantities of food, ammunition and equipment. When the 2nd Brigade eventually rallied at Chu, its soldiers were exhausted and demoralised. Meanwhile the Chinese general Pan Dingxin (潘鼎新), informed by sympathisers in Lang Son that the French were in full retreat, promptly turned his battered army around and reoccupied Lang Son on 30 March. The Chinese were in no condition to pursue the French to Chu, and contented themselves with a limited advance to Dong Song.
There was also bad news for the French from the western front. On 23 March, in the Battle of Phu Lam Tao
, a force of Chinese regulars and Black Flags surprised and routed a French zouave battalion that had been ordered to scout positions around Hung Hoa in preparation for Giovanninelli's projected offensive against the Yunnan Army.
', as this humiliating blow to French policy in Tonkin was immediately dubbed, effectively ended Ferry's distinguished career in French politics. He would never again become premier, and his political influence during the rest of his career would be severely limited. His successor, Henri Brisson
, promptly concluded peace with China. The Chinese government agreed to implement the Tientsin Accord (implicitly recognising the French protectorate over Tonkin), and the French government dropped its demand for an indemnity for the Bac Le Ambush. A peace protocol ending hostilities was signed on 4 April, and a substantive peace treaty was signed on 9 June at Tianjin
by Li Hongzhang and the French minister Jules Patenôtre
.
. The so-called 'Gapsin Coup' brought Japan and China to the brink of war, and thereafter the Qing court considered that the Japanese were a greater threat to China than the French. Fear of Japan trumped fear of France, and in January 1885 the Empress Dowager
directed her ministers to seek an honourable peace with France. Secret talks between the French and Chinese were held in Paris in February and March 1885, and the fall of Ferry's ministry removed the last remaining obstacles to a peace.
with a flank attack delivered against the east of the Chinese line, capturing the key position of La Table and forcing the Chinese to withdraw behind the Keelung River. Duchesne's victory sparked a brief panic in Taipei
, but the French were not strong enough to advance beyond their bridgehead. The Keelung Campaign
now reached a point of equilibrium. The French were holding a virtually impregnable defensive perimeter around Keelung but could not exploit their success, while Liu Mingchuan's army remained in presence just beyond their advanced positions.
However, the French had one card left to play. Duchesne's victory enabled Admiral Courbet to detach a marine infantry battalion from the Keelung garrison to capture the Pescadores Islands in late March. Strategically, the Pescadores Campaign
was an important victory, which would have prevented the Chinese from further reinforcing their army in Formosa, but it came too late to affect the outcome of the war. Future French operations were cancelled on the news of Lieutenant-Colonel Herbinger's retreat from Lang Son
on 28 March, and Courbet was on the point of evacuating Keelung to reinforce the Tonkin expeditionary corps, leaving only a minimum garrison at Makung in the Pescadores, when hostilities were ended in April by the conclusion of preliminaries of peace.
The news of the peace protocol of 4 April did not reach the French and Chinese forces in Tonkin for several days, and the final engagement of the Sino–French War took place on 14 April 1885 at Kép
, where the French beat off a half-hearted Chinese attack on their positions. Meanwhile Brière de l’Isle had reinforced the key French posts at Hung Hoa and Chu, and when hostilities ended in the third fortnight of April the French were standing firm against both the Guangxi and Yunnan armies. Although Brière de l’Isle was planning to attack the Yunnan Army at Phu Lam Tao to avenge the defeat of 23 March, many French officers doubted whether this offensive would have succeeded. At the same time, the Chinese armies had no prospect whatsoever of driving the French from Hung Hoa or Chu. Militarily, the war in Tonkin ended in a stalemate.
The peace protocol of 4 April required the Chinese to withdraw their armies from Tonkin, and the French continued to occupy Keelung and the Pescadores for several months after the end of hostilities, as a surety for Chinese good faith. Admiral Courbet fell seriously ill during this occupation, and on 11 June died aboard his flagship Bayard
in Makung harbour. Meanwhile the Chinese punctiliously observed the terms of the peace settlement, and by the end of June 1885 both the Yunnan and Guangxi armies had evacuated Tonkin. Liu Yongfu's Black Flag Army also withdrew from Tonkinese territory.
The French were well aware of China's sensitivities regarding Japan, and as early as June 1883, in the wake of Rivière's death at Paper Bridge, began angling for an alliance with Japan to offset their precarious military position in Tonkin. The French foreign minister Paul Challemel-Lacour believed that France "ought not to disdain the support which, at an appropriate moment, the attitude of Japan would be able to supply to our actions". In order to court the Japanese government, France offered to support, against British opposition, Japan's pleas for revision of the unequal treaties
of the Bakumatsu era, which provided extra-territoriality and advantageous tariffs to foreigners. Japan welcomed the offer of French support, but was reluctant to be drawn into a military alliance. Japan was in effect quite worried of the military might China represented, at least on paper, at that time. As the situation in Annam deteriorated however, France was even more anxious of obtaining Japanese help.
After French difficulties in Taiwan
, new attempts at negotiating an alliance were made with the Minister General Campenon meeting with General Miura Gorō, but Gorō remained ambiguous, encouraging France to continue to support Japan's drive for Treaty revision. Hopes for an alliance were reawakened in December 1884 when a clash occurred between China and Japan in Korea
, when Japan supported the Gapsin coup d'état by Kim Okgyun
against the pro-Chinese Korean government, prompting Jules Ferry
to request the French ambassador in Japan Sienkiewicz to approach the Japanese government with an offer. Sienkiewicz however remained extremely negative to the point of refraining from communicating Ferry's proposal. French interest faded in 1885 as the campaign in Tonkin progressed, while, on the contrary Japanese interest increased as the Japanese government and public opinion started to favour open conflict with China. The Sino-French war ended however without an alliance coming to fruition.
, Annam and Tonkin
(the territories which comprise the modern state of Vietnam) and Cambodia
were incorporated into French Indochina
. They were joined a few years later by Laos
, ceded to France by Siam at the conclusion of the Franco-Siamese War of 1893
.
Domestically, the unsatisfactory conclusion to the Sino–French War dampened enthusiasm for colonial conquest. The war had already claimed Ferry's scalp, and his successor Henri Brisson
also resigned in the wake of the acrimonious 'Tonkin Debate' of December 1885, in which Clemenceau and other opponents of colonial expansion nearly succeeded in securing a French withdrawal from Tonkin. In the end, the Chamber voted the 1886 credits to support the Tonkin expeditionary corps by 274 votes to 270. If only three votes had gone the other way, the French would have left Tonkin. As Thomazi would later write, 'France gained Indochina very much against its own wishes.' The reverberations of the Tonkin Affair
tarnished the reputation of the proponents of French colonial expansion generally, and delayed the realisation of other French colonial projects, including the conquest of Madagascar. It was not until the early 1890s that domestic political support for colonial expansion revived in France.
As far as China was concerned, the war hastened the emergence of a strong nationalist movement, and was a significant step in the decline of the Qing empire. The loss of the Fujian fleet on 23 August 1884 was considered particularly humiliating. The Chinese strategy also demonstrated the flaws in the late Qing national defence system of independent regional armies and fleets. The military and naval commanders in the south received no assistance from Li Hongzhang's Northern Seas (Beiyang
) fleet, based in the Gulf of Petchili, and only token assistance from the Southern Seas (Nanyang
) fleet at Shanghai. The excuse given, that these forces were needed to deter a Japanese penetration of Korea, was not convincing. The truth was, that having built up a respectable steam navy at considerable expense, the Chinese were reluctant to hazard it in battle, even though concentrating their forces would have given them the best chance of challenging France's local naval superiority. The Empress Dowager
and her advisers responded in October 1885 by establishing a Navy Yamen on the model of the admiralties of the European powers, to provide unified direction of naval policy. The benefits of this reform were largely nullified by corruption, and although China acquired a number of modern ships in the decade after the Sino–French War the Chinese navies remained handicapped by incompetent leadership. The bulk of China's steamship fleet was destroyed or captured in the Sino-Japanese War
(1894–1895), and for decades thereafter China ceased to be a naval power of any importance.
Tonkin
Tonkin , also spelled Tongkin, Tonquin or Tongking, is the northernmost part of Vietnam, south of China's Yunnan and Guangxi Provinces, east of northern Laos, and west of the Gulf of Tonkin. Locally, it is known as Bắc Kỳ, meaning "Northern Region"...
(northern Vietnam
Vietnam
Vietnam – sometimes spelled Viet Nam , officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam – is the easternmost country on the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. It is bordered by China to the north, Laos to the northwest, Cambodia to the southwest, and the South China Sea –...
). As the French achieved their war aims, they are usually considered to have won the war. Nevertheless, the French triumph was marred by a number of defeats in individual battles and the Chinese armies performed rather better than they did in China's other nineteenth-century foreign wars. In some quarters near Guangxi
Guangxi
Guangxi, formerly romanized Kwangsi, is a province of southern China along its border with Vietnam. In 1958, it became the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region of the People's Republic of China, a region with special privileges created specifically for the Zhuang people.Guangxi's location, in...
and in Taiwan
Taiwan
Taiwan , also known, especially in the past, as Formosa , is the largest island of the same-named island group of East Asia in the western Pacific Ocean and located off the southeastern coast of mainland China. The island forms over 99% of the current territory of the Republic of China following...
the war is even regarded as a Chinese victory.
Prelude
French interest in northern Vietnam dated from the late 18th-century, when the political Catholic priest Pigneau de BehainePigneau de Behaine
Pierre Joseph Georges Pigneau , commonly known as Pigneau de Béhaine, also Pierre Pigneaux and Bá Đa Lộc , was a French Catholic priest best known for his role in assisting Nguyễn Ánh to establish the Nguyễn Dynasty in Vietnam after the Tây Sơn...
recruited French volunteers to fight for Nguyễn Ánh to start the Nguyễn Dynasty in an attempt to gain privileges for France and the Roman Catholic Church. In 1858, France began their colonial campaign and in 1862 annexed several southern provinces of Vietnam to become the colony of Cochinchina
Cochinchina
Cochinchina is a region encompassing the southern third of Vietnam whose principal city is Saigon. It was a French colony from 1862 to 1954. The later state of South Vietnam was created in 1954 by combining Cochinchina with southern Annam. In Vietnamese, the region is called Nam Bộ...
, laying the foundations for its later colonial empire in Indochina
French Indochina
French Indochina was part of the French colonial empire in southeast Asia. A federation of the three Vietnamese regions, Tonkin , Annam , and Cochinchina , as well as Cambodia, was formed in 1887....
. French explorers followed the course of the Red River through northern Vietnam to its source in Yunnan
Yunnan
Yunnan is a province of the People's Republic of China, located in the far southwest of the country spanning approximately and with a population of 45.7 million . The capital of the province is Kunming. The province borders Burma, Laos, and Vietnam.Yunnan is situated in a mountainous area, with...
, arousing hopes that an extremely profitable overland trade route could be established with China, bypassing the treaty ports of the Chinese coastal provinces. The main obstacle to the realisation of this dream was the Black Flag Army
Black Flag Army
The Black Flag Army was a splinter remnant of a bandit group recruited largely from soldiers of ethnic Zhuang background, who crossed the border from Guangxi province of China into Upper Tonkin, in the Empire of Annam in 1865. They became known mainly for their fights against French forces in...
, a well-organized bandit force under a formidable leader, Liu Yongfu (Liu Yung-fu, 劉永福), which was levying exorbitant dues on trade on the Red River between Sơn Tây
Son Tay
Sơn Tây is an urban district and city in Hanoi, the capital of Vietnam. It was the capital of Son Tay province before merging with Ha Dong province in 1965...
and the town of Lào Cai
Lao Cai
Lào Cai is a city in northeastern Vietnam. It is the capital of Lao Cai province. The city borders the city of Hekou, in the Yunnan province of Southwest China. It lies at the junction of the Red River and the Nam Ti River approximately 160 miles northwest of Hanoi...
on the Yunnan border.
Henri Rivière’s expedition in Tonkin
The Vietnamese government, unable to confront Rivière with its own ramshackle army, enlisted the help of Liu Yongfu, whose well-trained and seasoned Black Flag soldiers were to prove a thorn in the side of the French. The Black Flags had already inflicted one humiliating defeat on a French force commanded by Lieutenant de Vaisseau Francis Garnier
Francis Garnier
Marie Joseph François Garnier was a French officer and explorer known for his exploration of the Mekong River in Southeast Asia.- Early career :...
in 1873. Like Rivière in 1882, Garnier had exceeded his instructions and attempted to intervene militarily in northern Vietnam. Liu Yongfu had been called in by the Vietnamese government and ended a remarkable series of French victories against the Vietnamese by defeating Garnier's small French force beneath the walls of Hanoi. Garnier was killed in this battle and the French government later disavowed his expedition.
The Vietnamese also bid for Chinese support. Vietnam had long been a vassal state of China, and China agreed to arm and support the Black Flags and to covertly oppose French operations in Tonkin. The Qing court also sent a strong signal to the French that China would not allow Tonkin to fall under French control. In the summer of 1882, troops of the Chinese Yunnan and Guangxi armies crossed the border into Tonkin, occupying Lạng Sơn, Bắc Ninh, Hung Hoa and other towns. The French minister to China, Frédéric Bourée, was so alarmed by the prospect of war with China that in November and December 1882 he negotiated a deal with the Chinese statesman, Li Hongzhang, to divide Tonkin into French and Chinese spheres of influence. The Vietnamese were not consulted by either party to these negotiations.
Nam Dinh
Nam Định is a big city in the Red River Delta of northern Vietnam. It is the capital of Nam Dinh Province and capital of the South of Red River Delta. Nam Dinh province was, at one time, part of Ha Nam Ninh province until it was split up again in 1996 to return to being two separate provinces,...
with a force of 520 French soldiers under his personal command. During his absence at Nam Định, the Black Flags and Vietnamese made an attack on Hanoi, but they were repulsed by Chef de Bataillon Berthe de Villers in the Battle of Gia Cuc
Battle of Gia Cuc
The Battle of Gia Cuc, fought on 27 and 28 March 1883, was a battle in the Tonkin Campaign between the French and Vietnamese, during the period of undeclared hostilities that preceded the Sino-French War .- Background :...
on 28 March. Rivière was jubilant: 'This will force them to take forward their Tonkin Question!'
Rivière's timing was perfect. He had expected to be cashiered for his capture of Nam Dinh
Capture of Nam Dinh
The Capture of Nam Dinh , a confrontation between the French and the Vietnamese, was one of the early engagements of the Tonkin campaign...
; instead he found himself the hero of the hour. There had recently been a change of government in France, and the new administration of Jules Ferry
Jules Ferry
Jules François Camille Ferry was a French statesman and republican. He was a promoter of laicism and colonial expansion.- Early life :Born in Saint-Dié, in the Vosges département, France, he studied law, and was called to the bar at Paris in 1854, but soon went into politics, contributing to...
was strongly in favour of colonial expansion. It therefore decided to back up Rivière. Ferry and Foreign Minister Paul-Armand Challemel-Lacour denounced Bourée's agreement with Li Hongzhang and recalled the hapless French minister. They also made it clear to the Chinese that they were determined to place Tonkin under French protection. In April 1883, realising that the Vietnamese were incapable of resisting the French effectively, the Chinese civil Mandarin Tang Jingsong (Tang Ching-sung
Tang Ching-sung
Tang Ching-sung was a Chinese general and statesman. He commanded the Yunnan Army in the Sino-French War , and made an important contribution to China's military effort in Tonkin by persuading the Black Flag leader Liu Yung-fu to serve under Chinese command...
, 唐景崧) persuaded Liu Yongfu to take the field against Rivière with the Black Flag Army.
On 10 May 1883 Liu Yongfu challenged the French to battle in a taunting message widely placarded on the walls of Hanoi. On 19 May Rivière confronted the Black Flags in the Battle of Paper Bridge
Battle of Paper Bridge
The Battle of Cầu Giấy or Paper Bridge, fought on 19 May 1883, was one of the numerous clashes during the Tonkin campaign between the French and the Black Flags...
. The result was a disastrous defeat for the French. Rivière's small force (around 450 men) attacked a strong Black Flag defensive position near the village of Cầu Giấy, a few miles to the west of Hanoi, known to the French as Paper Bridge (Pont de Papier). After initial successes the French were eventually enveloped on both wings, and were only with difficulty able to regroup and fall back to Hanoi. Rivière, Berthe de Villers and several other senior officers were killed in this action.
French intervention in Tonkin
Protectorate over Tonkin
On 20 August 1883 Admiral Amédée CourbetAmédée Courbet
Anatole-Amédée-Prosper Courbet was a French admiral who won a series of important land and naval victories during the Tonkin campaign and the Sino-French War .-Early years:...
, who had recently been appointed to the command of the newly formed Tonkin Coasts Naval Division, stormed the forts which guarded the approaches to the Vietnamese capital Huế in the Battle of Thuan An
Battle of Thuan An
The Battle of Thuan An was a clash between the French and the Vietnamese during the period of early hostilities of the Tonkin Campaign...
, and forced the Vietnamese government to sign the Treaty of Huế
Treaty of Hué (1883)
The Treaty of Huế, concluded on 25 August 1883 between France and Vietnam, recognised a French protectorate over Annam and Tonkin. Dictated to the Vietnamese by the French administrator François-Jules Harmand in the wake of the French military seizure of the Thuan An forts, the treaty is often...
, placing Tonkin under French protection.
At the same time the new commander of the Tonkin expeditionary corps, General Bouët, attacked the Black Flag positions on the Day River. Although the French mauled the Black Flag Army in the Battle of Phu Hoai
Battle of Phu Hoai
The Battle of Phu Hoai was an indecisive engagement between the Tonkin Expeditionary Corps and Liu Yongfu's Black Flag Army during the early months of the Tonkin campaign...
(15 August) and the Battle of Palan
Battle of Palan
The Battle of Palan was one of several clashes between the Tonkin Expeditionary Corps and Liu Yongfu's Black Flag Army during the Tonkin campaign...
(1 September), they were unable to capture all of Liu Yongfu's positions, and in the eyes of the world the battles were tantamount to French defeats. Bouët was widely held to have failed in his mission, and resigned in September 1883. In the event, severe flooding eventually forced Liu Yongfu to abandon the line of the Day River and fall back to the fortified city of Son Tay, several miles to the west.
Confrontation between France and China
Li Hongzhang
Li Hongzhang or Li Hung-chang , Marquis Suyi of the First Class , GCVO, was a leading statesman of the late Qing Empire...
were terminated by the Qing government on receipt of a naively optimistic assessment by Marquis Zeng Jize
Zeng Jize
Marquis Zeng Jize , one of China's earliest ministers to London, Paris and Saint Petersburg, played an important role in the diplomacy that preceded and accompanied the Sino-French War .- Early career :Zeng Jize , a native of Hunan province, was the eldest son of Zeng Guofan...
, the Chinese minister to Paris, that the French government had no stomach for a full-scale war with China. Jules Ferry and the French foreign minister Paul-Armand Challemel-Lacour
Paul-Armand Challemel-Lacour
Paul-Armand Challemel-Lacour was a French statesman.-Biography:He was born in Avranches in the Manche département of northwestern France. After passing through the École Normale Supérieure he became professor of philosophy successively at Pau and at Limoges...
met a number of times in the summer and autumn of 1883 with Marquis Zeng in Paris, but these parallel diplomatic discussions also proved abortive. The Chinese stood firm, and refused to withdraw substantial garrisons of Chinese regular troops from Son Tay, Bac Ninh and Lang Son, despite the likelihood that they would be shortly engaged in battle against the French. As war with China seemed increasingly likely, the French persuaded the German government to delay the release of Dingyuan and Zhenyuan, two modern battleships then being constructed in German shipyards for China's Beiyang Fleet
Beiyang Fleet
The Beiyang Fleet was one of the four modernised Chinese navies in the late Qing Dynasty. Among the four, the Beiyang Fleet was particularly sponsored by Li Hongzhang, one of the most trusted vassals of Empress Dowager Cixi and the principal patron of the "self-strengthening movement" in northern...
. Meanwhile, the French consolidated their hold on the Delta by establishing posts at Quang Yen, Hung Yen and Ninh Binh
Ninh Bình
Ninh Bình is a city in the Red River Delta of northern Vietnam. It is the capital of Ninh Binh province.-Geography:Ninh Binh city located in the southernmost plains north Vietnam...
.
The growing tension between France and China gave rise to anti-foreign demonstrations inside China during the autumn of 1883. The most serious incidents took place in Guangdong province, where attacks were made on the property of European merchants in Guangzhou and on Shamian island. Several European powers, including France, sent gunboats to Guangzhou to protect their nationals.
Son Tay and Bac Ninh
Son Tay
Sơn Tây is an urban district and city in Hanoi, the capital of Vietnam. It was the capital of Son Tay province before merging with Ha Dong province in 1965...
in December 1883. The Son Tay Campaign
Son Tay Campaign
The Son Tay Campaign was a campaign fought by the French to capture the strategically important city of Son Tay in Tonkin from Liu Yongfu's Black Flag Army and allied contingents of Vietnamese and Chinese troops...
was the fiercest campaign the French had yet fought in Tonkin. Although the Chinese and Vietnamese contingents at Son Tay played little part in the defence, Liu Yongfu's Black Flags fought ferociously to hold the city. On 14 December the French assaulted the outer defences of Son Tay at Phu Sa, but were thrown back with heavy casualties. Hoping to exploit Courbet's defeat, Liu Yongfu attacked the French lines the same night, but the Black Flag attack also failed disastrously. After resting his troops on 15 December, Courbet again assaulted the defences of Son Tay on the afternoon of 16 December. This time the attack was thoroughly prepared by artillery, and delivered only after the defenders had been worn down. At 5 p.m. a Foreign Legion battalion and a battalion of marine fusiliers captured the western gate of Son Tay and fought their way into the town. Liu Yongfu's garrison withdrew to the citadel, and evacuated Son Tay under cover of darkness several hours later. Courbet had achieved his objective, but at considerable cost. French casualties at Son Tay were 83 dead and 320 wounded. The fighting at Son Tay also took a terrible toll of the Black Flags, and in the opinion of some observers broke them once and for all as a serious fighting force. Liu Yongfu felt that he had been deliberately left to bear the brunt of the fighting by his Chinese and Vietnamese allies, and determined never again to expose his troops so openly.
Charles-Théodore Millot
Charles-Théodore Millot was a French general who distinguished himself in the Franco-Prussian War and the Tonkin campaign...
, who took over responsibility for the land campaign from Admiral Courbet after the fall of Son Tay. Reinforcements from France and the African colonies had now raised the strength of the Tonkin Expeditionary Corps
Tonkin Expeditionary Corps
The Tonkin Expeditionary Corps was an important French military command based in northern Vietnam from June 1883 to April 1886. The expeditionary corps fought the Tonkin campaign taking part in campaigns against the Black Flag Army and the Chinese Yunnan and Guangxi Armies during the...
to over 10,000 men, and Millot organised this force into two brigades. The 1st Brigade was commanded by General Louis Brière de l'Isle
Louis Brière de l'Isle
Louis Alexandre Esprit Gaston Brière de l'Isle was a French Army general who achieved distinction firstly as Governor of Senegal , and then as general-in-chief of the Tonkin Expeditionary Corps during the Sino-French War .-Military career to 1871:Louis Briere de l'Isle was born on 4 June 1827 in...
, who had earlier made his reputation as governor of Senegal, and the 2nd Brigade was commanded by the charismatic young Foreign Legion general François de Négrier
François de Négrier
General François Oscar de Négrier was one of the most charismatic French generals of the Third Republic, winning fame in Algeria in the Sud-Oranais campaign and in Tonkin during the Sino-French War .- Early career :Born in Belfort, France on October 2, 1839, De Négrier served with Marshal...
, who had recently quelled a serious Arab rebellion in Algeria. The French target was Bac Ninh
Bac Ninh
Bắc Ninh is a city in Vietnam and capital of the Bac Ninh province. The city is the cultural, administrative, and commercial center of the province. The city area is 80.82 square km, with a population of 150,331 . In January, 2006, the town of Bac Ninh was upgraded to city...
, garrisoned by a strong force of regular Chinese troops of the Guangxi Army. The Bac Ninh campaign
Bac Ninh campaign
The Bac Ninh Campaign was one of a series of clashes between French and Chinese forces in northern Vietnam during the Tonkin campaign...
was a walkover for the French. Morale in the Chinese army was low, and Liu Yongfu was careful to keep his experienced Black Flags out of danger. Millot bypassed Chinese defences to the southwest of Bac Ninh, and assaulted the city on 12 March from the southeast, with complete success. The Guangxi Army put up a feeble resistance, and the French took the city with ease, capturing large quantities of ammunition and a number of brand new Krupp cannon.
The Tientsin Accord and the Treaty of Huế
Zhang Zhidong
Zhang Zhidong ; Pseudonyms: Xiāngtāo , Xiāngyán , Yīgōng , Wújìng-Jūshì , later Bàobīng ; Posthumous name: Wénxiāng ) was an eminent Chinese politician during the late Qing Dynasty who advocated for controlled reform...
, which was agitating for a full-scale war against France. Further French successes in the spring of 1884, including the Capture of Hung Hoa
Capture of Hung Hoa
The Capture of Hung Hoa was an important French victory in the Tonkin campaign .- Background :Hung Hoa was captured by the French a month to the day after the capture of Bac Ninh...
and Thái Nguyên
Thai Nguyen
Thái Nguyên is a city and municipality in Vietnam. It is the capital and located in center of Thai Nguyen province, in northeastern Vietnam. This is the largest city and often considered as center of Northern midlands and mountain areas...
, convinced the Empress Dowager Cixi
Empress Dowager Cixi
Empress Dowager Cixi1 , of the Manchu Yehenara clan, was a powerful and charismatic figure who became the de facto ruler of the Manchu Qing Dynasty in China for 47 years from 1861 to her death in 1908....
that China should come to terms, and an accord was reached between France and China in May. The negotiations took place in Tianjin (Tientsin). Li Hongzhang, the leader of the Chinese moderates, represented China; and Captain François-Ernest Fournier, commander of the French cruiser Volta, represented France. The Tientsin Accord
Tientsin Accord
The Tientsin Accord or Li-Fournier Convention, concluded on 11 May 1884, was intended to settle an undeclared war between France and China over the sovereignty of Tonkin...
, concluded on 11 May 1884, provided for Chinese recognition of the French protectorate over Annam and Tonkin and withdrawal of Chinese troops from Tonkin, in return for a comprehensive treaty that would settle details of trade and commerce between France and China and provide for the demarcation of its disputed border with Vietnam.
On 6 June the French followed up their accord with China by concluding a fresh Treaty of Hue
Treaty of Hué (1884)
The Treaty of Huế or Protectorate Treaty was concluded on 6 June 1884 between France and Vietnam. It restated the main tenets of the punitive Harmand Treaty of 25 August 1883, but softened some of the harsher provisions of this treaty...
with the Vietnamese, which established a French protectorate over both Annam and Tonkin and allowed the French to station troops at strategic points in Vietnamese territory and to install residents in the main towns. The signature of the treaty was accompanied by an important symbolic gesture. The seal presented by the emperor of China several decades earlier to the Vietnamese king Gia Long was melted down in the presence of the French and Vietnamese plenipotentiaries, betokening the renunciation by Vietnam of its traditional links with China.
Fournier was not a professional diplomat, and the Tientsin Accord contained several loose ends. Crucially, it failed to explicitly state a deadline for the Chinese troop withdrawal from Tonkin. The French asserted that the troop withdrawal was to take place immediately, while the Chinese argued that the withdrawal was contingent upon the conclusion of the comprehensive treaty. In fact, the Chinese stance was an ex post facto rationalisation, designed to justify their unwillingness or inability to put the terms of the accord into effect. The accord was extremely unpopular in China, and provoked an immediate backlash. The war party called for Li Hongzhang's impeachment, and his political opponents intrigued to have orders sent to the Chinese troops in Tonkin to hold their positions.
The Bac Le ambush
When news of the 'Bac Le Ambush
Bac Le ambush
The Bac Le ambush was a clash during the Tonkin campaign in June 1884 between Chinese troops of the Guangxi Army and a French column sent to occupy Lang Son and other towns near the Chinese border. The French claimed that their troops had been ambushed by the Chinese...
' reached Paris, there was fury at what was perceived as blatant Chinese treachery. Ferry's government demanded an apology, an indemnity, and the immediate implementation of the terms of the Tianjin Accord. The Chinese government agreed to negotiate, but refused to apologise or pay an indemnity. The mood in France was against compromise, and although negotiations continued throughout July, Admiral Courbet was ordered to take his squadron to Fuzhou
Fuzhou
Fuzhou is the capital and one of the largest cities in Fujian Province, People's Republic of China. Along with the many counties of Ningde, those of Fuzhou are considered to constitute the Mindong linguistic and cultural area....
(Foochow). He was instructed to prepare to attack the Chinese fleet in the harbour and to destroy the Foochow Navy Yard. Meanwhile, as a preliminary demonstration of what would follow if the Chinese were recalcitrant, Rear Admiral Sébastien Lespès destroyed three Chinese shore batteries in the port of Keelung
Keelung
Keelung City is a major port city situated in the northeastern part of Taiwan. It borders New Taipei and forms the Taipei–Keelung metropolitan area, along with the Taipei and New Taipei. Nicknamed the Rainy Port for its frequent rain and maritime role, the city is Taiwan's second largest seaport...
in northern Formosa (Taiwan
Taiwan
Taiwan , also known, especially in the past, as Formosa , is the largest island of the same-named island group of East Asia in the western Pacific Ocean and located off the southeastern coast of mainland China. The island forms over 99% of the current territory of the Republic of China following...
) by naval bombardment on 5 August. The French put a landing force ashore to occupy Keelung and the nearby coal mines at Pei-tao (Pa-tou), as a 'pledge' (gage) to be bargained against a Chinese withdrawal from Tonkin, but the arrival of a large Chinese army under the command of the imperial commissioner Liu Mingchuan
Liu Mingchuan
Liu Mingchuan was a Chinese official during the Qing dynasty. He adopted a style name of Xingsan . Liu became involved in the suppression of the Taiping rebellion at an early age, and worked closely with Zeng Guofan and Li Hongzhang as he emerged as an important Huai Army officer...
(劉銘傳) forced it to re-embark on 6 August.
Fuzhou and the Min River
Far East Squadron
The French Far East Squadron was an exceptional naval grouping created for the duration of the Sino-French War .- Background :...
annihilated China's outclassed Fujian fleet and severely damaged the Foochow Navy Yard
Foochow Arsenal
The Foochow Arsenal , also Mawei Arsenal was one of several shipyards in China built under orders of Li Hongzhang and Zuo Zongtang, leaders of the Qing government's Self-Strengthening Movement of the mid to late 19th century...
(which, ironically, had been built under the direction of the French administrator Prosper Giquel
Prosper Giquel
Prosper Marie Giquel , sometimes spelled Gicquel, was a French naval officer who played an important role in the modernization of 19th century China. His Chinese name was 日意格.-Career:...
). Nine Chinese ships were sunk in less than an hour, including the corvette Yangwu
Yangwu
The Yangwu was a Chinese warship and the flagship of the Fujian Fleet.The Yangwu was a wooden corvette, built in 1872 at the Foochow Navy Yard. She was part of a large shipbuilding program at the Foochow Arsenal, and cost 254,000 taels for her construction...
, the flagship of the Fujian fleet. Chinese losses may have amounted to 3,000 dead, while French losses were minimal. Courbet then successfully withdrew down the Min River to the open sea, destroying several Chinese shore batteries from behind as he took the French squadron through the Min'an and Jinpai passes.
Riots in Hong Kong
The French attack at Fuzhou effectively ended diplomatic contacts between France and China. Although neither country declared war, the dispute would now be settled on the battlefield. The news of the destruction of the Fujian fleet was greeted by an outbreak of patriotic fervour in China, marred by attacks on foreigners and foreign property. There was considerable sympathy for China in Europe, and the Chinese were able to hire a number of British, German and American army and navy officers as advisers.Patriotic indignation spread to the British colony of Hong Kong
Hong Kong
Hong Kong is one of two Special Administrative Regions of the People's Republic of China , the other being Macau. A city-state situated on China's south coast and enclosed by the Pearl River Delta and South China Sea, it is renowned for its expansive skyline and deep natural harbour...
. In September 1884 dock workers in Hong Kong refused to repair the French ironclad La Galissonnière, which had suffered shell damage in the August naval engagements. The strike collapsed at the end of September, but the dock workers were prevented from resuming their business by other groups of Chinese workers, including longshoremen, sedan chair carriers and rickshawmen. An attempt by the British authorities to protect the dock workers against harassment resulted in serious rioting on 3 October, during which at least one rioter was shot dead and several Sikh constables were injured. The British suspected, with good reason, that the disturbances had been fomented by the Chinese authorities in Guangdong province.
French occupation of Keelung
Keelung
Keelung City is a major port city situated in the northeastern part of Taiwan. It borders New Taipei and forms the Taipei–Keelung metropolitan area, along with the Taipei and New Taipei. Nicknamed the Rainy Port for its frequent rain and maritime role, the city is Taiwan's second largest seaport...
and Tamsui, redeeming the failure of 6 August and finally winning the ‘pledge’ they sought. On 1 October Lieutenant-Colonel Bertaux-Levillain landed at Keelung with a force of 1,800 marine infantry, forcing the Chinese to withdraw to strong defensive positions which had been prepared in the surrounding hills. The French force was too small to advance beyond Keelung, and the Pei-tao coal mines remained in Chinese hands. Meanwhile, after an ineffective naval bombardment on 2 October, Admiral Lespès attacked the Chinese defences at Tamsui with 600 sailors from his squadron's landing companies on 8 October, and was decisively repulsed by forces under the command of the Fujianese general Sun Kaihua (孫開華). As a result of this reverse, French control over Formosa was limited merely to the town of Keelung. This achievement fell far short of what had been hoped for.
Blockade of Formosa
Towards the end of 1884 the French were able to enforce a limited blockade of the northern Formosan ports of Keelung and Tamsui and the southern ports of Taiwanfu (TainanTainan
Tainan City is a city in southern Taiwan. It is the fifth largest after New Taipei, Kaohsiung, Taichung, and Taipei. It was formerly a provincial city, and in 2010, the provincial city merged with the adjacent Tainan County to form a single special municipality. Tainan faces the Taiwan Strait in...
) and Takow (Kaohsiung
Kaohsiung
Kaohsiung is a city located in southwestern Taiwan, facing the Taiwan Strait on the west. Kaohsiung, officially named Kaohsiung City, is divided into thirty-eight districts. The city is one of five special municipalities of the Republic of China...
). In early January 1885 the Formosa expeditionary corps, now under the command of Colonel Jacques Duchesne
Jacques Duchesne
Jacques Charles René Achille Duchesne was a French general of the 19th century. He was born at Sens on March 3, 1837. He entered Saint-Cyr in 1855, and became a Lieutenant in 1861.-Career:...
, was substantially reinforced with two battalions of infantry, bringing its total strength to around 4,000 men. Meanwhile, drafts from the Hunan and Anhui Armies had brought the strength of Liu Mingchuan's defending army to around 25,000 men. Although severely outnumbered, the French captured a number of minor Chinese positions to the southeast of Keelung at the end of January 1885, but were forced to halt offensive operations in February due to incessant rain.
Shipu Bay, Zhenhai Bay and the rice blockade
Nanyang Fleet
The Nanyang Fleet was one of the four modernised Chinese navies in the late Qing Dynasty. Established in the 1870s, the fleet suffered losses in the Sino-French War, escaped intact in the Sino-Japanese War, and was formally abolished in 1909....
(Southern Seas fleet) to break the French blockade of Formosa. On 11 February Courbet's task force met the cruisers Kaiji, Nanchen and Nanrui, three of the most modern ships in the Chinese fleet, near Shipu Bay, accompanied by the frigate Yuyuan and the composite sloop Chengqing. The Chinese scattered at the French approach, and while the three cruisers successfully made their escape, the French succeeded in trapping Yuyuan and Chengqing in Shipu Bay. On the night of 14 February, in the Battle of Shipu
Battle of Shipu
The Battle of Shipu was a French naval victory during the Sino-French War . The battle took place on the night of 14 February 1885 in Shipu Bay , near Ningbo, China.- Background :...
, the French attacked the Chinese vessels with two torpedo launches. During a brief engagement inside the bay, Yuyuan was seriously damaged by torpedoes and Chengqing was hit by Chinese artillery fire. Both ships were subsequently scuttled by the Chinese. The French torpedo launches escaped almost without loss.
Courbet followed up this success on 1 March by locating Kaiji, Nanchen and Nanrui, which had taken refuge with four other Chinese warships in Zhenhai Bay, near the port of Ningbo
Ningbo
Ningbo is a seaport city of northeastern Zhejiang province, Eastern China. Holding sub-provincial administrative status, the municipality has a population of 7,605,700 inhabitants at the 2010 census whom 3,089,180 in the built up area made of 6 urban districts. It lies south of the Hangzhou Bay,...
. Courbet considered forcing the Chinese defences, but finally decided to guard the entrance to the bay to keep the enemy vessels bottled up there for the duration of hostilities. A brief and inconclusive skirmish between the French cruiser Nielly and the Chinese shore batteries on 1 March enabled the Chinese general Ouyang Lijian (歐陽利見), charged with the defence of Ningbo, to claim the so-called 'Battle of Zhenhai
Battle of Zhenhai
The so-called Battle of Zhenhai was a minor confrontation on 1 March 1885 between Admiral Amédée Courbet's Far East Squadron and Chinese warships and shore batteries near the coastal city of Zhenhai, 12 miles downstream of Ningbo, during the Sino-French War...
' as a defensive victory.
In February 1885, under diplomatic pressure from China, Britain invoked the provisions of the 1870 Foreign Enlistment Act and closed Hong Kong and other ports in the Far East to French warships. The French government retaliated by ordering Admiral Courbet to implement a 'rice blockade' of the Yangzi River, hoping to bring the Qing court to terms by provoking serious rice shortages in northern China. The rice blockade severely disrupted the transport of rice by sea from Shanghai and forced the Chinese to carry it overland, but the war ended before the blockade seriously affected China's economy.
French victories in the delta
Kep Campaign
The Kep Campaign was an important campaign in northern Vietnam during the opening months of the Sino-French War...
, (2 to 15 October 1884), three French columns under the overall command of General de Négrier fell upon the separated detachments of the Guangxi Army and successively defeated them in engagements at Lam
Lam
-Lam:*Mor lam, an ancient Lao form of song in Laos and Isan*Lam saravane, a music genre*Lam luang, a music genre*Lam, Germany, a town in Bavaria-LAM:*Lactational amenorrhea method, a contraceptive method...
(6 October), Kép
Kép
Kép is a township and town and capital of Lạng Giang District, Bac Giang Province, in northeastern Vietnam....
(8 October) and Chu
Chu
Chu or CHU may refer to:Surname:* Chu , a common Chinese surname for 朱 , but it can also refer to any Chinese surname whose pinyin is "chu", such as 楚, 储, 褚, 初, 除 and other possible surnames....
(10 October). The second of these battles was marked by bitter close-quarter fighting between French and Chinese troops, and de Négrier's soldiers suffered heavy casualties storming the fortified village of Kep. The exasperated victors shot or bayoneted scores of wounded Chinese soldiers after the battle, and reports of French atrocities at Kep shocked public opinion in Europe. In fact, prisoners were rarely taken by either side during the Sino–French War, and the French were equally shocked by the Chinese habit of paying a bounty for severed French heads.
In the wake of these French victories the Chinese fell back to Bac Le and Dong Song, and de Négrier established important forward positions at Kep and Chu, which threatened the Guangxi Army's base at Lang Son. Chu was only a few miles southwest of the Guangxi Army's advanced posts at Dong Song, and on 16 December a strong Chinese raiding detachment ambushed two companies of the Foreign Legion just to the east of Chu, at Ha Ho. The legionnaires fought their way out of the Chinese encirclement, but suffered a number of casualties and had to abandon their dead on the battlefield. De Négrier immediately brought up reinforcements and pursued the Chinese, but the raiders made good their retreat to Dong Song.
Shortly after the October engagements against the Guangxi Army, Brière de l’Isle took steps to resupply the western outposts of Hung Hoa, Thái Nguyên and Tuyen Quang
Tuyen Quang
-History:The French post at Tuyen Quang was defended for four months against 12,000 troops of the Yunnan Army and the Black Flag Army by two companies of the French Foreign Legion during the Sino-French War...
, which were coming under increasing threat from Liu Yongfu's Black Flags and Tang Jingsong's Yunnan Army. On 19 November, in the Battle of Yu Oc
Battle of Yu Oc
The Battle of Yu Oc was a French victory during the Sino-French War. The battle was fought to relieve the French garrison of Tuyen Quang, under siege by the T'ang Ching-sung's Yunnan Army and Liu Yongfu's Black Flag Army...
, a column making for Tuyen Quan under the command of Colonel Jacques Duchesne
Jacques Duchesne
Jacques Charles René Achille Duchesne was a French general of the 19th century. He was born at Sens on March 3, 1837. He entered Saint-Cyr in 1855, and became a Lieutenant in 1861.-Career:...
was ambushed in the Yu Oc gorge by the Black Flags but was able to fight its way through to the beleaguered post. The French also sealed off the eastern Delta from raids by Chinese guerillas based in Guangdong by occupying Tien Yen, Dong Trieu and other strategic points, and by blockading the Cantonese port of Beihai (Pak-Hoi). They also conducted sweeps along the lower course of the Red River to dislodge Annamese guerilla bands from bases close to Hanoi. These operations enabled Brière de l’Isle to concentrate the bulk of the Tonkin expeditionary corps around Chu and Kep at the end of 1884, to advance on Lang Son as soon as the word was given.
The Lang Son Campaign
Jules Louis Lewal
Jules Louis Lewal was a French general.-Biography:He was born in Paris; entered the army in 1846; served in the Italian campaign of 1859, with the French troops in Mexico , and, after cooperation with Adolphe Niel in the army reforms, in the Franco-Prussian War...
, who immediately ordered Brière de l’Isle to capture Lang Son. The campaign would be launched from the French forward base at Chu, and on 3 and 4 January 1885 General de Négrier attacked and defeated a substantial detachment of the Guangxi Army that had concentrated around the nearby village of Nui Bop to try to disrupt the French preparations. De Nègrier's victory at Nui Bop
Battle of Nui Bop
The Battle of Nui Bop was a French victory during the Sino-French War. The battle was fought to clear Chinese forces away from the French forward base at Chu, and was an essential preliminary to the Lang Son Campaign in February 1885....
, won at odds of just under one to ten, was regarded by his fellow-officers as the most spectacular professional triumph of his career.
Lang Son Campaign
The Lang Son Campaign was a major French offensive in Tonkin during the Sino-French War...
. Finally, on 3 February 1885, Brière de l’Isle began his advance from Chu with a column of just under 7,200 troops, accompanied by 4,500 coolies. In ten days the column advanced to the outskirts of Lang Son. The troops were burdened with the weight of their provisions and equipment, and had to march through extremely difficult country. They also had to fight fierce actions to overrun stoutly defended Chinese positions, at Tay Hoa
Tay Hoa
Tây Hòa is a rural district of Phu Yen province in the South Central Coastal region of Vietnam.-References:...
(4 February), Ha Hoa
Ha Hoa
Ha Hoa is a district of Phu Tho Province in the Northeastern region of Vietnam.As of 2003 the district had a population of 108,556. The district covers an area of 340 km²...
(5 February) and Dong Song (6 February). After a brief pause for breath at Dong Song, the expeditionary corps pressed on towards Lang Son, fighting further actions at Deo Quao (9 February), and Pho Vy (11 February). On 12 February, in a costly but successful battle, the Turcos and marine infantry of Colonel Laurent Giovanninelli's 1st Brigade stormed the main Chinese defences at Bac Vie, several kilometres to the south of Lang Son. On 13 February, the French column entered Lang Son which the Chinese abandoned after fighting a token rearguard action at the nearby village of Ky Lua.
Siege and relief of Tuyen Quang
Tuyen Quang
-History:The French post at Tuyen Quang was defended for four months against 12,000 troops of the Yunnan Army and the Black Flag Army by two companies of the French Foreign Legion during the Sino-French War...
, which had been placed under siege in November 1884 by Liu Yongfu's Black Flag Army and Tang Jingsong's Yunnan Army. The Siege of Tuyen Quang
Siege of Tuyen Quang
The Siege of Tuyen Quang was an important confrontation between the French and the Chinese armies in Tonkin during the Sino-French War...
was the most evocative confrontation of the Sino–French War. The Chinese and Black Flags sapped methodically up to the French positions, and in January and February 1885 breached the outer defences with mines and delivered seven separate assaults on the breach. The Tuyen Quang garrison, 400 legionnaires and 200 Tonkinese auxiliaries under the command of chef de bataillon Marc-Edmond Dominé, beat off all attempts to storm their positions, but lost over a third of their strength (50 dead and 224 wounded) sustaining a heroic defence against overwhelming odds. By mid-February it was clear that Tuyen Quang would fall unless it was relieved immediately.
Leaving de Négrier at Lang Son with the 2nd Brigade, Brière de l’Isle personally led Giovanninelli's 1st Brigade back to Hanoi, and then upriver to the relief of Tuyen Quang. The brigade, reinforced at Phu Doan on 24 February by a small column from Hung Hoa under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel de Maussion, found the route to Tuyen Quang blocked by a strong Chinese defensive position at Hoa Moc. On 2 March 1885 Giovanninelli attacked the left flank of the Chinese defensive line. The Battle of Hoa Moc
Battle of Hoa Moc
The Battle of Hoa Moc was the most fiercely-fought action of the Sino-French War . At heavy cost, Colonel Giovanninelli's 1st Brigade of the Tonkin Expeditionary Corps defeated forces of the Black Flag and Yunnan Armies blocking the way to the besieged French post of Tuyen Quang.- Background :The...
was the most fiercely fought action of the war. Two French assaults were decisively repulsed, and although the French eventually stormed the Chinese positions, they suffered very high casualties (76 dead and 408 wounded). Nevertheless, their costly victory cleared the way to Tuyen Quang. The Yunnan Army and the Black Flags raised the siege and drew off to the west, and the relieving force entered the beleaguered post on 3 March. Brière de l’Isle praised the courage of the hard-pressed garrison in a widely quoted order of the day. ‘Today, you enjoy the admiration of the men who have relieved you at such heavy cost. Tomorrow, all France will applaud you!’
Bang Bo, Ky Lua and the retreat from Lang Son
Before his departure for Tuyen Quang, Brière de l'Isle ordered de Négrier to press on from Lang Son towards the Chinese border and expel the battered remnants of the Guangxi Army from Tonkinese soil. After resupplying the 2nd Brigade with food and ammunition, de Négrier defeated the Guangxi Army at the Battle of Dong DangBattle of Dong Dang
The Battle of Dong Dang was an important French victory during the Sino-French War.- Background :The battle was fought as a pendant to the Lang Son Campaign , in which the French captured the Guangxi Army's base at Lang Son.On 16 February General Louis Brière de l'Isle, the commander of the Tonkin...
on 23 February and cleared it from Tonkinese territory. For good measure, the French crossed briefly into Guangxi province and blew up the 'Gate of China', an elaborate Chinese customs building on the Tonkin-Guangxi border. They were not strong enough to exploit this victory, however, and the 2nd Brigade returned to Langson at the end of February.
On 23 and 24 March the 2nd Brigade, only 1,500 men strong, fought a fierce action with over 25,000 troops of the Guangxi Army entrenched near Zhennanguan
Friendship Gate
Friendship Pass Friendship Pass Friendship Pass (Chinese:友谊关,formerly 镇南关, Vietnamese: Hữu Nghị Quan, formerly Ải Nam Quan (both the present Vietnamese and Chinese names mean Friendship Pass) is a pass in the border between the China’s Guangxi and Vietnam’s Lang Son Province...
on the Chinese border. The Battle of Bang Bo (named by the French from the Vietnamese pronunciation of Hengpo, a village in the centre of the Chinese position where the fighting was fiercest), is normally known as the Battle of Zhennan Pass in China. The French took a number of outworks on 23 March, but failed to take the main Chinese positions on 24 March and were fiercely counterattacked in their turn. Although the French made a fighting withdrawal and prevented the Chinese from piercing their line, casualties in the 2nd Brigade were relatively heavy (70 dead and 188 wounded) and there were ominous scenes of disorder as the defeated French regrouped after the battle. As the brigade's morale was precarious and ammunition was running short, de Négrier decided to fall back to Lang Son.
The French had amply avenged their defeat at Bang Bo four days earlier, and if de Négrier had remained in command the 2nd Brigade would probably have chased the Guangxi Army back across the Chinese border. But towards the end of the battle de Négrier was seriously wounded in the chest while scouting the Chinese positions. He was forced to hand over command to his senior regimental commander, Lieutenant-Colonel Paul-Gustave Herbinger. Herbinger was a noted military theoretician who had won a respectable battlefield reputation during the Franco-Prussian War, but was quite out of his depth as a field commander in Tonkin. Several French officers had already commented scathingly on his performance during the Lang Son campaign and at Bang Bo, where he had badly bungled an attack on the Chinese positions.
Upon assuming command of the brigade, Herbinger panicked. Despite the evidence that the Chinese had been decisively defeated and were streaming back in disarray towards the Chinese frontier, he convinced himself that they were preparing to encircle Lang Son and cut his supply line. Disregarding the appalled protests of some of his officers, he ordered the 2nd Brigade to abandon Lang Son on the evening of 28 March and retreat to Chu. The Retreat from Lang Son
Retreat from Lang Son
The Retreat from Lang Son was a controversial, and almost certainly unnecessary, French strategic withdrawal in Tonkin at the end of March 1885 that brought down the government of the French premier Jules Ferry and brought the Sino-French War to an end in circumstances of considerable...
was conducted without loss and with little interference from the Chinese, but Herbinger set an unnecessarily punishing pace and abandoned considerable quantities of food, ammunition and equipment. When the 2nd Brigade eventually rallied at Chu, its soldiers were exhausted and demoralised. Meanwhile the Chinese general Pan Dingxin (潘鼎新), informed by sympathisers in Lang Son that the French were in full retreat, promptly turned his battered army around and reoccupied Lang Son on 30 March. The Chinese were in no condition to pursue the French to Chu, and contented themselves with a limited advance to Dong Song.
There was also bad news for the French from the western front. On 23 March, in the Battle of Phu Lam Tao
Battle of Phu Lam Tao
The Battle of Phu Lam Tao was a politically-significant engagement during the Sino-French War , in which a French Zouave battalion was defeated by a mixed force of Chinese soldiers and Black Flags.- Background :...
, a force of Chinese regulars and Black Flags surprised and routed a French zouave battalion that had been ordered to scout positions around Hung Hoa in preparation for Giovanninelli's projected offensive against the Yunnan Army.
Collapse of Ferry's government
Neither reverse was serious, but in the light of Herbinger's alarming reports Brière de l’Isle believed the situation to be much worse than it was, and sent an extremely pessimistic telegram back to Paris on the evening of 28 March. The political effect of this telegram was momentous. Ferry's immediate reaction was to reinforce the army in Tonkin, and indeed Brière de l’Isle quickly revised his estimate of the situation and advised the government that the front could soon be stabilised. However, his second thoughts came too late. When his first telegram was made public in Paris there was an uproar in the Chamber of Deputies. A motion of no confidence was tabled, and Ferry's government fell on 30 March. The 'Tonkin AffairTonkin Affair
The Tonkin Affair of March 1885 was a major French political crisis that erupted in the closing weeks of the Sino-French War. It effectively destroyed the political career of the French prime minister Jules Ferry, and abruptly ended the string of Republican governments inaugurated several years...
', as this humiliating blow to French policy in Tonkin was immediately dubbed, effectively ended Ferry's distinguished career in French politics. He would never again become premier, and his political influence during the rest of his career would be severely limited. His successor, Henri Brisson
Henri Brisson
Eugène Henri Brisson was a French statesman, Prime Minister of France for a period in 1885-1886 and again in 1898.-Biography:He was born at Bourges , and followed his father’s profession of advocate. Having made his mark in opposition during the last days of the empire, he was appointed...
, promptly concluded peace with China. The Chinese government agreed to implement the Tientsin Accord (implicitly recognising the French protectorate over Tonkin), and the French government dropped its demand for an indemnity for the Bac Le Ambush. A peace protocol ending hostilities was signed on 4 April, and a substantive peace treaty was signed on 9 June at Tianjin
Treaty of Tientsin (1885)
The Treaty of Tientsin, signed on 9 June 1885, officially ended the Sino-French War. The treaty, in ten articles, restated in greater detail the main provisions of the Tientsin Accord, signed between France and China on 11 May 1884...
by Li Hongzhang and the French minister Jules Patenôtre
Jules Patenotre des Noyers
Jules Patenôtre des Noyers , French diplomat, was born at Baye .Educated at the École Normale Supérieure, he taught for some years in the Algiers lycée before he joined the diplomatic service in 1871. He took service from 1873 to 1876 in the North of Persia...
.
China's fear of Japan
An important factor in China's decision to make peace was fear of Japanese expansionism. Japan had taken advantage of China's distraction with France to intrigue in the Chinese protectorate state of Korea. In December 1884 the Japanese sponsored a coup attempt in Seoul which was crushed by the intervention of Chinese troops under the command of Yuan ShikaiYuan Shikai
Yuan Shikai was an important Chinese general and politician famous for his influence during the late Qing Dynasty, his role in the events leading up to the abdication of the last Qing Emperor of China, his autocratic rule as the second President of the Republic of China , and his short-lived...
. The so-called 'Gapsin Coup' brought Japan and China to the brink of war, and thereafter the Qing court considered that the Japanese were a greater threat to China than the French. Fear of Japan trumped fear of France, and in January 1885 the Empress Dowager
Empress Dowager Cixi
Empress Dowager Cixi1 , of the Manchu Yehenara clan, was a powerful and charismatic figure who became the de facto ruler of the Manchu Qing Dynasty in China for 47 years from 1861 to her death in 1908....
directed her ministers to seek an honourable peace with France. Secret talks between the French and Chinese were held in Paris in February and March 1885, and the fall of Ferry's ministry removed the last remaining obstacles to a peace.
Final engagements
Ironically, while the war was being decided on the battlefields of Tonkin and in Paris, the Formosa expeditionary corps won two spectacular victories in March 1885. In a series of actions fought between 4 and 7 March Colonel Duchesne broke the Chinese encirclement of KeelungKeelung
Keelung City is a major port city situated in the northeastern part of Taiwan. It borders New Taipei and forms the Taipei–Keelung metropolitan area, along with the Taipei and New Taipei. Nicknamed the Rainy Port for its frequent rain and maritime role, the city is Taiwan's second largest seaport...
with a flank attack delivered against the east of the Chinese line, capturing the key position of La Table and forcing the Chinese to withdraw behind the Keelung River. Duchesne's victory sparked a brief panic in Taipei
Taipei
Taipei City is the capital of the Republic of China and the central city of the largest metropolitan area of Taiwan. Situated at the northern tip of the island, Taipei is located on the Tamsui River, and is about 25 km southwest of Keelung, its port on the Pacific Ocean...
, but the French were not strong enough to advance beyond their bridgehead. The Keelung Campaign
Keelung Campaign
The Keelung Campaign was a controversial military campaign undertaken by the French in northern Formosa during the Sino-French War. After making a botched attack on Keelung in August 1884, the French landed an expeditionary corps of 2,000 men and captured the port in October 1884...
now reached a point of equilibrium. The French were holding a virtually impregnable defensive perimeter around Keelung but could not exploit their success, while Liu Mingchuan's army remained in presence just beyond their advanced positions.
Pescadores Campaign
The Pescadores Campaign in late March 1885 was one of the last campaigns of the Sino-French War . It was fought to capture a strategically important island group off the western coast of Taiwan...
was an important victory, which would have prevented the Chinese from further reinforcing their army in Formosa, but it came too late to affect the outcome of the war. Future French operations were cancelled on the news of Lieutenant-Colonel Herbinger's retreat from Lang Son
Retreat from Lang Son
The Retreat from Lang Son was a controversial, and almost certainly unnecessary, French strategic withdrawal in Tonkin at the end of March 1885 that brought down the government of the French premier Jules Ferry and brought the Sino-French War to an end in circumstances of considerable...
on 28 March, and Courbet was on the point of evacuating Keelung to reinforce the Tonkin expeditionary corps, leaving only a minimum garrison at Makung in the Pescadores, when hostilities were ended in April by the conclusion of preliminaries of peace.
The news of the peace protocol of 4 April did not reach the French and Chinese forces in Tonkin for several days, and the final engagement of the Sino–French War took place on 14 April 1885 at Kép
Kép
Kép is a township and town and capital of Lạng Giang District, Bac Giang Province, in northeastern Vietnam....
, where the French beat off a half-hearted Chinese attack on their positions. Meanwhile Brière de l’Isle had reinforced the key French posts at Hung Hoa and Chu, and when hostilities ended in the third fortnight of April the French were standing firm against both the Guangxi and Yunnan armies. Although Brière de l’Isle was planning to attack the Yunnan Army at Phu Lam Tao to avenge the defeat of 23 March, many French officers doubted whether this offensive would have succeeded. At the same time, the Chinese armies had no prospect whatsoever of driving the French from Hung Hoa or Chu. Militarily, the war in Tonkin ended in a stalemate.
The peace protocol of 4 April required the Chinese to withdraw their armies from Tonkin, and the French continued to occupy Keelung and the Pescadores for several months after the end of hostilities, as a surety for Chinese good faith. Admiral Courbet fell seriously ill during this occupation, and on 11 June died aboard his flagship Bayard
French battleship Bayard (1880)
The Bayard was an early stationary battleship of the French Navy, lead ship of her class. Bayard had a wooden hull and a full rigging, as well as a side armour and steam machinery.- Active service :...
in Makung harbour. Meanwhile the Chinese punctiliously observed the terms of the peace settlement, and by the end of June 1885 both the Yunnan and Guangxi armies had evacuated Tonkin. Liu Yongfu's Black Flag Army also withdrew from Tonkinese territory.
French attempts to secure an alliance with Japan
Unequal Treaties
“Unequal treaty” is a term used in specific reference to a number of treaties imposed by Western powers, during the 19th and early 20th centuries, on Qing Dynasty China and late Tokugawa Japan...
of the Bakumatsu era, which provided extra-territoriality and advantageous tariffs to foreigners. Japan welcomed the offer of French support, but was reluctant to be drawn into a military alliance. Japan was in effect quite worried of the military might China represented, at least on paper, at that time. As the situation in Annam deteriorated however, France was even more anxious of obtaining Japanese help.
After French difficulties in Taiwan
Taiwan
Taiwan , also known, especially in the past, as Formosa , is the largest island of the same-named island group of East Asia in the western Pacific Ocean and located off the southeastern coast of mainland China. The island forms over 99% of the current territory of the Republic of China following...
, new attempts at negotiating an alliance were made with the Minister General Campenon meeting with General Miura Gorō, but Gorō remained ambiguous, encouraging France to continue to support Japan's drive for Treaty revision. Hopes for an alliance were reawakened in December 1884 when a clash occurred between China and Japan in Korea
Korea
Korea ) is an East Asian geographic region that is currently divided into two separate sovereign states — North Korea and South Korea. Located on the Korean Peninsula, Korea is bordered by the People's Republic of China to the northwest, Russia to the northeast, and is separated from Japan to the...
, when Japan supported the Gapsin coup d'état by Kim Okgyun
Kim Okgyun
Kim Ok-gyun [김옥균; 金玉均] was a reformist activist during the Joseon Dynasty of Korea. He served under the national civil service under King Gojong, and actively participated to advance Western ideas and sciences in Korea...
against the pro-Chinese Korean government, prompting Jules Ferry
Jules Ferry
Jules François Camille Ferry was a French statesman and republican. He was a promoter of laicism and colonial expansion.- Early life :Born in Saint-Dié, in the Vosges département, France, he studied law, and was called to the bar at Paris in 1854, but soon went into politics, contributing to...
to request the French ambassador in Japan Sienkiewicz to approach the Japanese government with an offer. Sienkiewicz however remained extremely negative to the point of refraining from communicating Ferry's proposal. French interest faded in 1885 as the campaign in Tonkin progressed, while, on the contrary Japanese interest increased as the Japanese government and public opinion started to favour open conflict with China. The Sino-French war ended however without an alliance coming to fruition.
Aftermath
The peace treaty of June 1885 gave the French most of what they wanted. They were obliged to evacuate Formosa and the Pescadores (which Courbet had wanted to retain as a French counterweight to the British colony of Hong Kong), but the Chinese withdrawal from Tonkin left the way clear for them to reoccupy Lang Son and to advance up the Red River to Lao Cai on the Yunnan-Tonkin border. In the years that followed the French crushed a vigorous Vietnamese resistance movement and consolidated their hold on Annam and Tonkin. In 1887, CochinchinaCochinchina
Cochinchina is a region encompassing the southern third of Vietnam whose principal city is Saigon. It was a French colony from 1862 to 1954. The later state of South Vietnam was created in 1954 by combining Cochinchina with southern Annam. In Vietnamese, the region is called Nam Bộ...
, Annam and Tonkin
Tonkin
Tonkin , also spelled Tongkin, Tonquin or Tongking, is the northernmost part of Vietnam, south of China's Yunnan and Guangxi Provinces, east of northern Laos, and west of the Gulf of Tonkin. Locally, it is known as Bắc Kỳ, meaning "Northern Region"...
(the territories which comprise the modern state of Vietnam) and Cambodia
Cambodia
Cambodia , officially known as the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country located in the southern portion of the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia...
were incorporated into French Indochina
French Indochina
French Indochina was part of the French colonial empire in southeast Asia. A federation of the three Vietnamese regions, Tonkin , Annam , and Cochinchina , as well as Cambodia, was formed in 1887....
. They were joined a few years later by Laos
Laos
Laos Lao: ສາທາລະນະລັດ ປະຊາທິປະໄຕ ປະຊາຊົນລາວ Sathalanalat Paxathipatai Paxaxon Lao, officially the Lao People's Democratic Republic, is a landlocked country in Southeast Asia, bordered by Burma and China to the northwest, Vietnam to the east, Cambodia to the south and Thailand to the west...
, ceded to France by Siam at the conclusion of the Franco-Siamese War of 1893
Franco-Siamese War of 1893
The Franco-Siamese War of 1893 was a conflict between the French Third Republic and the Kingdom of Siam. Auguste Pavie, French vice consul in Luang Prabang in 1886, was the chief agent in furthering French interests in Laos...
.
Henri Brisson
Eugène Henri Brisson was a French statesman, Prime Minister of France for a period in 1885-1886 and again in 1898.-Biography:He was born at Bourges , and followed his father’s profession of advocate. Having made his mark in opposition during the last days of the empire, he was appointed...
also resigned in the wake of the acrimonious 'Tonkin Debate' of December 1885, in which Clemenceau and other opponents of colonial expansion nearly succeeded in securing a French withdrawal from Tonkin. In the end, the Chamber voted the 1886 credits to support the Tonkin expeditionary corps by 274 votes to 270. If only three votes had gone the other way, the French would have left Tonkin. As Thomazi would later write, 'France gained Indochina very much against its own wishes.' The reverberations of the Tonkin Affair
Tonkin Affair
The Tonkin Affair of March 1885 was a major French political crisis that erupted in the closing weeks of the Sino-French War. It effectively destroyed the political career of the French prime minister Jules Ferry, and abruptly ended the string of Republican governments inaugurated several years...
tarnished the reputation of the proponents of French colonial expansion generally, and delayed the realisation of other French colonial projects, including the conquest of Madagascar. It was not until the early 1890s that domestic political support for colonial expansion revived in France.
As far as China was concerned, the war hastened the emergence of a strong nationalist movement, and was a significant step in the decline of the Qing empire. The loss of the Fujian fleet on 23 August 1884 was considered particularly humiliating. The Chinese strategy also demonstrated the flaws in the late Qing national defence system of independent regional armies and fleets. The military and naval commanders in the south received no assistance from Li Hongzhang's Northern Seas (Beiyang
Beiyang
The term Beiyang originated toward the end of the Qing Dynasty, and it referred to the coastal areas of Zhili , Liaoning, and Shandong in northeast China....
) fleet, based in the Gulf of Petchili, and only token assistance from the Southern Seas (Nanyang
Nanyang Fleet
The Nanyang Fleet was one of the four modernised Chinese navies in the late Qing Dynasty. Established in the 1870s, the fleet suffered losses in the Sino-French War, escaped intact in the Sino-Japanese War, and was formally abolished in 1909....
) fleet at Shanghai. The excuse given, that these forces were needed to deter a Japanese penetration of Korea, was not convincing. The truth was, that having built up a respectable steam navy at considerable expense, the Chinese were reluctant to hazard it in battle, even though concentrating their forces would have given them the best chance of challenging France's local naval superiority. The Empress Dowager
Empress Dowager
Empress Dowager was the title given to the mother of a Chinese, Korean, Japanese or Vietnamese emperor.The title was also given occasionally to another woman of the same generation, while a woman from the previous generation was sometimes given the title of Grand empress dowager. Numerous empress...
and her advisers responded in October 1885 by establishing a Navy Yamen on the model of the admiralties of the European powers, to provide unified direction of naval policy. The benefits of this reform were largely nullified by corruption, and although China acquired a number of modern ships in the decade after the Sino–French War the Chinese navies remained handicapped by incompetent leadership. The bulk of China's steamship fleet was destroyed or captured in the Sino-Japanese War
First Sino-Japanese War
The First Sino-Japanese War was fought between Qing Dynasty China and Meiji Japan, primarily over control of Korea...
(1894–1895), and for decades thereafter China ceased to be a naval power of any importance.
See also
- France-Asia relations
- Franco-Siamese War of 1893
- 'Times' 1883 about Franco-Chinese war