After Tianjin fell, an observer who had official business in Tianjin wrote a detailed letter to relatives and friends in the southern provinces about the various situations he saw and heard there. The letter was written passionately, filled with sorrow, and reading it felt like reading "The Ten Days of Yangzhou." Here are some excerpts:
"The discipline of foreign soldiers is not much stronger than that of the Chinese; at most, it's just a case of the pot calling the kettle black. According to the foreigner Hockler: ‘The soldiers of a certain country in June and July are the best, while the Russian soldiers are the worst.’ Now the situation is just the opposite. Seeing the wealth that the soldiers before them had grabbed, the new foreign soldiers regretted arriving late and began to rob like crazy. Most of the victims go to the provincial office (which was the former governor's office) or to the relevant military officials to file complaints. They will ask for your name and who did it; if you can't provide that information, they'll just drop it. Only if you can catch the criminal can they possibly help you handle it. But who dares to do that? Who dares to provoke them and cause trouble? Everyone is trembling with fear and daring not to go out. Sometimes foreigners also get robbed, and it goes without saying that Chinese people do too."
After July, some people buried their treasures in coffins, but the news leaked, and the foreign soldiers made a fortune. As a result, in the suburbs outside the city, as well as in the guild halls and charitable estates of various provinces, almost no coffin was left unpried open. Bodies were abandoned by the roadside, with wild dogs and boars not caring one bit about the stench; by the time the deceased's relatives came to claim them, the bodies were nothing but a mangled mess. The coffin of Governor Li Shaoyun was pried open three times.
The disaster in Tianjin has its roots in the Boxers, and this is a fact. However, if it weren't for the instigation of the scholars in the capital, if it weren't for the complicity of those in the Imperial Guard, and if it weren't for the connivance of the officials in Zhili, the scale and severity of this disaster would not have been so great. Xu, Li, Yu, and Gang have all become light as a feather, now just corpses, yet the Northerners still euphemistically call it "martyrdom," which honestly makes me want to vomit.
Now, looking at the provinces in the North, everywhere is a landscape of wounds and scars, and the ones most severely affected are mostly the kind-hearted ordinary folks and those wealthy families. Meanwhile, those former Boxer members, who once wrapped their heads in red cloth and wielded steel knives, are praised for their loyalty when they win battles, and even when they lose, they can still loot and receive generous rewards afterward. You see, now in Tianjin, a coolie can earn six to seven jiao a day, and a rickshaw puller can earn two to three jiao each trip, making over a yuan in a day; most of these people are former Boxer members.
Behind the Hou family, some brothels, taverns, theaters, and storytelling venues have gradually flourished. Those people sit down and shout loudly, forming cliques, and upon closer inspection, there are no officials or businessmen among them: each one is burly, eats messily, dresses haphazardly, and behaves rudely. Alas, what a mess this world is! These people can't really be blamed, but what's strange is that those literati, warriors, and officials of the past! China has actually allowed such people to hold power and discuss national affairs, while us common folks have only been struggling until today; it's really too late!
When the bandits rebelled back then, they hated foreign goods and would kill anyone caught using them without mercy. For example, cigarettes, glasses, and even foreign umbrellas and socks—anyone caught using them would be executed immediately. There were once six students who fled in panic; because they had a pencil and a piece of foreign paper on them, they were discovered by bandits on the road and brutally hacked to death. Luo Jichen's brother, Xilu, made his way from Henan to Tianjin with two boxes of foreign books, reluctant to part with them. On the way, he was tied to a tree by bandits, and passersby took turns slashing at him. The bandits' knives were quite dull, yet he surprisingly survived, shouting to the sky, which the bandits found rather entertaining; one of his servants, who had followed him for many years and insisted he was a good man, was also killed, leaving only the coachman unharmed. Their hatred for foreign goods had reached such extremes.
Now, however, things are completely different: those in tattered hats, old leather shoes, dirty clothes, and ragged pants feel the need to flaunt them; on their low-brimmed white hats, they enjoy writing in foreign script, mixing cursive and regular styles, with countless spelling mistakes, all in an attempt to curry favor with foreigners; they strut around with their heads held high, as if they’re something special. Alas, don't those folks from the North realize that shame exists in this world?
At the beginning, when the Boxers were causing trouble, the high-ranking officials in Beijing, although some like Xu Guozhang and Yuan Shikai understood the situation, were still controlled by the court and had no way to take action. Only Yu Lu (裕禄) could resolve the issue, but he hesitated, was weak and indecisive, and ultimately caused a great disaster; he got what he deserved! He made two major mistakes: first, he did not adopt General Yang Futong's suggestion to eliminate the Boxers; second, after the railways in Changxindian and other places were destroyed, he still tolerated and condoned their actions. By May 18th or 19th, the Boxers had already developed into a wildfire that couldn't be contained. If he hadn't lied about his military successes, the court might have remained alert, and the situation could have ended sooner; but he was afraid of losing his position and his life, and never dared to tell the truth, even hoping that the Boxers could be of some use. So when Zhang Decheng reported that the Boxers had won a battle, he rewarded him; when the Holy Mother of Huanglian arrived, he even knelt down to greet her; he even opened the armory to allow the Boxers to take weapons freely; he even offered a bounty for the heads of foreigners: fifty taels of silver for a man, forty for a woman, and thirty for a child, and the bounty notices were eventually seized by the allied forces. In this way, the chaos turned into something completely unmanageable. Alas! It is truly heartbreaking!
What is most embarrassing is that this time, in killing foreigners and driving them away, they used all their efforts. However, the thousands of troops in Beijing's Cuihu Shen Camp, Shenji Camp, Wuwei Army, and Zhongjun, could not handle the Boxers, who were fewer than a thousand in Jiaomin Lane; the tens of thousands in Tianjin's Lianjun, Niejun, and Songjun could not deal with fewer than three thousand in the concession. The Boxers were originally nothing, and General Dong from Langfang even falsely reported military achievements, claiming he had won a battle; the Li Army in Tongzhou collapsed before even fighting, truly the most pathetic of the pathetic! As the saying goes: "Zhou has great rewards, good people are rich."
This bout of great chaos is completely different from the past. There were few rich people in the country, but many foreign laborers. On the day Tianjin fell, foreign working-class individuals in Tianjin were hauling carts back and forth, at least six or seven trips. Those who were penniless before might now have hundreds of thousands of taels of silver. Forty or fifty pawn shops, hundreds of bureaucratic wealthy households, a dozen or so salt merchants suddenly lost all their possessions and clothing, except for a few books and paintings taken by foreigners; most of it was burned. But this is just one county's situation in Tianjin. As for the capital city, those officials fled west in panic, taking nothing with them, with Qing troops looting in front and the allied forces ransacking from behind. Everything accumulated since the Yuan and Ming dynasties, from statutes and artifacts to national treasures, was swept away. Recently, seeing the Western armies withdraw from Beijing, each person carried several large bags, mostly containing rare treasures, coming with empty bags and leaving with bound goods. Half of these items will likely find their way into museums abroad, so even if they lose the war, they won't face any real losses. The privately collected items in China have all been sent abroad and will never return, forever marking a national disgrace. Not to mention the future military expenses, the losses from this time alone exceed hundreds of thousands of taels! Alas! If the Yellow Emperor and Shen Nong were aware of what was happening down below, they would surely be heartbroken! Who is truly to blame for this catastrophe?
"Yao Liangcai, the commander of the Nie Army, was stationed at the Tianjin East Manufacturing Bureau, which had not been lost. At first, he allowed his soldiers to plunder the silver from the mint, and in the blink of an eye, hundreds of thousands of taels had been looted. Then, when the Western troops came to attack, he set fire to the manufacturing bureau, setting it ablaze several times to fan the flames. Eventually, the cotton factory inexplicably exploded, and the Nie Army retreated, abandoning it to the foreigners. He saw the Western army's attack as exactly what he wanted; otherwise, those hundreds of thousands of taels of silver would have nowhere to settle. On May 21st and 22nd, the Nie Army rampaged everywhere, truly a sight that was unbearable to witness. The personnel beneath the head of the Military Academy fled wearing only thin clothes. But since the Military Academy had no troops to defend it, why should the Nie Army be the only ones blamed?
A foreigner, Deng Erluo, said: 'Beijing's Jiaomin Lane had been besieged for several months, and something very strange happened, which remains a mystery to this day: one day, during an intense battle between the attacking and defending sides, a young Chinese man waving a white towel suddenly appeared among the foreign soldiers. The foreign soldiers captured him and interrogated him, only to find out that he was delivering a message for the foreigners in Tianjin. The letter contained many important matters, so the foreign soldiers wrote him a reply, and he left. Half a month later, this person returned with a letter from Tianjin, saying that Yang Village had been taken, and the allied forces could set off. Everyone was delighted and applauded. They offered him a reward of a thousand gold pieces, but he firmly refused; when asked his name, he did not answer; when asked why he did this, he said that his mother once told him that to save China from destruction, they must save the envoy, and he did this for his mother, not for any other reason; when asked if he could make another trip to Tianjin to deliver a message, he said: 'My task is complete, I will not do it again.' After saying this, he suddenly disappeared. If this is true, then those who worry about Zhou's (referring to Premier Zhou Enlai) death cannot enjoy this glory alone, and this young man is a figure like Lu Zhonglian. The survival of the Chinese people depends entirely on him! I heard this young man was from the North and didn’t speak any foreign languages."
I also heard that foreigners in Tianjin said: In the villages above Dagu, there are many bandits lurking. Western commanders wanted to find someone to investigate the situation, but finding suitable candidates was difficult. A young man was willing to go himself, so a few soldiers were sent to escort him. As he was about to enter the bandits' territory, he turned back and said, "This is not the way to escort scouts!" The soldiers realized and all shouted together to catch him, punching and kicking him. Gasping for breath and running wildly, drenched in sweat, he reached the place and sat under a tree, crying and cursing. The bandits, hearing the commotion, mistook him for one of their own, so they helped him back and treated him well, telling him all the important information and agreeing on a time to come out together. One day, they crossed the boundary together and were caught by foreigners, thus thoroughly understanding the situation of the bandits' hideout and eliminating them in one fell swoop. The foreigners were very grateful to him and offered him money, which he refused. When asked for his name and address, he did not say anything. This man was also from the North.
Most of the bandits were ignorant peasants from the countryside, temporarily coming to Tianjin. The so-called bustling city amazed them with everything they encountered, and no one knew their names. The Jinshi Lianmao Company had always transported goods for the Swire Company, so it was believed to be dealing with foreigners, thus it was searched and robbed. Upon entering, they spotted a sign made of shiny copper plates and shouted it was a golden carriage (a carriage made of gold) and then left.
I saw them eagerly chewing on cow knee grass, mistaking it for ginseng, and they also took Western sugar. As soon as they tasted it, someone nearby shouted, "This is alum!" and he quickly spat it out. This person really knew nothing.
When things first started, there were shouts everywhere in and out of Tianjin city, some saying "The Boxer Rebellion has achieved a great victory," and others saying "All foreigners have been killed." They wanted it to rain and shouted for rain, wanted it to clear up and shouted for clear skies, spending the whole day offering water, burning incense, and praying; those who disobeyed were executed. Their methods were truly unfathomable.
"The discontent among Western forces in the north is quite rare in Europe. However, the Boxers' atrocities certainly fueled the fire. The Boxers killed missionaries and Russians in an extremely cruel manner, including chopping, pounding, burying alive, branding with hot irons, dismembering, and decapitation; it's hard to list them all. The Catholic cemetery to the west of Beijing was dug up, and the remains of notable missionaries like Matteo Ricci, Ferdinand Verbiest, Johann Adam Schall von Bell, and Nicolas Trigault were desecrated. The imperial steles of the Qing Dynasty and earlier were smashed. In Baoding Prefecture, there was a family named Zhang Deng who had many connections to missionaries. When the Boxers captured their women, they would dig a hole, bury them upside down, leaving only their lower bodies exposed, for their own amusement. This is utterly inhumane! Ah, everyone has a cruel and vicious side, usually hidden from view. Once incited, it immediately erupts. The differences between Eastern and Western cultures are nothing but empty rhetoric!"
