The Last Empress - Anchee Min [138]
When we reached Tung-kuan I received a telegram from Li Hung-chang reporting that the negotiations had come to a halt. "The Allies demand we show evidence of punishment," Li wrote.
I was expected to hand over General Tung and Prince Ts'eng. I had never felt so manipulated. No matter how I justified it, I would be betraying my own people.
It wasn't until the arrival of Yung Lu that General Tung complied with the throne's instructions to reduce his troop strength by five thousand. He withdrew to the distance the Allies had requested, outside of Peking, which meant our further vulnerability.
Li Hung-chang sent me a transcript of his day's negotiations as a reply to my complaints regarding the foreigners' demands:
ALLIES: Do not such people as Prince Ts'eng and his Ironhats deserve death?
LI: They did not accomplish their purpose.
ALLIES: Sixty people were killed and one hundred sixty wounded in the legations.
LI: The number of deaths of Ironhats, Boxers and civilians of China were in the thousands.
ALLIES: What would you think if the Prince of Wales and cousins of the Queen had headed an attack on the Chinese minister in London?
LI: The Ironhats were foolish people.
Under pressure from Li Hung-chang, on November 13 I issued an edict announcing punishments. Prince Ts'eng Junior and his brothers were to be imprisoned for life at Mukden, near Manchuria. His cousins were to be either placed under house arrest or degraded in rank and would lose all of their privileges. The punishment of the former governor of Shantung was waived because he had died. Other governors who had failed to protect the foreign missionaries were to be banished for life, exiled to the remote frontier in Turkistan and condemned to hard labor. Master Red Sword and two other ringleaders, who were distant royal relatives, were to be executed.
The Allies considered the punishments inadequate. They called what had happened "unprecedented in human history, crimes against the laws of nations, against the laws of humanity, and against civilization."
I had no other choice but to issue another decree assigning stiffer sentences. I failed to please the Allies again, for my words were believed to be worthless—and I would surely find a way to help the criminals evade punishment.
In order to prove myself, I invited the foreign press to witness a public execution, to be held at the vegetable market on Greengrocer Street in central Peking.
The locals suffered tremendous humiliation when the tall, high-nosed, blond-haired foreigners showed up with their flashing cameras.
"It is impossible to know what large fee was paid to the executioner," George Morrison of the Times wrote of the event. "Two mats were laid down. There was a great crowd, a multitude of correspondents, and photographs by the score were taken. Rarely has an execution been seen by so many nationalities ... One slice in each case was sufficient."
The journalists cheered when the heads rolled.
I was deeply ashamed.
At the Allies' request, I ordered the execution of ten additional Boxer ringleaders. Except for the two beheadings carried out in public, the rest I granted an honorable suicide.
Family members came begging for the lives of their loved ones. "Your Majesty supported the Boxers," they cried, gathering outside my palace. Their petitions were written in blood.
I hid behind my gate, peering out like a coward. I sent Li Lien-ying to offer the wives and children a few taels for the winter. It was impossible to forgive myself.
Li Hung-chang argued back and forth with the Allies over the life of General Tung. They yielded only after an understanding was reached that the general could be useful in ensuring stability in northwestern China. Tung was deprived of his rank, but he would be allowed to remain the warlord of Kansu if he departed the capital