S01E27 Taiping Rebellion: Second Opium War-Storming the Dagu Forts

Chinese Revolutions: A History Podcast

S01E27 Taiping Rebellion: Second Opium War-Storming the Dagu Forts

As part of the ongoing series on the Taiping Rebellion, we're taking a look at the storming of the Dagu Forts, which guarded the waterway approaching Beijing. While the civil war between official Qing forces and Taiping rebels was going on, the foreign powers decided to push their own issues with the Qing government.

Of interest to us is how this reduced the prestige and authority of the Qing Dynasty. While the Taiping Rebellion ultimately failed, it advanced the specific understanding of later revolutionaries who would overthrow the Qing: get rid of the foreign Manchu overlords and replace the imperial dynastic system.

Storming the Dagu Forts

In May 1858, a combined British-French fleet bombarded and took the Dagu Forts by storm. This was the most important Chinese coastal fortification, protecting the direct waterway to Beijing.

Foreign powers were careful not to act unilaterally, keeping the balance of power between foreign powers acting in China and trying to demonstrate to the Chinese that they weren't trying for a trade monopoly.

They succeeded in forcing the Qing government to negotiate a new treaty with foreign powers, granting additional trade concessions and freedom of movement for foreign nationals.

The most galling concession for Qing prestige was the permanent stationing of European ambassadors in Beijing. The path foreign diplomatic staff would take was the traditional route for foreign tribute missions. This time, the foreigners would be coming and going with zero tokens of submission to the Chinese emperor.

About the Taiping Rebellion...

Foreign powers were trying to be neutral in the Taiping Rebellion. They just wanted to sell their products and buy Chinese products.

What distinguished foreign intervention in China from imperial ventures elsewhere was the relative lack of attempts to conquer and rule portions of Chinese territory. Yet foreign armies ran all over China, looting, killing, and destroying anyhow.

Foreign powers would ultimately intervene on behalf of the Qing, but it wouldn't leave them looking like the ones in charge.

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