In February 1867 (Tongzhi 6), the American steamship Rover, bound from Shantou, Guangdong, China, to Niuzhuang, Shandong, sank on the reef on its way through Hongtou Island. The 14 American and Chinese crew members on board, all in lifeboats, drifted to Langya (present-day Hengchun Town, Pingtung County) ashore, were killed by the indigenous people, and only one escaped and was rescued by the local Han chinese.
After the Rover event, the processing level is getting higher and higher. On July 21, a note from Wu Tang, the governor of Fujian and Zhejiang, and Li Futai, the governor of Fujian, not only reported the beginning and end of the incident to the two empresses of Ci'an and Cixi, as well as the Tongzhi Emperor, affirmed the handling methods of the general soldiers and Daotai, and at the same time said that they had sent Zeng Yuanfu, Lifan Tongzhi Wang Wendi, and others who were familiar with the situation in the area, to handle the case, promising to find the murderer of the trouble and let the US side retrieve the body of the victim.
At this time, the prime minister in charge of handling foreign affairs, Wang Wei, the minister of state affairs, and Prince Gong Yishi also began to express their position, pointing out that although Taiwan's shengfan was not regulated by the laws of the Qing Dynasty, "its land is the ground of China", so he believed that when Qing officials debated with foreign consuls, "they should not reveal the non-national territory." For the follow-up judgment of the situation at that time, Yi Bi believed that whether the indigenous people lost or the United States lost, the situation would be more difficult, and the handling methods of the governor of Fujian and Zhejiang and Taiwan Province were too slow, so Prince Gong personally ordered the acceleration of the handling, "Do not be confused and let the United States have a handle to grasp."
These remarks show that the top level of the Qing court was not as good as that of the local officials at the grass-roots level--Wu Dating, taiwan's military reserve road, who "gave birth to a fan on the terrace, lived in a cave, did not carry the territory, and was not reached by the sound religion.", on the contrary, it was even more able to raise the national vision, from the new importance of the Western powers to China's concept of sovereignty, to view the importance of the "territory."At that time, it was indeed not an easy thing to have this kind of thinking.
As for the attitude of the Tongzhi Emperor, the archives do not find much of his views on the handling of the Luofa incident, and the imperial approval is mostly "the Yamen knows" and "according to the discussion", in addition, in October of the sixth year of Tongzhi, the Tongzhi Emperor specifically mentioned the then US ambassador to China, Anson Burlingame, who expressed his agreement with Prince Gong's proposal to hire the outgoing Pu Anchen as the "Minister of Foreign Affairs in China", that is, to represent the Qing government in foreign work. This is the origin of the later very famous Pu Anchen Mission.
Who is Pu Anchen?
Pu Anchen was born on November 14, 1820 in New Berlin, New York. On June 14, 1861, shortly after President Lincoln took office, he appointed Pu Anchen as the thirteenth U.S. Minister to China. The term of office consists of 6 years. On July 20, 1862, Pu Anchen arrived in Beijing and became one of the first foreign envoys to settle in Beijing. During his term as minister to China, Pu anchen actively implemented the "policy of cooperation" with China proposed by US Secretary of State Seward: to carry out "impartial" diplomatic activities to replace "diplomacy by force." "Neither demand nor occupy the concession at the treaty ports" and "never threaten the territorial integrity of the Chinese Empire." Compared with the tyranny of Russia, France, Germany and other countries, the United States' attitude toward China won the favor of the Qing government and also had special trust in Pu Anchen.
During his tenure as minister, once an American committed a crime in China, causing a lot of trouble to the local people, Pu Anchen, after listening to the testimony of the Chinese victim, immediately ordered the American prisoner to be sentenced to death as a minister and dragged out to hang.
On November 27, 1867, Pu Anchen, who had been a minister to China for six years, was about to leave his post and return to China, and at the banquet hosted for him by Prime Minister Yamen, "In the future, when there are unfair things with various countries, Yi Bi will do very much, that is, just as China sent Yi as an envoy." ”。 At that time, the Qing government was preparing to send its first mission to foreign countries, but it was suffering from a lack of suitable diplomatic talents and was very embarrassed by the issue of etiquette. Prince Gong Yi made a concerted remark and proposed to appoint Pu Anchen, a friendly person, as China's first plenipotentiary envoy (Minister of Foreign Affairs between China) to represent the Chinese Government on envoys to the United States, Britain, France, Prussia, and Russia to carry out China's first modern diplomatic activities, and this opinion was immediately adopted.
On February 25, 1868, the first Pu Anchen mission of the Qing government, a group of thirty people, set sail from the Huangpu River Wharf in Hongkou, Shanghai, on the ship "Gusdagory" to San Francisco, USA. He was accompanied by two Chinese officials: Prime Minister Yamen Jiming Customs Dao Zhigang and Rebbe LangZhong sun jiagu, as well as translator Zhang Deyi. Pu Anchen's two deputies: john M. Brown, a British embassy translator, and E.de Champs, a customs and tax justice officer on the right. For this trip, Pu Anchen was also commissioned to design China's first national flag.
In the United States, the Pu Anchen delegation and U.S. Secretary of State Seward signed the first reciprocal treaty in China's modern history, the Sino-US Renewal Treaty, known in history as the Pu Anchen Treaty. The treaty recognized China as an equal country and opposed a demand to cede China's territory.
In Britain, the Pu Anchen delegation continued to meet with Queen Victoria and Foreign Secretary Clarandon as "Chinese Chincha". Subsequently, Clarandon issued a self-contained note expressing the British government's willingness to work with the Chinese government "for peace" and to implement a policy of repealing and slowing down.
In France, Emperor Napoleon III received the Envoy of Pu Anchen. However, due to the strong opposition, Pu Anchen and his party stayed in Paris for more than half a year, but still could not achieve any results. Unable to obtain a treaty like the one in Washington, or a self-made note like in England, he had to leave France in disappointment.
In Prussia, the Purissian mission successfully concluded negotiations in Berlin, and Prime Minister Otto von Bismarck made a similar statement in favor of China as britain.
In Russia, Tsar Alexander II received the Delegation of Pu'anchen in St. Petersburg. At that time, Russia and Britain were vying for hegemony in Asia, and relations with the later United States were relatively friendly. However, the Tsar tried his best to avoid substantive contents such as the territorial dispute between China and Russia during the talks, which made Pu Anchen depressed and depressed, thinking day and night, and eventually contracted pneumonia, and died suddenly in St. Petersburg at the age of 50.
In recognition of Pu Anchen's "peace and consultation" when he was a minister in China and "serving the country" during his mission, the Qing dynasty government did its utmost to safeguard China's sovereignty and territorial integrity. He was awarded the title of Yipin and a pension of 10,000 taels of silver. His body was returned from Russia to the United States. The Boston city government held a grand farewell ceremony for his body in the famous Faneuil Hall, where the American Star-Spangled Banner and the Chinese Yellow Dragon Flag were hung.