October 5, 1881, August 13 of the old calendar. The General Taxation Division, Hede, wrote to Jin Denggan, director of the Chinese Customs Office in London, saying that Li Hongzhang might appoint U.S. Navy Admiral Xue Feier as commander-in-chief of the Beiyang Marine Division, complaining that the British government had not allowed him to try his luck in order to give the British this status.
Li
October 5, 1885, August 27 of the old calendar. Xu Jingcheng, minister in France and Germany, sent a telegram to Li Hongzhang, saying that the machine of the "Jiyuan" dome cruiser was broken, and asked the "Zhenyuan" ship to go to Singapore for repairs.
Jiyuan ship
October 5, 1894, the seventh day of the ninth month of the old calendar. The Qing court sent a telegram to Li Hongzhang, saying that the Beiyang Navy had injured various ships, and that they had heard that they had been repaired one after another, but the two large ships only needed to be repaired in half a month, and it was too late, and they were processed and repaired day and night, and if any enemy ships drove by, they would intercept head-on.
On the same day, Li Hongzhang asked Ding Ruchang to draw up a "Statute of Punishment and Persuasion of the Navy," which stipulated that after that, all ships of the Navy should engage in military law when they retreated from the enemy, and that the former enemy would try their best to attack the attackers, and although the warships were sunk and burned, the officers and men in the ships were saved and spared punishment, and they were still judged for their merits.
Admiral Ding Ruchang of the Beiyang Navy
After the Yellow Sea War, the "Naval Punishment Regulations" promulgated soon after the "Beiyang Naval Regulations" have more human nature and warmth than the "Beiyang Naval Regulations" reward and punishment. However, the reason why Ding Ruchang was in a hurry to introduce this regulation had a lot to do with the heroic martyrdom of Deng Shichang in the pipe of the "Zhiyuan" ship.
In the Battle of the Yellow Sea, the "Zhiyuan" ship pipe led Deng Shichang to drive the battleship to the Flagship of the Japanese Combined Fleet " Yoshino " with full horsepower, thus sinking "Yoshino", but unfortunately was hit by a torpedo, the "Zhiyuan" ship sank, and after Deng Shichang fell into the water, both comrades-in-arms and dogs rescued him. However, Deng Shichang, who swore to coexist and die with the battleship, refused to rescue him and sacrificed himself in the turbid Yellow Sea.
After Deng Shichang's heroic martyrdom, the Qing government gave Deng Shichang a strong commendation, and it was a huge pension, and it was also a posthumous gift to the prince Shaobao, and the people also sang and praised Deng Shichang, and Deng Shichang became a national hero and will remain in the annals of history forever.
However, as far as Ding Ruchang, admiral of the Beiyang Navy, was concerned, in the Battle of the Yellow Sea, the largest steam ship-ship duel in the history of the world, not only lost the main battleship of the Beiyang Navy, the "Zhiyuan", which greatly reduced the strength of the Beiyang Navy, but also lost Deng Shichang, who was a capable general.
Deng Shichang
Therefore, in the face of the aggressive aggression of the Japanese army, Ding Ruchang did not agree with Deng Shichang's martyrdom, he believed that the warship was sunk by the enemy, as long as the general himself did his best, he was innocent, and he should try his best to escape and save one more general for the country.
Stay in the green mountains, not afraid of no firewood. Based on the above understanding, in order to learn the lesson of losing Deng Shichang, Ding Ruchang urgently formulated the "Naval Punishment Regulations" to give leniency to the officers and men who damaged warships during the war.
Li Hongzhang, as Ding Ruchang's immediate superior and the founder of the Beiyang Marine Division, also felt the same feeling, completely agreed with Ding Ruchang's point of view, and also believed that Deng Shichang's move was not worth advocating, and explicitly ordered all the officers and men of the Beiyang Marine Division not to follow suit.
On the same day, after receiving a further detailed report on the Battle of the Yellow Sea, Li Hongzhang compiled and wrote the "Battle Situation of Dadonggou" to report to the Qing court, which is the most detailed and authoritative record of the Battle of Dadonggou by the Chinese authorities.