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Li Hongzhang
Late Qing official from Hefei who raised the Huai Army, governed Zhili for a quarter century and signed the Treaty of Shimonoseki and the Boxer Protocol
Mural of the event “First Sino-Japanese War”, which this person took part in.
By the late nineteenth century, Qing China and Japan increasingly competed for political and strategic influence on the Korean peninsula. After the Donghak Peasant Movement in 1894, both states sent troops to Korea; diplomacy broke down and war followed.
Also known as Shao Quan · Yi Sou
Li Hongzhang, courtesy name Shaoquan, came from Hefei in Anhui and passed the metropolitan examination in 1847, later joining the staff of Zeng Guofan. In 1862 he raised the Huai Army, shipped it by steamer to Shanghai and, as acting governor of Jiangsu, fought the Taipings, winning an earldom. In 1870 he succeeded Zeng as governor-general of Zhili and commissioner for northern ports, and over the years he set up the Jiangnan Arsenal and a steamship company and built the Beiyang fleet, formally established in 1888. After the fleet was destroyed in the war with Japan, he went to Shimonoseki in 1895, was wounded in the face by a gunman during the talks, and signed a treaty ceding Taiwan and the Penghu Islands and paying 200 million taels. In 1901 he and Prince Qing signed the Boxer Protocol; he died in Beijing two months later and was given the posthumous name Wenzhong. Liang Qichao published a book-length study of him that same year.
Life and times
Dates 1823 CE–1901 CE
- 1861Self-Strengthening MovementTook partage 38
- 1861Self-Strengthening Arsenals and Beiyang Fleetage 38
- 1894First Sino-Japanese WarTook partage 71
- 1895Treaty of Shimonoseki Signedage 72