​ Chinese immigration in 19th century- a coincidence

During 19th century a large amounts of Chinese residents moved to the United States; the

number of Chinese immigrants increased drastically. That was the beginning of Chinese

immigration. The gold rush, Taiping rebellion and poor living condition in China mainland are

three factors that contributed to the movement of Chinese people to the United states in 19th

century.

China was governed by Qing dynasty during the 19th century, which was corrupted and

irresponsible to its people. Moreover, at that time China was mostly controlled by the Western

countries and the invasions those western countries made created a more terrible living

condition. Chinese civils at that time did not even have enough food to eat. The drought made

harvesting impossible and because of that a plenty of people died from famine. Drought was not

the foremost crisis Chinese people were facing with . The foremost crisis for Chinese people and

their government was a tremendous increase of population. A data showed, “1779-1850, brought

another 56% increase, bringing the total population to 430 million (approximately 1/2 the 1980

total) on the eve of the great Taiping rebellion of mid-century.” More populations means more

demands for more limited resources and also more lands; unfortunately, Qing dynasty could not

provide its people with all of those things because most of the lands were taken by the foreign

countries. With more people and less lands, the famine began to plague the whole country. One

women named Ning living in that time once wrote down this in her journal “I was so hungry one

day that I took a brick, pounded it to bits, and ate it. It made me feel better. (Ning Lao).” This

journal demonstrates the lives of middle and lower class Chinese people in 19th century. The
natural disaster, skyrocketed population growth, limited lands all happened at once in 19th

century China. What’s even worse was that the Qing dynasty only made a little response to those

issues; those officials even the emperor himself did not care about the lives of their people at all.

The poor living environment forced people to move to a better place to survive. Some people

wanted to overthrow the corrupted Qing dynasty to totally change the society itself.

In 1851, A person named “Hong xiuquan” who thought his mission was to pull

the devils out of China began a rebellion called “Taiping Rebellion”. Here is how it

started, “​Hong ​Xiuquan's teachings and the famine sparked a January 1851

uprising in Jintian (now called Guiping), which the government quashed. In response, a

rebel army of 10,000 men and women marched to Jintian and overran the garrison of

Qing troops stationed there; this marks the official start of the Taiping Rebellion.(​Kallie

Szczepanski​)”Hong promoted the idea of communism and also the abolishment of

private ownership of property. That idea let many people become the followers of

Taiping rebellion. ​In order to suppress this rebellion, Qing dynasty asked the helps from the

Western countries. Clashes between Taiping soldiers and Soldiers of Qing Dynasty made China

more chaotic than what it was already. Many cities and towns were destroyed during those

clashes.According to a historical document, after “Taiping rebellion” drove to the Northern part

of China, one of the leaders of Taiping soldiers “ Yang xiuquan” wanted to usurp the power of

“Tian Wang”; because of that he and thousands of his followers were slain. Another Taiping

general, “ Shi Da Kai”, began to fear for his life, and he abandoned Hong, taking with him many

of the Taiping followers.(anonymous) Many people who were involved in Taiping rebellions

were either killed by soldiers of Qing dynasty or their own leaders. As the history documents
stated, the Taiping rebellion was bloody. Taiping rebellion promoted the idea of “total war”,

everybody is involved in this rebellion. However, some of the people were not willing to join the

army because they just want a more peaceful place to live. According to the records, “​At its

peak, the Taiping Heavenly Army likely fielded approximately 500,000 soldiers, male and

female.（​ ​Kallie Szczepanski​）”At the end of Taiping rebellion, all of the leaders and soldiers

were executed by Qing Dynasty. Taiping rebellion created a lot of turmoils at that time just like

all the other wars; Some people who did not want to involve with this rebellion moved to the

other parts of the world to find a safer place to live. Most of people moved to the United States

because at that time the gold was discovered in the United States.

Another big event in 19th century was the gold rush of California. People discovered a plenty

of golds in California and millions of people from worldwide went to the United States in order

to gain the golds. One of the documents described the eagerness of people to gain those golds,

“Digging for gold from early dawn until dusk was backbreaking work. The hope of “striking it

rich” became an obsession with many of the Forty-Niners. Stories of others who had found their

fortune in gold kept driving them on. A streak of bad luck could always be followed by a rich

strike.（​Beilharz, Alan​）” The news that golden treasures were discovered in California reached

China. Thousands of Chinese people went to the United States to find golds to supply their

family and to flee the famine, conflicts in their country. According to one of the historical

documents， “the number of Chinese immigrants were “ 1855,3329…………..1869,14990.”

Since 1855, more and more Chinese people immigrated into the United States.（​Scharf, J.

Thomas​）” Many of them became miners in California; they would send their money back to

China after they earned some money from the gold mining. Most of them did not become rich by
doing this but at least they got some things to support their family in China. One of the historical

documents documented this phenomenon, “ the Chinese immigrants were mainly peasant

farmers who left home because of economic and political troubles in China. Most intended to

work hard, make a lot of money, and then return to their families and villages as wealthy men.”

（Roberta Kugell Gumport）” In 19th century, drought was one of the main problems Chinese

peasants were facing. They could not harvest from the crops because of drought;without those

harvestings, they could not have things to eat and also to sell. Golden products were thought as a

symbol of wealth at that time; the discovery of gold could be a great opportunity for them to

become wealthy and get out of such poor situation. Thus, when those peasants heard that there

was an opportunity to earn the golds, they were fanatic about going.

To conclude, Chinese people in 19th century moved to the United States because of a

coincidence. The internal turmoil caused by the rebels, poor living condition and eagerness for

gold spurred many Chinese people in 19th century to move to the other side of the world. What

is interesting is that all those three factors happened at approximately same time. The Taiping

rebellion began in 1851; the gold rush began in 1849 and from 1849 to 1855 the drought plagued

the Chinese mainland. The drought or poor living conditions and the internal turmoil caused

from these events made people start to think of movements; at the same time, the news that gold

was discovered in the other part of the world reached the Chinese mainland. It is reasonable to

say that the gold was discovered at the right time. After the Chinese people heard that gold was

discovered in the other part of the world, those who considered moving to the other places knew

where should they go. In 19th century, thousands of Chinese people immigrated into the United

States to mine the gold. The first immigration of Chinese people to the United States was a
coincidence; if gold was not discovered in California in 1849, then the Chinese people who

wanted to flee from the famine and internal turmoil would have had to spend a long time finding

a suitable place to live. To some degree, the gold rush provided a way for the Chinese people to

solve the dilemma of where to locate. That is to say, gold rush pulled the Chinese people into the

United States;Taiping rebellion and poor living condition in China mainland push some Chinese

people out of China. Sometimes coincidence is an essential factor in historical events just as the

universe does operate in a mysterious way.