CHINESE HISTORY

WRITTEN BY:
 Kenneth Pletcher
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Opium Wars, two armed conflicts in China in the mid-19th century

between the forces of Western countries and of the Qing dynasty,
which ruled China from 1644 to 1911/12. The first Opium War (1839–
42) was fought between China and Britain, and the second Opium War
(1856–60), also known as the Arrow War or the Anglo-French War in
China, was fought by Britain and France against China. In each case
the foreign powers were victorious and gained commercial privileges
and legal and territorial concessions in China. The conflicts marked
the start of the era of unequal treaties and other inroads on
Qing sovereignty that helped weaken and ultimately topple
the dynasty in favour of republican China in the early 20th century.
second Opium War battleBattle scene of a British assault during the Second
Opium War (or Arrow War; 1856–60); undated illustration.Public Domain
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The First Opium War

questions and answers about the Opium WarsQuestions and answers

about the Opium Wars.Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.See all videos for this
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The Opium Wars arose from China’s attempts to suppress the opium
trade. Foreign traders (primarily British) had been illegally
exporting opium mainly from India to China since the 18th century,
but that trade grew dramatically from about 1820. The resulting
widespread addiction in China was causing serious social and
economic disruption there. In spring 1839 the Chinese government
confiscated and destroyed more than 20,000 chests of opium—some
1,400 tons of the drug—that were warehoused at Canton (Guangzhou)
by British merchants. The antagonism between the two sides
increased in July when some drunken British sailors killed a Chinese
villager. The British government, which did not wish its subjects to be
tried in the Chinese legal system, refused to turn the accused men over
to the Chinese courts.

Hostilities broke out later that year when British warships destroyed a
Chinese blockade of the Pearl River (Zhu Jiang) estuary at Hong Kong.
The British government decided in early 1840 to send an
expeditionary force to China, which arrived at Hong Kong in June. The
British fleet proceeded up the Pearl River estuary to Canton, and, after
months of negotiations there, attacked and occupied the city in May
1841. Subsequent British campaigns over the next year were likewise
successful against the inferior Qing forces, despite a determined
counterattack by Chinese troops in the spring of 1842. The British held
against that offensive, however, and captured Nanjing (Nanking) in
late August, which put an end to the fighting.
first Opium WarBritish ships attacking a Chinese battery on the Pearl River
during the first Opium War, 1841.From Narrative of a Voyage Round the World:
Performed in Her Majesty's ship Sulphur, During the Years 1836-1842, Including Details
of the Naval Operations in China, from Dec. 1840, to Nov. 1841, by Captain Sir Edward
Belcher, R.N.

Peace negotiations proceeded quickly, resulting in the Treaty of

Nanjing, signed on August 29. By its provisions, China was required to
pay Britain a large indemnity, cede Hong Kong Island to the British,
and increase the number of treaty ports where the British could trade
and reside from one (Canton) to five. Among the four additional
designated ports was Shanghai, and the new access to foreigners there
marked the beginning of the city’s transformation into one of China’s
major commercial entrepôts. The British Supplementary Treaty of the
Bogue (Humen), signed October 8, 1843, gave British
citizens extraterritoriality (the right to be tried by British courts)
and most-favoured-nation status (Britain was granted any rights in
China that might be granted to other foreign countries). Other
Western countries quickly demanded and were given similar
privileges.
 Treaty of NanjingThe signing of the Treaty of Nanjing.Anne S.K. Brown
Military Collection, Brown University Library
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The Second Opium War

In the mid-1850s, while the Qing government was embroiled in trying
to quell the Taiping Rebellion (1850–64), the British, seeking to
extend their trading rights in China, found an excuse to renew
hostilities. In early October 1856 some Chinese officials boarded the
British-registered ship Arrow while it was docked in Canton, arrested
several Chinese crew members (who were later released), and
allegedly lowered the British flag. Later that month a British warship
sailed up the Pearl River estuary and began bombarding Canton, and
there were skirmishes between British and Chinese troops. Trading
ceased as a stalemate ensued. In December Chinese in Canton burned
foreign factories (trading warehouses) there, and tensions escalated.

The French decided to join the British military expedition, using as

their excuse the murder of a French missionary in the interior of China
in early 1856. After delays in assembling the forces in China (British
troops that were en route were first diverted to India to help quell
the Indian Mutiny), the allies began military operations in late 1857.
They quickly captured Canton, deposed the
city’s intransigent governor, and installed a more-compliant official. In
May 1858 allied troops in British warships reached Tianjin (Tientsin)
and forced the Chinese into negotiations. The treaties of Tianjin,
signed in June 1858, provided residence in Beijing for foreign envoys,
the opening of several new ports to Western trade and residence, the
right of foreign travel in the interior of China, and freedom of
movement for Christian missionaries. In further negotiations
in Shanghai later in the year, the importation of opium was legalized.

The British withdrew from Tianjin in the summer of 1858, but they
returned to the area in June 1859 en route to Beijing with French and
British diplomats to ratify the treaties. The Chinese refused to let them
pass by the Dagu forts at the mouth of the Hai River and proposed an
alternate route to Beijing. The British-led forces decided against taking
the other route and instead tried to push forward past Dagu. They
were driven back with heavy casualties. The Chinese subsequently
refused to ratify the treaties, and the allies resumed hostilities. In
August 1860 a considerably larger force of warships and British and
French troops destroyed the Dagu batteries, proceeded upriver to
Tianjin, and, in October, captured Beijing and plundered and then
burned the Yuanming Garden, the emperor’s summer palace. Later
that month the Chinese signed the Beijing Convention, in which they
agreed to observe the treaties of Tianjin and also ceded to the British
the southern portion of the Kowloon Peninsula adjacent to Hong
Kong.

Kenneth PletcherThe Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica

LEARN MORE in these related Britannica articles:


 China: The first Opium War and its aftermath

In February 1840 the British government decided to launch a military expedition, and Elliot
and his cousin, George (later Sir George) Elliot, were appointed joint plenipotentiaries to
China (though the latter, in poor health, resigned in November). In June, 16…

Western colonialism: The Opium Wars

The first phase of the forceful penetration of China by western Europe came in the
two Opium Wars. Great Britain had been buying increasing quantities of tea from China, but
it had few products that China was interested in buying by way of…

Lin Zexu: Role in the first Opium War

Following the traditional period of mourning and retirement at the death of his father, a time
that also served for reflection and literary activity, Lin returned to official life in the upper
reaches of the government. When, in the middle of the 1830s,…
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Opium Wars
QUICK FACTS

DATE
 1839 - 1842
 1856 - 1860
TIMELINE
 Timeline of the First Opium War
 Timeline of the Second Opium War (Arrow War)
LOCATION
 Guangzhou
 China
 Jiangsu
 Guangdong
 Beijing
PARTICIPANTS
 China
 Qing dynasty
 France
 United Kingdom
KEY PEOPLE
 Charles-Guillaume-Marie-Apollinaire-Antoine Cousin-Montauban, count de
Palikao
 Charles George Gordon
 Sir Hugh Gough
 Lin Zexu
 Robert Napier, 1st Baron Napier
  Daoguang
MAJOR EVENTS
 Treaty of Nanjing
 First Opium War
 Arrow War
RELATED TOPICS
 British Supplementary Treaty of the Bogue
 Canton system
 Opium trade
 Treaty port
 Unequal treaty
DID YOU KNOW?
 China was not only a major power in the East under the Qing but also a wealthy
country and a major exporter of luxury goods prior to the Opium Wars.
 Under the Canton Trade System, which regulated foreign access to China before
the Opium Wars, foreign merchants were restricted to one port of access and were
subjected to Chinese regulations while in the country.
 The Opium Wars were actually quite small; the British side of the First Opium
War fought with only twenty naval vessels and fewer than five thousand troops.

Sir Hugh Gough

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 Sir Hugh Gough
BRITISH MILITARY OFFICER
WRITTEN BY:
 The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
See Article History
Alternative Titles: 1st Viscount Gough, Baron Gough

Sir Hugh Gough, also called (1846–49) Baron Gough, or (from

1849) 1st Viscount Gough, (born Nov. 3, 1779, Limerick, County
Limerick, Ire.—died March 2, 1869, St. Helen’s, near Dublin), British
soldier prominent in the Peninsular War and in India, who was said to
have commanded in more general actions than any British officer
except the Duke of Wellington.

The son of a lieutenant colonel in the Limerick city militia, Gough

obtained a commission in the British Army at age 13. He took part in
the British occupation of the Cape of Good Hope in 1796 and
campaigned in the West Indies in 1797–1800. A major by purchase at
25, he commanded the Royal Irish Fusiliers regiment in Portugal and
Spain during the Peninsular War (1808–14). He was severely
wounded at Talavera (1809), led his forces to victory at Barrosa (1811),
helped defend Tarifa, and captured the baton of the French marshal
Jean-Baptiste Jourdan at Vitoria (1813). He was knighted in 1815 and
pensioned, and for 20 years he saw action only briefly, against the
peasantry of southern Ireland (1821–24). As a major general, he was
given command in Mysore, India, in 1837 and led the expedition to
China in the first Opium War (1839–42). He was appointed
commander in chief in India in 1843 and defeated the Marāthā army
that year and then the Sikhs in the Sikh Wars in 1845–46 and in
1848–49.

Gough suffered unexpectedly heavy losses against the Sikhs; his tactics
were criticized, and he was replaced by Sir Charles Napier. Gough was
made a baron after the First Sikh War (1846) and raised to a
viscountcy after the second (1849); he returned home to the thanks of
both houses of Parliament. In 1855 he was appointed colonel of the
Royal Horse Guards and in 1862 was made field marshal.

00:00

LEARN MORE in these related Britannica articles:

Battle of Firoz Shah

…of about 18,000 men under Sir Hugh Gough attacked a Sikh army of 35,000 under Lal
Singh in late afternoon. After a near repulse and a night of peril, the British achieved victory
in the morning at a cost of about 2,400 casualties compared with about 8,000 Sikh casualties.
Gough…
 

Peninsular War

Peninsular War, (1808–14), that part of the Napoleonic Wars fought in the Iberian Peninsula,
where the French were opposed by British, Spanish, and Portuguese forces. Napoleon’s
peninsula struggle contributed considerably to his eventual downfall; but until 1813 the
conflict in Spain and…

Sikh Wars

Sikh Wars, (1845–46; 1848–49), two campaigns fought between the Sikhs and the British.
They resulted in the conquest and annexation by the British of the Punjab in northwestern
India. The first war was precipitated by mutual suspicions and the turbulence of the Sikh
army. The Sikh state in the Punjab had…

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