¹ See, for example, the long introduction by Michael, Franz to Spector, Stanley, Li Hung-chang and the Huai Army: a Study in Nineteenth-century Chinese Regionalism, Seattle, 1964.Google Scholar Also , Michael's earlier study, ‘Military Organization and Power Structure of China During the Taiping Rebellion,’ Pacific Historical Review, 18 (1949), 469–83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

² For some abstract thoughts here, see Levenson, Joseph L., ‘The Province, the Nation, and the World: The Problem of Chinese Identity’, in Feuerwerker, Albert et al. (eds.), Approaches to Modern Chinese History, Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1967, pp. 268–88.Google Scholar Also Chang P'eng-yüan, ‘The Constitutionalists’, and Fincher, John, ‘Political Provincialism and the National Revolution’, in Wright, Mary C. (ed.), China in Revolution: The First Phase, 1900–1913, New Haven, 1968, pp. 143–84 and 185–226, respectively.Google Scholar

³ For general accounts of his career, see Cameron, Meribeth E., ‘The Public Career of Chang Chih-tung, 1837–1909’, Pacific Historical Review, 7·3, (09 1938), 187–250;CrossRefGoogle Scholar the same author's contribution to Hummel, Arthur W. (ed.), Eminent Chinese of the Ch'ing Period, Washington, D.C., 1943, pp. 27–32;Google Scholar Ayers, Thomas W., ‘Chang Chih-tung and Chinese Educational Change’ (Harvard doctoral dissertation, 1959);Google Scholar and Chün, Hu, Chang Wen-hsiang-kung (Chih-tung) Nien-p'u [Chronological Biography of Chang Chih-tung]Google Scholar, reprinted in Yün-lung, Shen, ed., Chin-tai Chung-kuo Shih-liao Ts'ung-k'an [Collections of Materials on Modern Chinese History] (Taipei), vol. 47.Google Scholar

⁴ , Ayers, op. cit., pp. 27–40.Google Scholar

⁵ This paragraph is based on Ayers, chapter 3. This aspect of Chang's career is the main focus of his analysis.Google Scholar

⁶ Yen-p'ing, Hao, ‘A Study of the Ch'ing-liu Tang: The “Disinterested” Scholar-Official Group (1875–1884)’, Papers on China, 16 (1962), 40–65;Google Scholar also see Eastman, Lloyd, ‘Ch'ing-i and Chinese Policy Formation During the Nineteenth Century’, Journal of Asian Studies, 24·4 (08 1965), 595–612.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁷ Ayers, , op. cit. pp. 94–8.Google Scholar

⁸ Ibid.

⁹ See the articles by Hao Yen-p'ing and Eastman.

¹⁰ Hsü, Immanuel C. Y., The Ili Crisis: A Study of Sino-Russian Diplomacy 1871–1881, London, 1965, pp. 70–7.Google Scholar

¹¹ , Ayers, op. cit., p. 78.Google Scholar

¹² PG of 28 November 1883, in NCH, 30 January 1884, p. 123. Also NCH, 27 February 1884, pp. 226–7.Google Scholar

¹³ These particular items are included in a report by a correspondent of 27 November 1883 which appeared in NCH, 2 January 1884, p. 10.Google Scholar

¹⁴ This was one among three memorials submitted the same day, all urging the court to stand firm on , Vietnam. Collected Works, ‘Tsou-i’ [Memorials], 7 : 9a–23b.Google Scholar

¹⁵ Richard, Timothy, Forty-five Years in China, New York, 1916, pp. 172–3.Google Scholar

¹⁶ The entire proclamation translated in NCH, 22 August 1884, p. 216.Google Scholar

¹⁷ Chün, Hu, p. 71, says Chang received the summons on 25 April (Kuang-hsü 10/4/I)Google Scholar, while 22 April (Kuang-hsü 10/3/27) is given by Shih-fu, Ch'ien, Ch'ing-chi Chung-yao Chih-kuan Nien-piao [Tables of Important Officials in Ch'ing Times], Peking, 1959, p. 200. His appointment was made permanent in August.Google Scholar

¹⁸ Eastman, Lloyd E., Throne and Mandarins: China's Search for a Policy During the Sino-French Controversy 1880–1885, Cambridge, 1967, pp. 103–4;Google Scholar also Shih-fu, Ch'ien, p. 200, for other provincial appointments on this date.Google Scholar

¹⁹ , Ayers, op. cit., pp. 132–3.Google Scholar

²⁰ See, for example, praise of Chang and his achievements in Shansi by the editors in NCH, 27 February 1884, p. 215, and 4 July 1884, p. s6, where Chang is referred to as the ‘Reformer par excellence in the country’.Google Scholar

²¹ NCH, 25 July 1884, p. 95.Google Scholar

²² Shih-fu, Ch'ien, pp. 199–205.Google Scholar

²³ Note NCH, 12, 19, and 26 March 1884, pp. 292, 311 and 347, respectively. For an interesting analysis of pacification problems around Canton in earlier decadesGoogle Scholar, see Wakeman, Frederic Jr., Strangers at the Gate: Social Disorder in South China, 1839–1861, Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1966. Problems remained in the 1890s.Google Scholar See Schiffrin, Harold Z. on the situation in 1895 in Sun Yat-sen and the Origins of the Chinese Revolution, Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1968, chapter 2 on the Canton uprising.Google Scholar

²⁴ NCH, 14 May 1886, p. 508. Also 9 December 1885, p. 655, and 18 June 1886, p. 647.Google Scholar

²⁵ NCH, 20 January 1886, p. 62.Google Scholar

²⁶ An early report by , Changand Governor Wen-wei, Ni in PG of 28 March, in NCH, 25 June 1886, p. 668.Google Scholar Later, Collected Works, ‘Memorials’, 13 : 30b–34b and 14 : 8b–14a; PG of 7 October in NCH, 27 October 1887, p. 456.Google Scholar

²⁷ See Chang's memorial of late 1889, just before he left, in PG of 20 November in NCH, 20 December 1889, p. 752. Also Schiffrin, chapter 2, for the 1890s.Google Scholar

²⁸ The first report appears in NCH, 24 February 1886, p. 200.Google Scholar

²⁹ See Chang's final report on the Hainan situation in PG of 10 December 1889, in NCH, 10 January 1890, p. 40. Also the Shen Pao, in NCH, 3 February 1888, p. 136.Google Scholar

³⁰ PG of 5 May, in NCH, 12 June 1885, p. 675.Google Scholar

³¹ PG of 16 July, in NCH, 19 September 1885, p. 343.Google Scholar

³² PG of 2 July, in NCH, 15 July 1887, p. 72.Google Scholar

³³ This all began in 1886; see NCH, 3 November 1886, p. 476. Chang's report on the general results of this reform is in PG of 16 November in NCH, 6 December 1889, p. 692, and his blast at the gentry in PG of 19 December in NCH, 17 January 1890, pp. 64–5.Google Scholar

³⁴ The number of incidents of this sort defy citation. The Collected Works and NCH record them every few months from 1885 through 1889.Google Scholar

³⁵ , Schiffrin, pp. 59–60, describes the exceedingly corrupt practices which flourished under Li Han-chang in the early 1890s.Google Scholar

³⁶ This estimate from NCH, 27 August 1886, p. 222.Google Scholar Also see Collected Works, ‘Memorials’, 17 : 1a–11a, for a description by Chang himself of the financial bind he was in in mid-1886.Google Scholar

³⁷ The British were quick to note (and disapprove of) the heavy taxation of commerce, of course; NCH, 1 April 1885, p. 378, and 10 February 1886, p. 149. Also NCH, 2 July 1886, p. 3, 7–8, and 4 September 1886, p. 254.Google Scholar

³⁸ Collected Works, ‘Memorials’, 19 : 11b–12b.Google Scholar

³⁹ See Collected Works, ‘Memorials’, 11 : 1a–8a, for the joint memorial by Chang and P'eng Yü-lin to legalize the lotteries. This form of gambling was based on the surnames of provincial and metropolitan examination candidates. For a very interesting description of its operation, and the huge profits accruing to its proprietors, see a long two-part article in NCH, 11 January 1888, pp. 33–4, and 20 January, pp. 57–9.Google Scholar

⁴⁰ Translated in NCH, 18 February 1885, p. 189.Google Scholar

⁴¹ See, for example, reports by British observers in NCH, 15 August 1884, p. 185, and 29 August 1884, pp. 234, 243.Google Scholar

⁴² For such incidents, see NCH, 24 September 1886, p. 335; 3 November 1886, pp. 476–7; 1 December 1886, p. 585.Google Scholar

⁴³ Collected Works, ‘Memorials’, 11 : 16a–24b.Google Scholar

⁴⁴ Collected Works, ‘Memorials’, 11 : 24b–27b, 13 : 1a–12a.Google Scholar

⁴⁵ , Ayers, op. cit., pp. 144–6. There were a Torpedo School, a School of Telegraphy, and a Naval and Military Officers' School. Plans for the officers' school were made as early as 1885, but it was not completely operative until 1889.Google Scholar

⁴⁶ For the history of the Canton Arsenal, see Yü-t'ang, Sun, I, pp. 455–65.Google Scholar It had first been set up in 1874; Whampoa shipbuilding facilities purchased from the British had been added in 1876. The arsenal apparently consisted of separate plants for manufacture of ammunition, other military supplies, and the boatworks, but it did not have facilities for weapons manufacture. See P'eng Yü-lin's performance report of 1884 in Yü-t'ang, Sun, I, p. 465.Google Scholar

⁴⁷ Erh-min, Wang, Ch'ing-chi Ping-kung-yeh ti Hsing-ch'i [The Rise of Military Industries in the Ch'ing Period], Taipei, 1963, p. 94, and Sun Yü-t'ang, I, p. 562, table 9. According to Sun, a total of 800,000 taels was subscribed, but some of this was paid to the Foochow Shipyard for gunboats ordered and constructed there.Google Scholar

⁴⁸ NCH, May 1885, p. 588; 7 October 1885, p. 397; and 16 July 1886, pp. 62–3, where the British applaud his effective rebuttal of the French consul over a matter of property damage claims. He did, however, satisfactorily entertain US Minister Denby when he visited Canton in 1886;Google Scholar NCH, 7 May 1886, pp. 476–7.Google Scholar

⁴⁹ For that incident, see Eastman, Lloyd, ‘The Kwangtung Anti-Foreign Disturbances during the Sino-French War’, Papers on China, 13 (1959), 1–31.Google Scholar For typical comments on the fragility of Westerners' security in Canton, see NCH, 25 July 1884, p. 95, and 3 December 1884, pp. 630–1.Google Scholar

⁵⁰ Erh-min, Wang, p. 93, and Ayers, p. 135, describe the effect of the war on Chang.Google Scholar

⁵¹ Yü-t'ang, Sun, I, pp. 518–20.Google Scholar

⁵² Ibid., pp. 520–3.

⁵³ See NCH, 17 March 1886, p. 287, for the observation that Chang was already at this time employing younger officials who had a smattering of foreign knowledge over better Chinese scholars who had no such skills. Also note the more detailed treatment of this question below.Google Scholar

⁵⁴ The planned curriculum included mining, electricity, chemistry, botany, and international law. Ayers, pp. 167–9.Google Scholar

⁵⁵ NCH, 5 August 1887, pp. 160–1.Google Scholar

⁵⁶ Reprinted from The Chinese Times (Tientsin), in NCH, 12 August 1887, pp. 181–2.Google Scholar

⁵⁷ It was a large and impressive establishment, covering fifteen acres of ground and housed in sturdy buildings. NCH, 12 April 1889, pp. 434–5. Also NCH, 28 September 1889, p. 380.Google Scholar

⁵⁸ Chang technically had to obtain Li's permission, for Li had received official monopoly rights for ten years for his Shanghai Cotton Cloth Mill. Morrell, James, ‘Two Early Chinese Cotton Mills’, Papers on China, 21 (1968), 66.Google Scholar

⁵⁹ , Morrell, op. cit, 67.Google ScholarPubMed Chang had obviously by now made a regular practice of working through the Chinese ambassadors in London and Berlin. As Morrell notes, this probably assured him good quality equipment at a reasonable price. There is evidence, in fact, that he may have been taken in in some of his early purchases from foreign firms, giving him reason to be circumspect in his orders. A British correspondent reported that some German gunboats which the Kwangtung government had bought during the Sino-French War were nothing but ‘crotchety and patched-up tubs’, NCH, 20 01 1886, p. 62.Google Scholar

⁶⁰ Ibid., 69.

⁶¹ Ibid., 76.

⁶² Yü-t'ang, Sun, II, p. 744.Google Scholar

⁶³ Ibid., p. 747.

⁶⁴ Ibid., p. 838.

⁶⁵ This memorial is in Yü-t'ang, Sun, II, pp. 746–8.Google Scholar

⁶⁶ NCH, 11 January 1889, p. 28, and March 1889, p. 356.Google Scholar Also ‘Diplomatic and Consular Reports on Trade and Finance,’ Annual series no. 574, Canton, 1888, in British Sessional Papers, House of Commons, 1889, vol. 100, p. 517.Google Scholar

⁶⁷ To, Wu, ‘Chin-T'ung T'ieh-lu te Cheng-i’ [The Dispute over the TientsinTungchow Railway], Chung-kuo Chin-tai Ching-chi-shih Yen-chiu Chi-k'an [Researches on the Modern Economic History of China], 4·1 (05 1936), 75, argues for this interpretation. Forces allied with and arrayed against Li's plan were at a standoff, and some sort of compromise solution was a necessity.Google Scholar For a more recent treatment of this railroad controversy, see Kuo-chi, Li, Chungkuo Tsao-ch'ite T'ieh-lu Ching-ying [Early Chinese Railroad Enterprise], Nankang, Taiwan, 1961, pp. 74–85. Both Wu and Li note that a major factor in the opposition to the proposal of Li, which was also backed by Prince Ch'un (I-huan), was the power of the grain tribute lobby, which feared loss of its perquisites on the Tientsin–Peking route. But there was also considerable criticism of Li for purely political reasons, according to Li, pp. 79–80.Google Scholar

⁶⁸ , Wu to, op. cit., 125Google Scholar, and Kuo-chi, Li, op. cit., p. 85.Google Scholar

⁶⁹ The rate of entries in the Collected Works rises sharply after notice of his transfer and reaches fever pitch in the last few days before his departure. Chang's timetable from Canton through Hong Kong and Shanghai to Wuchang, where he arrived in late December, is in Hu Chün, pp. 105–6.Google Scholar

⁷⁰ NCH, 18 October 1889, p. 470.Google Scholar

⁷¹ Folsom, Kenneth E., Friends, Guests and Colleagues. The Mu-fu System in the Late Ch'ing Period, Berkeley, 1968, chapter 2, traces the development of the mu-fu system, especially in Ming and Ch'ing times.Google Scholar

⁷² Folsom studies this general problem through the example of Li Hung-chang.Google Scholar

⁷³ In late 1884, two military officers, both from Shansi, and an expectant prefect were sent to him; PG of 24 August in NCH, 22 October 1884, p. 451. In 1885, he requested that the Shansi circuit intendant Huang Chao-lin be sent to him;Google Scholar Collected Works, ‘Memorials’, 10 : 13b–14b.Google Scholar

⁷⁴ In early 1885, he requested the retention of the expectant prefect Ts'ai Hsiyung, a foreign affairs expert who seems to have been in Canton for some time before. Collected Works, ‘Memorials’, 10 : 8b–9b. Ts'ai became one of Chang's most valued assistants in both Canton and Wuchang.Google Scholar

⁷⁵ Ku Hung-ming, for example, was recruited in Hong Kong by one Yü-shu, Yang, a subordinate of Chang. Boorman, Howard L. (ed.), Biographical Dictionary of Republican China, 4 vols. projected, New York, 1967–, II, p. 250.Google Scholar

⁷⁶ Ku Hung-ming was with Chang until 1905; , Boorman, II, p. 251. Liang Tun-yen, a former student in Jung Hung's China Educational Mission to the US, later became Minister of Foreign Affairs;Google Scholar , Hummel, op. cit., p. 404.Google Scholar

⁷⁷ In late 1888, he had requested that Lu Wei-ch'i and Ts'ai Kuo-chen be kept in his service at Canton; PG of 15 December 1888 in NCH, 11 january 1889, p. 36.Google Scholar Also Collected Works, ‘Memorials’, 28 : 32b–34a.Google Scholar

⁷⁸ NCH, 23 July 1886, p. 87, and 12 January 1887, p. 33.Google Scholar

⁷⁹ This was Hsüeh P'ei-jung. , Morrell, op. cit., 70.Google Scholar

⁸⁰ NCH, 15 March 1889, p. 324, and Sun Yü-t'ang, II, 768.Google Scholar

⁸¹ NCH, 31 January 1890, p. 116.Google Scholar

⁸² He had to make at least two requests for the transfer of the Shansi circuit intendant Huang Chao-lin, and even then there appears no firm evidence that he ever obtained his services. Collected Works, ‘Memorials’, 10 : 13b–14b and 12 : 22a–23a.Google Scholar

⁸³ , Morrell, op. cit., 76–8. At this point, the desperate Chang transferred to Hupei a sum of 200,000 taels which actually belonged to the Shansi Reconstruction Bureau, and which he had borrowed in 1884 to meet maritime defence expenses. The money had been invested in Canton or Hong Kong instead of returned, but Shansi had regularly been receiving the interest payments.Google Scholar

⁸⁴ Yü-t'ang, Sun, II, p. 838.Google Scholar

⁸⁵ Yü-t'ang, Sun, II, p. 750,Google Scholar To, Wu, op. cit., 126Google Scholar, and Kuo-chi, Li, op. cit., p. 85. This initial grant was a victory of sorts for Chang's argument that railroad building should be viewed in the context of national economic development; first build an ironworks, then use the steel rails it produces to build the railroad. Li Kuo-chi, pp. 83–5, describes the jockeying between Li Hung-chang and Chang which went on in the autumn of 1889 because of policy differences on railroad construction.Google Scholar

⁸⁶ Kuo-chi, Li, p. 85. This was vindication for Li's position that railroads should be tied directly to national defence and built rapidly with rails bought abroad.Google Scholar

⁸⁷ See Chang's telegram to Li of 23 August 1889, fifteen days after the new appointments were announced, in which he expressed hope that he could entrust his fledgling enterprises to Han-chang, Li. Yü-t'ang, Sun, II, p. 745.Google Scholar

⁸⁸ For the two memorials, , Morrell, op. cit., 69Google ScholarPubMed, and Yü-t'ang, Sun, II, pp. 746–8; for Chang's telegram to Liu, Sun Yü-t'ang, II, p. 748.Google Scholar

⁸⁹ For the cotton mill, , Morrell, op. cit., 70;Google Scholar for the arsenal, Yü-t'ang, Sun, I, pp. 523–7; for the ironworks, Sun Yü-t'ang, II, pp. 749–50.Google Scholar

⁹⁰ See , Spector, op. cit., chapter 10.Google Scholar

⁹¹ NCH, 18 June 1886, p. 647; Hao Yen-p'ing, p. 91;Google Scholar Collected Works, ‘Memorials’, 24 : 1b–3a; and the relevant pages in Ch'ien Shih-fu, the most important source for this sort of information.Google ScholarPubMed

⁹² NCH, 4 March 1885, p. 250, and 18 April 1885, p. 438.Google Scholar

⁹³ NCH, 17 February 1886, p. 172; also 24 February 1886, p. 200, and 3 March 1886, p. 231. It is unlikely that P'eng was involved here. Old and ailing, he was about to leave for the Yangtze. There are no traces of complaints against Chang in his memorials preserved from the mid-1880s. See P'eng Kang-chih-kung Tsou-kao [Memorials of P'eng Yü-lin] (1891, no place of publication given).Google Scholar

⁹⁴ NCH, 3 March 1886, p. 231, 20 October 1886, p. 422, and 12 January 1887, p. 33.Google Scholar

⁹⁵ For only one of several good sources on this traditional interaction between local officials and gentry see the concluding chapter of T'ung-tsu, Ch'ü, Local Government in China Under the Ch'ing, Cambridge, Mass., 1962.Google Scholar

⁹⁶ PG of 2 July translated in NCH, 15 July 1887, p. 72.Google Scholar

⁹⁷ NCH, 11 June 1886, p. 618. It was rumoured that Ni met with his replacement, T'an Chün-p'ei, on the latter's way to Canton later in the year, and so terrified him by his account of Chang's habits that T'an managed to have his appointment rescinded.Google Scholar NCH, 22 December 1886, p. 671.Google Scholar

⁹⁸ The other two were T'an Chün-p'ei, Governer of Hupei, transferred in June, who went on to Yunnan in December 1886 without ever taking up the post, and Liu Jui-fen, minister to England, who was named to replace Wu in August 1888, but who also never took over the office. Eventually Li Han-chang became concurrent Governor when he replaced Chang. Ch'ien Shih-fu, pp. 109–205.Google Scholar

⁹⁹ , Wu to, op. cit., 119, draws a rather direct relationship between the two groups. I would not. The original group (as listed in Hao Yen-p'ing, 91), except for Chang and Wu Ta-ch'eng, who had also become a practising official with a revised regard for needed reforms, was largely destroyed politically by the Sino-French War.Google Scholar

¹⁰⁰ Kung-ch'üan, Hsiao, ‘Weng T'ung-ho and the Reform Movement of 1898’, Tsing Hua Journal of Chinese Studies, new series, 1·2, 04 1957, 120–2.Google Scholar

¹⁰¹ Collected Works, ‘Memorials’, 26 : 11a–15b;Google ScholarPubMed NCH, 29 November 1889, pp. 662–3, and 10 January 1890, p. 41.Google Scholar

¹⁰² Collected Works, ‘Memorials’, 28 : 34a–35aGoogle Scholar, and NCH, 17 January 1890, p. 65.Google Scholar

¹⁰³ , Hummel, op. cit., p. 732.Google Scholar

¹⁰⁴ Ibid.

¹⁰⁵ This is largely speculation, of course, and ignores the very practical reason for Chang's transfer given by Wu To and Li Kuo-chi, which I have mentioned above— that the man who proposed the railway project could be expected to implement it. However, it cannot be dismissed as fantasy, I think, until we know more about court politics during these years.Google Scholar

¹⁰⁶ Liu, Kwang-ching, ‘Li Hung-chang in Chihli: The Emergence of a Policy, 1870–1875’, in Feuerwerker et al., Approaches, p. 104.Google Scholar

¹⁰⁷ This is really another entire topic in itself. The clash between Chang and Li Hung-chang over railway development strategy in 1889–90, alluded to earlier in this paper, is but one example.Google Scholar