Having been requested by the Naval Institute to submit an article under the above caption, the writer will endeavor to briefly set forth the salient features of the defense of the Legations, or more properly the defense of the United States Legation, as it is recalled after a lapse of two years. To the more complete understanding of the situation, a sketch map is submitted herewith, which will be referred to from time to time. This map is drawn partly from memory and partly by consulting a sketch which appeared with an English newspaper's account of the siege. Two of the bastions on the wall are shown on a larger scale than the rest of the drawing in order that the ramps and wall barricades might be put in.
The guard was drawn from the Oregon and Newark. The Oregon contingent, one (1) officer and twenty-five (25) men, left their ship on one hour's notice and embarked on the Newark, from which vessel they landed on May 29, 1900, reinforced by one (1) marine officer, twenty-three (23) marines, medical officer, one (1) hospital apprentice and three (3) bluejackets with a Colt gun. The necessity for haste was such that the entire detail arrived in Peking with heavy marching order only, their baggage being all left behind to be sent up later. The destruction of the railroad prevented this, and the men suffered before the end of the siege for want of proper clothing and shoes.
The guards of the various nationalities marched into their respective legations at about 9 p. m. on the night of the 31st of May. As the American guard wheeled into line in the legation yard, they were not a little startled, and entirely dazzled by a blinding flash. When the smoke cleared away it was found that there were no casualties, only a guest of the American Minister taking a flashlight photograph. The minister had provided quarters for the guard by securing buildings (marked A on the map) in the rear of the Russian bank and Imbeck's store. These were reached by a doorway cut through the legation wall, and also had an entrance on the street in rear, directly under the Tartar City Wall. The situation of the United States Legation for defense was not a promising one. A rectangular compound bounded on the north and east by Chinese shops and houses, on the west by Legation street and on the south by Imbeck's stores, low, rambling buildings.
The main guard was established at the legation gate and the sentries posted at various points of vantage in the grounds. Outside the gate, a Chinese guard of boy soldiers armed with fans and spears were supposed to protect the legation; these vanished when the first shot was fired.
On the 7th of June, after we had been there a week, a meeting of all the guard commanders was held in the British Legation to decide upon plans for the common defense. The general plan was to hold all the legations as long as possible, to hold the Tartar wall in rear of the United States and German Legations, to send all non-combatants into the English Legation, as it was the largest, with the most commodious quarters; to stock this legation with all available food and live stock; to barricade all streets and to keep open the communications between the various legations.
The reason for holding this Tartar Wall was obvious; first, because it directly controlled all the legations, and second, because the water gate through it gave us means of communicating with the outer world. It was through this gate that the British Indian troops entered to the relief.
On June 13 some excitement was created by a Boxer brave appearing in Legation Street waving a naked sword. He was run down and arrested by the German sentries, but the rapid assembling of a mob and their demeanor showed that the time had arrived to barricade the streets leading through the legation quarters and to divert the traffic of the city to other channels. The authority of the Tsungli Yamen or Foreign Office was accordingly obtained to erect barricades on the principal streets and proclamations were furnished by that office to be posted on such barricades, commanding the populace to respect them. The first barricades were erected solely with a view of stopping traffic and not with any idea of defense against rifle fire. They consisted for the most part of Peking carts turned on end "Chevaux de Frise," filled in with planks, beams torn out of Chinese houses, any odds and ends that could be found to be piled up in form of an obstruction.
The Russian Legation being directly across Legation Street from ours, the Russian sailors and Cossacks worked in common with ours in building, and later on, defending the barricade which joined the two compounds, and although entirely unable to communicate with each other by word of mouth, appeared to find gestures to answer all purposes. The Russian commander, Baron Rhoden, spoke English a little, German and French perfectly, so communication between the officers was made possible, and the hearty co-operation of this Russian officer in all matters pertaining to the joint defense contributed greatly to its success. One Russian institution greatly appreciated by the American officers was the ever-burning samovar in the Russian Legation, ready to make tea "at all hours."
From June 9 to 20, twenty men under Captain Hall were detached on the defense of the Methodist Mission, where a large number of refugees had sought shelter. These buildings lay some three-quarters of a mile from the line. An elaborate system of defense was prepared there; barbed wire entanglements erected, earthworks constructed and trenches dug, but owing to their distance from the rest of the legations and the fact that they were controlled by the wall and the Hatamen Gate, these buildings were abandoned on June 20 and the refugees brought into the English Legation as per the plan of defense spoken of before.
The question of food supply for the men was settled by entering into a contract with a Chinaman to supply us with three good meals a day at seventy-five cents Mex. per man. This he faithfully lived up to until the fighting began, when he cast his lot with ours and remained faithfully at his post assisting in the cooking of the ration served from the common stock. When it was seen that a siege was inevitable, the two European stores within the lines were systematically emptied of all edibles, under the supervision of an officer, and all available food sent into the English Legation, together with large stores of rice taken from the Chinese shops. All horses, mules and racing ponies were sent into the English stables, where they were fattened for the fate which eventually befell all except about ten out of some hundred which had been driven in. It was not amiss during the siege to ask if "the horse had been curried," and in this form they proved most acceptable. Mr. Squires, the secretary of the United States Legation, who later, upon the death of Captain Strouts, became chief of staff to Sir Claude McDonald, took charge of the commissariat for the American guard and saw to it that the supply of food was regular. Upon first arriving at Peking we were at some pains to boil all our drinking water, and a man was especially detailed for this duty, but when the siege began in earnest this was found to be impracticable, and the wells had to be depended upon. Only two cases of typhoid appeared in the American guard, and in both cases the patients had been previously debilitated by wounds. From the 14th of June until the 20th, the feeling of uneasiness deepened among the residents in the legations and one by one all of the foreign buildings, churches or stores, outside of our lines, were set fire to by the mobs of Boxers. On the night of the 14th the uproar in the Chinese City beggars description. There was little sleep that night in the legation, as an attack was momentarily expected, and the preparations for defense were entirely inadequate.
During these few days prior to the first attack, several expeditions were sent out from the legations for the purpose of succoring Chinese Christians, penned in the burning districts by the Boxers. These expeditions were uniformly successful in rescuing large numbers of the persecuted Chinese and suffered no casualties, although inflicting heavy punishment on the Boxers and their attendant train of pillagers. It was realized at the time that these rescuing parties served to inflame the Boxer element more deeply against the foreigners, but it was more than flesh and blood could stand to see the terribly burned and lacerated bodies of those who escaped to our lines, and refuse to send aid to their comrades known to be still within the power of the fiendish Boxer hordes.
Up to the 18th of June the Foreign Office had been loud in their promises of protection and protestations of eternal friendship. On this date the news of the attack on the Taku forts was known in Peking, and the ministers were informed that a state of war existed, and that all foreigners must leave. The assassination of the brave Baron Von Kettler, while on his way to the Foreign Office, put an end to any thoughts of trusting ourselves to the protection of the guard of Chinese soldiers so kindly offered. This occurred on June 20, and at 6 p. m. that day the legations were fired upon on all sides. The besieged had not been idle during the days of uncertainty, and all barricades had been more or less re-enforced with brick, beams and stone torn from the demolished Chinese houses within the lines.
In this work of demolition the German troops were of great assistance, as in each squad one or two men were found whose bayonets had a saw edge on the back. A beam 6 by 6 inches could be cut through after some hard work, and when the key beam was cut through the roof would fall and the walls could be pushed over.
Later in the siege, when it became necessary to fight fire, many buildings were destroyed in this way. All barricades had to be built double, that is to afford protection from the rear, as the long-range rifles (Manlicher) of the Chinese, fired at all angles and directions, simply filled the air with projectiles and one could never know from which direction the shot might come. Dr. Lippett's wound was a case in point; he was just leaving the minister's house, crossing a space which was nightly filled with sleeping men, as it was considered protected, when a stray bullet coming from the direction in which there was no hostile Chinese for at least 1,500 yards, brought him down with a bad fracture of the leg.
Directly in the rear of the United States Legation, separated by the street, arose the Tartar City Wall. This solid structure was 45 feet high, 50 feet wide on the bottom and 40 feet wide at the top. The sides and top were built of large bricks, about 1 ½ feet long by 9 inches wide and 6 inches thick. On the top of this wall, on the sides are parapets, that outside being high and crenelated, and inside low. Every 100 yards a bastion juts out towards the Chinese city, the first houses of which are distant about 300 yards. On the inside two double ramps give access to the top of the wall, the one being directly in rear of the United States Legation and the other in rear of the German Legation. (See large map.) We found the top of the wall to be about six layers thick of the bricks spoken of before, which made the construction of the shallow trench in rear of our wall barricades very difficult. The centre of the wall is filled in with rubble.
After the Chinese troops had begun to fire on us from the wall, they were driven off, first by the Germans and later by ourselves, and a position fortified at the head of the ramps which gave access to the wall in rear of the United States Legation. The barricade was erected across this wall on the near side of the bastion. This was a grave error, as the far side should have been selected, but at the time of our occupation we took advantage of a small barricade placed by the Chinese, and worked from that. Later, when the Chinese had occupied and fortified the other side of the bastion, their position was taken from them and turned to our own advantage. Sand bags, or rather bags filled with earth and stone, were found to be of great value during the siege, and the women of the legations were given something to do in making these bags, which helped to divert their minds from the possible results if the Chinese should get in. Materials of all sorts were pressed into service for this purpose, and bags of gaudy satin laid side by side with those of sackcloth.
In the English Legation the best of order prevailed. The civilians were divided into committees, distinguished by different colored badges, and the works of defense, of sanitation and the issuing and care of food supplies went on smoothly under their respective leaders. The Chinese Christians worked faithfully and well under the guidance of their missionary overseers and had it not been for the aid given by these natives in the construction labors, the legations must have fallen.
It soon became apparent that some supreme military authority was needed, and Sir Claude McDonald, at the request of the ministers, assumed this office by common consent of the guard commanders. It then became possible for him to move troops from one point to another as they might be needed.
The besieged stood badly in need of artillery. The Italian 1-pounder did good work until its small store of ammunition was exhausted. The American Colt was found to use too much of our precious ammunition, so it was sent into the English Legation to be used as a last resort in case of a charge en masse. Necessity being the mother of invention, the "International Gun," now at the Naval Academy, was born. Mr. Squires and Gunner's Mate Mitchell had been experimenting with a "wirewound gun," the basis of which was to be the cylinder of a pump, when some Chinese unearthed a bronze cannon. It will be recalled that the Russians arrived in Peking with a chest full of 3-inch ammunition, but through an oversight the field piece had been left in Tien Tsin. The shells had been thrown down a well when the siege began to prevent their falling into the Chinese hands. These were now hauled up again and fitted to the bronze cannon. They were found to be too large, so the gun was reamed out by the simple device of pounding a shell home and firing the gun. Needless to say the crew retired before the gun went off. One of the first shots was directed at a blank wall near Mr. Squires' house, who was in some doubt whether the shell would penetrate. It went through the wall and two more besides. The question of a gun carriage was settled by using that belonging to the Italians. The "International" was lashed to a beam and the beam and all pointed. This gun was a sriking example of the Chinese proverb, "Any man can fire a gun, but who can tell where the shot will strike?" It answered its purpose, however, and by shifting it from point to point we sought to make the Chinese believe we were well supplied with artillery.
On the 10th of July the Chinese blew up part of the French Legation and the danger from mining was added to the list of troubles. When relief arrived it was found that part of the English Legation was undermined, and the Chinese had almost completed a mine under our position on the wall.
The Chinese method of building a barricade under fire is deserving of notice. They would tunnel through the houses parallel to the street until a point was reached at which they desired to erect a barricade. If no door was convenient the street wall would be demolished and one or two bricks shoved into place; then one by one the bricks would appear, only the hands of the builders being visible. No matter how many shots were fired at this structure slowly arising before our eyes, the worker would continue to shove his bricks into place. A field piece would, of course, have stopped such work at once, but we had none. Barricades would spring up in a night, and the morning light would reveal the Chinese positions ten yards nearer than they had been the night before. It was in this way that they advanced down the wall until only the width of the bastion, some 30 yards, separated our lines. Then they built obliquely out into the bastion and began the construction of the tower on our very flank, which is shown in the sketch of the wall barricades. As this tower commanded the inside of our barricade, it became necessary to dislodge them, which was done by a night attack, entirely unexpected by the Chinese, and which resulted in our capture of their position, with a loss of two of our men. Of the Chinese some forty dead were counted the next day. The Chinese having wrested the wall barricades in rear of the German Legation from the Germans, it was necessary to extend our lines to the rear along the wall to cover the water gate. This was done by running a traverse along the outer parapet of the wall, with cross barricades at various places, until a point on the wall was reached some 50 yards beyond the water gate. That position was then held until the relief arrived. After their experience with the night attack the Chinese would fire rockets and burn red fires on their barricades for illuminating purposes. After the truce of July 16 (and it will be noted that this truce was made just three days after their punishment and defeat at Tien Tsin, neither side advanced their barricades, but all hands worked in the strengthening of the defenses already in place. The barricades and bridge heads on Legation Street were reinforced, the bomb-proofs in the English Legation made more secure. The reason for this armistice appeared to have been a desire on the part of the Chinese to persuade the besieged legationers to leave for Tien Tsin, in order that the foreign armies might be stopped in their advance on the capitol. Sir Claude McDonald and the ministers, however, gave politely evasive answers to all suggestions for our departure.
For a while the two opposing forces sat on their respective barricades and exchanged friendly greetings. Proclamations in large Chinese letters hung on our barricades warned away the inquisitive Chinamen from a too close inspection of the strength, or rather weakness, of our defense. It became necessary to shoot a few of the more daring ones before they thoroughly understood that the proclamation meant business. Little by little the "sniping" began again, and the attack grew in strength as the relief army drew closer to the wall. The most severe attack was on the night of August 14, and the next day the siege was raised.
There were no "military operations" that would justify the name during the siege. It was all a matter of "sitting tight" behind a barricade, constant vigilance night and day, and firing promptly at such of the Chinese as had the temerity to expose themselves. Only once in the experience of the writer did the Chinese leave the shelter of their barricades to make an attack. This occurred on the wall on June 27. A sentry noticed that the Chinese were apparently breaching their barricades, then about 400 yards distant. The field glasses soon showed a number of Chinese issuing from the breach and running along the wall towards us. This movement was made in silence without firing, as they evidently hoped to catch us napping in the heat of the afternoon. We got ready for them and when they were some 200 yards away rose on the banquette and fired over the top of our barricade. They broke and ran back, and not until the last of them had squirmed and wiggled through the tall grass to the safety of their barricades was our fire returned. A few remained lying between the barricades, and their presence, dead, was very disagreeable. The horrors of this phase of the siege are indescribable. The many dead bodies of men, horses and dogs, outside and close to our lines, made breathing at times difficult. Tobacco was not scarce until late in the siege, and its use made life bearable. Most of the dead Chinese between the lines were buried, with our permission, when the truce was declared. It may be believed that this privilege was gladly granted.
Our loopholes were hurriedly constructed and became a source of danger, as the men failed to appreciate the necessity for blocking them up when not actually in use. The Japanese used a small mirror tied to a stick to look through the loopholes, which proved very efficacious in the daytime. The bricks of the Tartar City Wall made excellent barricades, built about four layers thick and breaking the joints. The top was surmounted with double layers of earth-bags, which stopped the projectiles used against us. One bag alone proved inadequate, as Private Toucher, U. S. M. C, met his death relying on one bag to protect his head while firing through a loophole. The bullet was deflected and must have entered sideways, as his whole forehead was blown in. These barricades crumble on the outside from the hail of projectiles, but were constantly reinforced from the inside. They even withstood the fire from field pieces, judged to be 3-pounders, firing at a distance of some 800 or 900 yards. Bricks in the rear face would be dislodged with some force when the projectiles struck, and caused some discomfort, but the damage was always repaired.
A sentry with glasses kept a lookout on the embrasure where their gun was mounted, and would yell "Shell!" when he saw the flash. All hands would drop into the trench, spoken of before, and lie securely until the shell had either struck or passed over, which latter most of them did. As our position was between two Chinese barricades, they had to be very careful that their guns were well pointed, as it often happened that shells intended for us would sail over our heads and drop among the Chinese beyond us. Thus, although we were between two fires, the position had some advantage.
The American guard was disposed for the most part as follows: About 15 men at the wall barricade, 6 or 7 in the trench communicating with the legation, about 20 at various points in the Legation proper, and 7 or 8 at the barricade on Legation Street. All posts were doubled, allowing one man to sleep and one to watch. At the wall barricade five posts of three men each were maintained, and the entire 15 relieved every night by 15 men from the legation, who were comparatively fresh, as it was possible to wash in the legation. Water for toilet purposes was unknown on the wall.
A table given herewith is of interest in showing the strength of the guards and percentage of casualties. It was compiled by Dr. Velde, a German surgeon, whose excellent work in charge of the legation hospital called forth the greatest praise on all sides. The table is believed to be accurate. The section marked "Peitang" refers to the troops who defended the French Catholic Cathedral. The statement that the Japanese sustained 104 per cent, of casualties is not an error. They defended the "Fu," where the native Christians were herded, and had their work cut out for them from the first. A number of them were wounded, discharged to duty, and wounded again, which accounts for an apparent impossibility.
The question has often been asked, "Why did not the Chinese overwhelm the legation?" It is thought the answer is, first, because their officers do not lead them, and second, because of their superstition. They believed the foreigners to be assisted by spirit soldiers, and hence were afraid to venture too close to the lines which contained, for them, unknown possibilities.