"Reports having reached us of an armed force having been collected in the neighbourhood of Shanghae, we, the commanders of the military and naval forces of her Britannic Majesty at Shanghae, hereby give notice that the city of Shanghae and foreign settlement are militarily occupied by the forces of her Britannic Majesty and her ally the Emperor of the French; and they warn all persons that, if armed bodies of men attack or approach the positions held by them, they will be considered as commencing hostilities against the allied forces, and will be dealt with accordingly.
"Shanghae, August 16, 1860."
This precious notification was sent on board a gun-boat and taken to a place entirely out of the line of march of the advancing forces, and of course was not delivered. Unprepared for foreign hostility, the Ti-pings, upon the 18th of August, appeared before Shanghae, and driving in the Tartar outposts advanced with a run to the walls, perfectly unacquainted with the fact that they were manned by English and French soldiers. Instead of the friendly reception always given by the Ti-pings to foreigners, and which they expected would now be returned, they were met with a storm of shot, shell, and musketry. The few following extracts are from the official organ, and give an account of the unjustifiable slaughter of men whose great hope was to enter into close and friendly relations with their "foreign brethren," for whose "strict neutrality" the British Government had solemnly pledged itself:—
"The camp had an earthwork all round, on which several American cannon were mounted. Since the allied occupation of the city all executions have been perpetrated here. Against this place the rebels advanced with unusual boldness. The Chinese soldiers and officers fought for some time with great spirit, but at last ran away as fast as possible, followed by the insurgents, who hoped to rush pell-mell with them to the city, and get through the west gate."
Now commences the "reception" given to the patriots by men whom, from first to last, they have considered and treated as brethren.
"Captain Cavanagh then ordered the bridge to be destroyed, and gave the insurgents a rather warm reception from the city-wall with rifles and canister.
"In the course of the afternoon two guns of Captain McIntyre's Madras mountain train were seen coming along outside the city wall, with only a small moat between them and the foe"—(Foe! The word is false: the Ti-pings came as friends, not foes)—"who were dodging about behind graves, houses, and trees, towards the south gate; but, curious to relate, not a shot was fired."
The "curious" thing to relate is the wonderful forbearance of those men, who, although several hundred of their comrades were mowed down by the savages on the walls, never retaliated with a single shot, but even permitted two guns to be placed in a commanding position from which they were subsequently used against them with fatal effect.
"The nature of the country outside the gates gave ample scope to the enemy to conceal themselves, so it was only when a group could be observed that the howitzers and a Chinese gun—the latter under Gunner Warwick—could be used with effect. The insurgents, however, are certainly no cowards, and constantly showed themselves near the wall from the south and the west gates.
"The firing of the foreigners, both from the cannon and rifles, was excellent. As soon as canister was useless, the foe were treated to shell, thrown time after time into the very middle of their flags.