On the evening of December 4, the foreign envoys and several high officers of the government were invited to a banquet to celebrate the inauguration of the postal service. When it was nearly over, an alarm of fire was given from the outside, according to arrangement of the conspirators, and Min Yong Ik, going out to look, was set upon by assassins, but instead of being killed as was intended, was only wounded. Thereupon the liberal leaders hastened to the palace, and assuring the king that he was in great danger, in his name sent to the Japanese minister for the Japanese legation guard. At the same time the conservative leaders were summoned, as they supposed by the king; as fast as they stepped out of their sedan chairs at the palace gates, they were relieved of their heads. Meanwhile the Japanese infantry commanded the inner gates of the palace, and during the next day the new ministers of government, the liberals whose names have already become familiar to us, prepared edicts to be issued by the king reforming ancient abuses and customs, and instituting new and radical measures of national policy. The city was in a state of commotion, but despite the surging crowd no actual outbreak occurred.
COREAN NATIVES VIEWING JAPANESE SOLDIERS.
On the morning of the 6th the cry was raised “death to the Japanese,” and then began a wild revelry of outrage, butchery, and incendiarism, in which the newly-trained militia were conspicuous. The white foreigners in Seoul, nine in number, of whom three were ladies, had gathered at the American legation, which under Lieutenant Bernadon’s directions was put in a state of defense. In it twenty-two Japanese also found refuge.
That afternoon the Chinese troops, six hundred strong, commanded by General Yuen and backed by three thousand Coreans, moved upon the palace to drive out the Japanese. With superb discipline and skill Captain Murakami and his little band drove off their assailants, and through the narrow streets reached the legation at 8:00 P.M. after forty-eight hours’ absence. The score of soldiers left behind, aided by the hundred or so of civilians who had gathered within, had successfully defended the enclosure from the mob. Provisions being exhausted, the Japanese with admirable coolness, discipline, and success began the march to the sea on the afternoon of the next day. Despite hostile soldiery with rifles and cannon, armed men firing from roof and wall, barred city gates, and a mob following them to the Han river, they crossed with their wounded and reached Chemulpo on the morning of the 8th. There they were fed by the sailors of the men-of-war, while a Japanese steamer carried the news to Nagasaki.
The short-lived liberal government came to an end after an existence of less than forty-eight hours. Hong Yong Sik, refusing to leave the king, was taken with him to the Chinese camp and there beheaded. The other conspirators fled to Japan, whence they were demanded by the Corean ministerial council, which demand was by the Japanese promptly refused. The torture and trial of twelve persons implicated in the affair was concluded January 27, 1885, and eleven were executed in the usual barbarous manner. Their bodies were chopped in pieces and the flesh and bones distributed in fragments through the streets of the city and the different provinces. The refugees ultimately reached America, except Kim-ok-Kiun who settled in Japan.
Count Inouye of Japan and Kim Hong Chip of Corea on January 9; and Inouye and Li Hung Chang, of China, on May 7 concluded conventions by which the troubles were settled. The chief points in the diplomacy were the payment of indemnity by Corea to Japan, and a joint agreement between China and Japan to withdraw their troops. Both camps were emptied on the 20th, and on the 21st of May the troops left Chemulpo for their respective countries. October 5 the Tai-wen Kun, now sixty-eight years old, but fresh as a man of forty and able as ever to be a disturbing element, returned from China and re-entered Seoul under a guard of Chinese warriors and many thousands of Coreans.
The affair was in its origin an anti-Chinese uprising of radical progressives, but in its ending an anti-Japanese demonstration. About three hundred lives were lost by battle and murder. The conduct of the American minister, General Foote, during this trying occasion, was most admirable, and the legation, which sheltered all the foreigners and many Japanese, was kept open and the American flag was never lowered.
Even in these troublous times a way was opened for the entrance of western science and reformed Christianity. Dr. Henry N. Allen, a missionary physician from Ohio, was called upon to attend Min Yong Ik and the wounded Chinese soldiers. The superiority of modern methods being at once manifest, the government became interested, and the dwelling occupied by Hong Yong Sik, who had been beheaded, was set aside as a hospital under Dr. Allen’s charge. From that time forward several missionaries from American churches have entered active work in Corea, and three American young men engaged by the Corean government as teachers have begun to devise an educational system for the kingdom. There are now native Christian churches in Seoul, a hospital, schools, orphanages, and a college. Americans were chosen as advisers and assistants of the nation. Three military officers to organize her army, naval officers to inaugurate a navy, commissioners of customs, and a counsellor in the foreign office were among these.
Renouncing the idea of the suzerainty of China over Corea, the king and government sent embassies to Japan, Europe, and the United States, to establish permanent legations. This movement was opposed by the Chinese, and especially by the Minister Yuen in an active, impudent, and even villainous manner. Yuen, who led the Chinese troops during the riot of December, 1884, and who escorted the Tai-wen Kun to Corea, is believed to have plotted to dethrone the king and set up another son of the old regent as a pro-Chinese partisan on the throne. Expecting to make use of the Corean military, whom he had drilled in person, his plot was exposed by Min Yong Ik. To checkmate any design of China, to prevent the departure of the envoys, or to convert her nominal authority into assertions of sovereignty or suzerainty, the Honorable Hugh N. Densmore, our minister, by the orders of the United States government, invited the embassy to take passage from Chemulpo in the United States Steamship Omaha, which was done. In charge of Dr. H.N. Allen, Pak Chung Yang, a noble of the second rank, envoy extraordinary and minister plenipotentiary of the king of Corea, arrived in Washington and had audience of President Cleveland in January, 1888.