CHINA'S REVOLUTION 1911-1912
Reading edition
A HISTORICAL AND POLITICAL RECORD OF THE CIVIL WAR
BY
EDWIN J. DINGLE
WITH 2 MAPS AND 36 ILLUSTRATIONS
NEW YORK McBRIDE, NAST & COMPANY 1912
(All rights reserved.)
TO THOSE WHO LAID DOWN THEIR LIVES AND TO THE NEW CHINA PARTY IN THE HOPE THAT THEIR STRUGGLES FOR FREEDOM MAY HERALD THE DAWNING OF A DAY OF RIGHT AND TRUTH FOR CHINA THIS VOLUME IS INSCRIBED
AUTHOR'S NOTE
This volume is a popular history of the Revolution in China that broke out at Wuchang, Hankow, and Hanyang in October of 1911. The narrative contains a good deal of new information touching upon revolutionism in China, and the events leading up to the present climax. The magnitude of this Revolution cannot possibly be understood yet; but this volume is written in the hope that it will enable the student otherwise untutored to understand much that one absorbs in Chinese life.
When the Revolution broke out, I was residing in Hankow. Throughout the war I remained in Hankow, leaving this centre for Shanghai during the days when the Peace Conference was held in that city. I am a personal friend of the leader of the Revolution, General Li Yuan Hung, and, by virtue of having all the time been in possession of much exclusive information from behind the political curtain, am probably equipped to write of the main doings of the Revolution in that area where its effects were most marked. On the very eve of the Revolution, a book written by myself was published simultaneously in England and America, which contains some strangely prophetic utterances, and will give the reader who has not made Chinese politics a study a general idea of the condition of the country when the Revolution made the scales drop from the eyes of her teeming millions.[1]
I wish gratefully to acknowledge the kind offices of Mr. Thos. F. Millard, editor of the China Press, for allowing me free use of the columns of that journal. Much of my information has been culled from the C.P., although many of the articles were written by myself for that newspaper, whilst the war was in progress; but I am largely indebted to that paper also for many of my general later facts.
Especially also do I wish to thank the Rev. Bernard Upward, of Hankow, for the assistance he has rendered me whilst this volume was being prepared. The chapter entitled "Some Revolution Factors" is from Mr. Upward's pen, as is also that headed "Yuan Shih K'ai"; many of the illustrations shown in the volume also are reproductions from Mr. Upward's splendid collection. My warm thanks are also due to Mr. Stanley V. Boxer, B.Sc., for the drawings from which the two maps embodied in this volume were prepared, and for the explanatory note accompanying the sketch map of the battlefields.
It should, perhaps, in fairness to myself, be mentioned that, owing to absence from England, I have not had an opportunity of reading the proof-sheets before this volume was printed.
EDWIN J. DINGLE.
HANKOW, HUPEH, CHINA. April 1, 1912.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I. THE REVOLUTION
II. THE AFTERMATH
III. GENERAL EXPECTATIONS
IV. GENERAL LI YUAN HUNG'S AMBITIONS FOR THE NEW CHINA
V. A PREMATURE OPENING
VI. THE EARLY HOSTILITIES
VII. THE BATTLE OF KILOMETRE TEN
VIII. THE BURNING OF HANKOW
IX. THE STRONGHOLD OF WUCHANG
X. LI YUAN HUNG SEEKS PEACE
XI. THE FALL OF HANYANG
XII. THE REPUBLIC SEEKS RECOGNITION
XIII. THE PEACE CONFERENCE—A MONARCHY OR A REPUBLIC?
XIV. THE COMING OF SUN YAT-SEN
XV. YUAN SHIH K'AI'S RETIREMENT
XVI. RECALLED TO SAVE THE MONARCHY
XVII. THE SZECHUEN REVOLT
XVIII. SOME REVOLUTION FACTORS
XIX. THE ABDICATION EDICT
XX. THE OUTLOOK FOR REFORM
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
GENERAL LI YUAN HUNG .... Frontispiece
WHERE CHINA'S REVOLUTION STARTED
THE PROVINCIAL ASSEMBLY HALL, WUCHANG
A CAPTURED BOMB-MAKER
A QUEUELESS BRIGADE
TYPICAL REVOLUTIONARIES
THE RAW MATERIAL OF THE REVOLUTIONARY ARMY
THE CENTRAL MART OF THE WORLD
THE FLIGHT OF THE GUN-JUNKS
THE EFFECT OF A NAVAL BOMBARDMENT
PREPARED FOR EVENTUALITIES
FOES MEETING AS FRIENDS
TACHIMEN, WITH IMPERIALISTS IN OCCUPATION
THE BURNING OF HANKOW
THE SING SENG ROAD
THE TOLL OF THE DEAD
ESCAPED FROM WUCHANG
TOMMY ATKINS ON GUARD
HOW THE IMPERIALISTS CROSSED THE HAN
HUNAN SOLDIER
HUPEH SOLDIER
THE IMPREGNABLE HANYANG HILL
THE THREE-EYED BRIDGE
THE HANDY MAN ASHORE
DISMANTLED IMPERIAL GUN ON PURPLE MOUNTAIN, NANKING
THE UBIQUITOUS BOY
DR. WU TING-FANG
YIN CHANG
TANG SHAO-YI
FENG KUO-CHANG
HWANG HSING
DR. SUN YAT SEN
YUAN SHI-K'AI
A PRE-REVOLUTION GROUP
THE CHILD-EMPEROR OF CHINA
WHAT REMAINS OF HANKOW'S MAIN RIVER GATEWAY
MAPS
HANKOW NATIVE CITY, SHOWING BURNT AREA
WUHAN CENTRE: SKETCH MAP OF THE BATTLEFIELDS
CHINA'S REVOLUTION 1911-1912