Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1900-08-02
TROUBLESOME TAKU.
Tkat City Always Bears the BruRt 81
the Empires Foreign.
QuarreIa.

-
The Taku forts, which defend the
mouth of the muddy and shallow Pei
Ho river, have already in the past, on
three occasions, been the scene Oh
fighting between an Anglo-French
force on the one hand and the Chinese
on the other. Twice they were cap
tured by their European assailants;
once they withstood attack, and a Sc
rious defeat was inflicted upon the
foreign devils" by the Chinese sol
diery, says the London Daily News
The forts at the date of this fight
ing were four in number, the north and
small north forts on the one side OF
the river, and south and the small
south forts on the other. They were
square structures, in 1883 mounting
about 300 guns of all patterns, with
walls of sun-dried mud, surrounded by
two wide bitches full of water, and too
deep to be crossed without swimming.
EnJanglements of sharp bamboo were
just below the actual ramparts, and
added no little to the difficulty of a
successful attack. From the swampy
nature of the banks of the Pei-Ho it
was by no means easy to approach the
forts on land, while the depth of water
in the river was insufficient for any
thing larger than a small gunboat to
steam up under them.
In May, 1858, during our second war
with CHINA var in which England
had the alliance of Francc-an Anglo
French squadron, under Admirals Sir
NJ. Seymour and Rigault de Genouily,
appeared off the mouth of the Pei-Ho.
Six French and five British gunboats
crossed the awkward bar at the mouth
of the river, and on May 20 steamed
up to the lower part of the forts, the
Cormorant opening a way for the flo
tilla by CALAMITY ramIning at full speed
a formidable boom which the Chinese
had thrown o the stream. The
vessels then directed a tremendous fire
upon the Chinese works, after which
storming parties were landed both on
the northern and southern banks, who
carried the forts with little trouble.
Thirty-four Frenchmen were. however,
killed or wounded by a magazine ex-
plosion in one of the forts The flo
tilla of gunboats proceeded upstream
as soon as the fighting was over, and
on the 26th reached Tientsin, where
the terrified Chinese made peace.
The peace did not, however, last
long. On June 20, 1859, an Anglo
French squadron, under Admiral Hope,
was refused passage by the Chinese
commander of the forts, and deter
mined. to force a way. Since 1858 the
works had been repaired and much
strengthened, the pick of the Chinese
army had been placed in them and the
river had been filled with obstacles of
all kinds-booms, strong RATS an
chored across the stream and sharp
ened stakes placed SO as to pierce the
bottom of any vessel steaming up
stream
On June 25 Admiral Hope attempted
to force a passage, but with no success
OF his IL gunboats six were disabled or
compelled to retire. In the Ployer, one
of the vessels that suffered most, 81
out of a crew of 40 were killed or
wounded in 30 minutes. The admiral
himself was severely wounded, and the
losses in officers and men we're exceed
ingly heavy. 1t was on this occasion
THAT AaDIs 1dllIdIf. the american OIHlcCE
who afteryvard commanded the cGnfed-
crate ironclad Merrimac in her famous
encounter with the Monitor, came to
the aid of the British with the cry:
Blood is thicker than water!" He
rowed off to the British admiral in the
very thick of the fight and offered to
remove the wounded. an offer which
was not declined. Some of his men
actually went to one of the British
guns the crew of which had fallen.
and fought it for some minutes. To-
ward seven p. m. Admiral Hope deter
mined to fling his last throw and to put
in a landing party to assault the forts.
This was done, but with the most dis
astrous results. The storming party
of English and French was not strong
enough, and could not scale the walls
OF the forts; it was beaten back with
loss Of about 400 killed and wound
ed, in addition to the casualties in
CURED in the purely naval attack.
To repair this defeat, in the follow
ing year a force of $4,000 British aud
French soldiers and a strong combined
squadron under Admirals Hope and
Charner were dispatched to the Pei
The army was landed to the north
of the Taku forts, and on August 90,
1860, began to lombard them in con-
junction with the fleet. On the follow
ing day the guns had done enough
damage to permit of the forts being
an operation which was &C.
comp!ished in the teeth of a fierce re-
sistance, with a loss to the English of
81 killed anG: 1s4 wounded. That loss
have been far heavier had the
Chinese ammunition been only toIer-
Sir r. Napier, who was one of the
leading the stormers, was ac-
tually hit at close quarters by five bull
let's, each N of which should have
killed him. As it was, he was merely
bruised.
On this occasion 1000 prisoners and
LOGO guns were captured by the
allies. whose victorious advance was |
not arrested till Picking had been
reached.
Tragediaa9
1t was one day last winter when the
.heater-going public was all expect
owe the coming of Sir Henry Irv-
ng. A gentleman sat III a BARRIERS
chair while the garruious little tonso-
-ial artist fused around. The gentle
knew the barber quite we'll; he
also knew his weakness for things the
and so he was not surprised
when the one-sided conversation /
to the subject of the stage.
Coin TO see Irving?" he queried
>etween strokes of the razor.