The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1900-06-30
THE BOXERS" OF THIRTY
YEARS AGO.

YEARS AGO.
With the startling tidings of the
Boxer" movement in China there
come many reminders of the evil days
of thirty years ago, when Christian
| blood flowed in streams within the
walls of Tien Tsln. ince the great mis-
sionary massacre of 1870 there has been
for Western Christians residing in the
realms of the Tien-tze or ''Son of Hea-
ven" an odor of blood in the name of
Tien Tsin.
BY the Anglo Chinese treaty
of 1860 that port was thrown open for
the first time to foreign trade. In the
following year a British consulate was
established on the spot. Hostility to
the white-face from the west ran high
and fierce, for the mob of Tien Tsin
had little intercourse with Europeans,
and, moreover, retained fresh and VIVID
recollections-bitter as calomel and gall
of the sack of Pekin, the Purple For
hidden City" by the Anglo-Frenc
forces in 1860. 1t was against this wall
of racial hate that a band of noble
French Sisters bravely flung them
selves at Tien Tsin. With the aid of
Father Chevrier and the French con-
sui, they speedily opened HOSPITAL for
sufferers of every nationality and
creed. Others of the devoted little band
engaged in clothing. feeding and edu-
eating the little girls that had been
purchased by the aid of the Holy In
fancy Fund 1.-The Celestials,' says M.
Plauchut, in his ''Chnia and the Chi
nese," "are in the habit of buying
girls, but for very different purpose
to that of the devoted priests and Sis
ters but they could not be
brought to believe that the missionaries
received the children merely to feed,
educate and make Christians of them"
All sorts of wild tales were set afioat
about the Sisters The mob was work
ed up to fine pitch of fury, and at
preconcerted signal the armed braves
rushed upon their victims
The French consul, his wife and his
interpreter were the first to fall be-
meath the blows of the assassins.
Meantime says Plauchut, ''as shep-
herd calls his flock together when the
wolves are threatening, the Able Chey-
rier had collected around him the or
phan children to the number OF 100
then under the care of the mission
aries; but they were all massacred, the
good priest dying amongst them. FROM
8 in the morning till in the afternoon
the work of slaughtering French and
other foreigners went on without In
Permission. The sun was low when the
busy mob remembered that the French
Sisters were still living. They pro-
ceeded to the convent, battered down
the door and, says the French author
already quoted, found the superior of
the Sisterhood calmly waiting to re-
ceive- them Alas" he continues, her
fortitude availed her nothing; she was
brutality seized. dragged to post not
far off and bound to it. Then ensued
a scene too horrible for description.
The fiends in human shape danced
round their helpless victim and inflicted
on her all the tortures in which the
Chinese are so terribly skilled, finally
cutting her body into small pieces. The
terrified nuns kneeling on the steps of
their little chapel in agonized prayer
were one and all first outraged and then
murdered their home and church were
set fire to and their mangled bodies
flung into the flames"
far.r 1,caIoee, Hoo do in China
over this foul massacre. But the real
offenders were never brought to JUS
tice. France was too engrossed at the
time with the fierce struggle against
Germany to weep much or for long over
the torture and massacre of a few
French missionaries in far off Tien
Fsin. The criminal in chief, Chunk-Ho,
governor of Tien Tsin, was actually
sent to Paris by the astute Orientals
to explain matters" He went, saw,
received with splendid
honors by M. Theirs. His explanations
we're deemed satisfactory. He returned
in peace to his own country, and had
not long touched it's shores when an
other outbreak against the foreign
devils occurred and the souls of sew
aral French missionaries were sent to
heaven after prolonged agony of
iendish torture. Six years after the |
great massacre of 1870 another band of |
Sisters went to Tien Tsin from the |
mother house in the Rue du Bac, Paris. |
Many others have joined them since.
And the splendid work which they are I
Icing with hospitals and schools among |
he heather may at any moment be |
again interrupted as it was on that red |
lay thirty years ago.
--<a-%zc-S-
The commencement exercises at MAJ |
1r-.,,.c,