Custer weekly chronicle. [volume] (Custer City, S.D.) 1890-1931, 1901-04-20
& YELLOW CRIME
THE SIEGE IN PEKIN.

not believe that there was any dan
ger impending, and opposed vigorously
Pichon's advice that the troops be sent
for ten days ago. Mr.. Conger sec
onded Sir Claude, partly because the
United States legation quarters are SO
limited that the second secretary ana
his wife are obliged to live In two
rooms ove the main office building,
and partly because he believed the
government willing and capable OF
putting down the disorder. Both were
suddenly converted when Fengtai, only
six miles away, was burned and the
Boxers were reported marching unop-
posed upon Picking. Then the most ex-
citing t~elegraphing for warshlps 10
come to Taku and guards and ma
| chine guns to come to Peking became
the order OF the day.
Had the Boxers been at all organ
lied they could have torn up the track
for a mile or two at Fengtai n Ell
fectually cut off the troops from arriV-
ing In time to prevent any city riots.
Fortunately, they seem TO have been
carried away by the desire to loot,
INC after they had carried off all the
furniture n belongings of the elght
foreign residences at Fengtai ana
robbed the empress private car OF all
movable property, they were content
to set fire to the stations n machine
otORo ohss NaaSbs -
adjoining villages.
June a. None of the Boxers has been
punished, n they have grown polo-
err. They burned the next station be-
low Fengtai, known as Huangstun,
thirteen miles from Picking; killed two
Church of England missionaries at
Y%ungching named Robinson and Nor
man, and defeated q force of Cossacks
sent cut from Tien Tsin to search for
the surviving Belgians escaping from
the Lee Han railway. In spite or THIS
and with seventeen men-of-War at
Tongku, the foreign minister, besides
bringing up each a guard OF hfty or
seventy-five men TO protect their WI
legations, are doing nothing thar we
can see at any rate, to paclfy the
country. Why they don't land a large
force, come to Picking and seize the
old ~reprobates that they all know are
the real bosses of the Boxer movement
in Picking and hold them ~esponslbi
for any further movement, hopouy
knows.
Every minister can tell you that Hsu-
flung, Kang VI, Chung Ii, Chung chi
and Chao Shu Chiao, with Prince Iuan
are the real causes of all the present
disorder, but although they all know
this, they still pretend TO belleVe the
assurances of the government that
they are putting down ana VIII put
down the trouble.
June 10. Events have been too excit-
ing to allow Of n sitting down quiet
~ to write. The missionaries from
Tungchow, thirteen miles south OF re-
king, have fled into this city and all
their college plant, private residences
and property has been destroyed py
soldiers sent from the taotai's yamen
to protect them. All the Picking mis-
sionarles have gathered together In the
Methodist mission compound, where,
with such arms as they could collect
a few shotguns, rifles and revolvers-
and with a guard of twenty marines,
sent by Mr.. Conger, United States
minister, they have fortlhed them-
selves with barbed wire n brick
fences, and are holding the fort" For
DAYS we have heard no word from our
Presbyterian missionaries at P%aoting-
fu, The last word, now some days
since, which came through the tsung-
li-yamen, and Is therefore ~untrustwor-
thy, was that they were safe at pres
emit. Wires south have been cut since
the burning of the college buildings
at Tungchow and / have been unable
TO write home the developments daily
occurring. on the 10th of June, just
before wires were cut, we had q mes
sage from United States Consul Rags
dale saying 500 q troops were com
ing to our assistance, but today is the
fourth day since it's receipt and we
only know of their reaching Lola, a
burned station on the railway to Tien
Tsin on Monday night. We have been
expecting them every hour since, but
no definite word Of their arrival at any
other place has reached us. Why they
don't send natives in advance we ant
imagine.
June IS. Eleven days we have been
besieged in Legation street. Our lit
tie guard of $50 marines and sailors of
all n~ationalities have kept u%nceasing
watch night and day and are nearly
exhausted. Eleven days ago we were
told an army was marching to our re-
lief and although they had only eighty
miles to come we have not yet seen
them nor do we know their where
abouts. We have nightly repealed at
tacks OF Boxers and soldiers of the
government and have killed in sorties
over 200 Of them, but we have millions
about us and unless relieved must soon
succumb. Our messenger to the out
side world hay been captured and
killed and our desperate situation
while ii may be guessed cannot be
truly known. With fifty men of war
now at Taku we have to remain with
In our barricaded streets n witness
the destruction of all the mission
premises and private foreign resi-
| ueIlAC III LIS lS 4 l1dll
board of missions large property, the
two large Catholic cathedrals known
as the South cathedral and the East
cathedral, the two compounds of the
American Presbyterian mission, the
Society for Propagation of the Gospel
Mission, the international institute and
the London mission a all furnished
magnificent CONGREGATIONS which we
have beheld without being able in any
way to prevent. At each place the
furious Boxers, aided by their soldier
sympathizers, have murdered with
shocking mutilation all the gltekeep-
ers as we'll as any women and children
in the neighborhood suspected of being
Christians or foreign sy~mpathizers.
At the South cathedral the massa-
ere was shocking; so much so that
when some of the poor mutilated
children came fleeing across the city,
bringing the news Of what was going
on, q relief party was organized from
our little force, consisting of twelve
Russians, twelve American marines
and two civilians, w. N. Pethick and
NJ. Duysberg, armed with shotguns,
who, risking conflict with the Manchu
troops, marched two miles from our
barbados and, coming on the Boxers
suddenly in the midst of the ruins
fired a number of volleys into them,
killing over sixty, upon which the rest
fled. They then collected the women
and children hidden in the surround
ing alleys and marched them back In
to our midst, where they are for the
present safe. l have just finished
dressing the wounded head Of a little
girl 10 years of age, who in spite OF
a sword cut four inches long in the
back Of her head and two fractures OF
the outer table of the skull, walked
all the way back here. leading a little
sister of s and a brother OF 4. AS she
patiently endured the stitching of the
wound she described to me the muir,
der of her father and mother and the
looting of her home. One old man OF
60 carried his mother of so upon his
back and brought her into temporary
ca fatu hut how long before we are