THE CAPTURE OF PEKIN
Captain John Astley, of Z Battery, Light Artillery, U.S.A., had thought
often of the lad who had crossed the Pacific with him, and when he
received the order to proceed with his battery to China he wondered
if, by any chance, he should again meet his young friend. In the rush
of events that followed Rob was quite forgotten, until a strange
coincidence brought his name so prominently to the front that it was
mentioned almost daily. Captain Astley even hoped to find the lad in
Pekin, and had anticipated the joyful recognition that would accompany
their meeting. Now, therefore, as he sat writing in General Chaffee's
temporary headquarters, near the Tung Chou gateway, blown up by the
Japanese that very morning, the name uttered by the Chinese beggar under
examination instantly attracted his attention.
"I beg your pardon, general," he said, "but this person has just
mentioned a name well known to me. Have I your permission to question
him?"
"Yes; question all you please," replied General Chaffee, who already was
absorbed in the plan of Pekin walls and the accompanying description of
their weak points that had so opportunely come to him.
"Can you possibly be the Rob Hinckley who crossed the Pacific to Manila
in the transport _Logan_ last March?" asked the artillery officer,
eagerly, of the wretched-looking figure that, trembling with weakness,
stood before him.
"I am, sir; and you are Captain John Astley, of Battery Z," was the
reply.
"Good Heavens, Rob! It seems impossible; and it is absolutely incredible
that any human being could be so completely disguised and so utterly
changed. How in the name of--? But I won't ask a question, though I am
nearly choked by a thousand that are clamorous for utterance. There is a
dear friend of yours somewhere outside, and I must bring him in, so that
all of us may hear your story together. General--"
Here the speaker said a few words to the commander in so low a tone that
Rob could not catch them, and hastily left the room.
In less than a minute he returned, accompanied by an excited but
puzzled-looking gentleman, clad in semi-military uniform, who, hastily
saluting the general, turned immediately to where Rob still was standing.
"Here he is, my boy!" cried Captain Astley, exultingly. "Your own daddy!
We found him in Shanghai fretting his life out over his lost family, and
brought him along as battery surgeon. But, hello! What's the matter? Why
don't you rush into each other's arms? Do you need an introduction?"
Father and son were staring curiously at each other.
"Is it possible that you are my own little Rob?" gasped the former.
"Are you really my father?" interrogated Rob, gazing doubtfully at the
white-headed man who now was said to be the same young, dark-haired
parent that had bidden him farewell in America years before.
"If you are Rob," continued Dr. Hinckley, huskily, "tell me what has
become of my wife--your mother. Is she alive or dead?"
"She is alive and safe in Cheng-Ting-Fu."
"Thank God! Thank God!" cried the overjoyed man, with tears rolling down
his cheeks. "But, Rob--Good Heavens!"
With this he sprang forward and caught the lad, who was tottering
and evidently about to fall. Loss of blood from his wound, strain,
excitement, and exhaustion--all had done their work--and everything swam
before his failing sight as his surgeon-father gently laid him down.
The next day, when the relieving army, which had fought its way mile by
mile from the distant sea, made its final dash for Pekin, Rob Hinckley
followed it in an ambulance, tossing and muttering incoherently in the
unconsciousness of a high fever.
Within the city the excitement on that memorable 13th of August was
intense. Foreign guns thundered against its massive walls and stout
gates from noon until dark, while from the lofty battlements swarms of
Chinese sharp-shooters replied with so furious a rifle-fire that none
dared cross the death-swept zone.
Inside the walls the bombardment of the legation defences was continuous
all that day and all through the night that followed. Nor were the
besieged foreigners silent; but through the long hours the baying of
their Nordenfeldt gun, the vicious barking of their Colt's automatic,
the growl of "Old Betsy," the Chinese six-pounder that they had
found and converted to their own use, and the sharp yelping of their
rifle-fire were heard unceasingly.
During the morning of the 14th the bombardment of the city was
continued, the Japanese being held at bay outside a stoutly defended
eastern gate, which they only succeeded in blowing up and carrying
after dark that night. At the same time the Russians were caught in
a death-trap at the next gateway on the south, where they easily had
forced the outer gate, but could make no impression upon the inner. Here
their chief of staff was killed, and many of their men, before they
extricated themselves and retired to a safe distance.
After that the Americans tried the same entrance, stormed it, scaled the
lofty wall, charged down the inner ramp, gained possession, opened the
gate, and found themselves inside the southern city. From this point
they fought their way through a net-work of alleys and streets, swarming
with Chinese riflemen, to the water-gate beneath the Tartar wall,
concerning which Rob Hinckley had furnished them with information.
In the mean time the British column, assigned to a gate still farther
south, had the marvellous good-fortune to find it undefended. So they
simply marched in, traversed the southern city, taking possession of the
Temple of Heaven _en route_, made their way to Rob's water-gate, waded
through its mud, and, to their own amazement as well as that of every
one else, found themselves not only in the heart of Pekin almost without
having fired a shot, but within the lines of legation defence as well.
The first officer of the relieving army to pass through the water-gate
was Major Scott, of the 1st Sikhs, and with him were four of his men.
Then came General Gasalee and his staff, followed by the Sikh regiment,
the 1st Bengal Lancers, a detachment of Welsh fusileers, a field
battery, the Hong-Kong regiment, and a detachment of Royal marines.
A few minutes later came the Americans, cheering their flag and their
weary comrades, who for two months had held the wall. They also came
through the famous water-gate that Chinese blindness had failed to
obstruct. General Chaffee led the way, and he was followed by five
hundred marines, the 14th and 9th regiments of infantry, two Hotchkiss
guns, and Battery Z.
The siege of the legations was ended, the relieving army was in
possession of Pekin, the Empress Dowager, together with the Emperor
and the whole imperial court had fled, and the ill-advised, savagely
brutal, but long-continued effort to drive foreigners from Chinese
soil had come to an ignominious ending. Had China been united, the
struggle might have been prolonged for years, though it never could
have succeeded; but China was "a house divided against itself." Out of
the eighteen provinces only three took part in the movement, the others
being either opposed to it or indifferent as to its outcome.
The Empress Dowager, who hated the very idea of reforms based upon
foreign models, was opposed by the Emperor, who desired them. The
prime-minister, Prince Tuan, bitterly anti-foreign, found his schemes
opposed by Prince Ching and the ever-politic Li Hung Chang. The
bloody Kwang-su general, Tung-Fu-Hsang, who thirsted for the blood of
foreigners, was thwarted in his plans for their destruction by the more
wary General Jung Lu, who ordered his troops not to kill any more than
they could help.
So Pekin fell, almost without a struggle, and for a year afterwards the
city was misruled and looted by foreign soldiers, who destroyed many of
its most beautiful structures and carried away its most precious works
of art. From it also they ravaged the surrounding country, sending out
punishment expeditions to kill, burn, and destroy in every direction.
In the mean time the American troops had been followed into the city by
a train of the biggest army wagons ever seen in China, each drawn by
six huge mules, and by a number of four-mule ambulances, one of which
brought Rob Hinckley. From it he was transferred to a hospital, where
he lay for weeks with no knowledge of his surroundings or of what was
happening about him. Then one day he opened his eyes and looked into the
face of his mother.
Of course he knew that this was a dream, for all things were but dreams
with him now, so he wearily closed his unreliable eyes and went to
sleep. The next time he opened them he again saw his mother's face,
bending lovingly, but oh! so anxiously, over him. This time the dream
lasted until she gently kissed his forehead, and he heard her say:
"Please, dear God, don't take him from us!" Then he knew that he was
awake and must make haste to get up, because it troubled his mother to
have him lie there. Besides, it was very silly not to be able to raise
his hands. A little later it occurred to him to wonder if he were in
Cheng-Ting-Fu, or, if not, how it happened that his mother had come away
from so safe a place into one so full of danger as Pekin.
By-and-by they told him all about the expedition that, accompanied by
his father, had been sent down the road from Pekin, how terribly it had
punished Pao-Ting-Fu for its murder of missionaries, and how it had gone
on to Cheng-Ting-Fu to find all the foreigners who had taken refuge
behind its brave walls safe and unharmed. He learned of his parents'
joyful reunion, and how they had hastened back to Pekin and his bedside.
Gradually, too, he was told the thrilling story of his father's escape
from the dreadful city of Tai-Yuan, of his perilous wanderings through
Shan-Si and Ho-nan, until finally he found himself on a branch of the
Han River, down which he floated for many nights in a skiff to Hankow.
From there he was taken on a United States gun-boat to Shanghai, where
he met Mr. Bishop, the engineer, and learned that his boy had plunged
into the very heart of the storm of wrath then centring about Pekin.
During his days of convalescence, while Rob was learning of all these
things, he saw much of the Lorimers, who had refused to leave Pekin
until assured that the lad, to whom they felt they were so largely
indebted for their own safety, was himself out of danger.
Then the two families left the city in which they had suffered and
endured so much, and travelled together over the reconstructed railway
to Tien-Tsin, where they took steamer for Shanghai. There Rob found
his trunk, together with the money due him for services rendered, that
had been forwarded from Canton by Mr. Bishop. He also found several
letters from the engineer, who had learned so highly to appreciate the
lad's pluck, manliness, and ready resource during the long journey they
had taken together that he now offered him a permanent and well-paid
position on the proposed American railway.
About this same time Mr. Lorimer, who was president of a great American
life insurance company, offered Dr. Hinckley the post of chief medical
examiner in China for his company, which was about to extend its
operations into that country.
It is almost needless to say that both these offers were promptly
accepted, and before the Lorimers took steamer for America and the last
stage of their eventful journey around the world, Dr. and Mrs. Hinckley
were already settled in the Shanghai house that was to be their future
home.
Rob left them there when he went to Canton to assume his new duties; but
he rejoins them in July of each year, when father, mother, and son go
together to Japan for a happy month among its life-giving mountains.
The strong friendship cemented between Annabel and Rob during those
terrible Pekin days has since been maintained by means of frequent
letters, and both await with eager anticipations the autumn of 1904,
when the Hinckleys are to revisit their own country and join the
Lorimers on a trip to the World's Fair at St. Louis.
In talking it all over, Mrs. Hinckley often exclaims: "How wonderful are
the ways of Providence!" and whenever Rob hears her speak thus, he adds:
"Yes, mother, and how splendidly were the designs of Providence carried
out by Chinese Jo!"
THE END