A BODY-SNATCHING EXPEDITION.
Early in May, 1867, the foreign settlement at Shanghae was thrown into
excitement by the report of the return of an unsuccessful piratical
expedition from Corea. The ennui of Eurasian port life was turned into
a lively glow of excitement. Conversation at the clubs and tea-tables,
which had wilted down to local gossip, Wade’s policy, paper hunts, and
the races, now turned upon the politics and geography, methods of royal
sepulture, mortuary architecture, antiquities, customs, and costumes in
the mysterious peninsula. The pleasures of wheelbarrow rides, and
visits to the bubbling springs, now palled before the pending trial at
the United States consular court.
An American citizen was charged with making an “unlawful and scandalous
expedition” to Corea, and of violently attempting to land in a country
with which the United States had no treaty relations. It was further
stated that he had gone to exhume the bones of a defunct king in order
to hold them for sale or ransom. In plain English, it was said to be a
piratical and body-snatching descent upon the grave-yards of Chō-sen,
to dig up royal remains, not for the purpose of dissection, nor in the
interests of science or of archæology, but for the sake of money, which
money was to be extorted from the regent and court of Seoul.
The idea, of course, awoke merriment as well as interest. One may well
understand why Professor Marsh should make periodical descents upon the
bone-yards of Red Cloud’s territory, and exhibit his triumphs—skeletons
of toothed birds and of geological horses as small as Corean ponies—in
a museum under glass cases, well mounted with shining brass springs and
iron joints. Even a school-boy can without laughing think of Dr.
Schliemann rooting among the tombs of Mycenæ, and Di Cesnola sifting
the dust of Kurium for its golden treasures. Even the night picture of
resurrectionists, emptying graves in a Scotch kirk-yard for subjects to
sell at a pound sterling apiece, has few elements of humor about it.
But to conceive of civilized “Christians,” or Israelites, chartering a
steamer to exhume and steal the carcase and mouldering bones of a
heathen king, to hold them in pawn to raise money on them, created more
laughter than frowns or tears. It was thought that the sign under which
the ship sailed, instead of being the flag of the North German
Confederation, should have been the three golden balls, such as hang
above a pawnbroker’s windows.
The person on trial was formerly an interpreter at the United States
consulate, and, having learned Chinese from childhood, was able to
speak the language fluently, and thus converse, by means of tongue or
pencil, with the many Coreans who know the standard of communication in
Eastern Asia either by sound or sight. It was he also who furnished the
cash for the expedition, the commander-in-chief of which was one
Oppert, a North German subject; the guide was a French Jesuit priest
named Farout (evidently a fictitious name) who spoke Corean, having
been in the country as a missionary. These three were the leaders of
the expedition.
Before going, the American had told Consul Seward that his object was
to take a Corean embassy to Europe, to negotiate treaties, and to
explain to the governments of France and the United States the murder
of their subjects in Corea. Four Coreans, with the French missionary
Bishop Ridel, had been in Shanghae a short time before, April 24, 1867;
and the defendant declared that it was from these four persons, whom he
styled “commissioners,” that he got his information as to the desire of
the Corean government for treaties, etc. He also stated that this
knowledge was held only by the four Coreans, himself, and a Jewish
peddler, who had several times penetrated into Corea, and by whom the
Corean “commissioners,” had been brought to Shanghae. These
“commissioners,” he averred, had a new and correct version of the
General Sherman affair. According to their report, some of the crew had
become embroiled in a row growing out of the improper treatment of some
native women, and were arrested. The crew went to rescue them. They
succeeded, and took also two native officers on board for hostages.
This so enraged the people that they attacked the crew, killed eight at
once, and made prisoners of the others who were still alive.
Readers of our narrative will smile at discovering the poor fishermen
who brought their bishop across the Yellow Sea in their boat thus
transformed into “ambassadors.”
One thing seemed to be on the surface—that this modern Jason and his
argonauts had gone out to find a golden fleece, but came back shorn.
On the return of the expedition, Mr. Seward questioned the American
closely, sifted the matter, and finally, being satisfied that something
was wrong, put him on trial, eliciting the facts which seem to be the
following:
Oppert, who had been at the Naipo, and up the Han River in the Emperor
and Rona, secured a steamer named the China, of six hundred and eighty
tons, with a steam tender, the Greta, of sixty tons, and run the North
German flag up at the fore. The complement of the ship was eight
Europeans, twenty Malays from Manila, and about one hundred Chinamen,
these last were a motley crew of sailors, laborers, and coolies—the
riff-raff of humanity, such as swarm in every Chinese port. With
muskets in their hands—it is doubtful whether a dozen of them had ever
fired off a gun—they were to form the “forces” or military escort of
the expedition, which was to negotiate “treaties,” embark an embassy to
travel round the globe, and introduce the Hermit Nation to the world.
The “fleet” left Shanghae April 30, 1867, and steamed to Nagasaki; in
which Japanese port she remained two days, taking on board coal, water,
and ten cases of muskets. The prow was then headed for Chung-chong
province. They arrived in Prince Jerome Gulf at 10 P.M. on Friday, May
8th. The next day at 10 A.M. they moved farther in the river. In the
afternoon they succeeded in getting two small boats, or sampans, partly
by persuasion and pay, partly by force. The expedition was then
organized, Oppert commanding. The mate, engineer, and regular Chinese
manned the tender which was to tow the boats. The muskets were unpacked
and distributed on deck, and the coolies were armed, equipped, taught
the difference between the butt and muzzle of their weapons, and given
their orders. Four men carried spades or coal shovels to exhume the
bones and treasure.
The French priest who had been in Corea acted as guide and interpreter.
Shortly after midnight, and very early on Sunday morning, the steam
tender began to move up the river, stopping at a point about forty
miles from the sea. The armed crowd landed, and the march across the
open country to the tomb was begun. As they proceeded, the neighborhood
became alive with curious people, and the hills were white with people
gazing at the strange procession. A few natives being met on the way,
the French priest stopped to speak with them. The party rested for a
while at a temple, for the march was getting tiresome, having already
occupied several hours.
Reaching the burial-place [near Totta-san?], they found a raised mound
with a slab of stone on each side at the base. Beneath this tomb was
the supposed treasure. Was it bones or gold?
The four men with spades now began their work, and soon levelled the
mound. They had dug out a considerable quantity of earth, when their
shovels struck on a rocky slab, which seemed to be the lid of the tomb
proper, or the sarcophagus. This they could not move. All efforts to
budge or pry it up were vain. Having no crowbars they were, after much
useless labor, with perhaps not a little swearing, compelled to give up
their task.
On their return march, the exasperated Coreans, plucking up courage,
attempted to molest them, but the marauders, firing their guns in the
air, kept their assailants at a respectful distance. The party and
tender dropped down the river and rejoined the steamer at noon, the
weather being foggy.
Further proceedings of the expedition are known only in outline. The
steamer weighed anchor and left for Kang-wa Island. They put themselves
in communication with the local magistrate during three days. On the
third day a party landed from the ship, and while on shore were fired
upon. Two men were killed and one wounded.
The expedition remained in Corea ten days, returning to Shanghae after
two weeks’ absence.
In the foregoing trial it is most evident that many details were
concealed. The quantity of truth divulged was probably in proportion to
the whole amount, as the puffs of steam from a safety-valve are to the
volume in the boiler. The accused let out just enough to save them from
conviction and to secure their acquittal.
The defendant was discharged with the Scotch verdict “not proven.” Mr.
George F. Seward, however, wrote to the State Department at Washington
his opinion, that the expedition was “an attempt to take from their
tombs the remains of one or more sovereigns of Corea, for the purpose,
it would seem, of holding them to ransom.”
Whether any great amount of treasure is ever buried with the sovereigns
or grandees of Chō-sen is not known to us. Certain it is that the
national sentiment is that of horror against the disturbance or rifling
of sepulchres. Now they had before their eyes a fresh confirmation of
their suspicions that the chief purpose of foreign invaders was to rob
the dead and violate the most holy instincts of humanity. The national
mind now settled into the conviction that, beyond all doubt, foreigners
were barbarians and many of them thieves and robbers. With such eyes
were they ready to look upon the flag and ships of the United States
when they came in 1871.
Note.—Nearly every word of the above was written in December, 1877, the
information having been derived from the United States Diplomatic
Correspondence. At that time we suspected that “Farout” was the
fictitious name of Feron, the French Roman Catholic missionary, who had
escaped the persecutions of 1866. It seems that three countries and
three religions were represented in this body-snatching expedition,
which was of a truly international character.
In March, 1880, there was published in London and New York the English
translation of “Ein Verschlossenes Land,” a work printed in Germany. As
we read “A Forbidden Land: Voyages to the Corea,” it dawned upon us
that the author was none other than “the needy Hamburgh trader,” “the
Jewish peddler,” of the Consular Court trial of 1867. It was even so.
Coolly and without denial, the author tells us that the main object of
his last voyage was to “remove” some buried relics held in great
veneration by that “blood-thirsty tyrant,” the Tai-wen Kun, or regent.
The project was first suggested to him by the French priest, who, as
the author takes pains to tell us, was not a Jesuit, nor had ever
belonged to that order (p. 295), though he gives Feron’s proposition in
his own words (p. 299), the italics being ours:
“If the project I am going to lay before you (i.e., to rob the grave)
will at first sight appear to you strange and out of the common,
remember that a great aim can never be gained by small means, and that
we must look at this affair from another point of view than that which
may be taken by narrow-minded people.”
The details of the landing, march [to near Totta-san?], excavation, and
retreat are duly narrated, the blame of failure being laid upon one
unlucky wight who was “the only disreputable character we had with us!”
After leaving Prince Jerome Gulf, the China proceeded up the Han River
to Tricault Island (see map, page 379), “about twenty minutes’ steam
below Kang-wha.” There the leader received a note from the Taiouen-goon
(the Tai-wen Kun, or regent), the gist of which was, “Corea has no need
of foreign intruders.” While holding a parley near the wall of a town
on Tricault Island, “the only disreputable character” in the party
again got them into trouble. This black sheep was a German sailor, who,
hungering after fresh veal, had stolen a calf; an act which drew the
fire of the native soldiery on the city wall. The thief received a ball
in his arm, which compelled him to drop the calf and run, while one
Manilaman was shot dead. It is not known how far the statistics of a
Corean warfare diverge from those elsewhere, nor how many tons of lead
are required to kill one man, but owing to the incredibly bad aim of
the jingal shooters, the remainder of the party of twenty or more
escaped their deserts and reached the tender. The next morning the
expedition set out on the return to Shanghae.
After a review of this book (in The Nation of April 7, 1880), which the
author issued after his imprisonment, the following note appeared in
the same paper of April 21st:
OPPERT’S COREAN OUTRAGE.
To the Editor of The Nation:
Sir: The notice of Oppert’s book on Corea recalls some curious
incidents to my mind. The raid on the King’s tomb was one of the
most extraordinary affairs ever known. Its inception and failure
might have been concealed but for the Coreans, when they attacked
the ghouls, killing an unfortunate Manilaman. Hearing of this, the
Spanish consul applied to Mr. Seward (United States Consul-General
at Shanghae), who at once arrested Jenkins. I was one of the four
“associates” summoned to sit with the consul-general in the trial,
and well remember what a perfect burlesque it was. The Chinese, who
had told a plain and coherent story on preliminary examination,
were as dumb as oysters on the stand. When all had been called, the
defendant’s counsel said that he would rest his case on their
testimony. Conviction was impossible, but in the minds of those
informed on the subject, the wickedness of this buccaneering
expedition was remembered as surpassing even the absurdity of an
attempt to destroy a granite mausoleum with coal shovels. There is
a monstrous impertinence in Oppert’s publishing an account of a
piratical fiasco which is reported to have cost him a term of
imprisonment at home.
A. A. Hayes, Jr. New York, April 15, 1880.