Instead, the Japanese were left to puzzle over the effects of the secret treaty without even knowing for sure that it existed. In July 1897, Russian military advisers arrived in Korea to train local troops. In November that same year, German forces occupied the port of Jiaozhou in Shandong, only a few miles from where Japanese occupiers still held Weihaiwei in lieu of payment of the Sino-Japanese War indemnities.8 Worried about the German presence, Li Hongzhang invited Russia to occupy a port of its own in the region to maintain a watch over the Germans. The Japanese were thus faced with the great insult of hearing that Port Arthur, which had been so hard fought for in the Sino-Japanese war, was now being handed over free to the Russians, who already hoped to build a railway from their new, beautifully-appointed warm-water port on the Yellow Sea, up to Harbin in Manchuria, where it would link to the Trans-Siberian Railway. The Japanese were less unhappy about another concession: Great Britain demanded, and received, occupant’s rights in Weihaiwei in order to ‘counterbalance’ the Russian occupation of Port Arthur, possibly to Japan’s own benefit.
In 1899, Vice Admiral Tōgō was moved to a new post, as commanding officer of the naval base at Sasebo. Although it still appeared to be a shore appointment, it put the 52-year-old officer in an enviable new position, overseeing not only the daily operation of the station, but also the construction of new ships in its dockyard. With the new threats on the Asian mainland, Japan was preparing a new fleet, and the locally built vessels would be chaperoned by full-sized, foreign-built battleships like the Mikasa, currently taking shape in England. His next assignment would be to put Japan’s might to use as part of an international effort, designed to save expatriates from America, Europe and Japan from death at the hands of a Chinese religious cult.
The Chinese interest in pitting foes against one another did not only apply on the borders. In 1900, the Beijing government made a fateful decision to look the other way while a new religious cult, dedicated to the removal of foreigners from Chinese soil, took direct action. The Society of the Harmonious Fist, otherwise known as the Boxers, was a grass-roots movement that first arose in Shandong province, where some of its adherents had murdered European missionaries. Not unlike Saigō Takamori’s Satsuma Rebellion in Japan, or the Donghaks in Korea, the Boxers were a blunt assertion of ‘traditional values’ – in this case a China free of white influence, with a quasi-religious element that held that true-hearted Boxers were impervious to foreign bullets. Although this claim was demonstrably untrue, the Boxers successfully massacred several enclaves of Europeans in China, and the Beijing faction managed to surround the Legation Quarter in Beijing. When the Empress Dowager claimed to have no control over Boxer activities, the foreign governments resolved to sent an international relief force.
The Yellow Sea was the route to Beijing. The international effort needed to sail past Russian-owned Port Arthur and British-occupied Weihaiwei, straight for Tianjin, the nearest sea-port to Beijing. The Boxers and their sympathisers held not only Beijing, but also the Dagu Forts, a maze of gun positions set around the S-bends of the Hai River where it met the Yellow Sea. Control of the Dagu forts controlled access to the port city of Tianjin, at one end of a railway that led to Beijing itself.
On 12 June, a member of the Japanese legation in Beijing was murdered and his body mutilated. As a mark of the seriousness of the situation, Tōgō himself was ordered out to China. While Tōgō was en route, the Chinese in one of the Dagu forts opened fire on the railway station, where many of the foreign troops had assembled. This attack came in concert with rioting by pro-Boxer parties within Tianjin itself and a series of attacks on Christian churches. The Japanese in town, 300 marines newly arrived from Sasebo, fought alongside Russian Cossacks led by Major-General Anatoly Stoessel. With the Japanese concession under attack, the marines still spared squads of men to back up their similarly beleagured allies at the French and German concessions.
Amid this chaos, Tōgō’s subordinate Captain Nagamino was obliged to make a political decision. Representatives of the foreign powers were unsure how to deal with the Dagu forts – the British and Germans favoured an all-out attack on the forts before they could do any more damage; the Americans refused to get involved in any attack until war was officially declared. Nagamino threw in his lot with the British and Germans, signing a joint ultimatum to the fort commanders to give up their forts before dawn or face the consequences.
A rag-tag fleet of three Russian craft formed a flotilla alongside a single boat each from France, Germany, Britain and Japan. All seemed to doubt their chances, volunteering their oldest and most expendable vessels – in Captain Nagamino’s case, the 13-year-old composite wood-and-iron gunboat Atago.9
The Atago, however, developed engine trouble and was instead left to guard the river bank near the flotilla’s point of embarkation. This appears to have been a genuine technical problem, as several hundred Japanese marines were still committed to the overland assault, as a similarly multinational force landed upriver with orders to storm the North-West and North Forts.
The other ships steamed gingerly downriver, with little choice but to form a single file, as the banks were barely 60 metres apart. It was hoped that the sight of them would be enough to persuade the occupants of the forts to leave; but in the event that the bluster failed, the flotilla would be a series of sitting ducks. Uncharacteristically for the Chinese, the watching artillerymen did not immediately open fire. Instead, they watched the ships as they rounded the S-bend on the approach to the first fort. The forts opened fire at one in the morning, with an instant reply from the waiting gunners on the ships. The flotilla continued its slow progress downstream, taking heavy damage from the onshore batteries, but giving as good as it got.
The land forces were right behind the bombardment, a united force of Germans, British and Japanese, blowing their own hole in the walls. The eager Japanese Lieutenant Shiraishi mounted a foolhardy single-handed charge over the wall, dropping down inside and fighting off Chinese defenders with little more than a broken staff, before unbolting the gates to let his fellow soldiers inside. As the hand-to-hand fighting continued within the fort, Shiraishi dashed for the roof, where in unseemly enthusiasm and unnecessarily violent competition with a rival coalition member, Shiraishi reached the flagpole on top of the fort, only to discover that he had somehow lost the flag he had saved for the purpose. Infamously, Shiraishi grabbed a large white cloth and daubed it with a ragged dot of fresh Chinese blood to make a rough approximation of the Rising Sun. It was this gory trophy that ran up the flagpole of the North West Fort, and signalled it had fallen to the alliance sometime around dawn.10 The North Fort fell soon afterwards, and then the South Fort. A second assault unfolded south of the river, as marines scrambled from two other boats to board several Chinese destroyers in the naval yard.
It was a superb victory for the international alliance, although the misgivings of the Americans and even some of the participants were soon realised. In firing upon Chinese government soldiers, the international alliance was blatantly lumping all Chinese in together as enemies, counting the loyal servants of the Empress Dowager as little different from the Boxer fanatics. It was the ideal excuse for the Empress Dowager, who convened an emergency council and decreed that all foreigners were henceforth banned from China. The foreigners in Beijing were expected to leave immediately, along the impossibly dangerous road to Tianjin, where they were sure to be massacred. Instead, the inhabitants of the Beijing Legation Quarter decided to make their stand where they were, barricading themselves within the small cluster of city blocks where all the foreign legations could be found. A mere stone’s-throw from the Forbidden City, the legation staff and their families blocked their entranceways, pooled their resources, and prayed for a swift rescue.
Tōgō arrived at the captured Dagu forts on 22 June 1900, too late to contribute to the assault. His presence seems to have been ordered more for political reasons than anything else, as there was considerable one-upmanship among the
coalition forces as to who should be in charge. As a Vice Admiral, Tōgō outranked many of the lesser commanders, many of whom were already in open disagreement about how to proceed.
With the sea-route to Dagu already in friendly hands, Tōgō could expect little naval action. Some of his smaller vessels might make brief forays upriver, but it was understood that much of the relief action of the Tianjin and Beijing foreigners was going to be a matter for the land armies. Consequently, Tōgō saw to it that the Japanese army was best served. Eight well-equipped Japanese troop transports arrived soon after him, and began unloading their men and supplies onto the beach. Tōgō immediately ordered that the Japanese warships send their ships’ boats to aid in the landing operation, effectively doubling the speed with which the Japanese could get ashore. However, Tōgō seemed to display a largely academic interest in the situation. He went upriver to Tanggu on an inspection trip, but otherwise preferred to lurk off shore within view of the coast, in the presence of the other coalition admirals.
On 29 June, the Russian battleship Petropavlovsk arrived, commanded by Vice Admiral Yevgeny Alexeiev. Ever inistent on the correct protocols, Tōgō made ready to pay a courtesy call on the new arrival, as Alexeiev outranked him. However, before Tōgō could set out, the over-enthusiastic Alexeiev rowed over to say hello. A tense meeting followed, with Alexeiev effusing loudly and at great length about the new-found alliance between Russia and Japan, while Tōgō offered little more than polite nods.
Tōgō remained aloof from much of the further squabbles among the coalition commanders. He attended one meeting of the assembled commanders, but pronounced it a waste of time, and sent a subordinate to further conclaves. Tōgō only broke his new rule when the British Admiral Sir Edward Seymour returned from the hinterland, in order to congratulate his colleague on his rescue. In all his dealings with the coalition commanders, Tōgō remained cagey with the Russians and cordial with the British – a sign, perhaps of future enmities and alliances, but also of the underlying tone of the coalition. The Russians were rushing to the area in order to balance what they regarded as a potentially unwelcome number of Japanese troops. With Japan so close to the Yellow Sea, it was a relatively simple matter for it to pour troops into the conflict, much to the concerns of the other powers, except for the British, who seemed glad of the asssistance. Notably, the Germans swiftly rushed over a Field Marshal, in order to prevent the Japanese land commander from being the highest ranking officer present.
While the admirals bickered and dealt over such matters as who landed first, who commanded which divisions, and which supplies were most crucial, Tōgō busied himself with one of his old hobbies – spying on everyone else. His report to Japan concentrated less on the minutiae of landing troops, for which Tōgō was once again little more than a riverbus driver, but on aspects of his coalition allies, particularly the over-friendly Russians.
I mainly directed my observation to the Russian warships, and my conclusion is that the Russian navy is not so formidable as is supposed by the world. It leaves very much to be desired. For one thing, it lacks discipline. What surprised me most, however, was the fact that Russia used warships as substitutes for transports, carrying soldiers and ammunition on board. This is evidently ignoring the true mission of a war vessel.11
In this assessment, Tōgō was being a little unfair. The Russians were, after all, arriving in the Yellow Sea in the full expectation that there would be no sea battles to fight. Tōgō himself had tasked boats from his warships to aid in the landing of Japanese troops, and none of the coalition forces were expecting to fight each other. However, for Tōgō this was no excuse, and, moreover, was a sign of a larger malaise.
A warship will thus have its energies wasted for what it is not intended, and will be of little use in case of emergency. This is what a naval man must be aware of most of all. Russia has at the same time betrayed by this that she is devoid of the proper means of transportation and that she is not likely to be able to despatch troops in a proper way at a moment’s notice.12
Meanwhile, the land forces steadily advanced upriver to Tianjin, and onwards towards Beijing. In Tianjin in late July, Tōgō’s curiosity got the better of him when he decided to try his hand at horse-riding. All of the other coalition officers were proceeding on horseback, and Tōgō’s legendary reticence, tinged perhaps with a touch of pride, did not allow him to admit that he had relatively little experience with horses. He borrowed a mount from a Japanese lieutenant-general, and having been warned that the animal was jumpy, kept his reins tight and moved the horse along at a slow pace.
Lieutenant Commander Takarabe Takeshi, riding alongside Tōgō, mistakenly assumed that it was the horse that was overcautious and cracked his riding crop across the animal’s rump. The horse immediately bolted, while the stoic Tōgō clung on for dear life. Eventually, he regained control and walked the horse back towards the other Japanese.
‘He ran pretty well, didn’t he?’ enthused a breathless Takarabe, only to be greeted with one Admiral Tōgō’s monosyllabic grunts. It was several years before Tōgō confessed his true feelings about the incident:
I was never so greatly troubled as I was then. I clung to the back of the horse so as not to fall, feeling pretty much in the same way as a man at the helm would suffer in stormy weather. The staff officer acted out of his good will and kindness and I could not complain. But I was very much troubled.13
If Tōgō was messing around on horseback in Tianjin, then he was plainly not performing much of an admiral’s duties any more. His presence had been wise, if not vital during the early flurry of activity off the Dagu forts, when the multinational expedition force was still unsure if it was a rescue party or an invading army. With the fall of Dagu and Tianjin, the further advance of the troops towards Beijing was now an army matter, and Tōgō could offer little assistance. Consequently, he was called home to Japan, arriving back at Nire at the same time as the news that the besieged foreigners of the Legation Quarter had been rescued from the Boxers after fifty-five days of fighting and waiting.
10
Port Arthur
Tōgō’s journey home was not without incident. He took a zig-zag route across the Bohai Gulf to Zhifu and back towards Korea, seemingly patrolling the old demarcation line that had once hemmed in his old foe Ding Ruchang. Leaving his ship at Chemulpo, he made the familiar journey inland to Seoul, where he was received in audience by the Korean ruler and made several courtesy calls on diplomats from some of the other nations involved in the Boxer strife. He then entertained two Korean ministers back aboard his ship, and steamed off down the coast of Korea. En route for Japan, he found a Russian ship stuck on a shoal and delayed his trip to come to her rescue, successfully towing her out of trouble.
Uneventful months followed at the naval academy; although in February 1901, Tōgō requested and was granted a brief compassionate leave. His mother Masuko, now eighty-seven years old, was in failing health, and Tōgō rushed to her bedside to nurse her in her final days. She remained a Satsuma samurai to her last breath, dying with the words: ‘Be loyal in your service.’1
Tōgō’s observations in Tianjin were not misspent. In the years that followed, the Japanese Admiralty re-assessed the greatest threat to Japan as issuing from Russia, and continued preparations to avenge the indignity of the Triple Intervention. Tōgō was called to Tokyo for secret talks on 15 October 1903. The summons found him once more bedridden with rheumatism, but he dragged himself to his feet, sure that if he did not, he would lose his chance to command the fleet. He was not to be disappointed. In a meeting with his old Satsuma friend, Admiral Yamamoto Gonnohyōe, Tōgō was informed that war was imminent and that he was to command the fleet. Tōgō was ecstatic at the news, but, true to form, merely acknowledged it with a curt nod and a salute. Even when being given the chance of a lifetime, he never went beyond bare monosyllables. He took his leave of his wife and family, and treated this sight of them as his last. To Mrs Tōgō, he left with a parting entreat
y that she should look after his dogs if he never came back.2
Although the result of his summons was a blunt statement in the official gazette that he had been appointed to a new post as Commander-in-Chief of the Standing Squadron, the discussion of his new position took several hours. Saying nothing to his subordinates, Tōgō threw his new squadron into a continuous round of drills, much of it in deliberate preparation for dealing with the naval tactics that he might expect from a pupil of Stepan Makarov – the admiral whose manual he had ordered to be translated some years earlier.
Tōgō would have several months to prepare, until 4 February 1904, when an Imperial Order was sent to both the army and navy:
We are now compelled to conclude that the Russian Government has no sincere desire to maintain the peace of the East. The integrity of the territories of China and Korea has a close connection with the independence and self-protection of our Japan. We have, therefore, ordered Our Government to break off the negotiations with Russia and have decided to take free action for the maintenance of our independence and self-protection.3
Admiral Togo Page 15