Chapter 38 "Tianjin Teaching Case" in Late Qing Dynasty

On July 21, 1870, at the gate of Tianjin Wanghailou Catholic Church in a gray sky, Zeng Guofan, Governor of Zhili and Minister of Beiyang, looked up at the sky, sighed, and finally made a very difficult decision. What kind of difficult subject is it that makes Zeng Guofan, who has gone through hardships and narrow escapes, and finally defeated Hong Xiuquan, a giant in the rebel world, find it so difficult? This problem is the "Tianjin Teaching Case" that almost changed the historical trend of the late Qing Dynasty. At the turn of the spring and summer of this year, in the cemetery of the Yuying Church, an affiliated institution of the French Catholic Church in Wanghailou, Tianjin, wild dogs foraging for food dug up the corpses of several children.

Afterwards, officials from the Tianjin County Government came to hear the news. According to statistics, nearly forty children were buried in the cemetery. After that, a gossip spread crazily: French missionaries in Wanghailou bought Chinese traffickers and abducted hundreds of children in Tianjin.For every child abducted, the missionaries gave the trafficker five taels of silver.French missionaries bought these children in order to prepare a new type of western medicine using the children's eyes, hearts and livers as raw materials.Those child corpses in the churchyard are the children who were abandoned after their livers were dissected.

Coincidentally, the Tianjin county government caught a human trafficker named Wu Lanzhen, who said that the leader Wang San entrusted him to abduct the children. Wu Lanzhen's words added fuel to the flames. For a while, the people were indignant and anti-foreign sentiment was surging!People in Tianjin went on strike and rallied one after another, spontaneously surrounded the office building of the Tianjin County Government, shouting: foreigners get out of Tianjin!If such a big thing happens, does your government care about it? Liu Jie, the magistrate of Tianjin, had no choice but to bring Wu Lanzhen to Wanghailou Church to identify the suspect Wang San, but Wu Lanzhen could not identify anyone, nor could he tell the details of the church.

However, thousands of angry people have gathered outside the church after hearing the news. They were emotional and threw bricks into the church. The conflict was about to break out. How to deal with this kind of chaotic group conflict scene, Liu Jie has no experience, and the French also have no experience. Just when Liu Jie was trying to disperse the crowd, the French Consul in Tianjin, Fontanier, angrily brought people to negotiate with Liu Jie.Although Liu Jie is already a county-level cadre, he is still a high-spirited scholar in his heart. Another word for a high-spirited scholar is "angry youth", and angry youth has a temper.

Feng Daye's self-conceived "patient persuasion" negotiation failed, and he was so angry that he decided to single out Liu Jie and the angry crowd.Losing his mind, Feng Daye pulled out his gun and pulled the trigger at Liu Jie. The movement was smooth and smooth, but the sight was too bad, he missed the target Liu Jie, but killed Liu Jie's servant. Feng Daye obviously underestimated the power of the people's war.This time, he will pay a high tuition fee for his impulsive recklessness. After a long period of silence, it will explode.Since the Opium War, Chinese people have been silent for too long!

The blood ignited the fuze of the riot, and the people boiled. They killed Feng Daye and his assistants, and rushed into the church to start a killing.Ten nuns, two priests, two French officials, and two French civilians were killed, and the church and the Foundling Hall were burned.But this did not quell people's anger. In the next few hours, the riots continued. Three Russian businessmen were killed, four British and American churches were destroyed, and more than 30 Chinese parishioners were killed. This is the "Tianjin Teaching Case Incident".