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OF the romantic
figures which grace the history of New England in the nineteenth century, none
is to be compared in dash and in all those other qualities that captivate the
imagination with the figure of Frederick Townsend Ward, the Salem boy who won a
generalship in the Chinese military service, suppressed the Tai-Ping rebellion,
organised the "Ever-victorious Army" – for whose exploits "Chinese" Gordon
always gets credit in history – and died fighting at Ning
Po for a
nation of which he had become one, a fair daughter of which he had married, and
by which he is to-day worshipped as a god. Very far certainly did this soldier
of fortune wander in the thirty short years of his life from the peaceful
red-brick Townsend mansion (now, alas! a steam bread bakery), at the corner of
Derby and Carleton Streets, Salem, in which, in 1831, he was born.
This house was built
by Ward's grandfather, Townsend, and during Frederick's boyhood was a charming
place of the comfortable colonial sort, to which was joined a big, rambling,
old-fashioned garden, and from the upper windows of which there was to be had a
fascinating view of the broad-stretching sea. To the sea it was, therefore, that
the lad naturally turned when, after ending his education at the Salem High
School, he was unable to gain admission to the military academy at West Point
and follow the soldier career in which it had always been his ambition to shine.
He shipped before the mast on an American vessel sailing from New York.
Apparently even the hardships of such a common sailor's lot could not dampen his
ardour for adventure, for he made a number of voyages.
At the outbreak of
the Crimean war young Ward was in France, and, thinking that his long-looked for
opportunity had come, he entered the French army for service against the
Russians. Enlisting as a private, he soon, through the influence of friends,
rose to be a lieutenant; but, becoming embroiled in a quarrel with his superior
officer, he resigned his commission and returned to New York, without having
seen service either in Russia or Turkey.
The next few years
of the young man's life were passed as a ship broker, in New York City, but this
work-a-day career soon became too humdrum, and he looked about for something
that promised more adventures. He had not to look far. Colonel William Walker
and his filibusters were about to start on the celebrated expedition against
Nicaragua, and with them Ward determined to cast in his lot. Through the trial
by fire which awaited the ill-fated expedition, he passed unhurt, and escaping
by some means or other its fatal termination, returned to New York.
California next
attracted his attention, but here he met with no better success, and after a
hand-to-mouth existence of a few months he turned again to seafaring life, and
shipped for China as the mate of an American vessel. His arrival at Shanghai in
1859 was most opportune, for there the chance for which he had been longing
awaited him.
The great Tai-Ping
rebellion, that half-Christian, wholly fanatical uprising which devastated many
flourishing provinces, had, at this time, attained alarming proportions. Ching
Wang, with a host of bloodcrazed rebels, had swept over the country in the
vicinity of Shanghai with fire and sword, and at the time of Ward's arrival
these fanatics were within eighteen miles of the city.
The Chinese
merchants had appealed in vain to the foreign consuls for assistance. The
imperial government had made no plans for the preservation of Shanghai. So the
wealthy merchants, fearing for their stores, resolved to take, the matter into
their own hands, and after a consultation of many days, offered a reward of two
hundred thousand dollars to any body of foreigners who should drive the
Tai-Pings from the city of Sungkiang.
Salem's soldier of
fortune, Frederick T. Ward, responded at once to the opportunity thus offered.
He accepted in June, 1860, the offer of
Ta Kee, the
mandarin at the head of the merchant body, and in less than a week – such was
the magnetism of the man – had raised a body of one hundred foreign sailors,
and, with an American by the name of Henry Burgevine as his lieutenant, had set
out for Sungkiang. The men in Ward's company were desperadoes, for the most
part, but they were no match, of course, for the twelve thousand Tai-Pings. This
Ward realised as soon as the skirmishing advance had been made, and he returned
to Shanghai for reinforcements.
From the Chinese
imperial troops he obtained men to garrison whatever courts the foreign legation
might capture, an arrangement which left the adventurers free
to go wherever their action could be most effective.
Thus reinforced,
Ward once more set out for Sungkiang. Even on this occasion his men were
outnumbered one hundred to one, but, such was the desperation of the attacking
force, the rebels were driven like sheep to the slaughter, and the defeat of the
Tai-Pings was overwhelming. It was during this battle, it is interesting to
know, that the term "foreign devils" first found place in the Chinese
vocabulary.
The promised reward
was forthwith presented to the gifted American soldier, and immediately ward
accepted a second commission against the rebels at Singpo. The Tai-Pings of this
city were under the leadership of a renegade Englishman named Savage, and the
fighting was fast and furious. Ward and his men performed many feats of valour,
and actually sealed the city wall, thirty feet in height, to fight like demons
upon its top. But it was without avail. With heavy losses, they were driven
back.
But the attempt was
not abandoned. Retiring to Shanghai, Ward secured the assistance of about one
hundred new foreign recruits, and with them returned once more to the scene of
his defeat. Half a mile from the walls of Singpo the little band of foreign
soldiers of fortune and poorly organised imperial troops were met by Savage and
the Tai-Pings, and the battle that resulted waged for hours. The rebels were the
aggressors, and ten miles of Ward's retreat upon Sungkiang saw fighting every
inch of the way. The line of retreat was strewn with rebel dead, and such were
their losses that they retired from the province altogether.
Later Savage was
killed, and the Tai-Pings quieted down. For his exploits ward received the
monetary rewards agreed upon, and was also granted the button of a mandarin of
the fourth degree.
He had received
severe wounds during the campaigns, and was taking time to recuperate from them
at Shanghai when the jealousy of other foreigners made itself felt, and the
soldier from Salem was obliged to face a charge before the United States consul
that he had violated the neutrality laws. The matter was dropped, however,
because the hero of Sungkiang promptly swore that he was no longer an American
citizen, as he had become a naturalised subject of the Chinese emperor!
Realising the value of the Chinese as fighting men, ward now determined to organise a number of Chinese regiments, officer them with Europeans, and arm and equip them after American methods. This he did, and in six months he appeared at Shanghai at the head of three bodies of Chinese, splendidly drilled and under iron discipline. He arrived in the nick of time, and, routing a vastly superior force, saved the city from capture.
After this exploit he was no
langer
shunned by Europeans as an adventurer and an outlaw. He was too prominent to be
overlooked. His Ever-Victorious Army; as it was afterward termed, entered upon a
campaign of glorious victory. One after another of the rebel strongholds fell
before it, and its leader was made a mandarin of the highest grade, with the
title of admiral-general.
Ward then assumed the Chinese name of Hwa, and married Changmei, a maiden of
high degree, who was nineteen at the time of her wedding, and as the daughter of
one of the richest and most exalted mandarins of the red button, was considered
in China an exceedingly good match for the Salem youth. According to oriental
standards she was a beauty, too.
Ward did not rest long from his campaigns, however, for we find that he was soon
besieged in the city, of Sungkiang with a few men. A relieving force of the
Ever-Victorious Army here came to his assistance.
He did not win all his victories easily. In the battle of Ningpo, toward the end
of the first division of the Tai-Ping rebellion, the carnage was frightful.
Outnumbered, but not out-generalled, the government forces fought valiantly.
Ward was shot through the. stomach while leading a charge, but refused to leave
the field while the battle was on. Through his field officers he directed his
men, and when the victory was assured, fell back unconscious in the arms of his
companion, Burgevine. He was carried to Ningpo, where he died the following
morning, a gallant and distinguished soldier, although still only thirty years
old.
In the Confucian cemetery at Ningpo his body was laid at rest with all possible
honours and with military ceremony becoming his rank. Over his grave, and that
of his young wife, who survived him only a few months, a mausoleum was erected,
and monuments were placed on the scenes of his victories. The mausoleum soon
became a shrine invested with miraculous power, and a number of years after his
death General Ward was solemnly declared to be a joss or god. The manuscript of
the imperial edict to this effect is now preserved in the Essex Institute.
The command of the Ever-Victorious Army reverted to Burgevine, but later,
through British intrigue, to General Gordon. It was Ward, however, the Salem
lad, who organised the army by which Chinese Gordon gained his fame. The British
made a saint and martyr of Gordon, and called Ward an adventurer and a common
sailor, but the Chinese rated him more nearly as he deserved.
In a little red-bound volume printed in Shanghai in 1863, and translated from
the Chinese for the benefit of a few of General Ward's relatives in this country
– a work which I have been permitted to examine – the native chronicler says of
our hero:
"What General Ward has done to and for China is as yet but imperfectly known,
for those whose duty it is to transfer to posterity a record of this great man
are either so wrapped in speculation as to how to build themselves up on his
deeds of the past time, or are so fearful that any comment on any subject
regarding him may detract from their ability, that with his last breath they
allow all that appertains to him to be buried in the tomb. Not one in ten
thousand of them could at all approach him in military genius, in courage, and
in resource, or do anything like what he did."
In his native land Ward has never been honoured as he deserves to be. On the
contrary, severe criticism has been accorded him because he was fighting in
China for money during our civil war, "when," said his detractors, "he might
have been using his talents for the protection of the flag under which he was
born."
But this was the fault of circumstances rather than of intention. Ward wished,
above everything, to be a soldier, and when he found fighting waiting for him in
China, it was the most natural thing in the world for him to accept the
opportunity the gods provided. But he did what he could under the circumstances
for his country. He offered ten thousand dollars to the national cause – and was
killed in the Chinese war before the answer to his proffer of financial aid came
from Minister Anson Burlingame.
It is rather odd that just the amount that he wished to be used by the North for
the advancement of the Union cause has recently (1901) been bequeathed to the
Essex Institute at Salem by Miss Elizabeth C. Ward, his lately deceased sister,
to found a Chinese library in memory of Salem's soldier of fortune. Thus is
rounded out this very romantic chapter of modern American history.
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