Keying (official) - Role During The Opium Wars

Role During The Opium Wars

In 1842, the Daoguang Emperor entrusted Keying to conclude a peace treaty with the Britain following the First Opium War, and he was chiefly responsible for negotiating and signing the Treaty of Nanking with the British on 29 August 1842. In the following years, Keying also concluded the Treaty of Whampoa with France, the Treaty of Wanghia with the United States and the Treaty of Canton with Sweden-Norway. This was the first group of treaties known as the "Unequal Treaties" in China.

In 1858, the Xianfeng Emperor ordered Keying to negotiate a peace treaty with Britain and France in order to conclude the Second Opium War. During the negotiations, the British interpreters Horatio Nelson Lay and Thomas Francis Wade sought to expose Keying's duplicity by producing documents the British had captured in Guangzhou, in which Keying expressed his contempt for the British. Humiliated, Keying promptly left the negotiations in Tianjin for Beijing and he was later arrested for having left his post in contravention of imperial order. He was sentenced to death by the Imperial Clan Court, but was allowed to commit suicide instead.