Pescadores Campaign (1885) - The Campaign

The Campaign

The French flotilla concentrated off Tai-wan-fu (台灣府, modern Tainan, 台南) on 28 March, and approached the Pescadores from the west before dawn on 29 March. During the morning of 29 March the French warships bombarded and silenced the Hsiaochi battery and other Chinese shore batteries guarding the approaches to Makung.

In the late afternoon Lange's battalion was put ashore on the southern cape of P'eng-hu Island, at Dome Hill, where it set up a defensive position for the night. There were no Chinese in sight, and the landing was made without resistance.

During the night of 29 March the French sent boats to scout a barrage of chains thrown across the entrance to Makung harbour. The scouting party discovered that no mines had yet been attached to the chains, and at dawn on 30 March a party of sailors from Bayard went forward in launches to cut a gap in the barrage. Chinese riflemen tried to disrupt this operation, and one French sailor was killed.

With the barrage breached, Courbet's flotilla entered Makung Bay during the morning of 30 March and bombarded the defences of Makung. At the same time, Lange's battalion left its bivouac on Dome Hill and began to advance towards Makung, its flanks covered by d'Estaing and Vipère in Makung Bay and Annamite in Dome Bay. The column was guided towards its objective by an elderly local fisherman, who had volunteered his services for pay. During the afternoon Lange's men cleared a force of Chinese infantry from the village of Kisambo and closed up to the village of Siu-kuei-kang (modern Suo-kang, 鎖港), which was strongly held by the Chinese. Lange's men bivouacked for the night to the west of the village, ready to attack the Chinese the following morning. During the evening the French column was reinforced by the landing companies of Bayard, Triomphante and d'Estaing and by four 65-millimetre cannon.

On the morning of 31 March Lange attacked the main Chinese defensive line around Siu-kuei-kang. Although the marine infantry and sailors were heavily outnumbered, French naval gunfire tipped the balance in their favour. The Chinese were driven back from their positions and attempted to make a second stand before Makung, near the village of Amo. Lange attacked them again, with equal success, and occupied Makung late in the afternoon.

Most of the defeated Chinese soldiers escaped to Amoy (Xiamen, 廈門) in mainland China or to Tai-wan-fu on junks and fishing boats under cover of darkness, though a number of soldiers were caught and handed over to the victorious French by the inhabitants of the Pescadores, who saw no reason to distinguish between two equally unwelcome sets of intruders.

French casualties in the Pescadores campaign were 5 killed and 12 wounded. The wounded included one officer, lieutenant de vaisseau Poirot of Triomphante. Chinese casualties may have amounted to 300 dead and around 400 wounded, and included several senior officers. The French were told by islanders that the American artillery officer Nelson was beheaded during the bombardment of 29 March on the orders of an enraged Chinese commander, because his guns were unable to make any effective reply to the French warships.

The French bombardment of the Chinese positions on the Pescadores was heard in Tai-wan-fu (modern Tainan) on the Formosan mainland. The British missionary William Campbell described the impact of the battle on the town's inhabitants:

One quiet afternoon during the spring of 1885 the people of Formosa were startled on hearing what seemed to them the sound of distant thunder. It was not thunder, but the ponderous ironclads of France engaged in demolishing the fortifications over against Fisher Island and Makung. Those fortifications were mounted with good-sized guns of foreign make, and occupied by several thousands of soldiers who had been hastily called from various centres on the mainland. It all availed nothing. Fighting was to be conducted in a very different style from that of other days; and, sure enough, the large floating batteries of the French fleet loomed into sight. According to popular report, no time was lost with any kind of preliminary formalities. The Chinese commenced to fire on the advancing ships, which continued steadily and with ominous silence to press forward in the direction of Makung. When within about rifle-shot range, there burst from them such a tremendous discharge against the large fort outside of the town that many a heart must have been filled with terror and amazement. Indeed, some say that on witnessing the fearful havoc caused by this opening volley from the French guns, both officers and men began to scamper off from the entrenchments; a statement which, however, cannot be altogether correct, since the number of soldiers suffering from frontal wounds, who afterwards found their way to the mission hospital at Tai-wan-fu showed conclusively that not a few of those poor matter-of-fact Chinamen must have made a noble stand against the invaders of their country.

The Pescadores campaign was Courbet's last military victory. Although it was a minor operation compared with the capture of Son Tay or the battle of Foochow, in the eyes of his officers it was his most flawless military achievement. Significantly, Courbet directed operations in person, and chose to fight this brief colonial campaign in the traditional style, with ships of the French navy supporting the land operations of marine infantry and artillery. The decision reflected inter-service rivalries. Courbet was cocking a snook at the army ministry, which had long ago wrested the direction of the Tonkin campaign away from the navy ministry. His timing was perfect. While the army ministry was struggling to explain away General François de Négrier's defeat in the battle of Bang Bo (24 March 1885) and the subsequent French retreat from Lang Son, Courbet presented the navy ministry with an elegant, almost bloodless victory in the Pescadores. The Sino-French War ended on a high note for the French navy and the Troupes de Marine.

On 27 July 1885, in the wake of an enquiry into their conduct, the defeated Chinese generals Chou Shan-ch'u and Cheng Ying-chieh were demoted and punished for the loss of the Pescadores by being posted to the remote northern Chinese province of Heilungkiang (黑龍江).