Boxers Defeated: Allied Troops Occupy Beijing to End Rebellion
Forces from eight nations, including Japan, Russia, Britain, France, Germany, the United States, Italy, and Austria-Hungary, stormed Beijing on August 14, 1900, ending the 55-day siege of the Legation Quarter and crushing the Boxer Rebellion. The Boxers, a Chinese peasant movement called the "Righteous and Harmonious Fists," had been attacking foreigners and Chinese Christians with the tacit support of Empress Dowager Cixi. The foreign occupiers looted the imperial palaces and extracted the Boxer Protocol of 1901, which imposed a staggering indemnity of 450 million taels of silver (roughly $10 billion today) payable over 39 years. The humiliation accelerated the collapse of the Qing dynasty, which fell in 1912.
August 14, 1900
126 years ago
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