Battle of Thuan An

The Battle of Thuan An (20 August 1883) was a clash between the French and the Vietnamese during the period of undeclared hostilities which preceded the Sino-French War (August 1884 to April 1885). During the battle a French landing force under the command of Admiral Amédée Courbet stormed the coastal forts that guarded the river approaches to the Vietnamese capital Hue, enabling the French to dictate a treaty to the Vietnamese that recognised a French protectorate over Tonkin. The French strike against the Vietnamese in August 1883, sanctioned by Jules Ferry's administration in Paris, did more than anything else to make a war between France and China inevitable, and sowed the seeds of the Vietnamese Can Vuong national uprising in July 1885.

Background

On 30 July 1883, Admiral Courbet, General Bouët and Jules Harmand, the French civil commissioner-general for Tonkin, held a council of war at Haiphong. The meeting noted that the Court of Hue was covertly aiding and abetting Liu Yongfu's Black Flag Army, and that the Vietnamese commander-in-chief Prince Hoang Ke Viem was openly in arms against the French at Nam Dinh. The three men agreed that Bouët should launch an offensive against the Black Flag Army in its positions around Phu Hoai on the Day River as soon as possible. They also decided, largely on Harmand's urging, to recommend to the French government a strike against the Vietnamese defences of Hue, followed by an ultimatum requiring the Vietnamese to accept a French protectorate over Tonkin or face immediate attack. Jules Ferry's government was initially reluctant to sanction an attack on Hue, fearing that it might provoke a response from China, but the French minister to China, Arthur Tricou, convinced the French government that China would acquiesce in a French 'act of virility'.

On 11 August the navy minister Charles Brun approved Harmand and Courbet’s proposal for a naval descent on Hue to coerce the Vietnamese court. The aim of the expedition was to put a landing force ashore to capture the Thuan An forts, which guarded the entrance to the River of Perfumes, after a preliminary bombardment by the warships of Courbet's Tonkin Coasts naval division. As the Tonkin Expeditionary Corps would be fully committed to Bouët's projected attack on the Black Flag Army, it was agreed that the landing near Hue would be made by troops from the French garrisons in Cochin China.

On 16 August Courbet left Along Bay aboard his flagship "Bayard", and on 16 August anchored at the entrance to the Hue River and scouted the Thuan An fortifications. Meanwhile a strong flotilla of the Tonkin Coasts naval division had concentrated in Tourane Bay. Courbet's naval force for the descent on Hue consisted of the ironclads "Bayard" and "Atalante", the cruiser "Château-Renaud", the gunboats "Lynx" and "Vipère" and the transport "Drac". This force was joined by the troopship "Annamite", which sailed up from Saigon with a landing force of 600 marine infantry and 100 Cochinchinese riflemen and a marine artillery battery. [The landing force included the 27th and 31st Companies, 1st Marine Infantry Regiment (Captains Moniot and Sorin) and the 22nd Marine Artillery Battery (Captain Luce). The detachment of Cochinchinese riflemen was commanded by Lieutenant Vincentelli. The marine infantry were under the overall command of Captain Radiguet.]

The naval bombardment

Courbet returned to Tourane Bay with "Bayard" on the evening of 16 August and issued his orders for an attack on the Thuan An forts on 18 August. On 17 August the French rehearsed their plans for the attack. The French naval division left Tourane at 8 a.m. on 18 August, in order of battle with "Bayard" at its head, and anchored off the entrance to the Hue River around 2 p.m. The ships took up positions for the impending attack. "Bayard" took station at the entrance to the river, to be able to fire both upon the southern forts and on the large northern fort, 2,000 metres away. "Château-Renaud" was a little to the east, and was charged with attacking the southern forts only. "Atalante", to the west of "Bayard", was tasked with attacking the large northern fort, and "Drac", anchored on the western flank of the French line, was to take on the small forts at the end of the enemy positions. The gunboats "Lynx" and "Vipère", placed between "Atalante" and "Drac", were to move in close and protect the landing. "Annamite" remained in the rear.

An attempt to negotiate was made by the Vietnamese, and discussions took up much of the afternoon. The Vietnamese garrison rejected an ultimatum to evacuate one of the forts.

At 5.40 p.m. on 18 August the ships of the naval division hoisted a French flag at each masthead, "Bayard" opened fire, and the entire division immediately followed suit. The light frigate "Alouette" from Cochin China joined the division shortly before hostilities commenced, and Courbet ascertained that she had no new orders for him before opening fire. The Vietnamese defenders replied, although outgunned, but the French ships were out of range of their antiquated cannon. The bombardment lasted for just over an hour, until it became too dark to fire effectively. The guns stopped firing at 7 p.m., and the French ships turned on their powerful electric searchlights to illuminate the forts, the Thuan An pass and the sea around their anchorage, in case of an enemy night attack.

Orders were given for a landing at dawn on 19 August. The men turned in early, and when the drums beat to quarters at 4 a.m. the officers and sailors of the landing companies prepared to man the boats. But shortly before dawn Courbet changed his mind and cancelled the landing. The sea was very rough, and he may also have considered that the previous day’s bombardment had not done enough damage. At dawn the French resumed their bombardment. To their surprise the Vietnamese replied with a well-aimed salvo of shells which whistled overhead and fell in the sea close around the French ships. They had taken advantage of the darkness to bring up rifled guns with a longer range. Although the French naval division was soon able to silence these guns, they scored a number of minor hits. "Vipère" and the ironclad "Bayard" were struck several times during these exchanges of fire, but were not seriously damaged.

The attack on the Thuan An forts

The sun rose on 20 August on a completely calm sea. At 5.30 a.m. Courbet decided to proceed immediately with the landing. Just over a thousand men (the two marine infantry companies, the Cochinchinese riflemen and the landing companies of "Bayard", "Atalante" and "Château-Renaud") would go ashore under the command of Captain Parrayon of "Bayard" and seize the Northern Fort.

The landing was made in two stages. At 5.45 a.m. an advance guard under Parrayon's personal command, consisting of the three ships’ landing companies and two sections of marine infantry, climbed into the launches and made slowly for the shore. Half an hour later this detachment struggled ashore in the sand dunes in front of the Vietnamese defences. The Vietnamese, snug in their trenches overlooking the beach, began to hurl firecrackers at the attackers. "Lynx" and "Vipère", anchored just offshore, responded with cannon and rifle fire, while the crews of the French launches fired their Hotchkiss "canons-revolvers". Under this covering fire, the landing companies were able to move slowly forward from the beach.

A spearhead led by "enseigne de vaisseau" Olivieri crossed the beach defences and fought a brief action with a party of Vietnamese who left their entrenchments to confront the invaders. The Vietnamese were quickly routed. At the same time the landing company of "Atalante" came up in support, under the command of "lieutenant de vaisseau" Poidloue, and captured a battery of cannon commanding a stretch of the river. This feat enabled Parrayon to attack the village and the Northern Fort, which he carried without firing a shot. Meanwhile the French had, with some difficulty, landed the 65-millimetre guns of Luce's battery on the dunes, and these also supported the French attack. The Vietnamese gradually gave way and eventually retreated, burning the village as they went. The ships of the naval division continued to fire throughout the action, laying down a barrage ahead of the landing force that paved the way for its advance.

At 8 a.m. Captain Sorin landed with the bulk of the marine infantry and linked up with the first detachment in front of the principal fort. After about an hour’s fighting Captain Parrayon, Ensign Olivieri and "lieutenant de vaisseau" Palma Gourdon (who would later win fame in the Battle of Shipu) were among the first into the fort. Five minutes later the French flag was hoisted on the citadel’s flagpole, to the cheers of all the men of the naval division.

During the morning battle the French had captured the Northern Fort. But the Southern Fort still remained in Vietnamese hands. In the afternoon, in order to prepare the way for an attack on the Southern Fort, the gunboats "Lynx" and "Vipère" boldly crossed the river barrage. The fort’s guns engaged them gamely, and the two gunboats fired back. Out at sea, "Bayard" and "Château-Renaud" added the weight of their own fire to the contest. The French had the better of this artillery duel. The fire from the fort slackened. On the morning of 21 August the squadron’s launches landed a strong French column on the beach opposite the Southern Fort, ready to attack it if necessary. But there was no need. The fort and the neighbouring villages were completely empty. The Annamese had evacuated their last defences, and there was now nothing to stop the French from sailing up the River of Perfumes to Hue.

Vietnamese losses during the bombardment and subsequent landing had been horrific, perhaps 2,500 men killed or wounded. French casualties, by contrast had been derisory, only a dozen men wounded. On the following day Courbet congratulated his troops on their success, singling out the officers and crew of "Lynx" and "Vipère" for special commendation. [De Lonlay, Au Tonkin, 19–44; Ganneron, "L’amiral Courbet", 203–10; Gervais, "L’amiral Courbet", 25–34; "Histoire illustrée de l’expédition du Tonkin", 95–6; Huard, "La guerre du Tonkin", 103–22; Loir, "L’escadre de l’amiral Courbet", 13–22; Loti, "Figures et choses qui passaient", 175–239; Nicolas, "Livre d’or de l’infanterie de la marine", 280–5; Thomazi, "Histoire militaire de l’Indochine française", 62–4; Thomazi, "La conquête de l’Indochine", 165–6]

The treaty of Hue

The French capture of the Thuan An forts overawed the Vietnamese court at Hue. In the middle of the following night Nguyen Van Thuong, the Vietnamese foreign minister, arrived with the French bishop Monsignor Caspar to interpret, and concluded a 48-hour armistice, agreeing to the evacuation of twelve inland forts defending the river, the destruction of their ammunition and the removal of the barrages. Harmand then sailed upriver to Hue aboard a steam launch.

At Hue Harmand presented a brutal ultimatum to the Vietnamese court, written in a style reminiscent of the Melian Dialogue of Thucydides and couched in terms that brooked no compromise. The emperor and his ministers were to have no opportunity to discuss the terms of the treaty, or to haggle over individual clauses. They must accept the treaty in full, or the terrible vengeance of France would fall upon them.

If we wanted to, we could destroy your dynasty root and branch and seize for ourselves the entire kingdom, as we have done in Cochin China. You know very well that this would present no difficulty to our armies. For a moment, you hoped to find help from a great empire on your borders, which has on several occasions posed as your suzerain. But even if such a suzerainty ever existed, and whatever the consequences that might once have resulted from it, it is now nothing but a historical curiosity. Now here is a fact which is quite certain. You are completely at our mercy. We have the power to seize and destroy your capital and to starve you all to death. It is up to you to choose between war and peace. We do not wish to conquer you, but you must accept our protectorate. For your people it is a guarantee of peace and prosperity. For your government and your court, it is the only chance of survival. We give you forty-eight hours to accept or reject, in their entirety and without discussion, the terms which we are magnanimously offering you. We believe that there is nothing in them dishonourable to you, and if they are carried out with sincerity on both sides they will bring happiness to the people of Annam. But if you reject them, you can expect to suffer the most terrible of misfortunes. The worst catastrophe you are capable of imagining will fall far short of what will actually befall you. The empire of Annam, its royal dynasty and its princes and court will have voted for their own extinction. The very name of Annam will be erased from history.

Cowed by the French appeal to naked force, the Vietnamese court gave way immediately, and on 25 August 1883 signed a treaty dictated by Harmand. The Treaty of Hue gave France everything it wanted from Vietnam. The Vietnamese recognised the legitimacy of the French occupation of Cochin China, accepted a French protectorate both for Annam and Tonkin and promised to withdraw their troops from Tonkin. Vietnam, its royal house and its court survived, but under French direction. France was granted the privilege of stationing a resident-general at Hue, who would work to the civil commissioner-general in Tonkin and could require a personal audience with the Vietnamese emperor. To ensure there were no second thoughts, a permanent French garrison would occupy the Thuan An forts. Large swathes of territory were also transferred from Annam to Cochin China and Tonkin. The French cancelled the country’s debts, but required in return the cession of the southern province of Binh Thuan, which was annexed to the French colony of Cochin China. At the same time the northern provinces of Nghe An, Thanh Hoa and Ha Tinh were transferred to Tonkin, where they would come under direct French oversight. In return the French undertook to drive out the Black Flags from Tonkin and to guarantee freedom of commerce on the Red River. These were hardly concessions, since they were planning to do both anyway. [Gervais, "L’amiral Courbet", 34–9; Huard, "La guerre du Tonkin", 122–30; Thomazi, "La conquête de l’Indochine", 166]

Notes

References

* Barbier, H., "La division navale d'Extrême-Orient (1870/1940)" (Nantes, 2006)
* Benoist, M., "Courbet: marin légendaire" (Paris, 1946)
* Duboc, E., "Trente cinq mois de campagne en Chine, au Tonkin" (Paris, 1899)
* Eastman, L., "Throne and Mandarins: China's Search for a Policy during the Sino-French Controversy" (Stanford, 1984)
* Ganneron, A., "L'amiral Courbet, d'après les papiers de la Marine et de la famille" (Paris, 1885)
* Gervais, E., "L'amiral Courbet" (Paris, undated)
* Huard, "La guerre du Tonkin" (Paris, 1887)
* Loir, Maurice, "L'escadre de l'amiral Courbet" (Paris, 1886)
* Lonlay, D. de, "Au Tonkin, 1883–1885" (Paris, 1886)
* Lonlay, D. de, "L'amiral Courbet et le « Bayard »: récits, souvenirs historiques" (Paris, 1886)
* Loti, Pierre, "Figures et choses qui passaient" (Paris, 1931)
* Lung Chang [龍章] , "Yueh-nan yu Chung-fa chan-cheng" [越南與中法戰爭, Vietnam and the Sino-French War] (Taipei, 1993)
* Thomazi, A., "La conquête de l'Indochine" (Paris, 1934)
* Thomazi, A., "Histoire militaire de l'Indochine français" (Hanoi, 1931)

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