1. Yuan Shikai was a Chinese general and statesman who served as the second provisional president and the first official president of the Republic of China, head of the Beiyang government from 1912 to 1916 and Emperor of China from 1915 to 1916.
75 Facts About Yuan Shikai
1. 2.
Yuan Shikai was sent to Joseon to head a Qing garrison in Seoul and was appointed imperial resident and supreme adviser to the Korean government after thwarting the Gapsin Coup in 1885.
3.
Yuan Shikai was recalled to China shortly before the outbreak of the First Sino-Japanese War, and received command of the first New Army, which paved the way for his rise to power.
4.
In 1898, Yuan Shikai formed an alliance with Empress Dowager Cixi and helped bring an end to the Guangxu Emperor's Hundred Days' Reform.
5.
Yuan Shikai played an active role in the Late Qing reforms, which included the abolition of the imperial examination.
6.
In return, Yuan Shikai was chosen as the first official president of the Republic of China after Sun voluntarily stepped aside in his favor.
7.
Yuan Shikai then outlawed the KMT and dissolved the National Assembly.
8.
In December 1915, in an attempt to further secure his rule, Yuan Shikai restored the monarchy and proclaimed himself as the Hongxian Emperor.
9.
In March 1916, Yuan Shikai formally abdicated and restored the Republic, having been emperor for only 83 days.
10.
On 16 September 1859, Yuan Shikai was born in the village of Zhangying to the Yuan Clan which later moved 16 kilometres southeast of Xiangcheng to a hilly area that was easier to defend against bandits.
11.
Yuan Shikai was the fourth of six sons, and in 1866 was adopted by his father's younger brother, until he died in 1873.
12.
From that point Yuan Shikai was raised by several other uncles, before returning to Xiangcheng in 1878.
13.
Yuan Shikai's family was affluent enough to provide Yuan Shikai with a traditional Confucian education.
14.
Yuan Shikai's career began with the purchase of a minor official title in 1880, which was a common method of official promotion in the late Qing.
15.
Between 1877 and 1878, Yuan Shikai accompanied one of his uncles who was sent to assist relief efforts after a drought in the province of Henan, and Yuan Shikai was praised by officials there for his role in helping manage the response, including in punishing those who embezzled relief funds.
16.
Yuan Shikai planned to retake it, but this never happened because his deployment to Korea in 1882.
17.
Yuan Shikai married nine more concubines throughout the course of his life.
18.
Yuan Shikai distinguished himself during his service on Wu's staff in Korea, including both in battle and in his administrative ability, and was recommended for promotion to the rank of subprefect by Wu.
19.
Yuan Shikai became known for enforcing strict discipline among the Chinese troops in Korea.
20.
The Korean king proposed that some of his troops be trained by the Chinese, and Yuan Shikai was put in charge of training the Korean royal guard, as the head of a new Capital Guard Command.
21.
Yuan Shikai led his troops to defeat the outnumbered Japanese and recover King Gojong.
22.
The 26-year-old Yuan Shikai established himself as a resourceful leader, and from that point Viceroy Li Hongzhang gave him a critical role in regaining Chinese control of Korea.
23.
In October 1885, Yuan Shikai was appointed Chinese imperial resident in Korea by Li, restoring a custom that dated back to the Mongol Yuan Shikai dynasty.
24.
Yuan Shikai spent the next nine years in that position and operated as if he were above the law.
25.
Yuan Shikai ended any attempts at reform, changed the composition of the Korean government, and worked to minimize any other foreign influence, especially Japanese.
26.
Yuan Shikai wanted to remove Gojong from the throne on several occasions, but was prevented from doing so by Li Hongzhang.
27.
Yuan Shikai had three Korean concubines, one of whom was Korean Princess Li's relative, concubine Kim.
28.
At this point Yuan Shikai had a positive reputation outside of China, due to his actions in Korea.
29.
Around this time, Yuan Shikai had the confidence of senior Qing officials, including Ronglu, the Minister of War, and Yikuang, Prince Qing.
30.
Several high-ranking officials, including Yikuang, Weng Tonghe, and Wang Wenshao, signed memorials to the throne in the fall of 1895 asking the Guangxu Emperor to appoint Yuan Shikai to oversee military modernization.
31.
Yuan Shikai was known for having organized Korean forces, defeating the Japanese during the 1880s, and displaying management skills as a logistics officer during the most recent war.
32.
On 8 December 1895 Yuan Shikai was appointed as the commander of the Newly Created Army, which was created on the basis of the Pacification Army that had been raised during the war at the Huai Army training camp in Xiaozhan, near Tianjin.
33.
Yuan Shikai immediately set about organizing the brigade-sized Newly Created Army, and spent the next three years developing a force at Xiaozhan that was different from any previous Chinese military, being not only equipped but organized along the lines of the German Army, and funded by the central government.
34.
Already in 1896, Yuan Shikai's troops received praise from Ronglu, and in July 1897 Yuan Shikai was made the provincial judge of Zhili.
35.
Between 1895 and 1898 the emperor had several meetings with Yuan Shikai, which was rare for an official of his level.
36.
Yuan Shikai was seen as a member of the reform movement, though he was focused on his military service and was not involved in their political machinations.
37.
Yuan Shikai asked reform advocates Kang Youwei, Tan Sitong and others to develop a plan to save him.
38.
Yuan Shikai refused a direct answer, but insisted he was loyal to the Emperor.
39.
Yuan Shikai's success opened the way for his rise to the top in both military and political sectors.
40.
Yuan Shikai took the side of the pro-foreign faction in the Imperial Court, along with Prince Qing, Li Hongzhang, and Ronglu.
41.
Yuan Shikai refused to side with the Boxers and attack the Eight-Nation Alliance forces, joining with other Chinese governors who commanded substantial modernized armies like Zhang Zhidong not participating in the Boxer Rebellion.
42.
Yuan Shikai's forces massacred tens of thousands of people in their anti-Boxer campaign in Zhili.
43.
Yuan Shikai operated out of Baoding during the campaign, which ended in 1902.
44.
Yuan Shikai founded a provincial junior college in Jinan, which adopted western ideas of education.
45.
Yuan Shikai created a 2,000-strong police force to keep order in Tianjin, the first of its kind in Chinese history, as a result of the Boxer Protocol forbidding any troops to be staged close to Tianjin.
46.
Yuan Shikai was involved in the transfer of railway control from Sheng Xuanhuai, leading railways and their construction to become a large source of his revenue.
47.
Yuan Shikai played an active role in late-Qing political reforms, including the creation of the Ministry of Education and Ministry of Police.
48.
Yuan Shikai further advocated ethnic equality between Manchus and Han Chinese.
49.
Yuan Shikai ordered the Ministry of Education to implement a system of primary and secondary schools and universities with state-mandated curriculum, modelled after the educational system of Meiji-era Japan.
50.
On 27 August 1908, the Qing court promulgated "Principles for a Constitution", which Yuan Shikai helped to draft.
51.
Yuan Shikai's Han-dominated New Army was primarily responsible for the defence of Beijing, as most of the modernized Eight Banner divisions were destroyed in the Boxer Rebellion and the new modernized Banner forces were token in nature.
52.
The public reason for Yuan Shikai's resignation was that he was returning to his home in the village of Huanshang, the prefecture-level city of Anyang, due to a foot disease.
53.
Yuan Shikai had arranged for the marriage of his niece to Duan as a means to consolidate power.
54.
Meanwhile, in the Battle of Yangxia, Yuan Shikai's forces recaptured Hankou and Hanyang from the revolutionaries.
55.
Yuan Shikai knew that complete suppression of the revolution would end his usefulness to the Qing regime.
56.
Yuan Shikai arranged for the abdication of the child emperor Puyi in return for being granted the position of President of the Republic of China.
57.
The Dowager Empress was sitting on a kang [platform] in a side room of the Mind Nature Palace, wiping her eyes with a handkerchief as a fat old man [Yuan Shikai] knelt before her on a red cushion, tears streaming down his face.
58.
Yuan Shikai wanted the geographic advantage of having the nation's capital close to his base of military power.
59.
However, the claim that the coup was organized by Yuan Shikai has been challenged by others.
60.
Yuan Shikai was elected Provisional President of the Republic of China by the Nanjing Provisional Senate on 14 February 1912, and sworn in on 10 March of that year.
61.
Anti-Yuan Shikai revolutionaries claimed Yuan Shikai orchestrated the collapse of the KMT internally and dismissed governors interpreted as being pro-KMT.
62.
Subsequently, Yuan Shikai gradually took over the government, using the military as the base of his power.
63.
Yuan Shikai dissolved the national and provincial assemblies, and the House of Representatives and Senate were replaced by the newly formed "Council of State", with Duan Qirui, his trusted Beiyang lieutenant, as prime minister.
64.
Yuan Shikai relied on the American-educated Tsai Tingkan for English translation and connections with western powers.
65.
Finally, Yuan Shikai had himself elected president to a five-year term, publicly labelled the KMT a seditious organization, ordered the KMT's dissolution, and evicted all its members from Parliament.
66.
The KMT's "Second Revolution" ended in failure as Yuan Shikai's troops achieved complete victory over revolutionary uprisings.
67.
Yuan Shikai justified these reforms by stating that representative democracy had been proven inefficient by political infighting.
68.
On 20 November 1915, Yuan Shikai held a specially convened "Representative Assembly" which voted unanimously to offer Yuan Shikai the throne.
69.
The new Empire of China was to formally begin on 1 January 1916, when Yuan Shikai intended to conduct the accession rites.
70.
Yuan Shikai expected widespread domestic and international support for his reign.
71.
Yuan Shikai died of uraemia at 10 am on 6 June 1916, at the age of fifty-six.
72.
Yuan Shikai's remains were moved to his home province and placed in a large mausoleum in Anyang.
73.
Yuan Shikai introduced far-ranging modernizations in law and social areas, and trained and organized one of China's first modern armies; but the loyalty Yuan had fostered in the armed forces dissolved after his death, undermining the authority of the central government.
74.
Yuan Shikai financed his regime through large foreign loans, and is criticized for weakening Chinese morale and international prestige, and for allowing the Japanese to gain broad concessions over China.
75.
Yuan Shikai was sometimes referred to by the name of his birthplace, "Xiangcheng", or by a title for tutors of the crown prince, "Kung-pao".