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Updated: June 18, 2025
With men like Burgevine about, who were not wanting in skill, and were as unprincipled as they were daring, it was impossible to say what might happen if the command of such an army fell into bad hands. The Chinese Government behaved very generously, giving each wounded officer £900, and others on a similar scale. In a letter written home, Gordon says:
If Burgevine had resigned, all would have been well, but he regarded the position from the standpoint of the adventurer who believes that his own interests form a supreme law and are the highest good. As commander of the Ever-Victorious Army he was a personage to be considered even by foreign governments. He would not voluntarily surrender the position which alone preserved him from obscurity.
The arrival of Major Gordon with 150 men on board his third steamer, the "Cricket," restored the confidence of the defenders, but there was no doubt that Burgevine had lost a most favorable opportunity, for if he had attacked this place instead of proceeding to Soochow it must have fallen.
An attempt was made to replace him by another American named Burgevine, who had been Ward's second in command. This man, however, was found to be incapable and was superceded; and in 1863 Major Gordon, R.E., was allowed by the British authorities to take over command of what was then an army of about five thousand men, and to act in co-operation with Tsêng Kuo-fan and Li Hung-chang.
For Burgevine was not more successful in alluring Gordon's army from its allegiance than in defeating it in open conflict. Having made one or two unsuccessful attempts, and discovered that the brilliant young commander was more than a match for him, he asked Gordon to meet him at an appointed place, where he told him that he had determined to desert the rebel cause. This did not surprise Gordon.
Burgevine, instead of fighting the battles of the failing cause he had adopted, was traveling about the country: at one moment in the capital interviewing Tien Wang and his ministers, at another going about in disguise even in the streets of Shanghai.
I feel that I have so many lives intrusted to me, that these are, as it were, at my disposal, and I will not risk them in an enterprise I consider rash. Burgevine is a very foolish fellow, and little thinks of the immense misery he will cause this unhappy country, for of the ultimate suppression of the rebellion I have little doubt."
I exclaimed, 'You have shot your best friend! His answer was, 'I know I have, and I wish to God I had killed you." We hear no more of Burgevine in connection with Gordon, so we here part company with him. According to Mr. Wilson, he had subsequently a very chequered career, and finally was reported to have been drowned by accident when a prisoner in the hands of the Imperialists.
In consequence of this arrangement Ward and Burgevine were compelled to desist from recruiting Europeans; but after a brief interval they were taken into the Chinese service for the purpose of drilling Chinese soldiers, a measure from which the most important consequences were to flow, for it proved to be the origin of the Ever-Victorious Army.
Gordon unfortunately believed in this statement, and as he wished to exhibit special lenience towards the man whom he had displaced in the command, he went bail for him, so that he retained his personal liberty when the Chinese arrested Burgevine's agent Beechy, and wished to arrest Burgevine himself. On 2nd August Burgevine threw off the mask.
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