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Updated: July 13, 2025
Suddenly they closed the gates and captured these men, beheading some 300 of them, including the brother of Li Hung Chang. This disaster to his allies decided Gordon to turn aside and lend his aid in reducing Taitsan, the city where his predecessor had suffered such a terrible defeat.
His men had taken a large amount of loot from Taitsan, and were anxious to dispose of it, and their young General, much against his will, had to accept the inevitable. With an army such as that which Gordon had under his control, it does not do to draw tight the reins of discipline too suddenly.
Li had some reason to believe that Taitsan would surrender on the approach of the imperialists, and he accordingly sent a large army, including 2,500 of the contingent, to attack it. The affair was badly managed. The assaulting party was stopped by a wide ditch; neither boats nor ladders arrived.
It must have been an anxious time when he led his small army against a place which would remind them so forcibly of the greatest disaster they had experienced. The city of Taitsan had a garrison of some 10,000 men, with a considerable sprinkling of white men, some of whom were deserters from the English and French armies, together with American sailors and others.
When Gordon reached Quinsan he was so apprehensive as to what might occur that he removed his heavy artillery and most of his munitions of war to Taitsan, where General Brown, in command at Shanghai, undertook to see that they were protected.
But instead of being able to go on at once from Taitsan to Quinsan, he had to return to headquarters, and there wait till the end of May, reorganising and making preparations.
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