The Juye Incident (, german: Juye Vorfall) refers to the killing of two German Catholic
missionaries,
Richard Henle and
Franz Xaver Nies, of the
Society of the Divine Word, in
Juye County
Juye () is a county in western Shandong province which is under the administration of Heze municipality. The county is 1,303 square km in area and has a population of approximately 910,000.
History
Juye originally belonged to Huxi prefecture.
Q ...
Shandong Province, China in the night of 1–2 November 1897 (
All Saints' Day
All Saints' Day, also known as All Hallows' Day, the Feast of All Saints, the Feast of All Hallows, the Solemnity of All Saints, and Hallowmas, is a Christian solemnity celebrated in honour of all the saints of the church, whether they are kn ...
to
All Souls' Day
All Souls' Day, also called ''The Commemoration of All the Faithful Departed'', is a day of prayer and remembrance for the faithful departed, observed by certain Christian denominations on 2 November. Through prayer, intercessions, alms and ...
). A third missionary,
Georg Maria Stenz, survived the attack unharmed.
The mission compound where the incident took place was located in Zhang Jia Village (, spelled "Tshantyachuang" in writings by Georg M. Stenz), about 10 km northeast of the town of Juye and about 25 km northwest of the city of
Jining
Jining () is a prefecture-level city in southwestern Shandong province. It borders Heze to the southwest, Zaozhuang to the southeast, Tai'an to the northeast, and the provinces of Henan and Jiangsu to the northwest and south respectively. Jinin ...
. Georg M. Stenz was the priest stationed in Zhang Jia Village and the other two missionaries, Henle and Nies, had come to visit him. Stenz describes the events of the incident as follows: Before they went to bed shortly before midnight, the missionaries had practiced the
Requiem Mass
A Requiem or Requiem Mass, also known as Mass for the dead ( la, Missa pro defunctis) or Mass of the dead ( la, Missa defunctorum), is a Mass of the Catholic Church offered for the repose of the soul or souls of one or more deceased persons, ...
(Miseremini mei) for the following All Souls' Day. Stenz had given his room to his guests for the night and had moved into a vacant porter's room himself. Believing the area to be quiet, the missionaries did not take any precautions and Stenz left the door to his room unlocked. A band of twenty to thirty armed men broke into the mission compound shortly after the missionaries had gone to bed. They broke the door to the room where Henle and Nies were staying and killed the two missionaries. Both victims were found to have suffered numerous wounds from stabbing and both were dead shortly before midnight. The attackers searched for Stenz, but could not find him. They retreated when the local Chinese Christians arrived at the scene to help. It is not certain who committed the killings, but it is most commonly assumed that the attack was launched by members of the
Big Swords Society. Stenz blamed the attack on the warden of a neighboring village (Cao Jia Zhuang, spelled "Tsaotyachuang" by Stenz and located about 10 km to the south of Zhang Jia Village) and believed that the attack was rooted in a dispute between the warden and comparatively wealthy relatives who had converted to Christianity and had therefore refused to pay for local temple feasts.
Less than two weeks after the Juye Incident, the
German Empire used the murders of the missionaries as a pretext to seize
Jiaozhou Bay
The Jiaozhou Bay (; german: Kiautschou Bucht, ) is a bay located in the prefecture-level city of Qingdao (Tsingtau), China.
The bay has historically been romanized as Kiaochow, Kiauchau or Kiao-Chau in English and Kiautschou in German.
Geogra ...
on Shandong's southern coast. Under
German threats, the
Qing government was also forced to remove many Shandong officials (including governor Li Bingheng) from their posts and to build three Catholic churches in the area (in
Jining
Jining () is a prefecture-level city in southwestern Shandong province. It borders Heze to the southwest, Zaozhuang to the southeast, Tai'an to the northeast, and the provinces of Henan and Jiangsu to the northwest and south respectively. Jinin ...
,
Caozhou, and Juye) at its own expense. The mission that had been attacked also received 3,000
s of silver in compensation for stolen or damaged property, and received the right to construct seven fortified residences in the area, also at government expense. This settlement strengthened missionary work in southern Shandong province and was part of the events that led to the
Boxer Uprising (1899–1900), a movement directed against the Christian and foreign presence in northern China. Imitating Germany, other powers (
Russia
Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-eig ...
,
Britain
Britain most often refers to:
* The United Kingdom, a sovereign state in Europe comprising the island of Great Britain, the north-eastern part of the island of Ireland and many smaller islands
* Great Britain, the largest island in the United King ...
,
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...
, and
Japan) began "a scramble for
concessions" to secure their own
spheres of influence
In the field of international relations, a sphere of influence (SOI) is a spatial region or concept division over which a state or organization has a level of cultural, economic, military or political exclusivity.
While there may be a formal al ...
in China.
Historian Paul Cohen has called the Juye incident "the opening wedge in a process of greatly intensified
imperialist
Imperialism is the state policy, practice, or advocacy of extending power and dominion, especially by direct territorial acquisition or by gaining political and economic control of other areas, often through employing hard power (economic and ...
activity in China" and Joseph W. Esherick comments that the Juye killings "set off a chain of events which radically altered the course of Chinese history."
[.]
Notes
Bibliography
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Further reading
Catholic Cyclopaedia: Chinese Martyrs* Tiedemann, R. G. (2007b). "Not Every Martyr is a Saint! The Juye Missionary Case of 1897 Reconsidered." In Noel Golvers and Sara Lievens (eds.), ''A lifelong dedication to the China mission: essays presented in honor of Father Jeroom Heyndrickx, CICM, on the occasion of his 75th birthday and the 25th anniversary of the F. Verbiest Institute, K.U. Leuven''. Leuven Chinese studies, 17. Leuven, Belgium: Ferdinand Verbiest Institute, K.U. Leuven. , .
{{German colonial campaigns
Christian missions in China
1897 in China
Diplomatic incidents
Foreign relations of the Qing dynasty
History of Shandong
November 1897 events
Violence against Christians
Anti-Christian sentiment in Asia
History of Christianity in China
1897 murders in China