Lin Hei'er (; 1871
– 1900?) was a Chinese rebel during the
Boxer Rebellion
The Boxer Rebellion, also known as the Boxer Uprising, the Boxer Insurrection, or the Yihetuan Movement, was an anti-foreign, anti-colonial, and anti-Christian uprising in China between 1899 and 1901, towards the end of the Qing dynasty, b ...
, known as the Holy Mother of the Yellow Lotus ().
She was a
prostitute and acrobat with martial arts knowledge who became a member of the
Yihetuan. During the Boxer Rebellion, she organized and commanded the
Red Lantern Red Lantern may refer to:
__NOTOC__ Arts and entertainment Film
*''Lentera Merah'' (''Red Lantern''), a 2006 Indonesian film
*''Raise the Red Lantern'', a 1991 Chinese film based on a novella, originally titled ''Wives and Concubines'' and written ...
unit of female soldiers in
Tianjin
Tianjin (; ; Mandarin: ), alternately romanized as Tientsin (), is a municipality and a coastal metropolis in Northern China on the shore of the Bohai Sea. It is one of the nine national central cities in Mainland China, with a total popu ...
.
Life
Born on a Tianjin canal houseboat, Lin studied acrobatics and earned a living as an itinerant entertainer with her father. She married Li Youchuan while still very young. Li Youchuan was arrested by British soldiers during a raid against the opium trade and died in prison.
Later, she became a prostitute in Houjia, on the south bank of the South Canal in the
Hongqiao District
Hongqiao District () is a district in the city of Tianjin, China. The name of the district derives from the name of a bridge - Dahong Bridge () - on the Ziya River, a tributary of Hai River.
Administrative divisions
Transportation Metro
Ho ...
, Tianjin.
Furious against foreigners because of the death of Li Youchuan, Hei'er joined the rebels of the Yihetuan. Once trained in martial arts, she trained female recruits and founded the
Red Lantern Unit of young female soldiers, the name coming from the color of their clothes. With rebel's widows she formed the Blue Lantern Unit and with the old women, the Black Lantern Unit. In addition she formed the Pan Lantern Unit of cooks who were in charge of feeding the rebel troops. She recruited prostitutes, beggars and peasants into her ranks and rejected well-to-do women as useless "lotus feet".
In July 1900, the combined force of the
Eight-Nation Alliance
The Eight-Nation Alliance was a multinational military coalition that invaded northern China in 1900 with the stated aim of relieving the foreign legations in Beijing, then besieged by the popular Boxer militia, who were determined to remove f ...
descended on Beijing and Tianjin and looted and pillaged the cities. Lin Hei'er and other leaders put up fierce resistance. Lin Hei'er was injured during the
Battle of Tientsin and was captured along with the other leaders on July 14, 1900, when the imperial troops who secretly helped the rebels abandoned them to their fate.
Her final destination is unknown. Probably she was tried and executed, although turned into a popular heroine, the popular songs proclaimed that she survived.
A monument in her honor, the Red Lantern monument, was erected in 1994 near her place of birth.
See also
*
List of people who disappeared
References
Bibliography
*
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Lin, Hei'er
1871 births
1900 deaths
Year of death uncertain
19th-century Chinese people
19th-century Chinese women
Chinese acrobatic gymnasts
Chinese female prostitutes
Chinese people of the Boxer Rebellion
Qing dynasty rebels
Gymnasts from Tianjin
Missing person cases in China
Women in 19th-century warfare