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Nanyang Fleet
The Nanyang Fleet (Chinese: ) was one ofthe four modernised
Chinese naval eets in the late QingDynasty. Established in the
1870s, the eet sueredlosses in the Sino-FrenchWar, escaped intact
in the Sino-Japanese War, and was formally abolished in 1909.
1 Composition, 1884
Before 1885 the Southern Seas (Nanyang) Fleet, based atShanghai,
was the largest of China's four regional eets.In the early 1880s
its best ships were the modern compos-ite cruiser Kaiji, completed
in 1884 at the Foochow NavyYard, the composite sloops Kangji and
Chengching, alsorecent products of the Foochow Navy Yard (1878
and1880), and the 2,630-ton wooden steam frigate Yuyuan,built at
the Kiangnan Arsenal in 1873. The eet was orig-inally to have had
the four steel Rendel gunboats Zhen-dong, Zhenxi, Zhennan and
Zhenbei, completed in 1879,but Li Hongzhang was so impressed by
them that hetook them over for the Beiyang Fleet, compensating
theNanyang Fleet with Longxiang, Huwei, Feiting and Ce-dian, four
iron Rendel 'alphabetical' gunboats that hadbeen in service at
Tianjin since 1876.*[1]Besides these relatively modern gunboats the
eet alsoincluded the elderly wooden gunboats Caojiang,
Zehai,Weijing and Jingyuan, the rst three products of theKiangnan
Arsenal (1869 and 1870) and the fourth built atthe Foochow Navy
Yard in 1872. Other vessels with theeet or operating on the Yangzi
River in 1884 includedthe composite sloops Chaowu and Chengqing,
both builtat the Foochow Navy Yard (1878 and 1880); the 2,630-ton
wooden steam frigate Haian, built at the KiangnanArsenal in 1872;
the wooden transports Yuankai andDengyingzhou, both built at the
Foochow Navy Yard(1875 and 1876); and the tiny ironclad Jinou, an
exper-imental product of the Kiangnan Arsenal (1876) nick-named
derisively by Europeans 'the terror of the Westernworld'.In July
1884, on the eve of the Sino-French War, theNanyang eet was
reinforced by the German-built steelcruisers Nanrui and Nanchen,
which sailed from Ger-many in March 1884.Table 1: Composition of
the Nanyang eet, August 1884
2 The Sino-French War (August1884April 1885)
French torpedo launch attacking the Chinese frigate Yuyuan,
14February 1885
The commander of the Nanyang eet during the Sino-French War was
Admiral Li Chengmou (), whohad earlier commanded the Fujian eet and
the traditionalYangtze water forces.*[2]Most of the ships of the
Nanyang eet remained safelyin harbour at Shanghai or Nanking during
the Sino-French War (August 1884April 1885). In July 1884 theFrench
ironclad Triomphante observed the presence ofthe Nanyang eet at
Shanghai. Her commander, capi-taine de vaisseau Baux, cabled
Admiral Amde Courbetfor permission to attack the Chinese with
Triomphanteand the cruiser d'Estaing. Jules Ferry's cabinet
consid-ered the merits of an attack on the Nanyang eet, but
de-cided that the risks to business condence were too great,and
notied Courbet that no naval action would be per-mitted at
Shanghai. Courbet thereupon ordered Triom-phante and d'Estaing to
leave Shanghai and join him inthe Min River, where he was
concentrating his squadron
1
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2 6 REFERENCES
against the Fujian Fleet and the FoochowNavy Yard. TheFrench
cruiser Parseval was sent to Shanghai in early Au-gust to keep the
Nanyang Fleet under observation.Courbet's attack on the Fujian
Fleet on 23 August 1884at the Battle of Fuzhou plunged France and
China intowar. The Nanyang Fleet commanders responded by split-ting
the eet to protect Shanghai and the Nanking Ar-senal, both
plausible targets for future French naval de-scents. The Rendel
gunboats Longxiang, Feiting, Cedianand Huwei remained at Shanghai,
and the frigate Haianwas lled with stones and prepared as a
blockship, tobe sunk across the entrance to the Huangpu river if
theFrench showed themselves in force. The German-builtcruisers
Nanrui and Nanchen, together with several otherships of the Nanyang
Fleet, withdrew to Nanking. In lateAugust 1884 Admiral Courbet
ordered Parseval to leaveShanghai. The lone French cruiser had lain
within rangeof the Nanyang Fleet for a whole week after the
outbreakof war, but the Chinese made no attempt to attack her.On
the night of 30 August 1884 capitaine de vaisseauThounens of
Parseval ran the gauntlet of the guns of theWusong forts and
escaped without casualties to the opensea. The Nanyang Fleet did
nothing whatsoever to hinderhis departure.*[3]Part of the Nanyang
eet made a disastrous sortie inFebruary 1885 to try to break the
French blockade ofFormosa. The frigate Yuyuan and the composite
sloopChengqing were sunk in the Battle of Shipu (14 February1885),
the former by a French torpedo attack and the lat-ter by friendly
re.*[4] Kaiji, Nanrui, Nanchen, Chaowu,Yuankai and two
'alphabetical' gunboats were trappedin Zhenhai Bay by the French on
1 March 1885 andignominiously blockaded there for the rest of the
war.*[5]
3 Postwar Development
The loss of Yuyuan and Chengqing in February 1885eroded the
Nanyang Fleet's advantage over the North-ern Seas Fleet (Beiyang
Fleet). During the followingdecade the Nanyang eet gradually lost
its primacy, asLi Hongzhang invested heavily in the Beiyang Fleet.
By1894, on the eve of the Sino-Japanese War, the BeiyangFleet had a
comfortable superiority over the NanyangFleet both in numbers of
ships and quality.Nevertheless, the Nanyang eet continued to
acquire newships after the Sino-French War, some of
reasonablequality. The rst of the new ships was the steel
cruiserBaomin, completed at theKiangnanArsenal in 1885. Thenext
additions were the composite cruisers Jingqing andHuantai, both
products of the Foochow Navy Yard (1886and 1887).*[6]Table 2:
Additions to the Nanyang eet, 188594
4 Ships of the Nanyang Fleet Baomin () Cedian () Dengyingzhou ()
Feiting () Huantai () Kaiji () Longxiang () Nanchen () Nanrui
()
5 Notes[1] Wright, 436
[2] Rawlinson, 120
[3] Duboc, 26061; Loir, 16982; Wright, 63
[4] Duboc, 27493; Loir, 24564; Lung Chang, 327-8
[5] Loir, 27184
[6] Wright, 679
6 References Arlington, L. C., Through the Dragon's Eyes
(Lon-don, 1931)
Duboc, E., Trente cinq mois de campagne en Chine,au Tonkin
(Paris, 1899)
Loir, M., L'escadre de l'amiral Courbet (Paris, 1886) Lung Chang
[], Yueh-nan yu Chung-fa chan-
cheng [, Vietnam and the Sino-French War] (Taipei, 1993)
Rawlinson, J., China's Struggle for Naval Develop-ment, 18391895
(Harvard, 1967)
Wright, R., The Chinese Steam Navy, 18621945(London, 2001)
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