Regarding the Burning of the Old Summer Palace, the 10th issue of "Middle School History Teaching Reference" in 2003 published Mr. Wang Xiangqing's "Old Summer Palace: Who Burned You", in recognition of the "Second Opium War in 1860" written in our history textbooks

", the British and French allied forces burned the Old Summer Palace", and added based on relevant historical data that after the British and French allied forces occupied Beijing, the first people to enter and loot the Old Summer Palace were not the British and French allied forces, but the local indigenous people, the poor Manchus and Han people near Haidian.

After reading Mr. Wang Xiangqing’s article, Mr. Liu Zhenxiu felt that he deeply agreed with Wang Wen’s conclusion that “the scum of our nation also played a disgraceful role.”

The reason why the government decided to burn the Old Summer Palace after killing the hostages was unknown, so he wrote "Additional Comment on "Old Summer Palace, Who Burned You"", which was published in the 12th issue of "Middle School History Teaching Reference" in 2003.

I have no objection to Liu Wen’s conclusion that “the looting of the Old Summer Palace was motivated by the greedy and brutal nature of imperialism, the burning was a ploy to destroy evidence, and revenge for the hostages was just an excuse.” However, Liu Wenyan said that the Qing government killed British and French hostages.

Unknown, in order to help readers have a comprehensive understanding of this issue, I would like to make up for the omissions and restore the true colors of history.

According to Mr. Zhu Weizheng's article "Before the Burning of the Old Summer Palace" (History Teaching, Issue 10, 2002) - In late July of the 10th year of Xianfeng in the Qing Dynasty, the British and French forces repeatedly defeated the Qing army and came to Tongzhou.

When the Qing emperor was defeated, he used sneak attacks to kidnap 39 people, including 26 British and 10 legal persons, who had entered Tongzhou for armistice negotiations and reporters from the Times, and were sent to the capital.

The Ministry of Punishment was imprisoned in the "Heavenly Prison".

The next day, the British ambassador's counselor Weituma rushed to Tongzhou and demanded the release of the hostages.

Two days later, the coalition forces learned that three hostages had been killed and immediately attacked Beijing.

Xianfeng abandoned the Old Summer Palace and rushed north to Chengde. Of course he did not forget to take his concubines and favored ministers with him, but he seemed to have forgotten to explain how to deal with the hostages locked in the prison.

Everyone knows how terrible the prisons of the Ministry of Punishment of the Qing Dynasty were. Prisoners ordered by the emperor to be locked up were lucky if they suffered a few less tortures every day.

Among those British and French diplomats and journalists, 17 people were tortured to death in the sky jail in just 25 days.

When Elgin heard that most of the hostages were dead, and that the first person to die in the sky jail was a reporter from The Times, he realized that trouble was coming.

As the plenipotentiary envoy appointed by the British cabinet for the war against China, Elgin failed to protect the lives of diplomats and famous journalists. How could he explain to the Queen's government and public opinion?

Needless to say, Elgin had to demonstrate to the British Parliament and the press that he had exacted revenge on the Qing emperor for his barbaric behavior.

The emperor's orders to kidnap, torture and kill British and French hostages were all issued in the Old Summer Palace, and the Old Summer Palace is very famous in the Western world.

Whether it was in revenge for the Qing emperor's kidnapping and massacre of hostages, or to cover up the British army's looting of the Qing emperor's palace compound, Elgin insisted on destroying it, and thus ignored the counter-suggestion of French Minister Grotto to demolish some palaces in Beijing.

In order to preserve the Old Summer Palace with European architectural style, the British army was ordered to burn the Old Summer Palace.