3-000-291 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Mr. F. [sic] W. Bowlby, the "Times'" correspondent in China - from a photograph by Herbert Watkins, 1860. 'The body of that gentleman was rendered up by the Chinese authorities, and buried with all due honour, in the Russian Cemetery at Pekin, on the 17th of October...In an article in the Times the following observations occur in reference to their correspondent...: "Every one has for many days listened for news of Mr. Bowlby's fate with an almost personal interest, and will receive the information of his death as a personal loss. Upon his pen we all depended for our knowledge of what has been passing in the far East...We all remember that admirable letter in which the capture of the forts was described in all its minutest details, yet in details so skilfully grouped that their minuteness did not tire; and we had all impatiently hoped to see that same pen again employed upon a subject of still higher interest, and in which the peculiar felicity of the writer would find still better scope. This expectation will now never be fulfilled".' Bowlby and others were held prisoner and tortured to death. In retaliation for the treatment of the delegation, the British and French burnt down the Qing Emperor's Old Summer Palace in Beijing. From "Illustrated London News", 1860.