It is a nationalist uprising in China. The so-called Boxer uprising was initiated by the secret organization known as the Righteous and Harmonious Society Movement or Boxers.
With much social unrest in China, the Boxers, as the movement’s adherents came to be known, found ready acceptance. A division within China’s royal dynasty further aided the growth of the movement.
Its objective was the removal of foreign influence over Chinese trade, politics, religion and technology. Brief but intense it stands as a significant episode of anti-imperialist fervor at a time when the United States was just beginning to involve itself to a greater degree in international affairs an create its own empire.
In May 1900, Boxers move across the countryside, destroying railroads, dismantling telegraph lines, and murdering Christian missionary including some Americans, as well as their Chinese converts, whom the Boxers detested as much as the “foreign devils.”
In June, after the Japanese legation’s chancellor and the German minister were murdered by an angry mob, Boxers laid siege to the foreign embassies in the city of Peking. On 4 August a second, heavily reinforce column reinforced Tianjin in relief of the embassies, defeating Chinese forces in two battles on 4 an 5 August.
Boxer uprising