[Exclusive] Japan attempted to take Gojong to Nagasaki
Documents show Gojong resisted the plan, Russian Czar Nicholas II opposed the plan, Roosevelt criticized it while acknowledging the protectorate treaty.
Japan attempted to take Emperor Gojong to Nagasaki during the 1904-1905 Russo–Japanese War, diplomatic documents obtained by The Korea Herald show.
The documents show how the Japanese viewed Emperor Gojong as a major obstacle to annexing Korea and planned to take him to Nagasaki.
The plan is discussed in the various diplomatic dispatches. The documents also indicate active interest by various powers on the issue. The Russians opposed the plan, the British are said to have agreed with the removal the emperor as well as the annexation plan and President Roosevelt of the U.S. postponed his decision on the establishment of protectorate over Korea but criticized the plan to remove Emperor Gojong.
Karoly Fendler, lecturer of Korean history at Budapest University ELTE, Hungary, and foreign researcher for overseas historical materials at National Institute of Korean History, discovered a 26-page report titled “Japanese intention to take the Korean Emperor to Mokko” at the Russian Empire’s Foreign Political Archives in Moscow. Earlier, in the 1990s, Fendler found a letter at the Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv (HHSA) in Vienna, Austria, pointing to the existence of a Japanese plan to have Emperor Gojong moved to Nagasaki.
The Russian government first received information about the alleged Japanese plan from its legation in Belgrade, Serbia, on April 22, 1905, according to the correspondence between the Russian Foreign Ministry and its diplomatic missions contained in the report found in the Russian archive.
The Russian ambassador in Belgrade reported to Count V.N. Lamsdorf, Russia’s foreign minister, that G. Fontaine, the first secretary of the French embassy in Belgrade, had received the news from Tokyo concerning the plan to transfer Emperor Gojong.
“’The wheels of diplomacy’ started to move faster,” said Fendler in an e-mail interview with The Korea Herald.
The first piece of information from Belgrade was sent to Czarskoe Selo, the residence of Russian czars near St. Petersburg, without delay, on April 26, 1905 and Czar Nicholas II wrote “This Japanese activity must be prevented somehow” in Russian on the letter.
“The fact that Nicholas II was upset is understandable, not only because the Russo-Japanese War was still going on, but also because of the cruelties the Japanese committed in Korea; the killing of Queen Min in 1895, trudging on international agreements and not considering Korea as a neutral independent state at that time,” said Fendler.
The next day, on April 27, 1905, Czar Nicholas II ordered that a secret telegram about the Japanese intention to transfer the Korean Emperor to Japan be sent to all Russian embassies -- including those in Berlin, London, Paris, Rome, Vienna, Washington, the Hague, Copenhagen and Beijing.
The letter Fendler discovered at HHSA is dated April 30, 1905. In it, Lev Urusov, the Russian ambassador in Vienna, relays the same information about the Japanese plan to move Gojong to Nagasaki to Agenor Goluchowski, foreign minister of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy.
“During the war, the Russian czarist government warned European governments to pay attention to Japan’s illegal, aggressive activity against Korea, in Korea and against the independence and neutrality of the Korean state,” said Fendler. Following the instruction of his government on Japan’s Korea policy, Urusov wrote the letter based on information from Russian foreign ministry’s sources, Fendler said.
While most of the replies from Russian missions said they had passed on “the Russian objection” to the respective governments, the replies from the English and the Chinese are the most interesting, said Fendler.
“We have to the best of my belief, never heard that it was the intention of the Japanese government to deport the Emperor of Corea (Korea), but I am asking enquiries, and hope to be able to make you aware before long of the manner in which the question is regarded by H.M. (His Majesty)’s Government,” British Foreign Minister Lord Lansdown replied.
At Lansdown’s request, the Japanese ambassador in London obtained a message from Japanese Foreign Secretary Komura that “the Japanese government is not planning to transfer the Korean emperor to Japan,” according to a telegram sent by Russian ambassador in London.
“It seems that the Japanese foreign minister was only denying the ‘transfer’ and not the existence of the plan,” said Fendler.
Kazakov, the Russian diplomat in Beijing, sent a telegram to Moscow from Beijing on May 1, 1905, saying that “I asked about the Chinese government’s reaction to this. They avoided giving a straight reply, saying that they cannot take sides yet, as they do not have any information about the question.”
The Russian envoy in Belgrade, the writer of the first report on the issue, sent another report on May 10 confirming his previous information. This time he enclosed Fontaine’s original report on the matter. The report, written in French on a thin, small, transparent piece of paper, read that the Japanese government was preparing to transport the Korean emperor to Japan, where a castle had already been built for him in Nagasaki.
Indeed, diplomatic dispatches between the German mission in Korea and the German foreign ministry discovered in August 2008 by Jung Sang-su, research professor and lecturer at Myongji University, at the German foreign minister’s political document archive show that Germany, Britain and the U.S. were paying close attention to Japan’s attempt to take Gojong.
A secret telegram sent by Saldern, German envoy in Seoul, to the foreign ministry in Germany on Feb. 14, 1905, reads: “The Japanese are trying to transfer Gojong to Japan. Gojong refused, worried that he would not be able to come back.”
A handwritten message is seen on the left side of the telegram, which is likely to have been written by Kaiser Wilhelm II, Jung told The Korea Herald. “The Emperor only made notes on very important telegrams. He probably read this one because it was marked secret. The letters, however, are blurry because they were written with a pencil, so it is hard to identify the specific content of the message,” said Jung.
Another telegram sent by Saldern on June 2, 1905, mentions British and U.S. reactions to Japan’s attempts. Bulow, the German prime minister, and Richthofen, the foreign minister, signed on the telegram that they had read it.
“Since a few weeks ago, Japan has been sounding Britain out about establishing a protectorate over Korea and dethroning Gojong to take him to Japan. Britain agreed on it. Japan inquired the U.S. about the same matter. Roosevelt postponed his decision about establishing a protectorate over Korea but criticized the plan to depose Gojong and take him to Japan,” reads the telegram.
“This could be the reason why Japan did not take Gojong. According to the latter part of the telegram, Morgan, U.S. minister in Seoul, said that the U.S. would aggressively intervene in the parts that are related to U.S. interests. This would mean economic interests, such as the establishment of the Hanseong electricity company. The United States probably thought that they would have to redo all the negotiations if Gojong was gone,” said Jung.
Jung said that Japan tried to take Gojong because they knew the Korean Emperor was the biggest obstacle for the annexation of Korea.
“Ever since the Russian legislation withdrew from Seoul immediately after the Russo-Japanese war began, Gojong tried to break away from Japan’s intensified control. He was looking for ways to take refuge in the German or the U.S. legation even before the actual outbreak of the war, so Japan must have searched for ways to get rid of Gojong. Gojong offered stout resistance, so it is likely that Japan later took Crown Prince Yeongchin instead,” said Jung. Yeongchin was taken to Japan in 1907 on the pretext of having the prince study there.
“The findings show that the first steps of Japan’s forced annexation of Korea were already being taken in early 1905. At the same time, we can see how Gojong stubbornly resisted Japan’s attempts, and tried to maintain Korea’s independence,” said Jung.
Not many, however, are aware of Japan’s attempt to remove Emperor Gojong.
“The fact is not yet known in Korea because no information about the matter has been found here and Japan would never leave such documents open. It was a very secret plan in Japan. None of the documents specifically mention who was the main force responsible for the plan, whether it was Ito Hirobumi or someone else, but just refers to ‘the Japanese,’” said Jung. Ito Hirobumi was Japan’s first resident-general in Korea.
However, Japan’s attempt to take Gojong was considered an important matter internationally, judging from the frequency of the telegrams sent by the German envoy.
“The German envoy in Seoul only sent telegrams to his country on very important issues, less than 10 a year,” said Jung.
“Japan probably had various ideas at the moment, and transferring Gojong seemed to have been one of them. Though it was not achieved, it is possible that many foreign ambassadors around the world had the information about the attempt. This shows what a dead-end situation Koreans faced at the time, not knowing Japan’s next action,” said Lee Min-won, head of East Asia History and Culture Research Institute.
“The diplomatic objection of czarist Russia was successful. The reactions coming from different European capitals made Japan give up such unlawful steps. They also had to take into consideration the huge international scandal caused by the killing of Korean Queen Min in 1895 by the Japanese,” said Fendler.
“Today, it is difficult to find out how real the French information received from Tokyo through Belgrade was. The final answer might possibly be found in the Japanese archives, which are difficult to get to,” Fendler said.
By Park Min-young (claire@heraldm.com)
Japan attempted to take Emperor Gojong to Nagasaki during the 1904-1905 Russo–Japanese War, diplomatic documents obtained by The Korea Herald show.
The documents show how the Japanese viewed Emperor Gojong as a major obstacle to annexing Korea and planned to take him to Nagasaki.
The plan is discussed in the various diplomatic dispatches. The documents also indicate active interest by various powers on the issue. The Russians opposed the plan, the British are said to have agreed with the removal the emperor as well as the annexation plan and President Roosevelt of the U.S. postponed his decision on the establishment of protectorate over Korea but criticized the plan to remove Emperor Gojong.
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| Gojong goes on an outing upon hearing the news of his son King Yeongchin's return from Japan. (Yonhap News) |
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| A copy of the letter sent by Lev Urusov, Russian envoy in Vienna, to Agenor Goluchowski, foreign minister of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy on April 30, 1905. The underlined paragraph reads: “The foreign ministry has recently recognized, from a reliable source, that the Mikado government had the intention to transfer the Emperor of Korea to Japan and install him at a palace built for this purpose in Nagasaki.” |
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| Karoly Fendler, lecturer of Korean history at Budapest University ELTE, Hungary |
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| Jung Sang-su, history department research professor and lecturer at Myongji University (Lee Sang-sub/The Korea Herald) |
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| Hand-copied pages of the 26-page report “Japanese intention to take the Korean Emperor to Mokko.” Karoly Fendler copied the content by hand because the Foreign Policy Archives of Russian Empire prohibits making photocopies. (Karoly Fendler) |
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| A copy of the telegram sent by Saldern, the German envoy in Korea, to the German Foreign Ministry on Feb. 14, 1905. (Lee Sang-sub/The Korea Herald) |
Karoly Fendler, lecturer of Korean history at Budapest University ELTE, Hungary, and foreign researcher for overseas historical materials at National Institute of Korean History, discovered a 26-page report titled “Japanese intention to take the Korean Emperor to Mokko” at the Russian Empire’s Foreign Political Archives in Moscow. Earlier, in the 1990s, Fendler found a letter at the Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv (HHSA) in Vienna, Austria, pointing to the existence of a Japanese plan to have Emperor Gojong moved to Nagasaki.
The Russian government first received information about the alleged Japanese plan from its legation in Belgrade, Serbia, on April 22, 1905, according to the correspondence between the Russian Foreign Ministry and its diplomatic missions contained in the report found in the Russian archive.
The Russian ambassador in Belgrade reported to Count V.N. Lamsdorf, Russia’s foreign minister, that G. Fontaine, the first secretary of the French embassy in Belgrade, had received the news from Tokyo concerning the plan to transfer Emperor Gojong.
“’The wheels of diplomacy’ started to move faster,” said Fendler in an e-mail interview with The Korea Herald.
The first piece of information from Belgrade was sent to Czarskoe Selo, the residence of Russian czars near St. Petersburg, without delay, on April 26, 1905 and Czar Nicholas II wrote “This Japanese activity must be prevented somehow” in Russian on the letter.
“The fact that Nicholas II was upset is understandable, not only because the Russo-Japanese War was still going on, but also because of the cruelties the Japanese committed in Korea; the killing of Queen Min in 1895, trudging on international agreements and not considering Korea as a neutral independent state at that time,” said Fendler.
The next day, on April 27, 1905, Czar Nicholas II ordered that a secret telegram about the Japanese intention to transfer the Korean Emperor to Japan be sent to all Russian embassies -- including those in Berlin, London, Paris, Rome, Vienna, Washington, the Hague, Copenhagen and Beijing.
The letter Fendler discovered at HHSA is dated April 30, 1905. In it, Lev Urusov, the Russian ambassador in Vienna, relays the same information about the Japanese plan to move Gojong to Nagasaki to Agenor Goluchowski, foreign minister of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy.
“During the war, the Russian czarist government warned European governments to pay attention to Japan’s illegal, aggressive activity against Korea, in Korea and against the independence and neutrality of the Korean state,” said Fendler. Following the instruction of his government on Japan’s Korea policy, Urusov wrote the letter based on information from Russian foreign ministry’s sources, Fendler said.
While most of the replies from Russian missions said they had passed on “the Russian objection” to the respective governments, the replies from the English and the Chinese are the most interesting, said Fendler.
“We have to the best of my belief, never heard that it was the intention of the Japanese government to deport the Emperor of Corea (Korea), but I am asking enquiries, and hope to be able to make you aware before long of the manner in which the question is regarded by H.M. (His Majesty)’s Government,” British Foreign Minister Lord Lansdown replied.
At Lansdown’s request, the Japanese ambassador in London obtained a message from Japanese Foreign Secretary Komura that “the Japanese government is not planning to transfer the Korean emperor to Japan,” according to a telegram sent by Russian ambassador in London.
“It seems that the Japanese foreign minister was only denying the ‘transfer’ and not the existence of the plan,” said Fendler.
Kazakov, the Russian diplomat in Beijing, sent a telegram to Moscow from Beijing on May 1, 1905, saying that “I asked about the Chinese government’s reaction to this. They avoided giving a straight reply, saying that they cannot take sides yet, as they do not have any information about the question.”
The Russian envoy in Belgrade, the writer of the first report on the issue, sent another report on May 10 confirming his previous information. This time he enclosed Fontaine’s original report on the matter. The report, written in French on a thin, small, transparent piece of paper, read that the Japanese government was preparing to transport the Korean emperor to Japan, where a castle had already been built for him in Nagasaki.
Indeed, diplomatic dispatches between the German mission in Korea and the German foreign ministry discovered in August 2008 by Jung Sang-su, research professor and lecturer at Myongji University, at the German foreign minister’s political document archive show that Germany, Britain and the U.S. were paying close attention to Japan’s attempt to take Gojong.
A secret telegram sent by Saldern, German envoy in Seoul, to the foreign ministry in Germany on Feb. 14, 1905, reads: “The Japanese are trying to transfer Gojong to Japan. Gojong refused, worried that he would not be able to come back.”
A handwritten message is seen on the left side of the telegram, which is likely to have been written by Kaiser Wilhelm II, Jung told The Korea Herald. “The Emperor only made notes on very important telegrams. He probably read this one because it was marked secret. The letters, however, are blurry because they were written with a pencil, so it is hard to identify the specific content of the message,” said Jung.
Another telegram sent by Saldern on June 2, 1905, mentions British and U.S. reactions to Japan’s attempts. Bulow, the German prime minister, and Richthofen, the foreign minister, signed on the telegram that they had read it.
“Since a few weeks ago, Japan has been sounding Britain out about establishing a protectorate over Korea and dethroning Gojong to take him to Japan. Britain agreed on it. Japan inquired the U.S. about the same matter. Roosevelt postponed his decision about establishing a protectorate over Korea but criticized the plan to depose Gojong and take him to Japan,” reads the telegram.
“This could be the reason why Japan did not take Gojong. According to the latter part of the telegram, Morgan, U.S. minister in Seoul, said that the U.S. would aggressively intervene in the parts that are related to U.S. interests. This would mean economic interests, such as the establishment of the Hanseong electricity company. The United States probably thought that they would have to redo all the negotiations if Gojong was gone,” said Jung.
Jung said that Japan tried to take Gojong because they knew the Korean Emperor was the biggest obstacle for the annexation of Korea.
“Ever since the Russian legislation withdrew from Seoul immediately after the Russo-Japanese war began, Gojong tried to break away from Japan’s intensified control. He was looking for ways to take refuge in the German or the U.S. legation even before the actual outbreak of the war, so Japan must have searched for ways to get rid of Gojong. Gojong offered stout resistance, so it is likely that Japan later took Crown Prince Yeongchin instead,” said Jung. Yeongchin was taken to Japan in 1907 on the pretext of having the prince study there.
“The findings show that the first steps of Japan’s forced annexation of Korea were already being taken in early 1905. At the same time, we can see how Gojong stubbornly resisted Japan’s attempts, and tried to maintain Korea’s independence,” said Jung.
Not many, however, are aware of Japan’s attempt to remove Emperor Gojong.
“The fact is not yet known in Korea because no information about the matter has been found here and Japan would never leave such documents open. It was a very secret plan in Japan. None of the documents specifically mention who was the main force responsible for the plan, whether it was Ito Hirobumi or someone else, but just refers to ‘the Japanese,’” said Jung. Ito Hirobumi was Japan’s first resident-general in Korea.
However, Japan’s attempt to take Gojong was considered an important matter internationally, judging from the frequency of the telegrams sent by the German envoy.
“The German envoy in Seoul only sent telegrams to his country on very important issues, less than 10 a year,” said Jung.
“Japan probably had various ideas at the moment, and transferring Gojong seemed to have been one of them. Though it was not achieved, it is possible that many foreign ambassadors around the world had the information about the attempt. This shows what a dead-end situation Koreans faced at the time, not knowing Japan’s next action,” said Lee Min-won, head of East Asia History and Culture Research Institute.
“The diplomatic objection of czarist Russia was successful. The reactions coming from different European capitals made Japan give up such unlawful steps. They also had to take into consideration the huge international scandal caused by the killing of Korean Queen Min in 1895 by the Japanese,” said Fendler.
“Today, it is difficult to find out how real the French information received from Tokyo through Belgrade was. The final answer might possibly be found in the Japanese archives, which are difficult to get to,” Fendler said.
By Park Min-young (claire@heraldm.com)
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답글삭제[단독] 일본, 고종 납치하려했다 [Exclusive] Japan attempted to take Gojong to Nagasaki Documents show Gojong resisted the plan, Russian Czar Nicholas II opposed..