Embassy to the Eastern Courts
Embassy to the Eastern Courts

Author: Andrew C A Jampoler

Publisher: Naval Institute Press

Published: 2015-11-15

Total Pages: 257

ISBN-13: 1612514170

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Some two centuries ago, during the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, New England’s merchants and traders found themselves frozen out of their traditional markets in Europe and the Caribbean. Desperate for new business for their idled ships and crews, they asked President Andrew Jackson to explore opportunities for them on the other side of the globe. Prompted by the secretary of the navy, Jackson sent Edmund Roberts—an unemployed ship owner from Portsmouth, New Hampshire, with no diplomatic experience—on an “embassy” (mission) to the potentates of Oman, Siam, Cochin China, and Japan, to negotiate pioneering trade treaties. So began an unusual and ultimately fatal adventure that twice took Roberts to exotic and dangerous places on the other side of the globe. Because the British and the Dutch were deeply interested in these same new markets, Roberts’ mission was kept secret. Sailing in the ill-fated USS Peacock, first in company with USS Boxer, then with USS Enterprise, Roberts traveled almost 70,000 miles across the great expanses of two oceans to successfully negotiate treaties with Oman and Siam. Although he failed twice to win over the emperor of Cochin China and died miserably in Macao before departing for Japan, Roberts’ embassy was nonetheless instrumental in opening doors to new diplomatic realms and extending the commerce of the fledgling American nation. Kept secret at the time and largely forgotten today, Edmund Roberts’ fascinating and important story is recounted in this latest book by Andrew Jampoler—retired naval officer turned maritime historian—whose previous works include Sailors in the Holy Land and The Last Lincoln Conspirator.

An Account of an Embassy to the Court of the Teshoo Lama in Tibet
An Account of an Embassy to the Court of the Teshoo Lama in Tibet

Author: Samuel Turner

Publisher: Asian Educational Services

Published: 1991

Total Pages: 522

ISBN-13: 9788120606876

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The mountains of the kingdom of Bhutan form a part of the Himalayan range. In the year 1772, without provocation, the army of Bhutan invaded the province of Cooch Behar, which shares its borders with Bengal. Alarmed by this incursion, the council of Bengal sent a deputation to deal with the occupying force. The troops of Bhutan were no match for the trained and well-equipped army of Bengal. The King of Bhutan, alarmed and defeated, sent an embassy to the Tesoo Lama to sue for peace by mediation. The Tesoo Lama was, at that time, the regent of Tibet and the guardian of the Dalai Lama, who was still a minor. The Tesoo Lama, acting on the prayers of Bhutan which was a dependency of Tibet sent a deputation to Calcutta, with a telegram addressed to the Governor Warren Hastings in 1774. The governor readily took this opportunity to extend British influence over this little-known quarter of the world. George Boyle was the man chosen to represent the British to carry an answer, and presents, back to the Lama. A man of keen observation and intellect, George Boyle s narrative of this mission is the subject of this book.

Raising the Flag
Raising the Flag

Author: Peter D. Eicher

Publisher: U of Nebraska Press

Published: 2018-06

Total Pages: 517

ISBN-13: 1640120386

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Since its inception the United States has sent envoys to advance American interests abroad, both across oceans and to areas that later became part of the country. Little has been known about these first envoys until now. From China to Chile, Tripoli to Tahiti, Mexico to Muscat, Peter D. Eicher chronicles the experience of the first American envoys in foreign lands. Their stories, often stranger than fiction, are replete with intrigues, revolutions, riots, war, shipwrecks, swashbucklers, desperadoes, and bootleggers. The circumstances the diplomats faced were precursors to today's headlines: Americans at war in the Middle East, intervention in Latin America, pirates off Africa, trade deficits with China. Early envoys abroad faced hostile governments, physical privations, disease, isolation, and the daunting challenge of explaining American democracy to foreign rulers. Many suffered threats from tyrannical despots, some were held as slaves or hostages, and others led foreign armies into battle. Some were heroes, some were scoundrels, and many perished far from home. From the American Revolution to the Civil War, Eicher profiles the characters who influenced the formative period of American diplomacy and the first steps the United States took as a world power. Their experiences combine to chart key trends in the development of early U.S. foreign policy that continue to affect us today. Raising the Flag illuminates how American ideas, values, and power helped shape the modern world.

The Last Embassy
The Last Embassy

Author: Tonio Andrade

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2021-06-01

Total Pages: 424

ISBN-13: 0691219885

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From the acclaimed author of The Gunpowder Age, a book that casts new light on the history of China and the West at the turn of the nineteenth century George Macartney's disastrous 1793 mission to China plays a central role in the prevailing narrative of modern Sino-European relations. Summarily dismissed by the Qing court, Macartney failed in nearly all of his objectives, perhaps setting the stage for the Opium Wars of the nineteenth century and the mistrust that still marks the relationship today. But not all European encounters with China were disastrous. The Last Embassy tells the story of the Dutch mission of 1795, bringing to light a dramatic but little-known episode that transforms our understanding of the history of China and the West. Drawing on a wealth of archival material, Tonio Andrade paints a panoramic and multifaceted portrait of an age marked by intrigues and war. China was on the brink of rebellion. In Europe, French armies were invading Holland. Enduring a harrowing voyage, the Dutch mission was to be the last European diplomatic delegation ever received in the traditional Chinese court. Andrade shows how, in contrast to the British emissaries, the Dutch were men with deep knowledge of Asia who respected regional diplomatic norms and were committed to understanding China on its own terms. Beautifully illustrated with sketches and paintings by Chinese and European artists, The Last Embassy suggests that the Qing court, often mischaracterized as arrogant and narrow-minded, was in fact open, flexible, curious, and cosmopolitan.

Cherishing Men from Afar
Cherishing Men from Afar

Author: James Louis Hevia

Publisher: Duke University Press

Published: 1995

Total Pages: 316

ISBN-13: 9780822316374

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In the late eighteenth century two expansive Eurasian empires met formally for the first time--the Manchu or Qing dynasty of China and the maritime empire of Great Britain. The occasion was the mission of Lord Macartney, sent by the British crown and sponsored by the East India Company, to the court of the Qianlong emperor. Cherishing Men from Afar looks at the initial confrontation between these two empires from a historical perspective informed by the insights of contemporary postcolonial criticism and cultural studies. The history of this encounter, like that of most colonial and imperial encounters, has traditionally been told from the Europeans' point of view. In this book, James L. Hevia consults Chinese sources--many previously untranslated--for a broader sense of what Qing court officials understood; and considers these documents in light of a sophisticated anthropological understanding of Qing ritual processes and expectations. He also reexamines the more familiar British accounts in the context of recent critiques of orientalism and work on the development of the bourgeois subject. Hevia's reading of these sources reveals the logics of two discrete imperial formations, not so much impaired by the cultural misunderstandings that have historically been attributed to their meeting, but animated by differing ideas about constructing relations of sovereignty and power. His examination of Chinese and English-language scholarly treatments of this event, both historical and contemporary, sheds new light on the place of the Macartney mission in the dynamics of colonial and imperial encounters.

Inside the Tudor Court
Inside the Tudor Court

Author: Lauren Mackay

Publisher: Amberley Publishing Limited

Published: 2014-02-15

Total Pages: 519

ISBN-13: 1445637243

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A first-hand perspective on Henry VIII’s court and relationships