Portrait de Yixing, prince Gong (1833-1898), frere de l'empereur de Chine, signataire du traite de...

Portrait de Yixing, prince Gong (1833-1898), frere de l'empereur de Chine, signataire du traite de 1860, consequence des evenements de la seconde guerre de l'opium (1855-1860). Prince Kung, Brother of the Emperor of China, signer of the treaty', 1860. A photograph of Prince Kung taken by Felice Beato after the Second Opium War (1855-1860). In October 1856, Chinese police boarded the British ship Arrow and charged its crew with smuggling. Eager to gain more trading rights, the British used the incident to precipitate the Second Opium War. British forces, aided by the French, won a quick military victory in 1857. When the Chinese government refused to ratify the Treaty of Tientsin, which had been signed in 1858, hostilities resumed. In 1860, after British and French troops had occupied Beijing and burned the Summer Palace, the Chinese agreed to ratify. The treaty opened additional trading ports, let foreign emissaries into Beijing and Christian missionaries into China, and opened travel to the interior. ©SSPL/National Media Museum