Claude Maxwell MacDonald
Encyclopedia
Order of St Michael and St George
The Most Distinguished Order of Saint Michael and Saint George is an order of chivalry founded on 28 April 1818 by George, Prince Regent, later George IV of the United Kingdom, while he was acting as Prince Regent for his father, George III....
GCVO
Royal Victorian Order
The Royal Victorian Order is a dynastic order of knighthood and a house order of chivalry recognising distinguished personal service to the order's Sovereign, the reigning monarch of the Commonwealth realms, any members of her family, or any of her viceroys...
KCB
Order of the Bath
The Most Honourable Order of the Bath is a British order of chivalry founded by George I on 18 May 1725. The name derives from the elaborate mediæval ceremony for creating a knight, which involved bathing as one of its elements. The knights so created were known as Knights of the Bath...
PC (1852 – 1915) was a British
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
diplomat
Diplomat
A diplomat is a person appointed by a state to conduct diplomacy with another state or international organization. The main functions of diplomats revolve around the representation and protection of the interests and nationals of the sending state, as well as the promotion of information and...
, best known for his service in China and Japan.
Biography
MacDonald was educated at Uppingham SchoolUppingham School
Uppingham School is a co-educational independent school of the English public school tradition, situated in the small town of Uppingham in Rutland, England...
and Sandhurst
Royal Military Academy Sandhurst
The Royal Military Academy Sandhurst , commonly known simply as Sandhurst, is a British Army officer initial training centre located in Sandhurst, Berkshire, England...
, and was a soldier-diplomat, commissioned into the 74th Foot
74th (Highland) Regiment of Foot
The 74th Regiment of Foot was a British Army line infantry regiment. During the Childers Reforms it was united with the 71st Regiment of Foot to form the Highland Light Infantry.-Service history:...
in 1872. He thought of himself as a 'soldier-outsider', as regards the Foreign Office.
His early career was in Africa. He served in the Egyptian campaign of 1882, from 1887 to 1889 was consul-general at Zanzibar
Zanzibar
Zanzibar ,Persian: زنگبار, from suffix bār: "coast" and Zangi: "bruin" ; is a semi-autonomous part of Tanzania, in East Africa. It comprises the Zanzibar Archipelago in the Indian Ocean, off the coast of the mainland, and consists of numerous small islands and two large ones: Unguja , and Pemba...
, and then served in west Africa.
China and Korea
In 1896, MacDonald was appointed British minister to China. He was also the British Minister to Korea in 1896 through 1898.In China, MacDonald obtained a lease at Weihaiwei, and obtained railway contracts for British syndicates. He was instrumental in securing the Second Peking Convention
Convention for the Extension of Hong Kong Territory
The Convention Between Great Britain and China Respecting an Extension of Hong Kong Territory or the Second Convention of Peking was a lease signed between Qing Dynasty and the United Kingdom in 1898.-Background:...
, by which China leased to Britain the New Territories
New Territories
New Territories is one of the three main regions of Hong Kong, alongside Hong Kong Island and the Kowloon Peninsula. It makes up 86.2% of Hong Kong's territory. Historically, it is the region described in The Convention for the Extension of Hong Kong Territory...
of Hong Kong
Hong Kong
Hong Kong is one of two Special Administrative Regions of the People's Republic of China , the other being Macau. A city-state situated on China's south coast and enclosed by the Pearl River Delta and South China Sea, it is renowned for its expansive skyline and deep natural harbour...
.
The Macartney-Macdonald Line
In 1899 he was the author of a Note which proposed a new demarcation of the border between China and British India in the KarakoramKarakoram
The Karakoram, or Karakorum , is a large mountain range spanning the borders between Pakistan, India and China, located in the regions of Gilgit-Baltistan , Ladakh , and Xinjiang region,...
and Kashmir
Kashmir
Kashmir is the northwestern region of the Indian subcontinent. Until the mid-19th century, the term Kashmir geographically denoted only the valley between the Great Himalayas and the Pir Panjal mountain range...
, now known as the Macartney-Macdonald Line, which still forms the basis of the border between China and Pakistan
Trans-Karakoram Tract
The Trans-Karakoram Tract is an area of nearly along both sides of the Shaksgam River, is entirely administered by the People's Republic of China as a part of Kargilik County and Taxkorgan Tajik Autonomous County in the Kashgar Prefecture of Xinjiang Autonomous Region, but claimed by Pakistan...
and the line of control between China and India
Origins of the Sino-Indian border dispute
Sovereignty over two separated pieces of territory was contested during the Sino-Indian War. One is Aksai Chin is located either in the Indian province of Kashmir or the Chinese province of Xinjiang in the west. It is a virtually uninhabited high-altitude wasteland crossed by the Xinjiang-Tibet...
.
As a military man, MacDonald led the defence of the foreign legations in 1900 which were under siege during the Boxer Rebellion
Boxer Rebellion
The Boxer Rebellion, also called the Boxer Uprising by some historians or the Righteous Harmony Society Movement in northern China, was a proto-nationalist movement by the "Righteous Harmony Society" , or "Righteous Fists of Harmony" or "Society of Righteous and Harmonious Fists" , in China between...
, and he worked well with the Anglophile Japanese Colonel Shiba Goro
Shiba Goro
-External links:*- Notes :...
.
Japan
MacDonald presided over the TokyoTokyo
, ; officially , is one of the 47 prefectures of Japan. Tokyo is the capital of Japan, the center of the Greater Tokyo Area, and the largest metropolitan area of Japan. It is the seat of the Japanese government and the Imperial Palace, and the home of the Japanese Imperial Family...
Legation in years of harmony between Britain and Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
(1900–12), swapping posts with Sir Ernest Satow who replaced him as Minister in Peking. On January 30, 1902, the first Anglo-Japanese Alliance
Anglo-Japanese Alliance
The first was signed in London at what is now the Lansdowne Club, on January 30, 1902, by Lord Lansdowne and Hayashi Tadasu . A diplomatic milestone for its ending of Britain's splendid isolation, the alliance was renewed and extended in scope twice, in 1905 and 1911, before its demise in 1921...
was signed in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
between the Foreign Secretary Lord Lansdowne
Henry Petty-FitzMaurice, 5th Marquess of Lansdowne
Henry Charles Keith Petty-Fitzmaurice, 5th Marquess of Lansdowne, KG, GCSI, GCMG, GCIE, PC was a British politician and Irish peer who served successively as the fifth Governor General of Canada, Viceroy of India, Secretary of State for War, and Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs...
and Hayashi Tadasu
Hayashi Tadasu
was a career diplomat and cabinet minister in Meiji period Japan. Baron Matsumoto Ryōjun, the onetime private physician to Tokugawa Yoshinobu and founder of the Imperial Japanese Army Medical Corps, was Hayashi’s brother.- Early life :...
, the Japanese Minister. MacDonald was still in Tokyo when the alliance was renewed in 1905 and 1911. He also became Britain's first ambassador
Ambassador
An ambassador is the highest ranking diplomat who represents a nation and is usually accredited to a foreign sovereign or government, or to an international organization....
to Japan when the status of the legation was raised to an embassy in 1905.
MacDonald was made a Privy Councillor in 1906.
In popular culture
The fictious character Sir Arthur Robinson in the film 55 Days at Peking55 Days at Peking
55 Days at Peking is a 1963 historical epic film starring Charlton Heston, Ava Gardner, and David Niven, made by Samuel Bronston Productions, and released by Allied Artists. The movie was produced by Samuel Bronston and directed by Nicholas Ray, Andrew Marton , and Guy Green...
(played by David Niven
David Niven
James David Graham Niven , known as David Niven, was a British actor and novelist, best known for his roles as Phileas Fogg in Around the World in 80 Days and Sir Charles Lytton, a.k.a. "the Phantom", in The Pink Panther...
) is somewhat based on Claude Maxwell MacDonald.
Selected works
In a statistical overview derived from writings by and about Claude MacDonald, OCLCOCLC
OCLC Online Computer Library Center, Inc. is "a nonprofit, membership, computer library service and research organization dedicated to the public purposes of furthering access to the world’s information and reducing information costs"...
/WorldCat
WorldCat
WorldCat is a union catalog which itemizes the collections of 72,000 libraries in 170 countries and territories which participate in the Online Computer Library Center global cooperative...
encompasses roughly 10+ works in 20+ publications in 2 languages and 300+ library holdings.
- 1900 — The Japanese detachment during the defence of the Peking legations, 1900
- 1900 — Reports from Her Majesty's minister in China [Sir C.M. Macdonald] respecting events at Peking. Presented to parliament, Dec. 1900
- 1898 — Despatch from Her Majesty's minister at Peking forwarding copies of the notes exchanged with the Chinese government respecting the non-alienation of the Yang-tsze region
See also
- List of Ambassadors from the United Kingdom to China
- List of Ambassadors from the United Kingdom to Korea
- List of Ambassadors from the United Kingdom to Japan
- List of Privy Counsellors (1901–1910)
- Anglo-Chinese relationsAnglo-Chinese relationsBritish–Chinese relations , also known as Sino-British relations and Anglo-Chinese relations, refers to the interstate relations between China and the United Kingdom. Although on opposing sides of the Cold War, both countries were allies during World War II, and are members of the UN...
- Anglo-Japanese relationsAnglo-Japanese relationsThe history of the relationship between Britain and Japan began in 1600 with the arrival of William Adams on the shores of Kyūshū at Usuki in Ōita Prefecture...
External links
- UK in Japan, Chronology of Heads of Mission