Trương Định

Trương Định (1820 – 19 August 1864), sometimes known as Trương Công Định, was a mandarin (scholar-official) in the Nguyễn dynasty of Vietnam under Emperor Tự Đức. He is best known for leading a guerrilla army in southern Vietnam against French forces in defiance of the emperor. He refused to recognise the 1862 Treaty of Saigon that ceded Vietnamese territory to France.

The son of a military mandarin from central Vietnam, Định moved south when his father was posted to Gia Định as the provincial commander. Định grew up to lead a military colony, overseeing the settlement and economic development of his constituency. He gained a reputation for being an able leader and land developer who cared for his people. When France began its invasion of southern Vietnam in 1859, Định organised local militia to reinforce the imperial army. As the regular army units suffered defeats on the battlefield, its remnants joined Định's partisans, and by 1861, he had around 6,000 men under his command. Định built his own resistance base and organised guerrilla attacks against the French. His success led Tự Đức to grant Định command of the southern partisans and to order the regular commanders to coordinate their plans with him. Định's forces quickly gained the respect of the French. They focused on disrupting the French bureaucracy and military posts in addition to the transportation of rice. Their most notable attack was the sinking of L'Espérance in December 1861.

Amid growing military setbacks, Vietnam signed the Treaty of Saigon in June 1862, losing three southern provinces which became the French colony of Cochinchina. Tự Đức hoped that by abiding by the treaty, Vietnam could eventually negotiate the future return of the territory. He ordered the partisans to disband, but Định refused to recognise the treaty and disobeyed the monarch, fighting on in defense of his homeland. With the loss of imperial support, Định's forces began to struggle against the superior resources of the French. His men were gradually worn down and, following an ambush, Định committed suicide to avoid being captured.

Vietnamese and French historians have fiercely debated Định's choice to disregard the treaty. The effectiveness of Định's insurgency led French officials to claim that Tự Đức was secretly assisting him, thereby violating the treaty, a pretext the French used to seize three more provinces in 1867. Vietnamese records dispute this, contending that Tự Đức attempted to ensure Định's compliance with the treaty. Định's defiance of the emperor has led historians to debate whether his actions were motivated by a rejection of the monarch's authority or whether he disobeyed in an attempt to help Tự Đức. Định remains widely respected among Vietnamese of all political persuasions. During the Vietnam War, communist historians sought to portray the Việt Cộng as Định's modern successor.

Early years Định was born in the Bình Sơn District in the Quảng Ngãi prefecture in Quảng Nam Province in central Vietnam. The son of a military mandarin named Trương Cầm, Định went south in the 1830s when his father was posted to Gia Định as the provincial commander.

Định took advantage of his improved socio-economic status to recruit a group of impoverished people, whom he organised for clearing land and founding a đồn điền ("military colony") in Gò Công. This occurred after Emperor Tự Đức's 1854 order, which granted General Nguyễn Tri Phương permission to organise southern levies in this manner. In recognition of his achievements, the mandarin authorities gave Định the rank of deputy regimental commander. His success in developing đồn điền was attributed to his organisational ability as well as a genuine concern for the welfare of those under his protection, ensuring that they had enough to eat and something to wear. In gratitude for Định's land development skills, the peasants gave him the middle name Công, which means "great public service".

French invasion in 1859 The process of Vietnam's colonisation began in September 1858 when a Franco-Spanish force landed at Da Nang in central Vietnam and attempted to proceed to the capital, Huế. After becoming tied down, they sailed to the less-defended south. The French and Spanish quickly captured the imperial Citadel of Saigon in February 1859—the fortress's commander committed suicide. The leaderless and defeated imperial troops fled in disarray. The Nguyễn Dynasty was Confucianist and had restricted the activity of missionaries. The belief system of Christianity was incompatible with the Confucian belief that the monarch was the "son of heaven".

In response to the razing of the Citadel of Saigon, Định organized his local levies into a guerrilla force that initially numbered between 500 and 1,000 men, operating out of Thuan Kieu. In the initial phase of the conflict, the local militias concentrated on evacuating the populace from areas that had been taken over by the French, while urging those who chose to stay to not cooperate with them. Snipers were deployed into French areas to assassinate isolated soldiers. Having fought at Ky Hoa, In May 1861, Admiral Léonard Charner ordered the dissolution of the đồn điền of Gò Công. He went about confiscating the land of those Vietnamese who remained loyal to the monarchy, giving it to his collaborators. French impositions against the trade of rice via nearby waterways caused a further backlash from the locals of Gò Công. In 1861, the resistance leaders in the Gò Công area delegated Định to travel to Biên Hòa to seek permission from Imperial Military Commissioner Nguyen Ba Nghi to "turn around the situation".

Appointed to the rank of lieutenant colonel, Learning of Định's role in support of the Nguyễn dynasty's call for popular resistance, Tự Đức promoted him to the rank of lieutenant colonel for the Gia Định region. Later in 1861, the imperial regulars were defeated at Biên Hòa,

He went on to recognise the popular nature of the partisans' efforts, stating that the "centre of resistance was everywhere, infinitely subdivided"; The first major attack against the French administration in the area targeted the Gò Công district office on 22 June 1861.

On 27 September, the guerrillas assassinated the French-installed chief of Gò Công, displaying his severed head in the town market. The chief's servant, who was an informant for Định, aided this operation. The killing had the effect of intimidating the chief's designated successor into submitting to the rebels and ceasing his service for the French. Around 150 guerrillas commanded by Nguyễn Trung Trực ambushed the vessel, killing all but 3 of the crew before burning and sinking the boat. The attack buoyed Vietnamese morale and instilled confidence among the freedom fighters that they could fight against French naval forces. The sinking earned the specific praise of Emperor Tự Đức, who described the incident as "most outstanding".

Continued guerrilla campaign

However, the overall Vietnamese military performance was not as successful as Định's guerrilla activities. On 5 June 1862, Định broke with the Nguyễn army after the court's plenipotentiary Phan Thanh Giản and another official, Lam Duy Hiep, signed the Treaty of Saigon. This agreement ceded the three southern provinces of Gia Định, Định Tường and Biên Hòa to France; they became the colony of Cochinchina. The treaty was accompanied by financial payments to France, religious concessions to missionaries and commercial opportunities for European merchants. Militarily, the withdrawal of the Nguyễn army deprived the resistance of the logistical support that could be provided by a regular force. It also permitted the French to concentrate their efforts against a single antagonist. Politically, the treaty provided, for those Vietnamese who needed one, a legal basis to collaborate with the French on Cochinchinese soil. As a result, the colonial forces found it easier to recruit militia and administrative personnel among Vietnamese who had been too afraid or too embarrassed to serve the French openly before the 1862 treaty. Định then allied himself with Võ Duy Dương to form the Movement of Popular Self Defense (Phong Trao Nhan Dan Tu Ve), creating an operations base in Đồng Tháp. From his stronghold at Gò Công, Định exhorted all southern Vietnamese to rise against the occupying regime, an appeal that was well received. In the words of French naval artillery officer Henri de Poyen, by December 1862, "the insurrection had broken out and was rapidly spreading throughout the colony". Định's appeal among the peasantry was attributed to their gratitude for his administration of the đồn điền. Under such a system, he was responsible for assisting them in matters such as clearing land, educating the community, providing health care and mediating disputes. Joining the resistance army was seen as a means of showing trust and gratitude. Hịch Trương Định (The proclamation of Trương Định), which was believed to have been written in 1862 or 1863, emphasised such themes. Quyen was eventually killed and in 1874, long after the southern insurgency had been crushed, Tự Đức granted a monthly allowance in grain and cash to Định's widow Le Thi Thuong, who had returned to her native village in Quảng Ngãi, which at the time was still in independent Vietnamese territory. because the monthly salary of a ninth-rank mandarin was only 18 francs and 48 litres of rice.

Debate on Defiance of Huế The actions of Định in the wake of the Treaty of Saigon have long been a subject of conjecture. At the time, the French military accused Huế of surreptitiously supporting Định in contravention of the treaty, while Huế denied this, publicly claiming that Định's actions in resisting the French would be counterproductive in attempting to maintain Vietnamese sovereignty.

After the signing of the Treaty of Saigon, the Huế court attempted to regain what it had lost militarily through diplomacy. Vietnamese negotiators sought a reversal of the territorial cession, which they regarded as the most humiliating clause of the treaty. Napoleon initially agreed, but the decision was reversed after lobbying from French officers. However, in one edict, Định claimed that Tự Đức endorsed his struggle, in an attempt to garner popular support. This fuelled French claims that the guerrillas were periodically traveling between French territory and the adjoining sovereign Nguyễn territory to get supplies from provincial officials.

Historians sympathetic to the colonisation reiterated the officers' assertions about the contacts between Huế and the southern partisans. De Poyen wrote that the southern insurgency "was ceaselessly excited and supported by emissaries from Huế, who travelled throughout the country".

In the specific case of Định, the Vietnamese documents record the failed attempts of Gian to persuade him to lay down his arms and accept an administrative post in An Giang. The records assert that his position as head of the resistance was granted by his followers rather than Huế. Shortly after signing the treaty, the court directed Gian to write to Định, ordering him to respect the agreement and end his resistance. Gian's letter and Định's rebuff show Tự Đức's insistence on abiding by the treaty and the guerrilla chief's staunch refusal to do so. Gian's letter argued that it was illegal and futile to ignore the court's order to cease hostilities. Gian wrote: "Trương Định has refused to return to the exercise of his office, and he is accordingly removed from that function with loss of honorific titles." Truong Buu Lam opined that "if some partisans received assistance from the Vietnamese authorities, it was extended to them by local officials who acted independently".

Debate on Disrespect of the mandate of heaven In light of Định's disobedience of Tự Đức, his justification for his defiance is discussed against the backdrop of the Confucian expectation for him to defer to the emperor's "Mandate of Heaven". As Định left no explicit or definitive statement for his rationale for disobeying Tự Đức, scholars who have recognised or suspected Định's disobedience have been forced to speculate.

quote|After the Huế court signed the Treaty of Saigon, a moral dilemma developed since the partisans could neither accept the loss of their country nor claim that their cause was righteous if they acted in violation of the court's orders. They therefore drew a careful distinction between the person of an individual king and the moral principle of loyalty to the monarchy.... The monarchy was therefore an idealised institution not tarnished by any accidental deviation from the ideal. Modern Vietnamese historians of the communist regime go to the extent of asserting that Định's justification for continued resistance was based on an implicit rejection of the monarchy at large. These historians base their hypothesis on the assertion that the Confucian virtue of monarchical loyalty was unconditional and absolute in 19th-century Vietnam. In the words of the editors of the Institute of Historical Study's journal, Nghiên cứu lịch sử (Historical Studies), "Loyalty to the king was the people's duty, and to satisfy the obligation of monarchical loyalty, the court's orders had to be followed".

According to historian Mark McLeod, these postulated explanations of Định's behaviour are plausible, given the chaos engulfing Vietnam at the time and the lack of conclusive documentation. However, Định and his supporters asserted their loyalty to the monarch and justified their struggle in his name, both before and after the signing of the treaty. These declarations show no hint of rejecting Tự Đức's authority nor any reference to a worthier, idealised monarch. Conversely, many of these proclamations display an intense feeling of personal loyalty. A placard that French forces found floating downstream near Định's base in Gò Công asserted: "Gratitude ties us to our king. We will avenge the insults he has received [from the French], or we will die for him." Tự Đức also appeared to view Định's continued resistance as a misguided manifestation of loyalty. Although the southern insurgents' disobedience provided the French with a pretext for further aggression, thereby hindering Tự Đức's plans for regaining the lost territory, the emperor never accused them of rebelling against royal authority. Instead, he continued to refer to them as "righteous recruits" motivated by "indignation" at the actions of the Westerners. After Định's death, Chiểu wrote in a poem:

quote|You have spared no efforts to help your country, Although you disobeyed the royal orders, you shall not be considered a disloyal subject. Định was highly regarded as a revolutionary hero by Vietnamese of both communist and anti-communist persuasions. In 1964, an article in the North Vietnamese Nghiên cứu lịch sửu described Định as "the hero symbolising the spirit of resistance to the foreign colonialists of the people of Southern Viet-Nam". The same article extolled Định's physical appearance and his capabilities, stating "He was handsome in appearance, understood the military manual and was a good shot". A prominent thoroughfare in the centre of Ho Chi Minh City in southern Vietnam is named after him.

Although Định received little attention in French academia, the North Vietnamese heavily relied on French sources for their accounts of the guerrilla leader. In the most detailed French account by Paulin Vial, Định is depicted as a "criminal" or "rebel". Osborne said that Định's final manifesto before his death showed him "to have been a man with a high concept of duty, an awareness of his own weakness and with a sense of despair, common to many of his countrymen, at the ambivalence of the Huế court".