The Second Opium War and the Burning of the Summer Palace

Britain and France wanted more than the first treaties gave: wider access to China's interior, legal opium trade and diplomats in Beijing. In 1856 Chinese officials boarded the Arrow, a ship registered in Hong Kong, and Britain used the incident as a reason for war; France joined, citing the execution of a French missionary. The Treaties of Tianjin in 1858 opened more ports, allowed foreign diplomats to live in Beijing, permitted missionaries to travel inland and legalized the opium trade.

When fighting resumed in 1860, an Anglo-French force marched on Beijing. After the Qing seized and mistreated British and French envoys, several of whom died, Lord Elgin ordered the destruction of the Yuanmingyuan, the vast imperial gardens known as the Old Summer Palace, which was looted and burned. The Convention of Peking ceded Kowloon to Britain, while Russia used the crisis to gain the territory where it founded Vladivostok.