In 1407, during the period of the great Ming fleets, China once again conquered Annam, which now extended as far south as the area of Danang. Following the death of Yung Lo, Chinese seapower declined. An Annamite victory at Lang Son, south of the Chinese border, and the recapture of Hanoi ended a twenty-one year period of Chinese rule.

Although the Chams temporarily regained their northern provinces, they suffered a disastrous defeat in 1471 and Annam annexed territory all the way down to Cape Varella. The area from the Chinese border to the cape was for a time under one ruler, but the basic causes of north-south conflict continued. Finding the lands to the south difficult to control, a viceroy, the head of the Nguyen family, was appointed in 1558 to rule there. His capital was Hue. Later those in the north attempted to oust the Nguyen ruler and in 1627 launched a major attack by land and sea. The south successfuly defended its territory in a prolonged war which ended in a truce in 1673. The area later to be known as Vietnam remained a divided land.

The Beginnings of European Maritime Influence

The arrival of a Portuguese ship in 1535 and the establishment of a trading post at Fai Fo (later known as Hoi An) marked the beginning of European influence in Indochina. Missionaries soon followed. The Mekong Delta was found to be a particularly fertile region for conversions to Catholicism.

With the decline of Portuguese seapower in the early seventeenth century, maritime supremacy in Southeast Asia passed to the Dutch. Predictably, in 1633, Dutch ships arrived at Turon or Tourane (later known as Danang) and four years later traders from Holland set up a factory in Tonkin.

A French missionary, Father Alexandre de Rhodes, visited Cochin China and Tonkin at this time. His belief that the area was excellent for future evangelizing caused him to go to Rome in 1645 to inform the Vatican of the need to expend more resources on Christianizing Indochina. He then visited France on a similar mission. The success of his efforts soon became evident when two French bishops were sent to Indochina as Vicars Apostolic of Tonkin and Cochin China, respectively. As evidence of the diligence of

Father Alexandre and his equally zealous successors, the Vietnamese Christian community soon grew to an estimated 300,000 people."

More than a century later, it would be through the efforts of the Vicar Apostolic of Cochin China, one Monsignor Pigneau de Behaine, that France began to play an important part in the affairs of Vietnam. The occasion was the so-called Tay Son rebellion. When the Tay Son rebels invaded from the north, Nguyen Anh took refuge in Siam. After the Tay Son forces captured Hanoi, a single rule was established over the northern and southern states. Later returning and capturing several provinces, Nguyen Anh was defeated when Tay Son forces were brought in by sea. After a second abortive attempt, Nguyen was advised by Pigneau to seek aid from King Louis XVI. Pigneau's trip to Paris as an emissary resulted in a 1787 treaty providing for military support in return for territorial concessions and a trade monopoly.

The French ministers secretly instructed the French Governor of India at Pondichéry to veto the treaty if, in his opinion, the plan for aid seemed impractical. Having neither the four ships, the 1,650 men, nor the guns and other equipment requested by Pigneau, the governor did not approve the mission. Unable to move the governor, the energetic monsignor approached French traders and merchants and convinced them of the riches to be gained if Nguyen Anh were on the throne granting preference and privilege to his French supporters. The result was that by June 1789 Pigneau acquired two corvettes which he loaded with 100 French and other European mercenaries. They landed in Vietnam, organized a mission to support Nguyen Anh, and taught the men how to cast cannon, build ships, and operate field artillery.10

A Vietnamese Navy

With French guidance and assistance a small navy was created. The royal fleet, commanded by Jean Marie Dayot, destroyed the "navy" of the Tay Son rebels in 1792, displayed the flag from the China Sea to the

"Donald Lancaster, The Emancipation of French Indochina (London: Oxford University Press, 1961), pp. 23-27.

10

Buttinger, Smaller Dragon, pp. 233-39; Lancaster, Emancipation of French Indochina, pp. 28-29; Bernard B. Fall, "The History and Culture of Vietnam," Naval War College Review, XXIII (Feb. 1971), p. 51. For a copy of the treaty, see Eugene Teston and Maurice Percheron, L'Indochine Moderne (Paris: Librairie de France, 1931), p. 25.

Bay of Bengal, and reputedly made it respected throughout the Orient. As a result of raids and small invasions along the southern coast and in the Mekong Delta, Nguyen Anh gained control of the delta within ten years. Saigon was captured in 1788. In 1802 occupation of Hanoi ended the Tay Son rule. With the area from the northern border to the Gulf of Siam now under one ruler, the Chinese emperor, to whom Nguyen paid tribute, designated the country Viet Nam.

Significantly, 400 Frenchmen remained in Gia Long's (as Nguyen Anh became known) service. Some like Théodore Lebrun, built the citadel at Saigon and most of the forts throughout Annam.11

Alarmed by the growing number of aggressive Western traders in Canton, Hong Kong, and other ports, and fearful that Christian missionary teachings were undermining imperial authority, the Emperor of China initiated a policy designed to push the "barbarians" out of the Middle Kingdom and its tributaries. The new Vietnamese king, Minh Mang, adopted a similar policy of isolation. Becoming convinced that France planned to conquer his people by mass conversion to Christianity, a religion that he believed was at variance with traditional Vietnamese order, Minh Mang began a campaign of persecuting Christians and authorizing the execution of certain French missionaries.12

American Attempts to Establish Relationships with Vietnam

During this troubled time, a ship of the United States Navy first visited Vietnam, as America attempted to expand its trade with the Orient. Edmund Roberts, an experienced merchant-ship captain, was appointed as a special diplomatic agent and sent in the American sloop-of-war Peacock (Commander David Geisinger commanding) on a cruise to Asia. Roberts's instructions called for him to conclude treaties of commerce and trade with Cochin China (the name then being used by Americans to refer to all Vietnam), with Siam, and with Muscat, a state bordering the Arabian Sea. Peacock arrived at Tourane Bay on 1 January 1833. Anchoring off

11 Teston and Percheron, L'Indochine Moderne, p. 26; Buttinger, Smaller Dragon, p. 306; Bernard B. Fall, The Two Viet-Nams: A Political and Military Analysis (New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1967), p. 9.

12

13 David J. Steinberg et al, In Search of Southeast Asia: A Modern History (New York: Praeger Publishers, 1971), pp. 127–30.

Hue or in the roadstead at Tourane was found unsafe because of the northeast monsoon. The ship then proceeded south and found secure anchorage at Vung Lam (Vung Chao), near Qui Nhon. Roberts spent a month attempting to gain an audience with the emperor at Hue, present a letter from President Andrew Jackson, and conduct negotiations. Encountering what were described as "insulting formalities," Roberts terminated the effort.

Sailing in Peacock for Siam, Roberts concluded a treaty of commerce and amity with that country. It was the first treaty ever signed by the United States with an Asian nation."

Soon thereafter, France deployed a naval squadron to the Far East. When Minh Mang closed all ports except Tourane to Western ships and pronounced the death penalty for foreign priests, French commanding officers were ordered to protect missionaries, but only if such actions could be carried out without exposing the French flag to possible insult and without resorting to hostilities. It was not long before the French Navy found itself at odds with the king of Annam. The first confrontation came in 1843 when Commandant Lévêque, the commanding officer of a French corvette, appeared at Tourane to obtain the release of five missionaries held captive at Hue.11

14

Two years later the United States Navy had its first introduction to Tourane. This port would become well known in the United States Navy after the passage of another 120 years. The earlier occasion was a visit by the famous frigate Constitution which was in the Far East on a roundthe-world cruise. The commanding officer of Constitution was the controversial and colorful Captain John Percival, known in the service as "Mad Jack." Upon anchoring off Tourane in May 1845, Percival learned from a native Christian that a bishop apostolic, Monsignor Lefèbvre, was being held prisoner by the king. Putting ashore a landing force of fifty bluejackets and thirty Marines, the captain seized five hostages (among them three local officials) and three junks, and held them for almost a week. Whether Percival's tactics, which were later disavowed by the United States, helped to gain the release of the missionary is not clearly established. It is known that, subsequently, a French warship won custody of Lefebvre and took him from the country. However, the bishop then secretly made

13 A full account is in Edmund Roberts, Embassy to the Eastern Courts of Cochin-China, Siam and Muscat (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1837), pp. 6, 171–226, 313.

14

Steinberg, In Search of Southeast Asia, p. 128; Buttinger, Smaller Dragon, pp. 304–24; Hall, History of South-East Asia, p. 609.