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Contact Info
Home Town Carlisle, Pennsylvania
Last Address Brookline, Massachusetts
Date of Passing Jul 26, 1937
Location of Interment Arlington National Cemetery (VLM) - Arlington, Virginia
Wall/Plot Coordinates Plot: Section East, Site 1107
US Army General. During the Civil War he served on the staff of his father, General Edwin Vose Sumner. Afterwards he remained on active duty, serving in the western United States during the Indian Wars. In May, 1898 he was appointed Brigadier General and commander of the 1st Cavalry Brigade, serving in Cuba during the Spanish-American War, leading his brigade at the Battle of Las Guasimas, and commanding the Army's Cavalry Division when General Joseph Wheeler became ill. Sumner commanded his brigade at the Battle of San Juan Hill for which he earned the Silver Star, and the Siege of Santiago, for which he earned promotion to Major General. After the war Sumner served as attaché at the US Embassy in London, commanded a brigade during the China Relief Expedition, a military district in the Philippines, and the Army's Department of the Missouri, Department of the Southwest and Department of the Pacific before retiring in 1906. He was the brother of General Edwin Vose Sumner, Jr.
Description The Boxer Rebellion, Boxer Uprising or Yihequan Movement was an anti-imperialist uprising that took place in China between 1899 and 1901, towards the end of the Qing dynasty. It was initiated by the Militia United in Righteousness (Yihetuan), known in English as the "Boxers", and was motivated by proto-nationalist sentiments and opposition to imperialist expansion and associated Christian missionary activity.
The uprising took place against a background of severe disruption caused by the encroachment of America and European nations. After several months of growing frustration against both the unrelenting wave of European and Christian presence in Shandong and the North China plain in June 1900, Boxer fighters, convinced they were invulnerable to foreign weapons, converged on Beijing with the slogan "Support Qing government and exterminate the foreigners." Foreigners and Chinese Christians sought refuge in the Legation Quarter. In response to reports of an armed invasion to lift the siege, the initially hesitant Empress Dowager Cixi supported the Boxers and on June 21 issued an Imperial Decree declaring war on the foreign powers. Diplomats, foreign civilians and soldiers as well as Chinese Christians in the Legation Quarter were placed under siege by the Imperial Army of China and the Boxers for 55 days.
Chinese officialdom was split between those supporting the Boxers and those favoring conciliation, led by Prince Qing. The supreme commander of the Chinese forces, the Manchu General Ronglu (Junglu), later claimed that he acted to protect the besieged foreigners. The Eight-Nation Alliance, after being initially turned back, brought 20,000 armed troops to China, defeated the Imperial Army, and captured Beijing on August 14, lifting the siege of the Legations. Uncontrolled plunder of the capital and the surrounding countryside ensued, along with the summary execution of those suspected of being Boxers.
The Boxer Protocol of 7 September 1901 provided for the execution of government officials who had supported the Boxers, provisions for foreign troops to be stationed in Beijing, and 450 million taels of silver—approximately $10 billion at 2017 silver prices and more than the government's annual tax revenue—to be paid as indemnity over the course of the next thirty-nine years to the eight nations involved. The Empress Dowager then sponsored a set of institutional and fiscal changes in an attempt to save the dynasty by reforming it.
