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Person1859 – 1916

Yuan Shikai

Also called: Yuan Shih-kai

Late-Qing master of the Beiyang Army who meddled in Joseon affairs after the 1882 Imo Incident; in the 1911 Revolution he secured the emperor’s abdication and became president of the Republic, but his bid to make himself emperor failed

Born into an official family at Xiangcheng in Henan, he joined the Huai Army after repeatedly failing the civil examinations. He came to Joseon with Wu Changqing’s troops in 1882, crushed the Gapsin Coup, and from 1885 until just before the Sino-Japanese War stayed in Seoul, deeply interfering in Korea’s diplomacy and government. After that war he trained a Western-style New Army at Xiaozhan near Tianjin, laying the foundation of the Beiyang Army, and as Viceroy of Zhili led the late-Qing reforms. Forced out by the regent in 1909, he was recalled when the 1911 Revolution broke out.

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2 related events

  1. 1
    1913 – 1916Yuan Shikai’s Dictatorship and the Warlord Eraleader

    Having taken over the provisional presidency, Yuan Shikai crushed the Nationalist Party and tried to make himself emperor; after his failure and death China fell into an age of rival regional warlords.

  2. 2
    1915Japan’s Twenty-One Demandsrelated figure

    Having seized Germany’s leasehold in Shandong during the First World War, Japan presented Yuan Shikai’s government with twenty-one demands for rights in Shandong, southern Manchuria and elsewhere, and forced it to accept most of them.

People who appear alongside

  • Sun Yat-sen1866 – 1925

    Leader of the Chinese revolution who led the Tongmenghui under the Three Principles of the People and became provisional president of the Republic of China after the Xinhai Revolution

Themes this person appears in

  • Republican China and Imperial Japan1912 – 1949

    The age when the Republic of China, born of the 1911 Revolution, passed through warlord division, the May Fourth Movement, the United Front and the Northern Expedition, fought Japan’s invasion and split in civil war — as Japan moved from Taishō democracy through the Manchurian Incident and military coups to the war in China and the Co-Prosperity Sphere, and colonized Korea resisted through the March First Movement and armed struggle