Puyi

For other uses, see Puyi (disambiguation). In Manchu, his given name is written in a special way. Under Manchu custom, it should be used alone or with titles, but not with his clan name.

Puyi (Chinese: 溥儀; pinyin: Pǔ Yí; Wade–Giles: P'u-i; 7 February 1906 – 17 October 1967) was the last emperor of China. He ruled as the Xuantong Emperor of the Qing dynasty from 1908 to 1912, and he was briefly put back on the throne in 1917. Later, he became the Kangde Emperor of Manchukuo, a puppet state controlled by Japan during World War II. After the war, he was held as a war criminal in the Soviet Union and China until 1959. That year, the Chinese Communist Party freed him and showed him as an example of successful reeducation.

In 1908, Empress Dowager Cixi chose Puyi to succeed the Guangxu Emperor, who had no children. He became emperor at the age of two. His father, Prince Chun, acted as regent for him. After the Xinhai Revolution, Empress Dowager Longyu signed the abdication edict for him. Under the Articles of Favorable Treatment, he could keep his imperial title and stay in the Forbidden City. From 1 to 12 July 1917, the loyalist general Zhang Xun put him back on the throne. In 1924, the warlord Feng Yuxiang expelled him from the palace, and Puyi found safety in Tianjin.

After the Japanese invasion of Manchuria, Puyi was made chief executive of Manchukuo in 1932. In 1934, he was crowned emperor of Manchukuo. At the end of the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1945, the Soviet Red Army captured him. In 1946, he gave testimony at the Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal. In 1950, he was sent back to the People's Republic of China.

After his release in 1959, Puyi published an autobiography, ghostwritten by Li Wenda. He worked as a gardener before becoming a researcher at the Central Research Institute of Culture and History. In 1964, he was chosen as a member of the 4th Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference. When the Cultural Revolution began in 1966, he was protected by Zhou Enlai. He died in 1967 without issue.

Childhood and reign (1908–1912)

Puyi was born in Beijing on 7 February 1906. His father was Zaifeng, the Prince Chun. In December 1908, Empress Dowager Cixi chose the two-year-old Puyi to become emperor after the Guangxu Emperor died. He was taken away from his family to the Forbidden City. He was very upset by the change. Cixi died less than two days after meeting him, and his father became Prince Regent. Puyi grew up spoiled, surrounded by adults who were mostly strangers to him. He did not see his birth mother for seven years.

See also: Imperial Edict of the Abdication of the Qing Emperor

In 1911, soldiers in Wuhan rebelled, and many people across China began to revolt against the Qing dynasty. Puyi's father resigned as regent in December. Empress Dowager Longyu took over, with Yuan Shikai as Prime Minister. On 12 February 1912, Longyu signed the edict that ended the Qing emperor's rule.

Life in the Forbidden City (1912–1924)

Under the Articles of Favourable Treatment of the Great Qing Emperor after His Abdication, made with the new Republic of China, Puyi was allowed to keep his title as emperor. He and the imperial court stayed in the northern half of the Forbidden City and in the Summer Palace. The Republic promised a yearly payment of taels of silver to the imperial family. The payment was never fully made and soon stopped. In 1912, Puyi was not told that China had become a republic, so for some time he still believed he was emperor. Later, he learned that President Yuan wanted to become emperor himself. Yuan proclaimed himself as emperor in 1915, but he gave up the plan after many people strongly opposed it.

See also: Manchu Restoration

In 1917, the warlord Zhang Xun put Puyi back on the throne for about ten days, from 1 to 12 July. The Premier, Duan Qirui, sent a plane to drop bombs over the Forbidden City to show his strength against Zhang Xun. The restoration failed. In 1919, the Scottish scholar Reginald Johnston became Puyi's tutor. He taught Puyi world history, philosophy, and English. He also encouraged Puyi to be more independent and to waste less. Puyi admired Johnston. In 1922, Puyi tried to leave the Forbidden City so he could study at the University of Oxford, but the attempt failed. That same year, Puyi married Wanrong, whom he had chosen from photographs. In 1923, after a fire and suspicions of theft, Puyi sent most of the palace servants away.

Expulsion from the Forbidden City (1924)

On 23 October 1924, a coup led by the warlord Feng Yuxiang took control of Beijing. Feng wanted political legitimacy, so he got rid of the unpopular Articles of Favourable Settlement to win the crowd's approval. On 5 November 1924, he changed the "Articles of Favourable Treatment" on his own. This ended Puyi's title as emperor and his special privileges, and made him an ordinary citizen of the Republic of China. Puyi was expelled from the Forbidden City that same day and given three hours to leave. He stayed for a few days at the house of his father Prince Chun, and then lived for a short time at the Japanese embassy in Beijing.

Johnston tried to get the British diplomatic legation in Beijing to host Puyi, and the British representative eventually agreed. However, Johnston later found that Puyi had already taken refuge in the Japanese legation after being advised by Zheng Xiaoxu. The Japanese diplomat Kenkichi Yoshizawa told Puyi that the Japanese government would protect him. Puyi's adviser Lu Zongyu, who was secretly working for the Japanese, suggested that Puyi move to Tianjin. On 23 February 1925, Puyi left Beijing for Tianjin.

In February 1925, Puyi moved to the Japanese concession of Tianjin, first to the Zhang Garden, and in 1929 to the former home of Lu Zongyu, known as the Garden of Serenity. Tianjin had large British, French, German, Russian and Japanese communities. Puyi and his advisers Chen Baochen, Zheng Xiaoxu, and Luo Zhenyu talked about plans to make him emperor again. Zheng and Luo wanted help from outside groups, but Chen disagreed. In June 1925, Zhang Zuolin, the warlord who ruled Manchuria, promised to restore the Qing in exchange for money for his army. He also warned Puyi not to trust his Japanese friends.

Puyi met Zhang Zongchang and the White Russian émigré general Grigory Semyonov. Both promised to put him back on the throne if he gave them money, and both kept the money for themselves. Colonel Kenji Doihara, a Japanese army officer, encouraged Puyi to seek restoration in Manchuria. In 1928, during the Northern Expedition to reunify China, the warlord Sun Dianying robbed the Qing tombs outside Beijing. This upset Puyi deeply. He never forgave the Kuomintang and blamed Chiang Kai-shek for the damage. This made him feel he had little powerful support, and it helped lead him to turn to the Japanese.

Captive in Manchuria (1931–1932)

In September 1931, Puyi wrote a letter to Jirō Minami, Japan's Minister of War. He said he wanted to become emperor again. On the night of 18 September 1931, the Mukden incident began. The Japanese Kwantung Army blew up part of a railway owned by the South Manchurian Railroad company. They blamed the warlord Marshal Zhang Xueliang. The army then attacked to take control of all of Manchuria. Kenji Doihara, who led the Kwantung Army's spy office, visited Puyi. He suggested that Puyi lead a new state in Manchuria.

The Empress Wanrong strongly disagreed with Puyi's plans. She said they were a betrayal of his country. Doihara asked Puyi's relative Yoshiko Kawashima, who supported Japan, to visit him and change his mind. In the Tientsin Incident of November 1931, Puyi left Tianjin in secret. He sailed to Port Arthur, where the Japanese agent Masahiko Amakasu met him. Once he was in Manchuria, Puyi found that he was not free. He was a prisoner. In early 1932, General Seishirō Itagaki told him that the new state would be a republic. Puyi would lead it as Chief Executive, not as an emperor. Puyi did not want this, but Zheng Xiaoxu persuaded him to accept it.

Chief Executive of Manchukuo (1932–1934)

On 1 March 1932, Puyi accepted a Japanese offer and became the Chief Executive of Manchukuo. Manchukuo was a puppet state controlled by the Empire of Japan. The commentator Wen Yuan-ning joked that Puyi had been "made emperor three times without knowing why." Puyi believed his time in Manchukuo was only the beginning and that he would soon rule China as emperor again. Japanese propaganda described the new state as a triumph of Pan-Asianism, where the "five races" came together. On 8 March 1932, Puyi arrived in Changchun. However, a British journalist and friend of Puyi, Woodhead, reported that few Chinese people outside official circles supported the new government. When the Lytton Commission came in April 1932 to look into whether Japan had committed aggression, Puyi told its leader, Victor Bulwer-Lytton, 2nd Earl of Lytton, that he had come to Manchukuo of his own free will. The Chinese diplomat Wellington Koo, who was on the commission, was not able to help Puyi's wife, Wanrong, leave Changchun.

Japanese emperor Hirohito wanted to see whether Puyi could be trusted before giving him an imperial title. In October 1933, Puyi was told he would be emperor again, and he was very happy. Meanwhile, General Doihara had won over the guerrilla leader Ma Zhanshan and had Puyi appoint him Defence Minister. However, Ma soon crossed the border into the Soviet Union so he could keep fighting the Japanese. Manchukuo also had many crimes. The Italian adventurer Amleto Vespa later said that Manchuria would have to pay for the way it had been taken advantage of. In 1933, Simon Kaspé, a French Jewish pianist, was kidnapped and killed by a gang linked to the Russian Fascists. The case drew attention around the world. Evidence that the gang worked for the Kempeitai, the military police of the Imperial Japanese Army, made it hard for Tokyo to ignore.

Emperor of Manchukuo (1934–1945)

On 1 March 1934, Puyi was crowned Emperor of Manchukuo under the name "Kangde" in Changchun. He was polite to the Japanese in public, but in private he often disagreed with them. He also wished he had been fully restored as a Qing Emperor. The Japanese chose Changchun as the capital and renamed it Xinjing. Puyi had wanted the capital to be Mukden (today Shenyang), which had been the Qing capital, but the Japanese did not agree. He lived in the Salt Tax Palace, which is now the Museum of the Imperial Palace of Manchukuo. He could not leave without permission, so he was almost like a prisoner. Over the following years, he signed the laws the Japanese prepared for him. He was kept away from the outside world. In December 1941, Puyi followed Japan in declaring war on the United States and Great Britain. In mid-1944, he began to doubt that Japan would win the war.

In August 1945, the Soviet Union declared war on Japan, and its Red Army entered Manchukuo. Puyi left Changchun by train. On 16 August, he gave up the throne. Soon after, the Red Army took him and his party prisoner. Puyi's wife, Wanrong, was captured by Chinese communist guerrillas while trying to reach Korea. She died in June 1946.

Later life (1945–1967)

After the war, the Soviets took Puyi to the Siberian town of Chita. He later lived in a sanatorium and then in Khabarovsk, near the Chinese border, where he was treated well. He followed the civil war in China by listening to broadcasts on Radio Moscow. The Soviet government said no many times when the Kuomintang government asked for him to be sent back to China. The Kuomintang had captured his cousin Dongzhen, who was killed in Beijing in 1948 after being found guilty of high treason. In 1946, Puyi spoke as a witness at the International Military Tribunal for the Far East in Tokyo. Defence lawyer Major Ben Bruce Blakeney asked him about the book Twilight in the Forbidden City. Puyi said the book's claim that he had willingly become emperor of Manchukuo was not true. The Australian judge Sir William Webb, who led the Tribunal, often became frustrated with his answers.

After the Chinese Communist Party won the civil war and took power in 1949, Puyi was sent back to China in 1950. He spent nine years at the Fushun War Criminals Management Centre in Liaoning. For a time he was moved to Harbin during the Korean War. There he took part in "remodelling", joining Marxism–Leninism and Mao Zedong Thought discussion groups. He also visited Pingfang to see where Unit 731 of the Imperial Japanese Army had done terrible things to people. Puyi was released in 1959 and moved to Beijing, where he worked as a gardener at the Beijing Botanical Gardens. He met Zhou Enlai in 1960 and married Li Shuxian, a hospital nurse, in 1962. From 1964 he worked as an editor for the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, earning about 100 yuan a month. His autobiography, From Emperor to Citizen, was polished by Lao She. During the Great Leap Forward, a time when millions of people starved to death in China, his trips to the countryside were cancelled. This meant he would not see the hardship there, and his faith in communism kept growing. Puyi also acted in a play about the Suez Crisis, in which he played a Labour MP who challenged Selwyn Lloyd in the House of Commons. Some other European wartime figures, such as William Joyce, who had been the announcer on Radio Berlin, Benito Mussolini, and Pierre Laval, were executed for their actions. Puyi was released after nine years.

Death

The Cultural Revolution began in 1966. The Red Guards saw Puyi, who stood for imperial China, as an easy target. He was placed under the protection of the local public security bureau. His food, pay, and comforts were taken away, but he was not publicly shamed, as many people were at that time. The Red Guards burned copies of his book in the streets. Zhou Enlai used his influence to protect Puyi and his family from the worst treatment. Puyi's health began to get worse in 1964. He died in Beijing on 17 October 1967, at the age of 61. He had kidney cancer and heart disease.

Puyi's body was cremated. After a family discussion, his ashes were first placed at the Babaoshan People's Cemetery. His seventh uncle, Zaitao, said that asking for a place in the Revolutionary Cemetery would cause trouble for Zhou Enlai during the Cultural Revolution. In 1980, a memorial service was held, and his ashes were moved to the Babaoshan Revolutionary Cemetery. In 1995, his widow Li Shuxian moved the ashes to the Hualong Imperial Cemetery, near the Western Qing Tombs. In 2015, some relatives gave Puyi and his wives posthumous names.

Titles, honours, and decorations

Titles

From 1908 to 1912, and during his short return to the throne in 1917, Puyi was called the "Xuantong Emperor" (宣统皇帝; 宣統皇帝; Xuāntǒng Huángdì). "Xuantong" was his era name. He was also allowed to keep the title Emperor of the Great Qing. The Republic of China treated him like a foreign ruler until 5 November 1924.

Because he was the last ruling emperor of China, many people in China and around the world call him "the last emperor" (末代皇帝; Mòdài Huángdì). Some call him "the last emperor of the Qing dynasty" (清末帝; Qīng Mò Dì). Because he gave up the throne, he is also called the "yielded emperor" (遜帝; Xùn Dì) or "abrogated emperor" (废帝; 廢帝; Fèi Dì). Sometimes "Qing" is added before these titles. When he led the puppet state of Manchukuo, his era name was "Datong" while he was its Chief Executive. From 1934 to 1945, as Emperor of Manchukuo, his era name was "Kangde". So he was known as the "Kangde Emperor" (康德皇帝; Kāngdé Huángdì, Japanese: Kōtoku Kōtei).

Qing

Manchukuo

Foreign

Family

Main article: Family of Puyi