Wanghailou Church [Tianjin]

Wanghailou Catholic church is located by the east bank of Haihe Ri- ver in Hebei District with Shizilin Bridge on its east,Shizilin school on its west and residential area behing it.Beining the first catholic church in Tianjin, it was built in 1869 With the total area of 3083.58-mm2 as an activity centre for cathalic believers. Its main building was of Gothic style,facing the south, with stone base and brick-wood frame, its plan is a rechanpular,53.5m long,15m wide and 22m high.

It has three towers with flat tops in the front like a pen rest.There are 8 columns in irs main hall,supporting its vault with coloured drawing. Inits great hall, the main altar for May, the mother of Tesus is in the middle, opposite which is the building where believer sing scripture. The doors and windows are arched with colored glass. The floor was laid by glazed files. It can hold thousands of people. In 1870,children were often abducted in Tianjin and dead bodies of the children were found in the wilds soon. The criminals later were caught and fold the truth that it was done by Wanghailou church and the French money were found from the criminals who sold the children who were dadncted.

Until then,the evidence of the case was profound and everyone knew the truth. Suddenly all the people were angry anout it and surrounded the church on June 21 th. The priest, Xie Fuyin hide the proof of his guilt and instigated his talons and fans to dispel the crowd by blubs and had a fisht with them. Feng Day,the french consul in Tianjin,wilfully made trouble in the govornment office in charge of business,destroyed everything and threatoned Liujie,The magistrate of Tianjin,with a fun,foring him to supports the public.

Being refused,Feng Daye was crying loudly while shooting at Liujie and shot Gao sheng,Liu Jie's suite,to death.Since the foreigners were so savage on the Chinese people's Land and killid people arbitrarily,the angry masses got together and beat Feng Daye and the evil priest, Xie Fuyin to death on sport and burnt.The mother Desheng Tang and the French Consular building.This was called Tianjin church case which shocked the country and the whole world.The church was destroyed so France,Britain,Russia,the USA and other 3countries declared war and their fleets were gathered outside Danukou.

The corrupt and incompetent Qing Government was so scared that they didn't know what to do.Then they sent Zeng Guofan and LiHongzhang to deal with the case.At last 16 patriots including Ma Hongliang,Cui Fusheng and Feng quezi were put to death and 26 were sent in exile with no reason;the magistrates of Tianjin,Zhang Guangzao and Liejie were removed from office and made to serve in the army in The far end of Heilongjiang Province;and more than 500,000 taels of silver was paid as indemnite. Futher more,the government of Qi Synasny Sent officials to France to make an apology. A sportaneous patrioctic struggle against the imperia Lism was suppresstd.The church was tebuilt later,but in 1900 it was destroyed again. And it was seriously destroyed because of earthqualu. In 1991 , the municipal government restored it.In 1988 it was prt on the list of the important historical sites to be gicer special protection by the State Council. as indemnity.