早年

巴夏禮，1828年生于英格蘭斯塔福德郡布洛克斯威奇（Bloxwich）。父親哈里·巴克斯（Harry Parkes）是煉鐵公司巴夏禮與奧特韋公司（Parkes, Otway & Co.）的創辦人。他的母親和父親分別在他四歲和五歲時去世，父親因交通意外而去世。亦因為如此，他成為了孤兒。而住在伯明翰的、曾是海軍軍官的伯父收留了他。他在Balsall Heath的一所寄宿學校中接受教育，後來在1838年5月，升讀英皇愛德華文法學校（King Edward's Grammer School）。

中國

第一次鴉片戰爭

1841年6月，巴夏禮乘船航往中國，居住于表姐瑪麗（Mary Wanstall Gützlaff）的住所中。1841年10月，巴夏禮抵達澳門，準備接替馬儒翰的職位，擔任英國駐華全權公使及商務總監砵甸乍爵士的翻譯、秘書。在習得基礎華語後，巴夏禮在1842年5月到香港與馬儒翰會合。

此時，第一次鴉片戰爭爆發了。1842年6月13日，砵甸乍沿長江進攻，巴夏禮在遠征中作為砵甸乍的隨從。在7月21日，鎮江被英軍攻占。8月29日，在英軍戰艦康沃利斯號，中英雙方簽署了《南京條約》。根據條約，廣州、廈門、福州、寧波和上海五個港口開放為通商口岸。

外交工作

在英軍占領舟山後，郭士立被任命為地方知府。1842年9月開始，巴夏禮在舟山政府處任職。1843年8月，巴夏禮通過了英國領事館在香港舉辦的中文水平測驗，在9月被任命為福州的翻譯。但是，在他趕到福州時發現他的職位已經被人代替了，就改任駐廣領事、香港華人部助手。

1844年6月，他被任命為廈門的翻譯。1845年3月，他和領事阿禮國一起前往福州，他擔任翻譯。10月4日，兩人在福州受到清軍擲石。1846年6月，他和阿禮國一起押運46,163英鎊賠款。

1846年8月，阿禮國與巴夏禮被派往上海，巴夏禮再次擔任翻譯。1847年，他開始學習日文。1848年3月，他跟隨一個副領事，與中方交涉，要求處罰在青浦襲擊英國傳教士的中國人。1848年4月9日，他被任命為上海的翻譯。1850年至1851年間，他離開了中國，回到歐洲。1851年，他返華出任廈門的翻譯。

1851年11月21日，他被任命為廣州的翻譯，1852年2月抵達廣州任職。他在此代替寶寧出任領事。1853年8月又被暫時調職為廣州副領事。

1854年，他被任命為廈門領事。1855年，他作為秘書，隨寶寧往暹羅，締結商業條約。這是暹羅第一次與西方國家締結條約。5月18日，條約于曼谷簽署，在條約簽署後，他返回英格蘭。他在7月1日抵達英格蘭，並在7月9日獲得維多利亞女王接見。在1855年後半年中，他都在幫助外交部處理中國、暹羅事務。

婚姻

在英格蘭時，他在朋友家中遇到了范妮·米爾士小姐（Miss Fanny Plumer），她是第一位副大法官托馬斯·米爾士爵士（Sir Thomas Plumer）的孫女。「她是一個美麗的女孩」，他在寫給朋友的信中提到她，「高挑，勻稱而優美，她膚色濃厚而柔和。她深棕色的眼睛充滿智慧，說話又語重深長。她充滿魅力，而家人都十分優秀。」經過六個星期的追求，他們在1856年元旦在倫敦小斯坦莫爾（Little Stanmore）的聖勞倫斯教堂（St. Lawrence's Church）成婚。次年1月9日，夫婦離開英格蘭。

第二次鴉片戰爭

由於擔任廣州領事這個職位，他再次與欽差大臣、兩廣總督葉名琛打交道。他們之間的矛盾在不久後引發了第二次鴉片戰爭。

1856年10月8日，老閘船亞羅號進入珠江後被清水軍官員登上。有消息指有幾個海盜在英國的保護下登船，所以清軍登船抓捕。12名華籍水手被捕，英國國旗被取下。巴夏禮以英國國旗被降下為由，對葉名琛表示抗議。葉名琛辯稱亞羅號由中國人水手操縱，又為中國人擁有，而且當時並未升起英國國旗。巴夏禮將其視之為對條約權利的侵犯，向港督寶靈稱英國國旗遭到侮辱。

葉名琛礙于顏面，拒絕道歉，只允釋放9人。但遭巴夏禮拒絕。寶靈希望進一步擴大英國在廣東的特權，將事件升級，引發戰爭，以移除在廣州的貿易、外交障礙。

葉名琛拒絕讓步後，皇家海軍在10月29日轟破城牆，隨後，巴夏禮與海軍上將米高·西摩爵士一道進入葉名琛的衙門。但英國部隊數量較少，不足以完全占領廣州，唯有繼續使用戰艦、炮兵監視城市。在12月16日，中國部隊在城外向歐洲聚居點開火，巴夏禮退到香港，並留了近一年。在這段時間裡，他在議會內遭到了猛烈批評。

1857年11月，英國部隊從香港來援。額爾金被任命駐華高級專員與全權代表，並與為一被害教士複仇的法軍一道行動。巴夏禮加入到邁克爾·西摩爵士的部隊中，並在12月12日對葉發出最後通牒。通牒過期後，在12月28日，廣州遭到轟擊。1858年1月5日，在部隊攻入城內後，巴夏禮帶一隊水兵抓住了葉名琛。

1月9日，廣東巡撫柏貴複職。他任怡和行伍崇曜與巴夏禮交涉。但柏貴只是西方人的一個傀儡，城市實際上為一委員會所統治。委員會由兩個英國人組成，其中一個是巴夏禮。因為巴夏禮通曉華語，所以成為了領袖。委員會建立法庭，組建警察，並在2月10日開放廣州港口。在天津條約簽署後，廣東官員對巴夏禮敵視依然，為取巴夏禮的首級而動員民兵，巨額懸賞。在1859年12月6日，巴夏禮獲得了巴斯三等勳章。

8月21日，英軍突襲大沽炮台，獲得成功。巴夏禮參與了隨後的勸降。8月24日，他到達天津後調度了聯軍部隊，又與大臣進行了談話。在發現大臣並非預期中的全權代表後，盟軍繼續向通州行進。

巴夏禮行先一步，在通州時，分別在9月14日與9月17日，兩次利用通州政府，獲准將軍隊前進至距城市5英里（8公里）處。9月18日，他離開了通州。在他發現了中國軍隊正在集結後，他準備回到通州通知委員會，卻被清軍俘虜。

巴夏禮、羅亨利、捺·辛格（Nal Singh）與兩個法國士兵，被僧格林沁俘獲。巴夏禮與羅亨利被送交刑部，關押于普通牢房，並飽受折磨。

9月29日，奉奕䜣之命，巴夏禮與尼斯被移到一座寺廟中關押，這裡的環境較好。此舉是為中方在中英談判增加籌碼。巴夏禮拒絕協助中方，也不願為中方與額爾金交涉。在10月8日，七人獲得釋放。在眾人遭釋放後，皇帝要求處決他們的命令抵達，眾人逃過一劫。英國談判全權代表額爾金以「對外交人員實施虐待」為由，於10月18日下令放火燒圓明園，以作為對清廷的報復。

11月28日，他航往上海並在次年1月回到廣州擔任原職，處理接收九龍的事宜。根據天津條約，揚子江上的三個口岸開放。在1861年2月至4月，巴夏禮隨海軍中將何伯爵士沿江而行，在鎮江、九江與漢口設立領事館，並試圖與南京的太平天國叛軍立下協議。

1861年4月，他回到北京，並在6月到南京，準備與太平天國領導會面。在1861年10月21日，聯軍向清廷歸還廣東，因此巴夏禮不再擔任專員。在11月，他前往上海，在同月內，再次與太平天國領袖會面，但這次會面的地點是在寧波。

巴夏禮向洪秀全提出協助太平天國叛軍打敗清朝,以事成後平分中國為條件，但洪秀全欲擁有全中國而拒絕巴夏禮。

1862年1月，他回到英格蘭，他被囚一事使他變得知名。在1862年5月19日，他獲得了巴斯爵級司令勳章。

1864年11月，他離開英格蘭，在3月3日抵達上海，在1858年12月21日被任命為領事。

日本

1865年5月，正在前往揚子江港口的巴夏禮收到通知，他被任命為駐日特命全權公使與領事，而上一任特命全權公使與領事是阿禮國。

這個職位他擔任了18年，在任內，他不斷使用自己的影響力去支持日本的自由派。他向幕府的對手示好，所以對明治政府有影響力。因為他支持改革派，所以他成為了守舊派的目標，守舊派三次試圖刺殺他。他鼓勵低級成員深入研究日本：薩道義與威廉·喬治·阿斯頓（William George Aston）獲益良多，後來成為日本學學者。但是，總體來說，為巴夏禮工作並不簡單，他也不為日本官員、民眾所知。

巴夏禮夫人因為在1867年攀登富士山而變得知名，這是第一次有非日本婦女攀登富士山。1879年11月，巴夏禮夫人在英格蘭病逝，當時她正在為巴夏禮歸來做準備。四日後，巴夏禮通過電報得到噩耗。

和紙匯報與收集

1869年，後來的首相，威廉·格萊斯頓，要求英國駐日代表團提交一份對和紙與製紙的報告。巴夏禮與他的團隊在日本不同城鎮作出了深入調查，出版了一份政府報告，「對日本製紙的報告」，收集了超過400張手製紙張。大部分收藏品現在在維多利亞和阿爾伯特博物館的Paper Conservation Laboratory與邱園Economic Botany Collection展覽。1879年，邱園向格拉斯哥、悉尼、墨爾本與阿德萊德送出複樣，但都遺失了。巴夏禮收藏的紙張原始、價值高，造紙方法與每張紙的功能都詳細記錄下來。

朝鮮

他是1883年至1884年間駐朝鮮公使。他代表英國與朝鮮王朝談判，于1883年簽署了（United Kingdom-Korea Treaty of 1883）。條約生效後，他成為了第一個駐朝外交代表。

逝世、紀念

1883年，巴夏禮到了北京。在北京時，他的健康變差，在1885年3月21日因瘧疾發熱病逝。1890年4月8日，幹諾公爵（Duke of Connaught）為他在上海外灘豎立紀念碑，但在二戰時被日軍移除。另在香港九龍油麻地亦有一條以其名字命名的白加士街。

家庭

巴夏禮的次女，梅布爾（Mabel Desborough Parkes），嫁給了皇家海軍中尉埃格頓·斯科維那（Egerton Bagot Byrd Levett-Scrivener）。梅布爾在1890年策馬時墮下身亡。長女馬里昂（Marion）嫁給了凱瑟克家族的J.J.凱瑟克。

作品

據統計，巴夏禮的作品大約有20部。

• Observations on Mr. P.P. Thoms' rendering of the Chinese word ... Man. (1852)

• File concerning Harry Parkes' mission to Bangkok in 1856 from the Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, London.

• Papers, 1853-1872.

關連項目

• 巴夏禮夜壺

注釋

參考

• Daniels, Gordon. Sir Harry Parkes: British representative in Japan 1865-83, 1996, Folkestone: Japan Library. ISBN 1-873410-36-0

• Lane-Poole, Stanley and Frederick Victor Dickins, Life of Sir Harry Parkes, 1894, London: 由香港大學圖書館掃描,HKUL Digital Initiatives, "China Through Western Eyes." extract, volume 1, chapters XV-XVII

• Ian Nish, British Envoys in Japan 1859-1972, 2004, Folkestone, Kent: Global Oriental. ISBN 1901903516/ISBN 9781901903515

• Parkes, Harry. "Reports on the manufacture of paper in Japan", 1871, Japan, No. 4.

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Early life

Parkes was born in Birchill Hall in the parish of Bloxwich in Staffordshire, England. His father, Harry Parkes, was the founder of Parkes, Otway & Co., ironmasters. His mother died when he was four, while his father was killed in a carriage accident in the following year. He lived with his uncle, a retired naval officer, at Birmingham and was educated at a boarding school in Balsall Heath before entering King Edward's School, Birmingham in May 1838.

Career in China (1841–64)

First Opium War

In June 1841, Parkes sailed to China to live with his cousin, Mary Wanstall, who was also the wife of the German missionary Karl Gützlaff. Upon arriving in Macau in October 1841, he prepared for employment in the office of John Robert Morrison, a translator of Sir Henry Pottinger, who was then the British envoy and plenipotentiary and superintendent of British trade in China. Around the time, the First Opium War (1839–42) was being fought between the British and the Qing Empire of China.

Parkes learnt the basics of the Chinese language and joined Morrison in Hong Kong in May 1842. On 13 June, he accompanied Pottinger on an expedition up the Yangtze River to Nanking. He witnessed the Battle of Chinkiang, the last major battle of the First Opium War, on 21 July. He was also present at the signing of the Treaty of Nanking on board on 29 August.

As a translator and then a consul

Between September 1842 and August 1843, Parkes served as a clerk under Karl Gützlaff, who was appointed as a civil magistrate in Chusan after the British occupied the island. In August 1843, he passed the consular examination in Chinese in Hong Kong and was appointed as a translator in Foochow in the following month. However, as there was a delay in the opening of Foochow port, he was instead reassigned to serve at the consulate in Canton and as an assistant to the Colonial Secretary of Hong Kong.

In June 1844, Parkes was appointed as a translator in Amoy. In March 1845, he and Rutherford Alcock (the British consul in Amoy) were transferred to Foochow, where they were attacked on 4 October by Chinese soldiers, who threw stones at them. In June 1846, he assisted Alcock in securing $46,163 from the Chinese authorities in Fukien as compensation for British property looted and destroyed during a riot.

In August 1846, Parkes and Alcock were transferred to Shanghai, where Parkes continued to serve as Alcock's translator. He started studying the Japanese language in the following year. In March 1848, he accompanied the British vice-consul in Shanghai to Nanking to negotiate the punishment of the Chinese men who assaulted three British missionaries in Tsingpu, Shanghai. He was appointed as a translator in Shanghai on 9 April 1848. After taking a period of leave from 1850–51 in Europe, he returned to China and continued his service as a translator in Amoy – an appointment he assumed in July 1849. He was reassigned to Canton again on 21 November 1851 and travelled there in February in the following year. While he was in Canton, he served as an acting Consul during Sir John Bowring's absence. In August 1853, he was temporarily placed in charge of the British vice-consulate in Canton.

Parkes was appointed as the British consul in Amoy in 1854. In 1855, he accompanied Bowring to Siam as a joint secretary of the diplomatic mission to conclude a commercial treaty between the British and Siamese. The treaty, known as the Bowring Treaty, was signed in Bangkok on 18 April. Parkes then returned to Britain with the Bowring Treaty for it to be ratified by the British government. He delivered it on 1 July and was received by Queen Victoria on 9 July. He spent the rest of the year helping the Foreign Office with Chinese and Siamese business. He exchanged the ratified Bowring Treaty in Bangkok on 5 April 1856 and arrived in Canton in June to serve as the acting British consul during Alcock's absence.

Second Opium War

Outbreak of war

Parkes's position as the acting British Consul in Canton brought him into renewed contact with Ye Mingchen (or Yeh Ming-ch'en), the Qing-appointed Imperial Commissioner and Governor-General of Canton. Conflict between them eventually led to the outbreak of the Second Opium War (1856–60).

On 8 October 1856, the Chinese-owned lorcha Arrow, which was allegedly sailing under the Red Ensign, was boarded by officials from the Qing water patrol when she entered the Pearl River after they received intelligence that several pirates were on board. They arrested 12 Chinese sailors and took down the Red Ensign from the Arrow. Parkes protested to Ye against the removal of the Red Ensign because he saw it as an insult to Britain. Ye replied that Arrow was owned and crewed by Chinese sailors and the flag was not flying at the time. Parkes considered this action a violation of British treaty rights so he reported the incident to Sir John Bowring, the Governor of Hong Kong, and portrayed it as an insult to Britain.

Parkes then demanded that Ye release the detained sailors immediately and apologise for the alleged insult to the British flag. Although the British right to enter Canton had been established under the Treaty of Nanking in 1842, it had previously been denied. Bowring saw the Arrow incident as an opportunity to enforce this right. The deliberate escalation of the incident into a war was the object of forcing the removal of Britain's obstacles to trade and diplomacy in Canton.

Ye refused to capitulate despite minor reprisals, thus the Royal Navy breached Canton's walls on 29 October, after which Parkes accompanied Admiral Sir Michael Seymour in entering Ye's administrative office. The British did not have sufficient troops to permanently occupy Canton, but they kept warships on the Pearl River and positioned their artillery to overlook the city. On 16 December, Qing forces set fire to the European settlement outside the city. Parkes retreated to Hong Kong and spent nearly a year there. During this period of time, he was severely criticised in Parliament. On 26 February 1857, Lord Malmesbury said in the House of Lords, "If it were not for the serious consequences involved in this matter, I do not know that I have ever met anything which I should consider more grotesque than the conduct of Consul Parkes throughout these transactions."

Battle of Canton

British reinforcements assembled in Hong Kong in November 1857 in preparation for war against the Qing Empire under the direction of Lord Elgin, who had been appointed as the British High Commissioner and Plenipotentiary to China. The British acted in coordination with the French, who were also drawn into the Second Opium War over the death of Auguste Chapdelaine, a French missionary in China. Parkes, who was attached to Admiral Seymour's staff, was part of the group of Anglo-French representatives who delivered an ultimatum to the Qing officials on 12 December. When the ultimatum expired, the British and French bombarded Canton on 28 December and conquered the city by late December. Parkes hunted Ye Mingchen through the streets of Canton; George Wingrove Cooke reported that Parkes took special pleasure in humiliating Ye. "Ye was my game," said Parkes, and finally found what a report called "a very fat man contemplating the achievement of getting over the wall at the extreme rear" of the administrative office.

On 9 January 1858, Bogui (or Po-kuei) was nominally reinstated by the Qing government as the Governor-General of Canton, but the city was actually governed by a European commission of two Englishmen (one of whom was Parkes) and a French naval officer. Parkes was the leader of the trio because he was the only one among them who could speak Chinese. The commission established a court, administered a police force, and opened the port on 10 February. Even though the Treaty of Tientsin was signed on 26 June, the Qing authorities in Kwangtung province remained hostile towards Europeans in Canton throughout 1858. They even mobilised militias and placed a large bounty on Parkes's head. Parkes was made a Companion of the Order of the Bath (CB) by Queen Victoria on 6 December 1859.

Peking campaign

On 25 June 1859, with the British attack on the Taku Forts by the Hai River in Tientsin hostilities between the Anglo-French and Qing sides resumed. On 6 July, Parkes was requested to join Lord Elgin in the Gulf of Pechihli. He sailed on 21 July and was appointed as Lord Elgin's Chinese secretary alongside Thomas Francis Wade.

On 1 August 1860, as an attaché to General Sir James Grant, Parkes was sent to Pehtang, Tientsin to take possession of the evacuated fort and perform some reconnaissance during the advance to the Taku Forts. After the successful assault on the main north fort on 21 August, he assisted in the negotiations for the surrender of the remaining Chinese positions in the forts. Three days later, he arrived in Tientsin, where he arranged for provisions for the Anglo-French forces and had meetings with the Qing imperial commissioners. Upon learning that the imperial commissioners did not hold plenipotentiary powers from the Xianfeng Emperor as they initially believed, the British and French troops then advanced further towards Tungchow near the Qing capital, Peking.

Parkes and a delegation – whose members included Henry Loch (Lord Elgin's private secretary) and Thomas William Bowlby (a journalist for The Times) – travelled ahead of the Anglo-French army to negotiate with the Qing officials in Tungchow on 14 and 17 September. After some negotiations, they managed to secure an agreement that the Anglo-French army should move to a position about away from Tungchow. On 18 September, he left Tungchow to mark out the site of the proposed British encampment, but returned to remonstrate with the Qing officials when he saw a Qing military force assembling at the site. After receiving a hostile response, he and the delegation attempted to head back to the British headquarters, but were arrested by Qing soldiers under the command of the general Sengge Rinchen. Following his capture, Parkes was escorted to Peking along with Loch, Nal Singh (a Sikh sowar), and two French soldiers. In Peking, he and Loch were taken to the Ministry of Justice (or Board of Punishments), where they were incarcerated and tortured.

On 29 September, as ordered by Prince Gong (the Xianfeng Emperor's brother), Parkes and Loch were transferred out of the prison to more comfortable living quarters in a temple, where they were pressured to intervene in the negotiations between the Anglo-French and Qing sides. Parkes refused to make any pledges or address any representations to Lord Elgin. On 8 October, Parkes, Loch and six other members of the delegation were released from captivity – just shortly before the Qing government received an order from the Xianfeng Emperor, who was taking shelter in the Chengde Mountain Resort, for their executions. On 18 October, in retaliation for the torture and deaths of the other members of the delegation, Lord Elgin ordered the British and French troops to burn down the Qing Empire's Old Summer Palace in the northwest of Peking.

Post-Second Opium War events

Following the signing of the Convention of Peking on 18 October 1860, Parkes returned to his post in Canton in January 1861 and managed the cession of Kowloon, Hong Kong to the Crown. The Treaty of Tientsin had opened the three Chinese port cities of Chinkiang, Kiukiang and Hankow to foreign trade. Between February and April 1861, Parkes accompanied Vice-Admiral Sir James Hope on an expedition along the Yangtze River to set up consulates at the three cities and attempt to reach an agreement with the Taiping rebels at Nanking.

Parkes returned to Peking in April 1861 but left for Nanking again in June for further meetings with the Taiping rebel leaders. On 21 October, the British and French returned the control of Canton to the Qing government, thereby ending Parkes's duties as the British commissioner in Canton. Parkes travelled to Shanghai in November and met up with the Taiping rebels again in Ningpo in December. In January 1862, he returned to England, where stories about his brief captivity in China during the Second Opium War had made him famous. On 19 May 1862, Queen Victoria made him a Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath (KCB) for his services. Parkes left England in January 1864 and arrived on 3 March in Shanghai, where he assumed the position of consul which he was previously appointed to on 21 December 1858. He was elected President of the North China Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society in 1864, resuscitating the moribund society.

Career in Japan (1865–83)

In May 1865, during a trip to the Yangtze ports, Parkes received a notification for him to succeed Sir Rutherford Alcock as "Her Majesty's Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary and Consul-General in Japan". One of his tasks was to ensure the approval of the Imperial Court in Kyoto for the Anglo-Japanese Friendship Treaty of 1854 and the Anglo-Japanese Treaty of Amity and Commerce of 1858.

During this turbulent Bakumatsu period, Parkes pursued a policy of neutrality between the Tokugawa shogunate and the pro-Imperial forces, hoping for a peaceful resolution to the crisis. Due to his support for the reformers, he was marked and treated with bitter hostility by the reactionaries, who attempted to assassinate him on three separate occasions. The overthrow of the shogunate and the subsequent Boshin War caught him by surprise, but he continued the policy of British neutrality. On 22 May 1868 he presented his credentials to Emperor Meiji, thus making Great Britain the first foreign power to officially recognize the new Meiji government.

Throughout his 18 years in office, Parkes was instrumental in bringing a large number of British foreign advisors to train the Imperial Japanese Navy and to build modern infrastructure, such as lighthouses, a telegraph system and a railway between Tokyo and Yokohama.

He ran the British mission in a way that encouraged the junior members to research on, and study, Japan in greater depth. Ernest Satow and William George Aston benefited from this to become prolific scholars of Japanese studies.

While in Japan, Parkes's wife became known, in 1867, as the first non-Japanese woman to ascend Mount Fuji. She fell ill and died in London in November 1879 while making preparations for her family to come home. Although he was summoned urgently by telegraph, Parkes did not manage to reach London until four days after her death. He wrote to Frederick Victor Dickins, "She hoped to the last that I should have reached in time. I have now six children to take charge of, and feebly indeed shall I replace her in that charge, while the Legation will have lost that bright and good spirit to which it owed whatever attention it possessed."

Japanese paper report and collection

In 1869, Prime Minister William Gladstone requested a report on washi (Japanese paper) and papermaking from the British embassy in Japan. Parkes and his team of consular staff conducted a thorough investigation in different towns, and then published a government report, Reports on the manufacture of paper in Japan, and produced a collection of over 400 sheets of handmade paper. The main parts of this collection are housed in the Paper Conservation Laboratory of the Victoria and Albert Museum, and the Economic Botany Collection of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. In 1879, Kew sent duplicate samples to Glasgow, Sydney, Melbourne and Adelaide, but these have been lost. The Parkes paper collection is important because the origin, price, manufacturing method and function of each paper was precisely documented.

Career in Korea (1883–84)

Having represented the British in the negotiations leading to a treaty of "Friendship, Commerce and Navigation," signed in the Kyongbok Palace in Seoul on 26 November 1883, Parkes was appointed as the British Minister to Korea in 1884. The new treaty came into force in April 1884, when Parkes returned to Seoul to exchange ratifications.

Death

Parkes died of malarial fever on 21 March 1885 in Beijing (spelt "Peking" at the time). On 8 April 1890, the Duke of Connaught unveiled a statue of Parkes at the Bund in Shanghai, where it stood until it was removed during the Japanese occupation of Shanghai in the Second Sino-Japanese War. There is a memorial to him in St Paul's Cathedral.

Family

While in England, Parkes met Fanny Plumer, the granddaughter of Sir Thomas Plumer, the first Vice Chancellor of England, at the home of a mutual friend. "She was a beautiful girl," wrote a friend about her, "tall, well-proportioned, and graceful, her colouring rich and soft, her features expressing sensitiveness and the power of warm emotion; her dark brown eyes full of intelligence and speaking earnestness of purpose. She possessed in a large degree the power of fascination in which all her family were remarkable." After a six-week courtship, Parkes and Plumer were married on New Year's Day, 1856, in St Lawrence's Church, Whitchurch. The couple left England on 9 January.

Lady Fanny Parkes is noted for being the first non-Japanese woman, possibly the first woman, ever to scale Mount Fuji on 7 and 8 October 1867.

Parkes's elder daughter, Marion Parkes, married James Johnstone Keswick from the Keswick family, the controllers of Jardine Matheson Holdings. His second daughter, Mabel Desborough Parkes, married Captain Egerton Levett, a Flag Lieutenant in the Royal Navy. She died after falling from her horse in 1890.

Selected works

In a statistical overview derived from writings by and about Parkes, OCLC/WorldCat encompasses roughly 20 works in more than 30 publications in four languages and over 400 library holdings.

• Observations on Mr. P.P. Thoms' rendering of the Chinese word ... Man. (1852)

• File concerning Harry Parkes' mission to Bangkok in 1856 from the Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, London by Harry Parkes (1856)

• Papers, 1853–1872