Table Of ContentFROM EMPEROR TO CITIZEN
The Autobiography of Aisin-Gioro Pu Yi
Translated by
W.J. F JENNER
FOREIGN LANGUAGES PRESS
BEIJING
First Edition 1989
Third Printing 1999
Originally published in two-volume edition
1965,1979
Home Page:
http ://www. flp. com. cn
E-mail Addresses:
[email protected]
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ISBN 0-8351-1159-8
ISBN 7-119-00772-6
© Foreign Languages Press, Beijing, China, 1965
Published by Foreign Languages Press
24 Baiwanzhuang Road, Beijing 100037, China
Distributed by China International Book Trading Corporation
35 Chegongzhuang Xilu, Beijing 100044, China
P.O. Box 399, Beijing, China
Printed in the People's Republic of China
Contents
CHAPTER ONE MY FAMILY 1
My Grandfather Prince Chun 3
My Maternal Grandfather Jung Lu 11
Tzu Hsi’s Decision 16
My Father’s Regency 19
A Prince’s Household 23
CHAPTER TWO CHILDHOOD 29
Accession and Abdication 31
Living as an Emperor 38
Mothers and Son 47
Studying in the Yu Ching Palace 53
Eunuchs 61
My Nurse 69
CHAPTER THREE FROM THE FORBIDDEN CITY TO
THE JAPANESE LEGATION 75
The Yuan Shih-kai Period 77
The Restoration of 1917 85
The Chieftains of the Peiyang Clique 95
Undying Hope 101
Reginald Johnston 108
My Wedding 116
Internal Clashes 122
The Dispersal of the Eunuchs 132
Reorganizing the Household Department 137
The Last Days in the Forbidden City 143
In the Northern Mansion 149
Decision at the Crossroads 155
From Legation Quarter to Concession 162
CHAPTER FOUR TIENTSIN 171
The Efforts of Lo Chen-yu 173
My Relations with the Commanders of the Fengtien Clique 179
Semionov and the “Second Chukeh Liang” 188
The Affair of the Eastern Mausolea 194
Consulate, Garrison and Black Dragon Society 198
Life in the Temporary Palace 207
CHAPTER FIVE TO THE NORTHEAST 215
The Unquiet Quiet Garden 217
Differences Among the Japanese 222.
Meeting Doihara 225
The Secret Crossing of the Pai River 230
Isolated 233
Disappointment 240
Meeting Itagaki 244
CHAPTER SIX FOURTEEN YEARS OF
“MANCHUKUO” 251
The Puppet Play Begins 253
Majesty Without Power 257
The Signing of the Secret Treaty and After 262
The Report of the League of Nations Commission of Enquiry 266
“Emperor” for the Third Time 273
The End of Illusion 283
Yoshioka Yasunori 292
“Imperial Rescripts” 295
Home Life 303
The Collapse 312
CHAPTER SEVEN IN THE SOVIET UNION 321
Fear and Illusion 323
Still Giving Myself Airs 325
I Refuse to Admit My Guilt 327
CHAPTER EIGHT FROM FEAR TO RECOGNIZING MY
GUILT 331
I Expect to Die 333
Arriving in Fushun 339
Separated from My Family 343
Move to Harbin 349
Writing My Autobiography and Presenting My Seals 354
Changes in My Household 359
Confession and Leniency 365
Making Boxes 371
The Investigators Arrive 378
The Sufferings and Hatred of the People of the Northeast 383
‘You Can Never Escape the Consequences of Your Sins” 388
CHAPTER NINE I ACCEPT REMOULDING 395
How Shall I Be a Man? 397
It Is Up to Me 403
Why So Magnanimous? 408
The Changes Explain Everything 416
Meeting Relations 421
The Japanese War Criminals 431
“The World’s Glory” 437
Another Visit 444
Labour and Optimism 453
The Test 458
Special Pardon 466
A New Chapter 472
INDEX 485
CHAPTER ONE
MY FAMILY
My Grandfather Prince Chun
I was bom in Peking in the mansion of Prince Chun on February
7,1906. My grandfather Yi Huan, the seventh son of Emperor Tao
Kuang (reigned 1821-50), was the first Prince Chun. Although my
father was only his fifth son he inherited the title as the eldest, third
and fourth sons died in childhood and the second son was taken into
the palace to become the emperor Kuang Hsu (reigned 1875-1908).
I was the eldest son of the second Prince Chun. I was nearly three
when on November 13, 1908 the empress dowager Tzu Hsi suddenly
decided to make me the heir to the throne as she and the emperor
Kuang Hsu lay seriously ill. I became the adopted son of Emperor
Tung Chih (reigned 1862-74) and the ritual heir of his cousin Kuang
Hsu. Within two days of my entering the palace both Kuang Hsu
and the Empress Dowager were dead. On December 2 I ascended the
imperial throne as the tenth ruler of the Ching Dynasty* and the
last emperor of China. Before three years were out the 1911 Revo
lution against the Ching Dynasty broke out and I abdicated.
My earliest memories are of the time of my abdication, but to
make things clearer it would be best to start with my grandfather and
my family.
In that blackest of eras, the late Ching Dynasty, the family of
Prince Chun were for half a century the faithful servants of the
empress dowager Tzu Hsi, and my grandfather in particular devoted
his life to her service.
My grandfather was born in 1842 and died in 1890. Looking
through the records of the imperial family one can see that he received
few honours during the eleven-year reign of his brother. Emperor
*( 1644-1911 ), a dynasty set up by the Asin-Gioro clan of the Manchus, a people who
originated in the Northeast of China.
3
Hsien Feng (reigned 1851-61), but that in the six months or so after
Hsien Feng’s death, when Tzu Hsi had just been made Empress Dow
ager, he was suddenly loaded with titles and positions.
The obvious reason why a young man of twenty was able to attain
such eminence was that his wife’s sister had become an empress dow
ager; but it was not the only reason. I remember that when I was
young I heard an anecdote about how during a theatrical performance
at home an uncle of mine, then six years old, was so terrified by
one scene that he started to cry. My grandfather shouted at him in
front of everybody, “What disgraceful behaviour! When I was twenty
I captured Su Shun with my own hands, but if you go on like that
you’ll never be able to handle affairs of state.” The capture of Su
Shun had been the real beginning of his meteoric rise.
The Su Shun affair took place in 1861. The Second Opium War*
had ended with a series of humiliating treaties and the emperor Hsien
Feng lay mortally ill in his refuge in Jehol. He summoned to his
deathbed three Ministers of the presence and five Grand Councillors
who had accompanied him in his flight, and having made his six-
year-old son Tsai Chun heir to the throne, he appointed them as a
regency council. The next day Hsien Feng died, and in accordance
with his wishes the eight princes and high officials put Tsai Chun
on the throne with the reign title Chi Hsiang and took all power
into their own hands.
The most important of the eight regents were two princes and Su
Shun, an Assistant Grand Secretary and President of the Board of
Revenue who had earned the hatred of the Manchu nobility by pro
moting many officials of Han nationality and had a reputation for
ruthlessness. A more basic reason for Su Shun’s later disastrous fall
was that his group underestimated the strength of Prince Kung (Yi
Hsin), who had made the most of the unpleasant assignment of
negotiating peace after the Second Opium War: in concluding the
" From 1856 to 1860 Britain and France jointly carried on a war of aggression against
China. The Ching government was then devoting all its energy to suppressing the peasant
revolution of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom and adopted a policy of passive resistance
towards the foreign aggressors, with the result that China suffered a disastrous defeat.
