How Did Paul Philastre, French Minister of Hué (1876-79), See Vietnam

Abstract

French colonial expansion in the 19th century was characterized by the fact that a majority of metropolitan people did not pay any attention to the overseas activities while a small number of groups—missionnaries, merchants and navy officers—were devoted to developing the economic, political and military activities beyond the sea.French colonization depended in principle on the activities of navy officers. It is said that French Cochinchine, for example, was an “Admiral colony”. In this historical context, we should examine the structure of navy administrative system in order to understand better the nature of French colonization. We take Cochinchine as an example.Since 1875, depending on the treaty of Saigon of 1874, France opened the delegation at Hué, capital of Nguyen Dynasty of Vietnam. A navy officer was appointed chargé d'affaires of Hué under the direction of Governor General of Cochinchine. Administrative hierarchy in the Ministry of Marine and Colonies as follows: Minister of Marine and Colonies —Governor General of Cochinchine— chargé d'affaires of Hué. But in practice, chargé d'affaires had the informations on Vietnam more accurate and abundant than any other person. Therefore, the decision-making on Vietnamese politics relied mainly on the informations given by chargé d'affaires of Hué. In this sense, chargé d'affaires played a very important role to make decisions on Vietnam.Paul Philastre (1837-1902), a navy officer, was appointed chargé d'affaires of Hué in 1876. He worked very energetically in this post for three years, addressing many interesting reports to Governor General of Cochinchine.Philastre was famous for his erudition of Vietnamese and Chinese languages. He translated “Code Gia Long” into French and published it in 1874. He expressed his sympathy for Vietnamese civilization and was in, good terms with Vietnamese Mandarin. He observed prudently what happened in the Court of Hué. Even though he was disappointed with Emperor Tu Duc, he asserted that France should never do the military intervention in Vietnam. His sympathy, his good relationship and his antimilitary proposition caused strong reactions of interventionists against him. Finally he resigned office in July, 1879.His reports, conserved at the Archives Nationales, Depot de la Section d'Outre-Mer at Aix-en-Provence in France, contain lots of lucid observations and sociological analysis on the Vietnamese situations at that time. By utilizing them, we could make clear the political structure and socio-economical situation in the 1870's under the reign of Nguyen Dynasty in vietnam.