Great Taiping Administrator: Hakka Hong Rengan

["Dixie" <Dixie@singnet.com.sg>]

Hung Jen-kan, 

Pinyin HONG RENGAN, Wade-Giles romanization HUNG-JIN (b. Feb. 18/20, 1822,
Hua-hsien, Kwangtung province, China--d. Nov. 23, 1864, Nan-ch'ang, Kiangsi
province), leader of the Taiping Rebellion, the great uprising that
occupied South China between 1850 and 1864; he tried to reorganize the
Taiping movement by introducing Western ideas of government and religion. 

Hung Jen-kan was a cousin and neighbour of Hung Hsiu-ch'|an, the supreme
Taiping leader, who began the rebellion after a series of visions in which
he saw himself as the younger son of God sent to save China. When the
rebellion broke out, Jen-kan fled to the British settlement of Hong Kong,
where he was baptized and educated by a Protestant missionary. In 1859 he
finally made his way to the Taiping camp with the intention of teaching the
Taipings the correct version of Protestant Christianity and helping them
improve their relations with the Western countries. 

Soon after his arrival at the Taiping camp, Jen-kan was elevated to prime
minister of the Taiping state. In that position he tried to introduce his
program, which included railroad construction, telegraph facilities, modern
banks and hospitals, and reform of the administration along Western
democratic lines. His suggestions aroused the jealousy of many of the older
Taiping leaders, however, and they refused to cooperate. Moreover, the
Western countries, having forced the Chinese government to grant their
trade concession to them in the "Arrow" War (1856-60), threw their support
to the dynasty in the suppression of the rebels. Jen-kan's policies
therefore failed, and he was demoted. After the fall of the Taiping capital
in 1864, he was captured and executed by government troops.