'Emptying the Lama Temple at Peking', 1900

Pen and ink over watercolour en grisaille by Johann Nepomuk Schonberg (1844-1913), 1900.

During the Boxer Rebellion of 1900 the foreign legations in Peking (Beijing) were besieged by nationalist rebels of the Society of Righteous and Harmonious Fists (or 'Boxers' as the Europeans came to call them), aided and abetted by Chinese Imperialist forces. A multinational force relieved the besieged European and Japanese forces, exacerbating the destruction caused by the rebels, by embarking on the systematic looting of the Imperial city.

Schonberg was an Austrian war correspondent and artist. He served in the Austrian Army in the 1860s. He supplied sketches to the 'Illustrated London News', eventually relocating to England. As well as the 3rd China War (Boxer Rebellion), Schonberg covered many other conflicts, including the American Civil War (1861-1865), the Franco-Prussian War (1870-1871), the Russo-Turkish War (1877-1878) and the Boer War (1899-1902).