Tongmenghui (1905): Sun Yat-sen's Revolutionary Alliance

The Tongmenghui, or Chinese Revolutionary Alliance, was a secret society founded in Tokyo on 20 August 1905 to overthrow the Qing dynasty and make China a republic. Led by Sun Yat-sen, it united several rival anti-Manchu groups, gave the revolutionary movement a programme and a newspaper, and organised a string of uprisings. Its members played leading roles in the Xinhai Revolution of 1911.

Background: students and exiles in Tokyo

After China’s defeat in the First Sino-Japanese War and the disaster of the Boxer Rebellion, many educated Chinese concluded that the Qing state could not defend the country. Thousands of young Chinese went to study in Japan, which had modernised rapidly and had just defeated Russia in 1904-1905. Tokyo became the main centre of Chinese radical politics.

Several revolutionary groups competed there. Sun Yat-sen had founded the Revive China Society (Xingzhonghui) in Honolulu in 1894 and had led a failed uprising in Guangzhou in 1895, after which he lived largely in exile. Huang Xing and Song Jiaoren led the China Revival Society (Huaxinghui) from Hunan, and Cai Yuanpei, Zhang Binglin and Tao Chengzhang were prominent in the Restoration Society (Guangfuhui) of Zhejiang and Jiangsu.

Founding of the alliance

With help from Japanese sympathisers, the leaders met in Tokyo in the summer of 1905. A preparatory meeting was held on 30 July, and the Tongmenghui was formally founded on 20 August 1905. Sun Yat-sen was elected its director (zongli), and Huang Xing became his chief partner in practical matters.

Members swore an oath to “expel the Tartar barbarians, restore China, establish a republic and equalise land rights”. In November 1905 the alliance launched its journal, Minbao (“The People’s Journal”), whose first issue carried Sun’s statement of the Three Principles of the People: nationalism, democracy and the people’s livelihood. Minbao fought fierce debates in print with constitutional monarchists such as Liang Qichao.

Most early members were students from almost every province of China. Branches were later set up in Southeast Asia, Hawaii and the Americas, where overseas Chinese communities provided much of the funding. The Singapore branch, founded in 1906, became an important base for the movement in Southeast Asia.

A decade of failed uprisings

The alliance’s strategy relied on armed risings, often in southern provinces near the coast or the borders of French Indochina, using secret societies, local militias and soldiers of the New Army, the Qing’s modernised forces. Between 1906 and 1911 it backed or launched about ten attempts, among them risings at Pingxiang and Liuyang (1906), Huanggang, Zhennanguan (1907) and Hekou (1908). All failed.

In 1910 Wang Jingwei tried to assassinate the prince regent in Beijing and was arrested. On 27 April 1911 Huang Xing led an attack on the viceroy’s office in Guangzhou; it was crushed, and the remains of 72 of the dead revolutionaries were buried at Huanghuagang, the “Yellow Flower Mound”, which became a national memorial.

The Japanese government expelled Sun Yat-sen in 1907 at Qing request, and the alliance suffered from quarrels over money, strategy and leadership. Some members, frustrated with Sun, formed separate groups, such as the Progressive Association (Gongjinhui), which worked within the New Army in central China.

From alliance to party

When soldiers in Wuchang rose on 10 October 1911, the uprising was organised largely by local groups influenced by the alliance rather than by its leadership. Sun was in the United States at the time. Yet the Tongmenghui’s network, ideas and leaders were central to the revolution that followed: Huang Xing commanded the defence of Hanyang, and Sun was elected provisional president of the Republic of China in December 1911.

In August 1912 Song Jiaoren merged the Tongmenghui with several smaller groups to form the Kuomintang (Nationalist Party), which won the 1913 parliamentary elections.

Key people

Sun Yat-sen (1866-1925), a Western-trained doctor from Guangdong, was the alliance’s leader, fundraiser and chief theorist, travelling constantly among overseas Chinese communities. Huang Xing (1874-1916) from Hunan was its main military organiser and led several of its uprisings in person. Song Jiaoren (1882-1913) was its leading advocate of parliamentary government; he was assassinated in Shanghai in March 1913 after the Kuomintang’s election victory.

Wang Jingwei, a gifted writer for Minbao, became famous for his failed attempt on the regent’s life; decades later he headed a Japanese-sponsored government during the Second World War. The classical scholar Zhang Binglin edited Minbao from 1906 to 1908 and gave anti-Manchu nationalism much of its intellectual force.

Timeline

• 1894, November: Sun Yat-sen founds the Revive China Society in Honolulu.
• 1905, 20 August: The Tongmenghui is founded in Tokyo with Sun as director.
• 1905, November: The first issue of Minbao sets out the Three Principles of the People.
• 1906, December: The Pingxiang-Liuyang-Liling uprising fails.
• 1907, March: Sun Yat-sen leaves Japan under pressure from the Japanese government.
• 1911, 27 April: The Guangzhou uprising led by Huang Xing is crushed.
• 1911, 10 October: The Wuchang Uprising starts the Xinhai Revolution.
• 1912, 25 August: The Tongmenghui becomes part of the new Kuomintang.

Why it matters

The Tongmenghui turned scattered anti-Qing groups into a national movement with a clear republican goal. Its failed uprisings kept revolution in the public eye, and its leaders and ideas shaped both the Republic of China and the Kuomintang for decades.