Maurice Joostens

Background

Maurice Joostens came from one of Antwerp’s wealthiest and most influential families. Legend traces their fortune to a mistake by Mathias Joostens during the Napoleonic era: he added an extra zero to an order and bought 5,000 bales of coffee instead of 500. Thanks to inflation under the Continental Blockade, this turned a modest merchant into a rich man. The story inspired Hendrik Conscience to write the novel Eene 0 te veel.

The family rose through Antwerp’s bourgeoisie, and Maurice’s grandfather, Constantin Joostens, became a Liberal Party senator. Beyond family money and connections, Joostens had other advantages for diplomacy. In 1882 he traveled to Egypt with his influential uncle Arthur Van Den Nest and wrote an orientalist report, Du Caire au Tropique, showing his fascination with foreign lands. He studied at the University of Paris, the University of Leuven, and the Université libre de Bruxelles, earning a degree in arts. Before entering diplomacy, he briefly worked in Antwerp banking at the Handelsbank, following his father’s path.

Diplomatic career

On 7 December 1885, Joostens filed his request at the Belgian ministry for foreign affairs to become a so-called attaché de légation and this was the start of his diplomatic career. First, he was, from April 1886 until January 1889, the second-class secretary at the legation in Madrid, then headed by Edouard Anspach, the brother of Jules Anspach. In 1889, Joostens made promotion to the legation in Cairo, where he served the Belgian imperial interests of, for example, Édouard Empain and the Tramways d'Alexandrie.

Shortly after his displacement to Egypt, Joostens was again promoted. This time he became first-class secretary in the highly ranked legation in London. There he could further develop his diplomatic skills both on the European and the imperial diplomatic theatre. As a result of an internal reorganisation in the Belgian diplomatic corps, Joostens was able to further develop his career.

The new minister for foreign affairs Paul de Favereau promoted him in 1896 to Washington D.C. where he would be the new conseiller de la légation or advisor of the legation. Under the auspices of Gontran de Lichtervelde Joostens showed remarkable diplomatic skill. In 1898 the then prince Albert of Belgium made a visit to the United States together with his physician L. Melis and Harry Jungbluth. For this occasion Joostens was named the diplomatic attaché to this group.

This was because of the commercial and imperialist agenda of this voyage, not only was Albert's visit a way for the future king to learn the country better, his uncle Leopold II of Belgium saw in this trip a great opportunity to tighten the Belgian-American relations on the imperialistic scene. By order of Leopold II, Joostens used the allure of the royal visit to attract investors for a Belgian-American cooperation to build the Beijing–Hankou Railway.

It was in this context that Joostens had several contacts with the American senator Calvin S. Brice who to Joosten's regret died during the American-Belgian negotiations. Although he didn't succeed to forge a cooperation between the American China Development Company and the Belgian investments backed by Leopold II, Joostens was able to show his feel for the diplomatic game in this episode and obtain the appreciation of the king. Next to the royal visit of prince Albert and the Beijing-Hankou Railway, the remarkable plan to make the Philippines a Belgian protectorate after the Spanish–American War was a third case in which Joostens was active.

Boxer Rebellion and the Siege of the International Legations

Shortly after Joostens' arrival in Beijing, the Boxer Rebellion, of which the first features showed in the winter of 1899, would reach its peak. This rebellion had anti-foreign, anti-Christian and mystical features and had among other things its origins in a crop failure in 1899, decades of frustrations about the Western presence in China and the chaos and internal struggles at the Chinese court following the failed Hundred Days' Reform. The wrath of the rebels was first aimed at Chinese Christians but later faced towards the foreign presence in China.

Since the Belgians were not unlike the other foreign investments deemed unwanted elements in the Chinese society, the Beijing-Hankou Railway was also attacked and several Belgian engineers, missionaries and officials were killed. During the first quarrels in the streets of the Legation Quarters Joostens was accused of having killed several rebels, but since the Austro-Hungarian government offered to protect the Belgian legation, it is more likely that these soldiers have fired these shots.

After the assassination of the German envoy Klemens von Ketteler near the Belgian legation and the refusal of the foreign diplomats to leave the Legation Quarter after Empress Dowager Cixi ordered them to do so, the rebellion reached a turning point. From now on, the Chinese Empire was at war with the foreign countries, and in this context, Joostens had to defend from 13 June until 16 June 1900, together with the other Belgians and the Austro-Hungarian marines, the Belgian legation.

Despite their efforts, they were not able to repel the rebels and had to retreat to first the French and later the British legation. In the meantime, the Belgian legation, which was located in an isolated corner in the Legation Quarter, was plundered and set on fire. On 20 June 1901, the rebels sieged, in collaboration with Imperial Chinese Army, the Legation Quarter and with this act the so-called Siege of the International Legations was put in place.

Shortly after the rebels sieged the Legation Quarter, the foreign powers gathered their forces and formed the Eight-Nation Alliance to crush the rebellion manu militari. Leopold II had also been very keen to participate and even privately funded a Belgian Expeditionary Corps but Kaiser Wilhelm II strongly opposed this idea and the king had to give up this plan.

Conference of Peking

When Beijing (Peking) was relieved on 14 August 1901 by the Eight-Nation Alliance, the Boxer Rebellion came to an end, but this meant by no means the end of the negotiations. Joostens, fourth from the left in a photograph of the signing, was present at the signing of the Boxer Protocol on 7 September 1901.