Qualla: Siege of Saigon https://qualla.com/siege-of-saigon en-us © 2026 Bendyline Mon, 20 Jul 2026 10:21:36 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/w/3/g/v/siege-of-saigon-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Siege of Saigon https://qualla.com/siege-of-saigon Siege of Saigon: Introduction https://qualla.com/siege-of-saigon/ Photo credit Antoine Léon Morel-Fatio, Public domain. For eleven months, roughly 1,000 French and Spanish soldiers held a single repaired fort against a Vietnamese army ten times their size, waiting for reinforcements that wars on three continents kept diverting elsewhere. The siege of Saigon, which dragged from March 1860 to February 1861, was not the kind of siege that produces heroic paintings. It was a siege of exhaustion and miscalculation -- a colonial expedition that had bitten off a city it could not chew, then found itself unable to either advance or retreat while France fought in Italy, then in China, before finally sending ships to finish what it had started in Cochinchina.

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Image: Antoine Léon Morel-Fatio | Public domain

]]> Thu, 26 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/w/3/g/v/siege-of-saigon-wp/w3gv-siege-of-saigon-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Siege of Saigon: A War Born from Missionary Grievance https://qualla.com/siege-of-saigon/ Photo credit Pierre Louis Pierson, Public domain. The chain of events that led to the siege began in 1858, when Admiral Charles Rigault de Genouilly attacked Vietnam on orders from Napoleon III. The stated mission was to stop the persecution of Catholic missionaries and guarantee the free propagation of the faith. Rigault de Gen...

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Image: Pierre Louis Pierson | Public domain

]]> Thu, 26 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/w/3/g/v/siege-of-saigon-wp/w3gv-siege-of-saigon-a-war-born-from-missionary-grievance.mp3 0:06 2 full Siege of Saigon: Five Days Upriver https://qualla.com/siege-of-saigon/ Photo credit Unknown author, Public domain. In January 1859, Rigault de Genouilly proposed striking Saigon instead -- a city of strategic importance as the key food-producing area for the Vietnamese army. On 2 February, he sailed south with corvettes, gunboats, a Spanish dispatch vessel, and transports. After pausing five ...

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]]> Thu, 26 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/w/3/g/v/siege-of-saigon-wp/w3gv-siege-of-saigon-five-days-upriver.mp3 0:06 3 full Siege of Saigon: A Victory Too Big to Hold https://qualla.com/siege-of-saigon/ Photo credit Antoine Léon Morel-Fatio, Public domain. The citadel was enormous, and the allied force far too small to defend it. Rigault de Genouilly's solution was ruthless: he had thirty-two mines prepared and on 8 March 1859 blew the citadel to rubble. The rice magazines were set alight and burned for months. Then Rigault de Geno...

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Image: Antoine Léon Morel-Fatio | Public domain

]]> Thu, 26 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/w/3/g/v/siege-of-saigon-wp/w3gv-siege-of-saigon-a-victory-too-big-to-hold.mp3 0:06 4 full Siege of Saigon: Wars on Three Continents https://qualla.com/siege-of-saigon/ Photo credit Antoine Léon Morel-Fatio, Public domain. What followed was a slow-motion crisis driven by events thousands of miles from Saigon. The Austro-Sardinian War broke out in 1859, tying down French troops in Italy. Rigault de Genouilly, criticized for his failures, was replaced by Admiral Francois Page, who was told to negotia...

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Image: Antoine Léon Morel-Fatio | Public domain

]]> Thu, 26 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/w/3/g/v/siege-of-saigon-wp/w3gv-siege-of-saigon-wars-on-three-continents.mp3 0:06 5 full Siege of Saigon: Seventy Ships and the Battle of Ky Hoa https://qualla.com/siege-of-saigon/ Photo credit Antoine Léon Morel-Fatio, Public domain. The siege broke because of a battle fought in China, not Vietnam. The Anglo-French victory at the Battle of Palikao on 21 September 1860 ended the war with China and freed the forces France needed. Admiral Charner arrived off Saigon with 70 ships -- the most powerful French naval...

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]]> Thu, 26 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/w/3/g/v/siege-of-saigon-wp/w3gv-siege-of-saigon-seventy-ships-and-the-battle-of-ky-hoa.mp3 0:06 6 full