French conquest of Vietnam

The nineteenth-century military and political expansion by which France defeated Vietnamese resistance and established colonial rule over Vietnam, completed in 1885.

Siege of Tourane: The 1858–1860 Franco-Spanish attack on the Vietnamese port of Tourane, now Da Nang. This failed opening assault began the conquest but redirected French forces toward southern Vietnam.
Nguyễn dynasty: Vietnam’s last ruling dynasty, which governed from 1802 until the monarchy ended in 1945. Its court confronted French pressure and lost sovereignty during the conquest.
Napoleon III: Emperor of the French from 1852 to 1870, whose government launched the invasion of Vietnam. His government authorized the expedition that opened the conquest.
Cần Vương movement: An 1885–1896 Vietnamese royalist movement that called on officials and people to defend the emperor against France. It sustained armed resistance after the French imposed protectorate rule.
French Cochinchina: The French colony in southern Vietnam established through annexations between 1862 and 1867. It was the first durable territorial result of the conquest.
Capture of Saigon: The French capture of Saigon in 1859 during their campaign against the Nguyễn dynasty. Seizing Saigon gave France a strategic foothold for conquering Cochinchina.
Minh Mạng: The Nguyễn emperor who ruled Vietnam from 1820 to 1841 and strengthened centralized rule while restricting Christianity. His religious policies became part of the justification France later invoked for intervention.
Francis Garnier: A French naval officer and explorer who seized Hanoi in 1873 during an unauthorized Tonkin expedition. His raid intensified French intervention in northern Vietnam.
Black Flag Army: A Chinese-led military force in northern Vietnam that fought French troops during the Tonkin campaign. Its battlefield resistance complicated France’s effort to dominate the north.
French protectorate of Annam: The French protectorate over central Vietnam, established through treaties in 1883 and 1884. It preserved the Nguyễn court while transferring effective authority to France.

Linked from 10 pages