Geographically, Saigon was situated just to the north of the great delta of the Mekong River. It was defined by three bodies of water. On the north was Thi Nghe Creek and on the south was Ben Nghe Creek (usually called the Arroyo Chinois); both streams flowed into the Saigon River, which bounded the town on the east. Both Thi Nghe Creek and the Arroyo Chinois were navigable by small vessels, including French gunboats.

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Saigon had a population of only about 2,000 and existed to provide goods and services to the garrison of the town and the river forts downstream. It had only two streets: One along the river was lined with a few shops and primitive houses; the other stretched along the Arroyo Chinois, where stood the more substantial warehouses and the tile-roofed residences of prosperous Chinese merchants. Inland were isolated farms and orchards.

The region’s principal commercial center was located some five kilometers up the Arroyo Chinois. Then known as Ta-ngon, or Ti-ngan (and today called Cholon — the Great Market), this trading entrepot had been founded by refugees from China’s deposed Ming Dynasty. For more than half a century, Cholon, linked to the Cochinchina hinterland by an extensive network of canals and natural waterways, had attracted the surplus rice and other produce of the region. It was the most important commercial center in the south.

On February 16, de Genouilly’s ships took station opposite the Gia Dinh Citadel. This large earth-and-masonry fort, the most important in Cochinchina, was located about 800 meters from the Saigon River (just to the southwest of what is now the National Zoo) and on the south side of Thi Nghe Creek. It occupied an area of about 2.5 acres and contained barracks, warehouses, government buildings and the homes of a number of government officials, including Gia Dinh’s senior mandarin, Vu Duy Ninh.

What transpired was brief and decisive. There was an exchange of fire between de Genouilly’s ships and the cannon at the citadel. When Vietnamese fire began to slacken, French and Spanish troops went ashore. Under the cover of continued shelling from naval guns and of small-arms fire from riflemen stationed in the ships’ topmasts, two companies of marine infantry and naval landing parties, all under the command of General Charles-Gabriel-Felicité Martin des Pallires, formed up in column and attacked the citadel’s northeast wall. Des Pallires was supported by a group of engineers and a troop of Spanish light cavalry from the Philippines. By 1000 hours, they had scaled the walls of the citadel and put the Vietnamese defenders to flight. Mandarin Vu committed suicide.

Before de Genouilly could take advantage of his victory, he received word that his forces in Tourane were in desperate straits. The admiral left a garrison of about 1,000 men at Saigon and sailed north again. What he found was discouraging. The French and Spanish troops were dying from disease at a rate of about 100 per month. Any hope of reinforcements was dashed when word reached the French fleet that Napoleon III had declared war on Austria in May 1859. Disgusted by the lack of support, de Genouilly asked to be relieved of command in October. In March 1860, the French finally abandoned Tourane and sailed north to join the British, who had resumed the West’s war with China.

The thousand-man French garrison left at Saigon was strong enough to defend what the French had thus far gained, including the Chinese commercial center of Cholon. Without reinforcements, however, they were unable to capitalize on their position and expand into the hinterland of Cochinchina. Vietnamese forces to the west of the town steadily pushed trench works toward the French lines and conducted increasingly costly raids. In one celebrated engagement at Khai Tuong Pagoda on December 7, 1860, the Vietnamese inflicted heavy casualties on the French and killed the co-commander of the French troops at Saigon.

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