The United States expedition to Korea, also known as the Korean Expedition, was an American punitive expedition against Korea which occurred in 1871.
In August 1866, the American armed merchant ship SS General Sherman attempted to open up trade with the isolationist Joseon dynasty of Korea while on a return voyage from Qing China, sailing up the Taedong River and being warned against illegally trading with Korea. As the French were concurrently launching a punitive expedition against Joseon due to its murder of Catholic priests, the Korean regent Heungseon Daewongun mistook the General Sherman for a French Navy warship and ordered the governor Bak Gyusu to inform the crew that they would be killed if they did not leave. The Americans ran aground not long after, and, when one of their foraging dinghies was intercepted by a Korean boat, the American sailors took the crew of the Korean junk hostage and demanded rice, gold, silver, and ginseng in exchange for their release. A group of Korean onlookers launched a rescue mission and attacked the American ship, which returned fire on the Koreans and killed seven of them. The Koreans responded by attacking the General Sherman with fire ships, forcing the American crew to abandon ship; they were promptly massacred by the Koreans. The Korean government never informed the United States of the incident, partly out of fear of a retaliatory expedition, and partly because the Koreans mistook the foreigners for Frenchmen.
In 1871, the US State Department dispatched Ambassador to China Frederick Low with the US Navy's Asiatic Squadron to investigate the disappearance of the General Sherman and open up Korea to foreign trade. The frigate USS Colorado, the sloops USS Alaska and USS Benicia, and the gunboats USS Monocacy and USS Palos set out from the Japanese port of Nagasaki on 16 May 1871, arriving at Incheon a week later before anchoring at Ganghwa Island on 28 May. From 30 to 31 May 1871, the expedition made contact with Korean officials, who refused to negotiate a trade treaty. On 1 June, the expedition was ambushed by Korean troops as it sailed up the Han River, as the Korean forts on the Selee River were ordered to prevent any foreign ships from coming within range of the capital of Hanseong (Seoul). The Americans repulsed the ambushing forces, and, after the Koreans refused to issue an apology for the incident and the Americans discovered the fate of the SS General Sherman, the American expedition attacked and occupied the Korean forts on Ganghwa Island, with their superior firepower overwhelming the inadequately-armed defenders. However, the Koreans refused to hold further negotiations with any American emissaries, and, after failing to leverage their hostages and receiving news of large and better equipped Korean reinforcements, Low chose to withdraw his numerically-inferior force. Korea's isolation would ultimately be ended by Japan in 1876, and it was not until 1882 that Korea agreed to trade with the United States.
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