He was mentioned in the official despatches, and received from the French Government the Cross of the Legion of Honour.

Five years later Gordon was fighting with the English and French armies in China.  Shortly after he was made commander of a force that was commissioned by the Emperor of China to put down a rebellion of the Taipings, of so dangerous a character that it threatened to overturn the monarchy.

Gordon had only about 3000 men, chiefly Chinese; and, notwithstanding the fact that when he took over the force it had just been demoralised by defeat, he soon proved himself more than a match for the rebel hordes.  From one victory to another he led his men on, and cities fell in quick succession before him.  His name ere long began to have the weight of an army in the mind of the rebels.  Major Gordon, in fact, had made a great mark in the Chinese Empire.

On the 30th April Gordon was before the city of Taitsan, where three months before the same army which was now under his command had been defeated.

Three times his men rushed into the breach which the big guns had made.  Twice they were hurled back; but for a third time Gordon urged them on, and their confidence in his leadership was such that they went readily; and this time, after a swift, sharp conflict, the city was won.

Europeans were fighting both with him and with the rebels.  In the breach at Taitsan he came across two of the men he formerly had under his command.  One was shot during the assault; the other cried out, “Mr. Gordon!  Mr. Gordon! you will not let me be killed”.  “Take him down to the river and shoot him,” said Gordon aloud.  Aside he whispered, “Put him in my boat, let the doctor attend him, and send him down to Shanghai”.  He was stern and resolute enough where it was necessary, but underneath all was a heart full of love and pity.

During this war the only weapon Gordon carried was a cane; and men grew to regard this stick as a kind of magic wand, and Gordon as a man whom nothing could harm.

On one occasion when he was wounded he refused to retire till he was forcibly carried off the field by the doctor’s orders.

After he had put an end to the rebellion the Emperor of China wanted to give him a large sum of money; but Gordon, whose only object in fighting was to benefit the people, refused it, and left China as poor as he had entered it.  He had various distinctions conferred upon him by the emperor, and the English people gave him the title of “Chinese Gordon”.

A gold medal was presented to him by the emperor.  Gordon, obliterating the inscription, sent it anonymously to the Coventry relief fund.  Of this incident he wrote at a later period:  “Never shall I forget what I got when I scored out the inscription on the gold medal.  How I have been repaid a millionfold!  There is now not one thing I value in the world.  Its honours, they are false; its knicknacks, they are perishable and useless; whilst I live I value God’s blessing—­health; and if you have that, as far as this world goes, you are rich.”