The population of Saigon has fluctuated with its changing fortunes. Towering tamarind trees lined the boulevards and palms graced the villas-now rain stained and moldy from years of neglect. There were hotels and villas for businessmen and administrators canals were filled in to make roads. Notre Dame Cathedral was completed in 1883, built upon the site of the former Citadel's arsenal. Public works like the post office and governor's palace were initiated. Using forced labor, the French built a new city of boulevards and buildings in what is now Central Saigon. Shortly thereafter, the French established the colony of Cochinchina, with Saigon as its capital. The bulk of the population was moved out to the country, leaving perhaps 25,000 residents. During counterattacks by the Vietnamese, the fort was destroyed. The French used explosives to breach the walls and capture Saigon.
In 1859 a French force of eight battleships and 2,000 troops started up Saigon River. The emperor and his successors blamed French missionaries for peasant uprisings, and when French and Vietnamese priests were executed, the French used this as an excuse to invade the country. A fort about a quarter of its size was constructed in its place. In 1835 a peasant revolt at Gia Dinh was put down by Emperor Minh Mang, who razed the Citadel. When Nguyen Anh proclaimed himself Emperor Gia Long and moved the court to Hue, the trappings of royalty were transported north, with Saigon serving as a base for governing the southern third of the country.īy 1800 Saigon had a population of 50,000. The octagonal Citadel was based on a French military design at its center lay the Royal Palace. In 1790 Nguyen Anh conscripted a force of 30,000 laborers and set about building a large Citadel in Gia Dinh, in the area between what is now the zoological gardens and Reunification Hall. In 1788 Nguyen Anh, with the help of the French Jesuit missionary Behaine and an army of French mercenaries, recaptured Gia Dinh. In the 17th century, factions of the Nguyen clan were crushed by a peasant revolt led by the Tay Son brothers, who captured Gia Dinh. Gia Dinh, a small fort housing the area governor and his administrators, was built. The settlement became the administrative center of the region, a trade base and tax-collecting center. Saigon continued to grow as Vietnamese settlers arrived from the north, spreading out along the delta waterways and clearing forest. Eventually, the Khmers were pushed back to the Mekong Delta.
A few years later the Chinese started a market at Cholon. Fully in control by 1680, the Vietnamese allowed 3,000 refugee Chinese Ming soldiers to settle the area of Bien Hoa. In the early 17th century, on the condition they be allowed to settle the south, the Vietnamese agreed to help the Khmers fight the Thais. Slowly it grew into a small market town as forest was cleared and rice paddies were carved out, it became an outpost on the eastern flank of the Angkorian Empire.Īs the Khmer and Cham Empires shrank, the Vietnamese advanced from the north. The Cambodians hunted in this area, then called Prei Nokor. In the 15th century Saigon was little more than swampland in a forest wilderness, an area under the Khmer sphere of influence. Little is known of Saigon's early history, and the origins of the city's name are uncertain.
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