Peeping in Joseon Korea: Voyeurism, diplomats and scandals (Part 2)

A Korean nobleman rides a palanquin in the late 19th century. Robert Neff Collection

By Robert Neff

• Published Feb 8, 2026 7:00 AM KST

On June 6, 1889, while out on an errand, Kim Chang-yo, the head Korean servant at the French Legation, committed the heinous crime of voyeurism. According to the secretary of the American Legation, as Kim passed the residence of Soh Piang-so, a member of the Korean gentry, he looked over the wall and “beheld with profane eyes the ladies of the noble household, a crime than which there is none greater in the Corean calendar.”

Kim, “having been discovered in the act of his offending,” was scolded by one of Soh’s house servants. Rather than apologize for his brazen act, Kim cursed at the servant. The nobleman was beyond words and patience; he immediately ordered the voyeur seized and soundly beaten.

When Victor Collin de Plancy, the French commissaire, learned of the incident, he was furious. The cause of his ire was not his servant’s illicit peeping, but rather Soh’s audacity in punishing a member of the legation’s staff without his permission. Plancy immediately dispatched his Korean guards to the nobleman’s residence — not only to free Kim, but also to arrest Soh for his arrogance and bring him to the French Legation.

Plancy harangued Soh for violating the principle of extraterritoriality, which protected foreign diplomats, their families and their staff from prosecution and punishment by local authorities. He then released Soh — presumably as an act of mercy — to return home in embarrassment and shame.

However, the story does not end there.

When Hugh Dinsmore, the American minister to Korea, returned to Seoul from his short stay in Jemulpo (part of modern Incheon), he was not in a good mood. While he was away — possibly for an embarrassing medical procedure — his secretary, Charles Chaille-Long, tried to usurp his position, at least in Dinsmore’s eyes. Dinsmore then found himself embroiled in a diplomatic quandary centered around Plancy and his peeping Tom employee.

In a report to the State Department, Dinsmore explained that Plancy had proposed “a meeting of the diplomatic body to consider the question of inviolability of legation servants as persecuted in the demand by the Korean Government for the delivery for trial and punishment” of one of his servants.

Although the meeting was held at Dinsmore’s house, his description of the event was rather bland, overcautious and tinged with smugness.

By contrast, in a report to his own government, Walter Hillier, the British consul, provided details and expressed his opinion that Plancy had “caused an incident that was trifling in the beginning to assume important dimensions.”

It is through Hillier that we are provided with Plancy’s side of the story. He acknowledged that Kim — Plancy seemed compelled to note that the Korean was a Catholic — was employed as the head servant responsible for managing the legation’s Korean staff. The incident took place on “a plot of rising ground in the south of the city which overlooks the premises” of Soh’s residence. Although Kim was merely standing, not actively peering into the noble’s house, he was perceived by Soh’s servants as “committing a punishable offence by Corean law.”

The servants “abused him in strong language” and Kim replied in equally strong terms. Soh, hearing the commotion, came out and tongue-lashed the bewildered Kim, who retorted just as harshly. This is what sealed Kim’s fate.

As we shall see in the next article, what followed would embroil foreign ministers and Korean officials alike in a diplomatic tangle.

I would like to express my appreciation to Diane Nars for allowing me to use one of her images.