The Soul of the Han Dynasty in the Late Ming Dynasty

Chapter 708

No one is a fool, among the more than [-] people arrested by Jin Yiwei, hundreds of them are shopkeepers and accountants of Shanxi merchants living in Gyeonggi, and some of them have just given year-end tribute to many civil servants and generals.

It didn't take long for General Zhenglu's actions in Shanxi to become known to the world. That was because Li Ruolian told Emperor Chengzuo the reason for arresting many Shanxi merchants in Gyeonggi, and also sent many confessions of Shanxi merchants collaborating with the enemy. .

Among the civil and military officials and nobles, many officials who have ties to Shanxi merchants or are the spokespersons of Shanxi merchants were furious. Cutting people's money is like killing their parents. We are at odds with Huang Han.

In the afternoon of the same day, hundreds of ministers impeached the General Zhenglu and fabricated charges to persecute merchants for money and murder, which made Shanxi no peace.

Early in the morning on the 28th of the twelfth lunar month, hundreds of civil servants and military generals gathered outside the Forbidden City knelt down to ask the emperor to uphold justice and return Shanxi to the world of peace.

Emperor Chongzhen had just received several 10 taels of silver bills from Li Ruolian, and before he had time to be happy, he learned that General Zhenglu’s move had stabbed a hornet’s nest. Nearly half of his courtiers were impatient, and gathered hundreds of people to kneel outside the Forbidden City to protest. Demand severe punishment for the general who conquered the captives.

From this, it can be seen that Huang Han's attack on Shanxi merchants made the sky angry and people resentful!Chongzhen was happy to see this, but the ministers asked him to issue an order to punish Huang Han severely, but he ignored it at all.

It is true that Huang Han, the power minister, will be a confidant of Ming Dynasty in the future, and Jin merchants and ministers who complain for Jin merchants are not good things.

Chongzhen's IQ was more than eight years old, and he could still tell the difference between good and bad. Cao Huachun, Wang Chengen, and Li Ruolian were sent to persuade those ministers to stop making trouble and go home early to prepare for the New Year.

These ministers were very stubborn, completely ignored the advice of Cao Huachun and the others, and threatened that the general who conquered the captives had no law and wanted to arrest businessmen for personal gain and set charges.

Its purpose is to confiscate the property of those businessmen. If such powerful ministers are not involved, the country will not have peace for the people.

These ministers who had their actual interests violated really put on a desperate posture, and they persisted until noon the next day and refused to disperse.

Chongzhen was furious and had nothing to do. The law does not punish the public. There are hundreds of people there, and these people are not unreasonable at all.

Huang Han did go too far, his food looks too ugly, it is said that there are hundreds of Shanxi merchants whose homes were ransacked, and what is even more disgusting is that all the families of these ransacked families disappeared, no one was alive or dead.

Many ministers thought that Huang Han killed for money, and maybe he had wiped out all these merchants. How can he explain the disappearance of thousands of Shanxi merchants and their families for no reason?

Hundreds of officials spoke fiercely, and the general who conquered the captives had the "Red Banner Army" that defeated tens of thousands of slaves and fled the Tartars. Who has the ability to resist when such troops are dispatched to loot houses and houses?

If the imperial court does not stand up for the people who died in vain, there will be no kingly law in the Ming Dynasty in the future, and the consequences will be disastrous.

At this time, General Zhenglu sent many meritorious officers and soldiers back to the capital to meet the emperor to accept the reward. The leaders were Zhang Fengyi, Liang Tingdong, the chief eunuch of the frontier, Zheng Zhihui, Fang Jingcheng and so on.

The "Red Banner Army" who came to the capital was not many, and there were dozens of generals leading 1000 cavalry.

Without exception, these soldiers possessed two or more decapitation skills. In addition, the two thousand general guards pushed more than a thousand wheelbarrows.

The emperor was eager to know what was going on in Shanxi, and immediately summoned Zhang Fengyi and others on the platform. All the cabinet ministers were present, and the six ministers also came one after another.

Dozens of generals from the "Red Banner Army" who received the award came, and basically none of them were battalion commanders, except for Fang Liandong, who had just won the Honorary Honor of the Prince Taibao.

While waiting for the emperor to summon him, he took dozens of young generals to talk to the ministers who complained about the grievances of the Shanxi merchants. After learning the name and position of an adult, he looked through the records he carried with him.

Then he took out a few pieces of paper full of words and showed the indignant Beijing official, and whispered a few words, and then the adult covered his face and ran, and ran away without a trace.

In less than an hour, half of the people left, and it didn't take long for the other half to find family members or friends who came to take them home, and told them to be careful in their words and deeds, and they must not offend the general Zhenglu and cause trouble.

In the end, there were less than 30 people left at the scene of hundreds of people kneeling and begging. These people are all clean, they are the kind of hard-bodied ministers who are not very capable and have a big temper. .

The strong wind knows the strong grass, and the toughness knows the honest minister.These dozens of hard-core ministers are smelly and tough, and they think they are standing on the moral high ground.

They thought that they were devoted to the country and not to others, and found that most of the participants had retreated, and they became more motivated.

When he started to deal with Shanxi merchants and related civil servants and military generals, Huang Han realized that he would stab a hornet's nest, and he was fully prepared for it.

A few years ago, Huang Han had the strength to engage in Shanxi merchants, but he was hesitant to do so because he was worried that the grass would not be eradicated and the spring breeze would regenerate, and he was also worried that he would not be able to monopolize the huge benefits of the search.

After the Shanxi merchants were arrested, the teenagers of the "Red Banner Army" took care of the main characters separately, and eight people took turns to conduct fatigue interrogation.

Most of the hungry and sleepy Shanxi merchants couldn't stand such a psychological offensive. They couldn't even survive eight hours, and began to honestly explain what they had done over the years, including when and where they gave to which Ming official, Xu Xu, etc. The officials gave bribes.

It was kind enough to adopt such an interrogation in the Ming Dynasty, which did not care about human rights, because under Mimu, it was easy to torture these people, not to mention that they had criminal facts.

Huang Han didn't want to kill people, and he didn't want to leave these people disabled or die within a few days after the court hearing. He used murderous means to collect criminal evidence, and the effect was bloody.

The purpose of appointing Fang Liandong to Beijing to face the saint is to give some benefits to the emperor, so that Emperor Chongzhen can feel that the general will not ignore the royal family at any time.

The guard army led by Fang Liandong brought more than a thousand carts of supplies, many of which were antiques, strange rocks, handicrafts, etc., which were going to be sold in the capital for cash, and also selected a lot of kits to dedicate to them. emperor.

Before departure, Huang Han summoned Fang Liandong to give orders, and a dozen banner guards accompanied Fang Liandong to Beijing with the evidence collected during this period.

In the civil and military dynasties of the Ming Dynasty, except for the Qingshui Yamen, there were not many officials who held real power who were not corrupt. Even Zheng Guochang and Liu Zhilun had a lot of gray income.

There are very few honest and powerful ministers such as Wen Tiren, the first assistant minister, and Cheng Guoxiang, the Minister of the Ministry of household affairs.

Therefore, after Fang Liandong found out the name of the official, he checked whether the flag guard had recorded the shortcomings of the official in the hands of the Shanxi merchants, and then showed the official the transcribed confession.

In the end, Fuer told the official that the general Zhenglu was kind to others, and he chose his collaborators to be lenient.

(End of this chapter)