Saving the Ming Dynasty: I can exchange bodies with Chongzhen

Chapter 144 There are no generals available, aren’t these all generals?
In addition, Sun Chuanting wrote a memorial to the emperor, asking the emperor to write a letter to the governor of Sichuan, asking him to cooperate in preventing Li Zicheng from sneaking into Sichuan.

In addition, Sun Chuanting also wrote a letter to Zuo Liangyu.

At this time, Zhang Xianzhong fought against the government army led by Zuo Liangyu in Nanyang, Henan, and was defeated and injured.

Zhang Xianzhong led his troops to Macheng and Qizhou in Huguang to join forces with Liu Guoneng, the leader of the Chuangtatian army.

"God bless me, I am defeated and feel ashamed of the people." Zhang Xianzhong said with red eyes when he met Liu Guoneng.

"I feel the same way as my brother. The Ming court is now strong, so we should think of a countermeasure." Liu Guoneng, the leader of the Chuangtatian, said with a grim expression, "Now, even the Manchu Tartars can't stop the Ming court's troops... How can we stop them?"

"Who said it wasn't true? In the past, every time we fought with the Ming court, the Manchu Tartars would inevitably respond in the north, but this time..." Zhang Xianzhong slammed the table, secretly resentful.

Liu Guoneng looked at him and said, "I heard that the Ming court sent a prime minister, Xiong Wencan, to the south. Now there is a man in my camp named Lu Ding."

"Lu Ding? Isn't he the one Li Zicheng took away?"

"Yes, that's the person."

"How did he get in touch with you?"

In the eighth year of Chongzhen, Li Zicheng fought in Shangluo. His general "Yidougu" led the crowd to capture a man, who was Lu Ding. Li Zicheng was originally going to kill him, but when he saw that Lu Ding was well-versed in all schools of thought and knew everything about yin and yang divination, he kept him in the camp.

Later, Yidu Gu asked Lu Ding to observe the weather, wind and rain, so as to judge the pros and cons of sending troops. The results were all correct, so his status became higher and higher.

Therefore, even Chuangtatian and Zhang Xianzhong had heard of this man's name.

Later, Yidugu fought a battle with Zuo Liangyu and was defeated. Lu Ding then joined Zuo Liangyu's subordinates. Who would have thought that he would get in touch with Chuangtatian again?
"It's a shame to say that the Ming court sent Xiong Wencan as prime minister, and this person worked under Xiong Wencan." Liu Guoneng, the Chuangtatian, said with a sigh.

Zhang Xianzhong stared at Liu Guoneng, his eyes burning with fire, "What do you mean, you want to surrender to the Ming court?"

Liu Guoneng was shocked and waved his hands, saying, "No, no, I just wanted to find out the next move of the Ming court, so I left this person in the camp."

Seeing that Zhang Xianzhong didn't believe him, he continued, "I heard a lot of news from him."

"The Ming court not only repelled the Manchu Tartars, but Huang Taiji also exchanged the surrendered general Chao Pichang for his son Haoge. However, Chao Pichang's subordinates rebelled because of this, killed hundreds of Manchus, and fled back to the Ming court..."

Zhang Xianzhong was shocked when he heard what Liu Guoneng said. "When did the Ming court become so powerful?"

"That's why I have to discuss this carefully with Brother Bingwu!"

"..."

The two men discussed for a long time, which lasted for two hours, before Chuangtatian finally sent Zhang Xianzhong away.

A man came out from behind the tent, "Marshal!"

Liu Guoneng sighed, "You have also seen that this person is probably not someone you can persuade to surrender."

Lu Ding smiled and bowed to Liu Guoneng, "I will certainly tell Lord Xiong about your intentions. As for Zhang Xianzhong, there is no rush."

"However, I hope that the Marshal will pay more attention and promote me two levels higher in my original position after the matter is accomplished."

Liu Guoneng's eyes suddenly lit up, "In this case, I'll have to rely on Lord Lu."

After receiving the emperor's edict, Xiong Wencan rushed to Henan without stopping and started his plan to recruit the surrender, and Lu Ding was the contact person he appointed.

Although Xiong Wencan's control over the battle situation was rubbish, he had a keen sense of surrender.
The first target was Liu Guoneng, the one who broke through the barriers.

Because Liu Guoneng was originally a student of a private school, he became quite influential after joining the uprising and became one of the famous leaders in the early stage of the uprising.

Moreover, this person had strong feudal ideas of loyalty, filial piety, chastity and righteousness. Xiong Wencan heard that Liu Guoneng believed in loyalty, filial piety, benevolence and righteousness, and never disobeyed his mother's words.

Lu Ding first asked someone to find Liu Guoneng's mother. After convincing her, he went to find Liu Guoneng, and found that the other party indeed had the intention of surrendering to the Ming Dynasty.

Liu Guoneng pounded his hands and stamped his feet, "The foolish people have fallen into injustice, and the wise governor has wiped them out and reborn them. I wish to report all of them to the shogunate's military register, and personally serve under their command, and do my best to the death!"

This made Xiong Wencan very happy, and he immediately wrote a memorial to the emperor. Now that he heard that Zhang Xianzhong had also come to join Liu Guoneng, he worked even harder to get Lu Ding and Liu Guoneng to persuade him to surrender.

……

capital,

When Zhu Changgan received Xiong Wencan's memorial, he couldn't help but sigh that it is the right way to do things according to the person's needs.

According to the original historical course, Liu Guoneng should have taken several months to accept the surrender, and Zhang Xianzhong should have had to wait until next year. Now it has been moved forward by half a year.

Of course, this is also closely related to the Qing Dynasty's entry into the Pass.

This battle, like a catalyst, inspired Hong Chengchou, Sun Chuanting and other Ming army generals, and dealt a heavy blow to the arrogance of Zhang Xianzhong, Chuangta Tian and Liu Guoneng.

"Wang Chengen, draft an edict for me, agreeing that Xiong Wencan should accept Liu Guoneng's offer of surrender. In addition, he will be promoted to a higher level on the original basis."

"Let Xiong Wencan hold a grand ceremony in Suizhou and let the Ming Times put it on the front page."

Chuangtatian was an influential figure in the rebel army. His surrender would objectively contribute to the trend of surrender among the peasant army.

Regarding the eunuch who accompanied Xiong Wencan this time, Liu Yuanbin.

Zhu Changgan also asked Wang Chengen to give rewards.

Zhu Changgan would not be stingy with rewards to anyone who was willing to work for the Ming Dynasty, including the East Factory and the Embroidered Uniform Guard. If the people around the emperor could not see the benefits, how could he expect them to do things for him?

"Pass on my secret order, telling Liu Yuanbin to stop worrying about Liu Guoneng and focus all his attention on Zhang Xianzhong."

Because he remembered that Liu Guoneng accepted the surrender and was willing to serve as the vanguard of the Ming government in suppressing the peasants.

His subordinates, numbering 50,000 to 60,000, were divided into fourteen groups. "Most of them returned to their hometowns, or joined the Laohuihui and Geliyan groups." Only 5,000 of them surrendered with him.

But Zhang Xianzhong was different. It seemed that he was pretending to surrender this time, and he made a comeback not long after.

Just as he finished speaking, he heard a eunuch running in.

"Your Majesty, Sun Chuanting's memorial has arrived."

"Hand it over!"

Wang Chengen quickly unfolded the memorial in which Sun Chuanting described his plan and mentioned the current predicament and the lack of good generals under his command.

He Renlong, also known as "Crazy He", was arrogant and spoiled. He always killed innocent people to take credit for his actions, but failed to mobilize anyone for his actions many times.

Zhu Changgan narrowed his eyes and said only two words to He Renlong: "Behead him!"

But Zhu Changgan didn't believe that Sun Chuanting had no good generals. There were countless generals who could fight in the Chongzhen Dynasty, but there were definitely quite a few who could fight. As he watched, Zhu Changgan immediately understood what Sun Chuanting meant.

He wanted to mobilize some former generals from Shaanxi. Shaanxi? Yulin?

Zhu Changgan suddenly remembered one thing, the most tragic battle before the demise of the Ming Dynasty.

That was the Battle of Yulin.

When the generals defending the city abandoned the city and fled, a group of generals abandoned by the court and idle at home spontaneously organized a family guard and called on the people of the whole city to defend the city together. With less than 5,000 troops, they resisted the siege of 70,000 enemy troops for twelve days. In the end, all of them were killed in the battle and no one surrendered.

In this battle, 26 generals died for their country, including eight generals.

At that time, the nine important border towns, including Ningxia, Gansu, and Yan'an Prefecture, were unstoppable in front of the rebels, but when they arrived in Yulin City, they encountered great trouble.

Yulin was originally just a guard under Yansui Town. During the Chenghua period, Yansui Town moved its seat of government to Yulin. Since then, it has been commonly known as Yulin Town, one of the nine important border towns.

In the history of Ming Dynasty, Yulin was an important town in the world, with the best soldiers and the most talented generals. Burning the land was a crime that required punishment.

The land in Yulin is barren and it is close to Mongolian grasslands. Every time the grassland tribes move south, Yulin is the first place to suffer disaster.

From the moment the Ming Dynasty was established, a large number of residents were stationed here. They fought against the Mongols for generations, the people were tough and numerous military families were born here.

The Battle of Yulin lasted for a full twelve days from November 15th to 27th, with only these useless generals and several thousand defenders in the city.

You must know that Li Zicheng had three armies at the beginning. The southern army and the western army were unstoppable all the way. Counties along the way surrendered one after another. Only Yulin's resistance was the most fierce and the most tragic.

In this battle, more than a dozen senior generals above the rank of deputy general were all killed in battle, and all officers below the rank of deputy general fought and died. At the same time, all the civil servants in the city, both on duty and unemployed at home, such as Zhang Yunhe, the head of the Ministry of Revenue, Peng Qing, the prefect, and Liu Fang, all committed suicide and died for their country.

There were thousands of women who died in the city. After the city was captured, the wells were filled with corpses. The Dashun Army then massacred the entire city.

When talking about this battle in later generations, many people could not help but sigh that Yulin was a place where the best soldiers in the world came from, but its military supplies and wages had been cut off for many years.

Looking at the resumes of You Shiwei and others, we can find that they all have one thing in common, that is, they all came from generals' families or rose from the ranks.

It served as an important town in the nine frontiers and fought against the Mongols, the Jurchens, and the rebel army.

"Wang Chengen, check for me which generals are idle at home in Yulin?"

Not long after, Wang Chengen came back.

"Your Majesty, there are seven." Wang Chengen placed the list of names in front of the emperor.

Among those who were unemployed in Yulin were the former generals of Shanhaiguan You Shiwei, Wang Shiqin, former generals of Baoding Wang Shiguo, former generals of Xuanfu Hou Shilu, former generals of Shanhaiguan Hou Gongji, former generals of Tianjin Wang Xueshu, former generals of Yansui Li Changling... Former deputy generals of Shanhaiguan Yang Ming, former deputy generals of Dingbian Zhang Fa, former deputy generals of Gushan Wang Yongzuo and other unemployed generals all had their own servants.

I don’t know, I’m scared.

Seven generals... Well, this Yulin City is really full of hidden dragons and crouching tigers.

No wonder Sun Chuanting was thinking about this place. It turned out that he was thinking about the elite troops in Yulin City.

Yulin was the base of Shaanxi generals in the Ming Dynasty. Countless generals from all over the country came from Yulin.

These servants were synonymous with elite soldiers in the late Ming Dynasty.

These generals were abandoned by Chongzhen because they made some mistakes during the reign of Chongzhen. Take You Shiwei as an example. In addition to him, his brothers You Shigong and You Shilu were also known for their bravery.

During the Tianqi period, he was promoted to Lieutenant General of Jianchang Camp and guarded Qiangzilu.

In the second year of Chongzhen, he was promoted to commander-in-chief and stationed in Juyong and Changping.

In the eighth year of Chongzhen, he led troops to defend Tongguan, Zhuyangguan and other places. As a result, due to a plague in the army and the defeat in the battle with the rebels, he was dismissed from his post by Chongzhen and sent back to his hometown.

Regarding this matter, Xuanda Governor Lu Xiangsheng once pleaded for him, "You Shiwei is good at pacifying soldiers and understands military affairs. It was only because his thousands of foreign soldiers stayed in the deserted mountains for a long time and got sick that they lost the battle. Now is the time to use troops. Wouldn't it be a pity not to use him?"

Unfortunately, Chongzhen never re-employed him until the end. In the 15th year of Chongzhen, he allowed You Shiwei and his brother You Shilu to come to Beijing to wait for deployment. Then they returned to their hometown and became unemployed.

Yulin, these military families will shed their last drop of blood for the Ming Dynasty in this brutal battle.

Chongzhen said every day that there were no generals available.

Aren’t these all generals?

"Pass on my decree and ask these generals in Yulin City to come to Beijing to report on their work." Zhu Changgan asked Sun Chengzong to draft the decree.

"Your Majesty, please think twice!" Sun Chengzong couldn't help but say.

"Your Majesty, please think twice!" Yang Sichang also stood up and advised.

Mobilizing so many unemployed generals to the capital at once, and all of them were from Shanxi, immediately aroused criticism from senior officials in the court.

"I have thought it over twice." Zhu Changgan narrowed his eyes and said firmly.

Today's Grand Council has largely stripped the Ministry of War of its power.

The appointment and dismissal of military generals has all fallen into the hands of the emperor. There are a large number of people from various ethnic groups in the south of the Yangtze River in the court, and it is also in his own interest to add some generals from the northwestern border.

Battle of Yulin

These thousands of people blocked the siege of the 70,000-strong rebel army, repelled wave after wave of enemy attacks, and finally all died for their country.

It would be better if I didn’t know. Now that I know, I will naturally never let such a thing happen again.

……

Looking at the mountain, the sun was setting a little to the west, the wind was shaking the mountain flowers, and the sunlight was shining through the treetops onto the ground, making spots. The weather had completely entered summer, the trees were stretching out, and the sound of the bell from the distant temple was coming from afar, making Chongzhen sigh as he looked at the distant mountains.

"The summer in the Ming Dynasty is really different from the summer in the palace."

He dusted his hands, then turned and walked towards the school. Not far away, a figure was staring at him.

It was Hongniangzi. For Chongzhen, he felt a different country, a different atmosphere, as if he was in another world.

But for her, it was a different feeling.

There were corpses and refugees everywhere. Even in summer, there was famine and cannibalism. What she saw was not a sense of another world, but rather misery, blood, war, taxes collected by the government, and the graves of the common people.

At this time, a man from the village ran over and said, "Boss, the person sent to investigate the identity of the son-in-law is back. He is..."

Red Lady turned her head sharply, frowning, "Why don't you say anything?"

(End of this chapter)