Crazy at the end of the Ming Dynasty

Wu Shigong got the letter of appointment for his new position from his father-in-law that night.Wu Shigong's new position is in Guidewei, Guide Mansion, Henan Province, in a thousand households office below, as an agent for six years as an agent for thousands of households.

When his father-in-law Xue Lian handed over the letter of appointment to Wu Shigong, he told Wu Shigong: The counterpart of this position—Guide, Henan, is located in a place in the Central Plains.That place is considered affluent, surrounded by large armies and densely populated with cities, so it is relatively safe, and Wu Shigong, a thousand households, basically does not know how to fight.

Xue Lian also took care of Wu Shigong: let him stop causing trouble when he gets to the place.As long as Wu Shigong stayed in the local area for a few years in peace, it didn't have to be six years. As soon as the news in the capital died down, Xue Lian would find a way to transfer Wu Shigong back to the capital.

Wu Shigong found helplessly that he was acting as an official again.However, Wu Shigong was satisfied with the arrangement of his father-in-law Xue Lian.The most satisfying thing is that there will be no wars in the place where I am.Moreover, the agent Qianhu, as soon as he heard his name, he was in charge of a force of 1000 people. In modern times, he would be the official position of a regiment commander.Wu Shigong didn't even know that his thousand households had no possibility of having a force of 1000 people.And about this, father-in-law Xue Lian didn't tell Wu Shigong either.

Wu Shigong also considered: As for six years later, even if his father-in-law Xue Lian has a solution, Wu Shigong will not return to the capital, and he will find a way to take Xue's family out of the capital.As for what method to use at that time, we will talk about it at that time.

So, why did Xue Lian say "wonderful!" to the official position that Wei Zhongxian arranged for his son-in-law?

First of all, of course, the location of this thousand households is relatively safe.Henan Guide is also relatively rich.Then Wu Shigong won't suffer too much when he gets there.

Secondly, in the Weisuo and Qianhusuo in the late Ming Dynasty, especially in the interior, although they were all military households, they also had to undertake some military tasks of suppressing bandits and maintaining local law and order.However, there is basically no need for these guards and thousand households to fight.The fighting will be done by war soldiers, that is, recruits who are paid by the court.The military households of the Weisuo and Qianhusuo at most do some auxiliary and logistical work in the war.

Of course, if the situation is critical, those military households will also go to the front line to fight.However, since they have not undergone any military training at all, their combat effectiveness is also conceivable.

So, what is the main job of these military households?It is farming and paying grain to the court.

When the Ming Dynasty was just established, the purpose of Zhu Yuanzhang's establishment of military households was: on the one hand, the soldiers of the military households could be used during the war; The harvest was turned over to the court.

By the end of the Ming Dynasty, we already knew that the financial crisis of the imperial court was very serious. Therefore, the taxes collected from military households had already accounted for [-] to [-]% of the total fiscal revenue of the entire Ming Dynasty. Just stare very closely.

As for Wu Shigong's agent for thousands of households, we can look at it this way.Think of Wu Shigong's thousand households as a large farm of the imperial court, and the military households are the tenant farmers in the farm, and Wu Shigong's acting thousand households are the chief stewards of the farm.

Therefore, in Xue Lian's view, Wu Shigong can easily complete his work as long as he guarantees to pay all the taxes to the court every year.Xue Lian didn't consider at all what kind of extra money his son-in-law Wu Shigong could make in this position of acting as an agent for thousands of households.Using Xue Lian's idea: Even if thousands of households do not pay all the taxes, the Xue family will subsidize a little, as long as Wu Shigong completes a good job.

Third, Wu Shigong took the position of acting as an agent for thousands of households, which is a kind of demotion.This is also an explanation to Emperor Chongzhen.

We can take a look at the situation of Li Lu, the former commander of the Nancheng Bingma Command Division.He was transferred from the capital to the place to be a garrison.And Wu Shigong is a thousand households in a thousand households.Although in terms of grades, they are all top five grades, but Li Lu is a formal military occupation, while Wu Shigong's military occupation is quite popular.This is like the difference between the head of the regular army and the head of the reserve force in modern times.Therefore, Wu Shigong's transfer this time should be said to be a demotion.

Therefore, if Emperor Chongzhen liquidated Wei Zhongxian's party in the future, he saw that Xue Lian had already demoted his son-in-law Wu Shigong and drove him out of the capital.Wu Shigong is just such an insignificant official position with thousands of households, so the Emperor Chongzhen will basically let Wu Shigong go.

In the end, Wu Shigong, the official position of a thousand households, only acted for six years.After six years, as long as the rumor has passed, there is a great possibility that Wu Shigong will be transferred back to the capital.

Therefore, it can be seen that Wei Zhongxian was really kind to Xue Lian, and found such an appropriate official position for Xue Lian's son-in-law.This couldn't help Xue Lian admiring loudly.

However, Wei Zhongxian and Xue Lian never imagined that within a few years, Henan would be plagued by famines.Peasant rebellions also followed one after another.In the end, the entire territory of Henan became the main battlefield for the peasant rebel army and the imperial court's encirclement and suppression army.After successive years of wars, the whole of Henan was a thousand miles away.In real history, the two largest cities in Henan - Kaifeng and Luoyang.Kaifeng City was dug up by Li Zicheng's rebel army to open the embankment of the Yellow River and divert the water from the Yellow River. Only a few hundred people survived in the city of Kaifeng with hundreds of thousands of soldiers and horses.

After Luoyang City was captured by Li Zicheng, King Fu in Luoyang City (that is, the uncle of Emperor Chongzhen) was cut alive by Li Zicheng, made into hot meat slices, and made into Fulu soup with venison for sharing.

If they knew all this, would Wei Zhongxian and Xue Lian still feel wonderful?Of course, the current Wu Shigong is completely unaware of all this.

However, the position of thousands of households acting for six years is also a bit strange.Because in the Ming Dynasty, the positions of thousands of households in military households were basically inherited from father to son.As for the position of Qianhu, after the death of the old Qianhu, his son is only ten years old, and he is not yet 16 years old to inherit the position, so he needs someone else to act on his behalf temporarily. Then return the official position of Qianhu to him.

However, under normal circumstances, the relatives of the old thousand households or other people in the guard are always acting as temporary representatives.But why do you have to report to the Ministry of War?No one knows why.The Ministry of War will not care about such trivial matters.For the Ministry of War, as long as there is no shortage of taxes paid by that thousand households, it doesn't matter even if there are no thousand households.But now Wu Shigong just needs it, so he just gave it to Wu Shigong.

The next day, as soon as Wu Shigong arrived at the Yamen, he received a letter from Eunuch Qin: Emperor Chongzhen would send someone to take over the Nancheng Army Command in the afternoon.

Wu Shigong immediately sent people to gather all the deputy commanders and hundreds of households, and informed them that the Nancheng Bingma Command Division would change its commander.Moreover, he asked Xu Limu to prepare the accounts of the Bingma Division, ready to be handed over at any time.

In the afternoon, Emperor Chongzhen sent three of his bodyguards to take office with papers in hand.They simply handed over the accounts and did not check the accounts of the soldiers and horses at all. Their main purpose was to let Wu Shigong hand over the official seal of the soldiers and horses to them as soon as possible.

After the handover was over, Wu Shigong walked out of the Bingmasi yamen, he looked back at the yamen, feeling a little lost and a little relieved in his heart.

Wu Shigong was just about to take Shumo and Xue's guards to leave when suddenly, someone next to him called him, "My lord."

Wu Shigong took a look, he knew that person, he was the second son of the late Deputy Commander Qian, the Qian Qi who had arranged him to take the position of Xiaoqi.

Wu Shigong stopped in his tracks and asked that Qian Qi what's the matter?

That Qian Qi told Wu Shigong: Deputy Commander Qian's wife was already very upset that Qian Qi got the position of Xiaoqi instead of Qian Qi's elder brother.But because Wu Shigong was still in command of the Bing Ma Si, he didn't dare to make any moves.However, now that the news of Wu Shigong's resignation has spread, Deputy Commander Qian's wife has also started activities, and has already kicked Qian Qi out of the house.Qian Qi now wants to join Wu Shigong and follow Wu Shigong.

After hearing Qian Qi's words, Wu Shigong smiled, a little sadly.Wu Shigong thought: I have done so many things in the Bingma Division, and the income of all the people in the Bingma Division has greatly increased.But up to now, there is only Qian Qi, who is almost not close to him, who has taken refuge in him.

Wu Shigong gestured to Qian Qi and said, "Then let's go together."

On the way back to Xue's mansion, Wu Shigong asked Shumo to send a letter to the powder shop.Let Zhao Ruya not have to clean up the mess in the makeup shop.Wu Shigong asked Zhao Ruya to prepare that he would leave the capital soon.When the time comes, he will leave with Zhao Ruya's mother and daughter.