Crazy at the end of the Ming Dynasty

When the Shandong Army first arrived at the city, Liu Zhaoji, the commander-in-chief, suggested that the main force of the enemy had not arrived, and the foothold was not stable, so he could go out of the city to fight.

But Shi Kefa said: "Spirit should not be tested lightly, and we should raise Quanfeng to wait for his death."

In terms of city defense, Shi Kefa made another arrangement: "The terrain of the west gate of the old city is low, and the high mound outside the city overlooks the city. , The branches turn back to each other, and there is little power. The generals have repeatedly said that. The public regards Li's shade tree, and cannot bear to cut it. Let me also say that the generals will take this place as a danger, and I will defend it myself."

On the night of the second day of the sixth lunar month, the officials and gentry in Yangzhou gathered hundreds of people in the city, launched a rebellion, and opened the city gate to invite the Shandong army to enter the city.After fierce fighting until the early hours of the morning, Yangzhou City fell into the hands of the Daping Army on the third day of the lunar new year.Liu Zhaoji died in battle, Yangzhou prefect Ren Minyu, He Gang and others were killed in battle, Shi Kefa and others refused to surrender after being captured, and were beheaded by Chi Ming's order.

Shi Kefa's vow not to surrender to the death can indeed be called his loyalty to Nanming.However, Shi Kefa did not make any commendable achievements during the entire Chongzhen period; his status and reputation rose rapidly during the Hongguang period.

However, as a politician, Shi Kefa made a fatal mistake in setting up a new monarch, which caused the military general to steal the merit of "determining the policy" and lose power; A lot of manpower, material resources, and financial resources are in vain.

Until the Shandong Army, a non-main force of the Daping Army, went south, most of the generals he controlled turned and surrendered, and became a powerful force of the Daping Dynasty to conquer Nanming. Shi Kefa's incompetence can be seen.

Take the Battle of Yangzhou as an example.Shi Kefa also failed to organize effective resistance.Before the Shandong army attacked the city, Shi Kefa was already pessimistic and disappointed, and handed over all military affairs to his staff.As a result, Yangzhou fell in less than a day.

As the commander-in-chief of the Nanming Jianghuai army, Shi Kefa's knowledge and talents are really ordinary.But in his life, there are also two points worthy of recognition: one is that he is honest and diligent as an official, and the other is that he would rather die than submit at the last moment.As for his entire political career, it doesn't deserve to be overstated.It can be said that Shi Kefa made almost all wrong decisions on important military and state affairs, and he bears an inescapable responsibility for the collapse of the Hongguang court.

certainly.Shi Kefa's death was also caused by Wu Shigong's ignorance of his "famous name" in the original history.There are a large number of high-ranking officials of the former Ming Dynasty who have surrendered to the Daping Dynasty, and there are more than a dozen people whose status is higher than Shi Kefa.Wu Shigong only regarded Shi Kefa as one of them.So no special treatment is possible.

To be honest, Wu Shigong still needs to pay more attention to Liu Zongzhou, the leader of the world's literati.Otherwise, Wu Shigong would at least tell Chi Ming that he would not deal with Shi Kefa arbitrarily.

At this time, it was late.There is only one new army that can be safely controlled.Among them, there are only more than 1000 officers and non-commissioned officers of the original Runing Army.Even with the more trusted original Ming Lu Army, the total number of troops is only 3.But now, facing the Southern Ming army that swarmed to surrender, Chi Ming felt anxious that he could not control the troops.

Coupled with the crooked mouths of those surrendered generals, they said: Shi Kefa is the first assistant governor of the Southern Ming Dynasty, with the most lofty status.If he is spared, it may cause instability in the surrendered army's morale.So Chi Ming also "follow the good".

Before and after the Shandong Army conquered Yangzhou, the Jiangbei and Nanming Army had almost no fighting spirit.He surrendered hastily without firing a single arrow.Under the leadership of his son Gao Yuanzhao, the son of the Marquis of Xingping, Li Benshen, the admiral, and Li Chengdong, the commander-in-chief, Gao Jie's troops surrendered successively; Guangchang Bo Liu Liangzuo also led his troops to surrender.

In the short period of less than four months from June to early September (this year is leap June), as many as 23 Nanming generals and 47 lieutenants came from the entire Huaiyang area.The total number of horse infantry reached an astonishing 23.

It is especially worth mentioning that the troops of general soldiers Li Chengdong, Li Benshen, Jin Shenghuan, Li Guoying, Tian Xiong, Ma Degong, Xu Yong and others are well equipped and have excellent combat skills.It can be said that as long as they unite with two or three troops, they can completely fight Chi Ming's Shandong Army on an even footing.But even this kind of troops were all demoralized, and the whole army surrendered to the Daping Dynasty without firing a single arrow.It was really a defeat.

The fact that the major feudal towns of the Hongguang Dynasty surrendered in anticipation was not because the generals were too weak to fight, but because they formed a powerful power group based on "determined strategies" and other reasons.Since all they care about is to keep their own glory and wealth, once a strong enemy overwhelms the situation, it is natural that the best policy is to surrender and "reveal merit".

One word can be said: The Hongguang court was established by relying on the vassal town, and it was the vassal town that rebelled and died.

On June 13, Zhou Xun and Xue Qiang led an army of 29 down the river, and met Zuo Menggeng, the son of Zuo Liangyu, for the first time.However, Zuo Menggeng's subordinates had ten soldiers and more than [-] soldiers. They neither dared to meet Zhou Xun and Xue Qiang's troops who came from the west, nor did they dare to go east to confront Chi Ming's troops, and they even did not want to go south to Jiangxi to avoid it for the time being. The main force of the Daping Army led his troops to surrender to the Daping Army on June [-] in the middle of the Yangtze River from Jiujiang to Dongliu.

Together with Zuo Menggeng, Huang Shu, the imperial censor of Huguang, returned to surrender.However, Yuan Jixian, the governor of Nanming Jiang, became a prisoner of the Daping Army under the coercion of Zuo Menggeng's force.After Yuan Jixian was coerced to see Zhou Xun, he categorically refused to persuade him to surrender, and was later escorted to Beijing for house arrest. Later, during the five-year amnesty of Qiongyuan, he was released to return to his hometown to be raised.

Because Zuo Liangyu had a personal grievance with Wu Shigong, the surrender negotiations took a long time.It wasn't until Hou Xun lobbied for a guarantee that Zuo Menggeng's tribe surrendered with confidence.And because the discipline of the left army was too corrupt, it took more than ten days to reorganize and surrender the army.Therefore, by the time Zhou Xun and Zhang Biao moved again, it was already the [-]th day of June.

By the way, what happened to this notorious army on the left.After that, almost all of this army was dismissed, and all the generals returned to their hometowns after being given a lot of money.Only Zuo Menggeng was made an earl, but most of Zuo Menggeng and Zuobu's generals died well.It's really amazing-the thief of the country!

The reorganized Daping Army troops wanted to detour to the northeast to cut off the Nanming heavy troops stationed in Fengyang and Luzhou.Zhang Biao's Daping Army responded to the weak troops.

But just two days after they set off, they were delighted to hear that the Nanming Army in Fengyang and Luzhou also surrendered to the Daping Army.

And Zhang Biao, who was stationed in Yexian County, Nanyang Prefecture, immediately led 24 soldiers and horses who had been ready to go to Runing immediately after receiving the general order of Zhou Xun on June [-].Then another [-] recruits gathered in Runing.Because the original Runing military depot was well established in the Runing Mansion, this troop was able to march at high speed and arrived at the junction of Runing and Fengyang on June [-].

At this time, the Nanming Army stationed in Fengyang and Luzhou had a total of more than [-] soldiers and horses.However, they are composed of two parts: one part is the Ming army left behind in Fengyang Mansion when Ma Shiying went north; the other part is the troops left by the late Gao Jie.

The Ming army left behind in Fengyang Mansion was originally crooked, because the elite of this army had long been conscripted by Ma Shiying and transferred to the north.In addition, Fengyang's troops were doing a lot of business with the Runing Army, and there were countless ties between the two armies.So seeing the arrival of Zhang Biao's troops, they surrendered without thinking.

And the other Nanming army was even more demoralized.In March of the first year of Qiongyuan, Gao Jie, Yue Qijie, governor of Henan Province, and Chen Qianfu, the governor of Henan Province, led the army to Luzhou, preparing to go north to occupy Xuzhou and other places.And this time going north was also the only military operation that the Southern Ming Army took the initiative to attack the Daping Dynasty.

Xu Dingguo, the general guarding the area, had already secretly communicated with the Daping Army in Runing, Henan, and sent his sons Xu Er'an and Xu Erji to the Runing Mansion as hostages at the request of Xue Qiang there.

So when Gao Jie's army arrived in Luzhou, Xu Dingguo was panicked and lost ground.Knowing that his troops were no match for Gao Jie, he asked Xue Qiang to send troops for support but was rejected, so he could only make up his mind to take risks.

So Xu Dingguo went out of the city to meet Gao Jie, which was falsely regarded as respectful; at the same time, he secretly planned a countermeasure.In fact, at that time, Gao Jie already knew the news that Xu Dingguo had sent his son to Runing. In order to prevent him from leading his subordinates to dedicate the Luzhou area to the Daping Dynasty, he wanted to use his superior force to coerce Xu Dingguo and his troops to march north with the army.

On the twelfth, Xu Dingguo held a big banquet in Luzhou City, nominally to clean up the dust for Gao Jie, Yue Qijie, and Chen Qianfu.And Yue Qijie advised Gao Jie not to enter Luzhou City easily, in order to prevent accidents.But Gao Jie is a martial artist, he thinks that he has many soldiers, so Xu Dingguo never dared to act rashly, so he only brought [-] soldiers into the city for the banquet, accompanied by Yue Qijie and Chen Qianfu.Xu Dingguo ambushed the army in advance, persuaded Gao Jie and others to drink with flower cards, and got drunk.

In the middle of the night, an ambush broke out and killed Gao Jie and the accompanying soldiers. Yue Qijie and Chen Qianfu fled Luzhou in a panic.The next day, when Gao Jie's men learned that the chief general had been killed, they were filled with indignation, and immediately invaded Luzhou to massacre the soldiers and civilians in retaliation.But Xu Dingguo fled west with his relatives and returned to Runing.

After Gao Jie's death, there was no leader in the army, and the soldiers and horses of his subordinates were in chaos.The nearby generals such as Huang Degong wanted to take the opportunity to carve up the troops and territory of Gao Jie's troops, and the two sides were at war.

People at the time said: Whoever called Fanshan harrier (Gao Jie was nicknamed Fanshan harrier in the peasant army), Chuangzi was not harmonious (Huang Degong was called Huang Chuangzi).Soldiers were raised on the ground, my wife came to suppress the stronghold (original note: Mrs. Xing also), and killed the old matchmaker (original note: Shi Gongye), and walked across the river and the Huaihe River.

Anyway, it's a chicken feather.

The military plan to go north this time not only failed completely, but also plunged the Nanming Army into disputes.It can be said that misfortunes never come singly. (To be continued..)