In the autumn of the ninth year of Shaoxing of the Southern Song Dynasty (1139 AD), the Jin general Guanyan Zongbi (Jin Wushu) launched a mutiny and killed the important ministers who advocated peace with the Song court. After that, the warlike Jin Wushu served as the marshal of the capital, led the TaishangShu Province, and held all the military and political power of the Jin State in one hand. Jin Wushu brazenly tore up the contract and sent troops to launch a large-scale attack on the Southern Song Dynasty in May of the tenth year of Shaoxing (1140).
The Wushu soldiers divided into several routes, ordering the general Che Li to lead an army to attack Shaanxi, Kong Yanzhou to attack Kaifeng, Wang Bolong to attack ChenZhou, and Li Cheng to attack Luoyang, and personally led the main force to attack Bozhou, Shunchangfu and other places, planning to forcibly cross the Huai River into the hinterland of the Southern Song Dynasty.
In mid-May, Liu Kun, a famous general who had served as the deputy retainer of Tokyo in the Southern Song Dynasty, led the elite "Eight Character Army" and more than 30,000 diansi pawns from south to north to Kaifeng on the way to Ren, and arrived in Shunchang (present-day Fuyang, Anhui) by water. Just at this moment, the news came that the Jin army had suddenly invaded the south, had conquered Kaifeng, and its forward was less than 300 miles away from Shunchang Province.
Liu Kun understood that the next target of the Jin army after taking Kaifeng was Shunchang Province, which was the only way for the Jin army to invade the south. He consulted with the governor of Shunchang and decided to lead an army to hold the city, and he analyzed that the strategic goal of the Jin people was to capture Shunchang, cross the Huai River from here, and then go straight to the Southern Song Dynasty's trip to Lin'an (Hangzhou), the capital of the country, and if Shunchang was lost, Lin'an was in danger! The Great Song is in danger! He patiently analyzed the situation for the soldiers, emphasized the importance of sticking to Shunchang, and strengthened everyone's determination to hold the city to the death. He ordered the sinking of ships, organized the army and the people to repair the fortifications of the city, expressed with practical actions that he would never flee, and vowed to coexist and die with Shunchang.
At the instigation of Liu Kun, the officers and men of the "Eight-Character Army" were enthusiastic about fighting, and they expressed one after another that they would defend the city with all their blood, kill the enemy to protect the country, and prefer to die rather than retreat. According to Shi Zai, the people of the Shunchang Army at that time were determined to become a city, and they fought with the same enemy, "men prepared for battle, women sharpened (sharpened) swords", ready to annihilate the enemy at any time.
On May 25, Han Chang, the forward of the Jin army and the horse Han Chang, led his soldiers and horses to the outside of Shunchang City, and Tunza was in the sharon vortex area thirty miles north of the city, and he sent dozens of rangers across the Yinghe River to scout and send out sentries under Shunchang City.
Liu Kun saw that the Jin army was traveling back and forth under the city, so he set up an ambush, captured two Jin army sentries, learned the actual situation of Han Chang's army from the captives, and sent more than a thousand brave warriors to attack the enemy camp at night.
On the 29th, more than 30,000 Jin troops marched to the city of Shunchang, surrounded the city, and began to attack the city. Liu Kai ordered the four gates to be opened widely, and sent troops to attack on all sides, so that the defenders of chengtou could cooperate in the battle. The Song army used a crossbow to shoot back the enemy, and then took advantage of the momentum to drive the defeated Jin army into the Yinghe River, and the Jin army trampled on each other in panic and drowned countless people. The first time the two armies fought, the Jin army paid a tragic price of thousands of casualties.
That night, Liu Kui sent his general Yan Chong to steal the camp with five hundred fierce soldiers. Surrounded by black fish, suddenly heard the continuous shouts of killing, the Golden Army did not know the truth, the order was chaotic, and attacked and killed each other in the darkness, killing and injuring countless people. The Jin army suffered one setback after another, and its morale was greatly weakened.
On the seventh day of the first month of June, Marshal Jin arrived with the main force of the Jin army under the command of Yan Zongbi (Jin Wushu). Under the city of Shunchang, he saw that the city was low and the defensive facilities were simple, so he rebuked the generals for being incompetent, and he said in a contemptuous tone: "The walls of Shunchang City are so thin and vulnerable, that they will meet the shifu in the coming day." He ordered the army: "After the city is destroyed, all the men in the city will be killed, and the children and jade will be plundered at will."
On the ninth day of the first month, Wushu commanded a large army to begin to besiege the city of Shunchang. The "Compilation of the Northern League of the Three Dynasties" records that the Jin army "has more than ten thousand armored soldiers and iron horses, displaying cloth, and standing like a mountain wall", and the siege of Shunchang City is impermeable. Dressed in battle robes and riding a war horse, Jin Wushu personally commanded the Jin army to attack the city.
At that time, it was the height of summer, the heat was compelling, Liu Kun ordered the defenders to focus on defense when the weather was cool in the morning, do not take the initiative to attack, at noon, the scorching sun was empty, the heat was unbearable, wearing heavy armor, the Jin army generals who had been scorched by the scorching sun for a long time were dizzy and exhausted, and the Song army, which was waiting for work, suddenly opened the city and launched a ferocious attack on the enemy. Liu Kun also ordered people to poison the grass on the upper reaches of the Yinghe River and on the banks in advance, and instructed his subordinates not to drink the river water during the war, and not to let the war horses eat the grass by the river.
The Jin soldiers were sleepy and tired, hungry and thirsty, and did not know the details, and many people and horses who drank water and ate grass were poisoned, which greatly weakened their combat effectiveness. At that time, Liu Kun deployed only more than 18,000 troops to defend the city, he arranged the remaining more than 10,000 horses outside the city to contain the enemy army, the Song army was much smaller than the Jin army, Liu Kun deployed a part of the troops at the head of the city, and the rest of the soldiers were in a team of 5,000 people, taking turns to fight outside the city, and then taking turns to rest and eat. The Song army waited for work with ease, relaxed and measured, always maintained a high fighting spirit, and firmly grasped the initiative on the battlefield.
Although the Jin Army was crowded, it had been unable to conquer for a long time, tired of coping, and appeared very passive. The Song army's key targets on the battlefield were the left and right wing cavalry of the Jin army, as well as the guards of the Jin Marshal Wushu Iron Pocket Heavy Armor- that is, the famous heavy-armored elite troops "Tiefu Tu" and "Kidnapper Horse".
The generals of the Song Army showed extraordinary bravery in battle, using long guns to pick off the iron helmets of the enemy, slashing and chopping axes, and the Jin army was beaten with broken arms and legs, and the liver and brain were destroyed, and the casualties were heavy.
The Song army commanded Zhao Zhun and Han Zhi to take the lead, rushed into the enemy position and slashed and killed, but still fought to the death with more than ten wounds, killing countless enemies. After all, the Jin army was large, and immediately launched a crazy counterattack, and the generals of the Song army disregarded the enemy's strength and weakness, and still fought hard to kill the enemy in blood.
Some sergeants, under unfavorable circumstances in battle, clung to the golden soldiers, rolled into the river together, and died with the enemy. The Song army defeated the crowd with a small number of people, and the momentum did not lose, and crushed the wave of fierce attacks of the Jin army, and in this battle, more than 5,000 Jin soldiers were annihilated and more than 10,000 people were wounded, especially the "special forces" that the Jin army had always been proud of, "tie floating slaughter, abducted horses" The losses were not light, making "Wushu usually think that they are strong, and lose seven or eight "History of Song". The Jin army was defeated and lost, and retreated to the west of the city to tie up in an attempt to trap the Song army. Just when it rained heavily and did not rest for days, and the flat land was more than a foot full of water, Liu Kun constantly sent troops to attack and harass, and the Jin soldiers were tired from fighting for a long time, and they were always robbed of the camp by the Song army, making it impossible to be peaceful day and night, so the people were panicked and morale was low. Jin Wushu was forced to order the withdrawal of the army on June 12, and the Jin army withdrew from Shunchang with losses and embarrassment, and the car equipment and flag armor abandoned outside the city were piled up.
In the Battle of Shunchang, Han Kun was calm and courageous, and commanded the Song army to defeat the main force of more than 100,000 Jin troops who were determined to win with few victories and more, shocking the aggressive Jin Dynasty, greatly destroying the arrogance of the Jin commander Yan Zongbi (Wu Shu), and smashing in one fell swoop the strategic attempt of the Jin army to invade Lin'an (Hangzhou), the core of the Southern Song Dynasty's rule, from the two Huai rivers.
【Illustration from the Internet】