When the Central Ming Dynasty was overthrown by the peasant rebel army led by Li Zicheng and the Qing army marched south after entering the customs, the military and political bureaucrats in all parts of Jiangnan who were unwilling to change hands and were surrendered one after another supported the establishment of imperial descendants to form a political power, and organized the anti-Qing struggle under the banner of the Ming Dynasty. The regimes of Hongguang, Shaoxing, Longwu, Yongli, Shaowu, and Dingwu established by the kings of the Ming Dynasty were collectively known as the "Southern Ming" or "Southern Ming Dynasty".
Map of the Ming Dynasty's territory
The continuation of ming unification by several Southern Ming courts gave the ming remnants the last hope, but in fact, except for a few idealists, most of the warlords who held real power were mainly concerned with the struggle for immediate interests, and rarely really took the restoration of the country as the starting point. The Ming Dynasty had completely lost its cohesion in the process of its decay and decay, and could not revive people's confidence; most people's ideals of home country could not compete with the consideration of real interests, and it was difficult for anyone to believe that this dynasty could rise again and bring them security.
Map of the Southern Ming Territory
Gu Yanwu of the late Ming and early Qing dynasties was one of them. When he was a teenager, he encountered the tragic situation of barbarian invasion and the destruction of the country and his family. Therefore, Gu Yanwu, who was in full swing and showing his ambition to achieve great things, had to give up everything and throw himself into the struggle against the Qing Dynasty and the restoration of the Ming Dynasty. In the face of rape, he not only actively contributed to the Southern Ming Dynasty and threw his pen into the army, but also put forward the shining slogan of "the rise and fall of the world, and the responsibility of the puppeteer" to encourage the remnants of the Southern Ming to participate in the struggle to restore the old Ming Dynasty and drive the Qing army out of the country.
In April 1644, qing soldiers, assisted by the Ming rebel general Wu Sangui, took Shanhaiguan, defeated Li Zicheng's rebel army, and marched straight into Beijing. Gu Yanwu, out of trust and revenge for the small court of Hongguang in Nanjing, accepted the recommendation of Yang Yongyan of Kunshan County and threw himself into the Southern Ming court as the secretary of the military department. However, when In May of the second year of Shunzhi (1645), when Gu Yanwu took Zhenjiang to Nanjing to take up his post, he heard that Nanjing had been captured by Qing forces and the Hongguang Emperor was captured, so he immediately decided to join forces with his close friends Guizhuang, Wu Qixun and others to join in the struggle against the Qing Dynasty and restore the Ming Dynasty. After the collapse of the Hongguang regime in the Southern Ming Dynasty and the Longwu regime along the coast of Fujian and Zhejiang, the struggle against the Qing Dynasty and the restoration of the Ming Dynasty, in which Gu Yanwu personally participated, entered a "dead end" in the struggle. However, Gu Yanwu did not lose his temper because of this. In the five years after the seventh year of Shunzhi (1650), he traveled between Wu and Hui from time to time, still paying attention to the anti-Qing struggle along the coastal areas of Fujian and Zhejiang, and hoping to have another opportunity to make meritorious achievements, but these wishes were never realized.
Map of the qing dynasty territory
The Ming remnants took it as their duty to save the dead, and participating in the Restoration Movement was an important way to realize the value of life. However, the Ming Dynasty had lost its cohesion in the process of its decay and decay, and the courts of the Southern Ming Dynasty were really places of fame and fortune. Whether it is Zhang Dai, who has the ability to run the political situation, Wang Fuzhi, who has absolute faith in the ethical principles of the monarch, or Qian Bingshi, who has the ambition to make progress, they all have to withdraw from political participation with disappointment.
"Southern Ming" can be regarded as a continuation of the remnants of the Ming Dynasty, and it is different from the deceased original Ming Central Dynasty. The "Southern Ming" lasted a total of 18 years. The duration of the existence of the regimes varies: 1 year of Hongguang, about 8 years of Shaoxing, more than 41 days of Longwu, and nearly 15 years of yong calendar. Among them, Shaowu is the shortest time, and the eternal calendar is the longest. The 15-year Yongli Dynasty, advancing and retreating according to the Qing army's military offensive to the south, moved its garrison to Guangdong, Guizhou, Xiangzhaoqing, Wuzhou, Guilin, Jeonju, Jingzhou, and Nanning from October of the third year of Shunzhi to February of the ninth year. After Moving to Anlong, Guizhou in February of the 9th year of Shunzhi, fang moved to Kunming, Yunnan Province, until March of the twelfth year of Shunzhi, where he stayed in Anlong for more than three years. After 4 years in Dian, he went into exile in Burma in February of the 16th year of Shunzhi until the end of the 18th year of Shunzhi and was captured by Wu Sangui. Yes, the "Southern Ming Dynasty" is consistent with the Shunzhi Dynasty in the Qing Dynasty.