Guide:
In 1838, the eighteenth year of Daoguang in the Qing Dynasty, the capital held a triennial examination of the imperial examination. In this examination of the imperial examination, two people who influenced the course of Qing Dynasty and even Chinese history came out, one was Zeng Guofan from Hunan, and the other was Li Wen'an from Anhui.
Needless to say, Zeng Guofan embarked on a career path after entering high school, successively serving as the governor of Liangjiang and the governor directly under him, and was the initiator of the foreign affairs movement and the founder of the Xiang Army. During the Xianfeng and Tongzhi years, he led the Xiang army to suppress the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom Movement, and was known as the "first minister of Zhongxing" in the Qing Dynasty.
Unlike Zeng Guofan, Li Wen'an's career was not smooth, and he traveled all over the place throughout his life, and the officials he did were all minor officials such as clerks and foreign langs. He was able to influence history mainly because he gave birth to several sons of extraordinary achievements.
According to historical records, Li Wen'an's ancestral home was in Hukou, Jiangxi, and his family later moved to Hefei, Anhui Province, due to the war. The Li family has been farming and reading for generations, and after several generations of hard work, by the time Li Wen'an's father, Li Dianhua, the family was already a middle-aged family with dozens of acres of land. But in terms of studying, no one has been able to enter high school.
Li Dianhua's lifelong ambition was to obtain a meritorious name, but unfortunately, his road to the imperial examination was not smooth, he failed to try many times, and finally he was forced by life to return to his hometown to practice medicine, and became a local langzhong with a small reputation. He did not have the opportunity to be famous, Li Dianhua put all his hopes on his son, and went all out to train his four sons to study, hoping that in the future they would be able to obtain meritorious names.
At that time, although the Li family had a small field property, they had to provide for their sons to study, and they had to marry wives for their sons, and their lives were still tight, and if they encountered a famine year and the fields failed, Li Dianhua could only go out to borrow money to survive. Regarding the poor life of the Li family at that time, one of Li Dianhua's grandsons said with tears in his later recollection: "My grandfather was poor and poor, and at the end of the year, the creditors were like carps crossing the river." ”
Although his life was so poor, the arrogant Li Dianhua did not compromise with fate, and he still spent a lot of money to hire a famous teacher and teach his son to read in order to prepare for the exam and gain fame. Faced with the debt collectors who came to the door, he went to the countryside day after day to practice medicine, just to earn more money.
Once, when Li Dianhua went to the countryside to practice medicine, he picked up a baby girl who was still swaddling on the side of the road. In that era of son preference, many poor families were forced by life to abandon the baby girls in their families. Li Dianhua was benevolent and could not bear the little girl's death in the wilderness, so he picked her up and raised her at home.
This little girl is good everywhere, but her appearance is a little ugly, and she has a lot of pockmarks on her face. But Li Dianhua, who only had four sons in the family, did not abandon it, and after obtaining the consent of his family, he recognized the little girl as his daughter, and since then he has also been a child.
In the blink of an eye, Li Dianhua's sons grew up one after another, and in order to marry his first three sons, Li Dianhua sold everything he could sell in the family and borrowed all his relatives and friends, so that he could barely scrape together enough money for the bride price. When it was time for Li Wen'an to get married, Li Dianhua really couldn't come up with a penny, and finally in desperation, he could only let Li Wen'an marry the young daughter Li Shi, who had been picked up.
Fortunately, Li Wen'an grew up with Li Shi since he was a child, and he did not dislike his sister's ugly appearance, and Li Shi was grateful to Li Dianhua for his adoption, and naturally had no complaints. In this way, under the auspices of Li Dianhua, Li Wen'an married his "sister" Li Shi, which was the first major event in his life.
After Li Wen'an got married, he took care of his wife and concentrated more on studying and preparing to take the imperial examination. At that time, his three older brothers failed to obtain meritorious titles, and Li Dianhua pinned all his hopes on Li Wen'an. Fortunately, Li Wen'an finally lived up to his trust, and won the examination in the fourteenth year of Daoguang (1834), and then entered the high school four years later, becoming the first person in the seven generations of Li to obtain a meritorious name.
Although Li Wen'an was not smooth in his career and did all his life as a minor official, he married his "sister" Li Shi and gave birth to 6 sons, all of whom were famous people in the late Qing Dynasty, of which the eldest son and the second son had the highest achievements.
The eldest son, Li Hanzhang, came from the door of Zeng Guofan, who followed the Xiang army to suppress the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, and had a smooth career in his life, serving as the governor of Hunan, the governor of Jiangsu, the governor of Zhejiang, the governor of Huguang, the governor of Sichuan, and the governor of Liangguang.
However, Li Wen'an's second son, Li Hongzhang, had greater achievements and fame than that of his eldest brother Li Hanzhang, and he was a well-known person in the Qing Dynasty and even in modern Chinese history. As the founder of the Huai Army, the main leader of the Foreign Affairs Movement, the founder of the Beiyang Marine Division, a scholar of the Wenhuadian University, and a first-class Marquis of Suyi, Li Hongzhang received all the honors that a human subject could receive. He was known as one of the famous ministers of Zhongxing in the late Qing Dynasty, the person who "recreated Xuanhuang" in Cixi's mouth, and the only person in the Qing Dynasty who had the ability to compete with the world's powers.
In addition to Li Hanzhang and Li Hongzhang, Li Wen'an's other four sons, Li Hezhang, Li Yunzhang, Li Fengzhang, and Li Zhaoqing, also served as officials, and the Hefei Li family suddenly changed from a poor ordinary cultivator to a local family, and all this is due to Li Wen'an. According to History, after Li Wen'an took the meritorious name, the life of the Li family suddenly became better, "starting from Kejia and becoming a Noble Family in Lu County."
The Li family can rise, and Li Wen'an's wife Li Shi is also indispensable. Although she looks ugly, she has been hard-working since she was a child, taught her husband and children, worked hard and complained, and her wisdom in dealing with the world is very high, and she can always handle the affairs of the family in an orderly manner, so that her husband and son have no worries when they are out.
Conclusion:
Although the union of Li Wen'an and Li Shi was helpless, they loved each other after marriage, raised eight children together, and both had successful careers. The first half of Li's life was miserable, and the second half of her mother enjoyed all the glory and wealth by virtue of her son, and lived to the age of eighty-three, twenty-eight years longer than her husband Li Wen'an. After his death, the imperial court posthumously gave Lady Yipin and was given the title of Lady Yipinbo.