The Dazexiang Uprising was the first large-scale peasant uprising in Chinese history, and this uprising had two key peasant leaders— Chen Sheng and Wu Guang. Chen Sheng worked for a long time, and Wu Guang was a poor peasant.
The mausoleum of Qin Shi Huang was not completed, and the second Hu Hai and Zhao Gao continued to build the Afang Palace. At that time, the whole Chinese mouth was not more than 20 million, and before and after they were requisitioned to build the Great Wall, guard Lingnan, repair the Afang Palace, build a large tomb and other laborers, there were almost two or three million people, and not only children and women, spent an unknown amount of manpower and financial resources, forcing the people to complain.
In 209 BC, Chen Sheng, Wu Guang, and about 900 other peasants were escorted by imperial court officers to Yuyang to defend. On the way, because of their physical strength, both were selected as the chiefs of the farms to manage these agricultural workers. One might ask why two ordinary peasants suddenly launched a huge uprising. In fact, the direct cause was the torrential rain that year.
At that time, the two were on their way to Yuyang, a downpour of rain unexpectedly, the muddy road hindered their progress, if they could not advance, they would miss the time to reach Yuyang, and once the time was exceeded, according to the laws of the Qin Dynasty at that time, they would be killed. The situation at that time forced the two to make a decision, whether they moved forward or not, they would eventually be executed.
As a result, a bold decision sprouted in the hearts of the two - uprising and rebellion! This is the only way to live, not to oppose, there is only one dead end! On the contrary, there is a glimmer of life!
Every historical figure who plotted rebellion needs a selfless reason that can not only make the rebellion reasonable, but also call on more people at the bottom to follow them and strengthen the ranks of rebellion. As a result, Chen Sheng and Wu Guang remembered two people, Fu Su and Xiang Yan. Fu Su was the eldest son of the King of Qin, a righteous man, who was annoyed by the King of Qin because of his repeated advice, and was sent by the First Emperor to garrison the army on the border, and after the second prince succeeded to the throne, Fu Su was killed. And Xiang Yan was once a general of the Chu State, who had made many military achievements and was loved by the people, but now his whereabouts are unknown, not only life or death.
If, in the name of these two people, they called for an uprising against the people of the world, there would be many people who would agree and follow.
Therefore, the two decided to unveil the uprising in the name of "supporting Fu Su and Xiang Yan", in order to make this uprising more convincing, the two wrote the three words "Chen Sheng Wang" with a white cloth in advance, which means "Chen Sheng will be called king", stuffed in the belly of the fish caught by others, and naturally this white cloth was discovered. At the same time, Chen Sheng sent Wu Guang to a deserted ancient temple near the station at night, lit a flame, and imitated the voice of a ghost and shouted: "Great Chu Xing, King Chen Sheng." These two strange phenomena really attracted everyone's attention, and everyone talked about it, and chen sheng was also pointing out.
Now with attention, it is almost a fuse.
The officer escorting these zhuangding was drunk, and Wu Guang took the opportunity to threaten to escape, so the officer was furious, insulted Wu Guang and beat him up, Chen Sheng and Wu Guang joined forces to kill the two officers. He also appealed to others: "This trip to Yuyang must be a death, are you willing to send to death?" Even if the eldest husband dies, he must also be famous for his descendants, so can the prince and the prince be hereditary? ”
An impassioned appeal made most of the people in the group volunteer to follow the two uprisings. Since then, Chen Sheng and Wu Guang have revolted in the name of Fu Su and Xiang Yan to conform to the will of the people. After the Dazexiang uprising, the two attacked all the way and expanded their ranks along the way, and soon after, Chen Sheng established himself as king, with the name of the country Chu.
Subsequently, more and more rebels seemed to have returned to a situation of disintegration. Hu Hai, who had just ascended to the throne, certainly felt collapsed, and in the face of such a situation, the young emperor did not know how to be good, and only felt that the imperial power in his hands was particularly hot. He could only hold on and hope for the early stabilization of the situation in the country.
However, the Qin Dynasty was at the end of its rope, and the uprising was in full swing.
By the winter of the following year, Chen Sheng's army had grown to hundreds of thousands of people, and they had attacked Lishan Ling in a mighty way. Hu Hai panicked, the Janissaries only had tens of thousands of people, and in the face of hundreds of thousands of troops, they could not withstand it at all. At this time, the finance and taxation official Zhang Handan suggested that the emperor should collect the 700,000 hard laborers in Lishan Mausoleum into an army, which could not only play a role in amnesty for the world, but also save the country for a while.
Hu Hai immediately agreed, and due to the numerical crushing, Chen Sheng's army was defeated, and the crisis of the King of Qin was temporarily lifted.
However, within the Qin Dynasty, a civil war between the courtiers was underway, and the eunuch Zhao Gao was very cunning, and in order to plant the stolen Li Si, he put him to death and seized the power of the court. He said: This uprising is related to Li Si, who is a Chu person. Li Si's son, Li You, had ruled over Chen Sheng's rebellion in the past, and various phenomena were very suspicious, and Zhao Gao suggested that the King of Qin thoroughly investigate the matter, so as to avoid future troubles.
After all, what others displayed was the truth, and although he was innocent, the emperor still did not trust him, so Li Si was imprisoned. However, this was only Zhao Gao's first step, and his ultimate goal was to put Li Si to death. Therefore, he also framed the right minister Feng Fuyi and the general Feng Hao, saying that the two colluded with Li Si to conspire against him, and the two men were unwilling to admit this trumped-up crime and died mingzhi, but the emperor favored Zhao Gao, and eventually, he beheaded Li Si.
However, Zhao Gao was only happy for a long time, he thought that the power of the DPRK was finally in his hands, but a sudden news overwhelmed him - the Qin army led by Zhang Handan stopped attacking, because of the shortage of grain and grass in the army. The matter of transferring grain and grass has always been Li Si's responsibility, and Zhao Gao knows nothing about it. However, Zhao Gao would admit his incompetence, and he not only ignored the grain and grass matters, but also framed Zhang Handan for slacking off military affairs.
The general Wang Li looked at this situation and had to find a way to transport military food to Zhang Handan for the sake of the country, so that this "hope of the Qin state" would not starve to death. After the army had eaten enough, it began to attack the Zhao state that had declared independence, and the gears of history began to advance slowly...
Resources:
【"History", "On the Death of Chen"]