During the Chenghua period of the Ming Dynasty, the imperial court carried out three military raids on the Jurchen tribe in Liaodong Province, known in history as "Chenghua Ploughing Court". The so-called "ploughing court" is to give the enemy a devastating blow, cut off the conditions for its recovery, and make it impossible for it to pose a threat.
After Ming Chengzu moved the capital to Beijing, Duoyan Wei was established from Gubeikou to Shanhaiguan, Taining Wei was established from Qiantun Wei in Guangning to Baiyun Mountain east of Guangning, and Fuyu Wei was established from east of Baiyun Mountain to Kaiyuan. He also divided the savage Jurchens from the northeast of Kaiyuan to the west of the Songhua River and the sea into more than 270 guard houses, each of which was given an official seal, and the tribal chiefs were selected to serve as commanders, thousands of households, and other positions, and sometimes some naturalized indigenous people were allowed to serve as the commanders and governors of the capitals, and the Ming Dynasty regarded these guardhouses as border screen domains.
The Ming Dynasty established the Nuer Gandu Division in Heilongjiang further north, and sent envoys to appease the local natives of all ethnic groups, and if they were willing to submit to the imperial court, they moved them to Anle Prefecture in Kaiyuan and Zizhou in Liaoyang to settle down. The leaders of these tribes were all canonized and appointed by the Ming government, and the imperial court awarded them crowns and seals according to their official positions, and issued them to Feng Lu on a monthly basis. The leaders of these guards had to pay tribute every year, the tribal garrisons had to be reported to the imperial court for approval, and when there was a war, their strong men had to obey the court's conscription.
In the last year of Yongle, the imperial court's policy of surrender was gradually abolished, and a part of the Jurchens stationed in Kaiyuan rebelled and entered the territory of Huli Reform, and the two sides attacked and killed each other. During the Xuande period, the imperial court once again sent envoys to recruit them and move them to the "old camp" of Jianzhou to settle down. The "old camp" was named Dongjianzhou, and at first there was only one guard, and then the left and right guards were added, collectively known as the three guards of Jianzhou. At that time, the Jurchens of Sanwei were only a few thousand in total, and their territory ran from Shanhaiguan to Kaiyuan, south to the sea, and the other three were Mengman tribes.
Ma Wensheng, a military attendant during the Chenghua period, made this comment on the characteristics of the Mongol and Jurchen tribes in this area: "Participating in its nature is that the Jurchens in Jianzhou are too deceitful and too Haixi, and Haixi is too Duoyan and other three guards. Gai Haixi and Jianzhou can fight with horses, while Duoyan Sanwei is longer than riding and shooting. He believed that the Mongols were only good at riding and shooting, and the Jurchen cavalry infantry was very powerful, so the Jurchens were more difficult to deal with, especially the Jianzhou Jurchens.
In the fourteenth year of orthodoxy, that is, in June 1449, the Wallachian Division also repeatedly invaded the Territory of the Ming Dynasty, and Emperor Ming Yingzong personally led 200,000 troops to go out on a campaign, but as a result, he was defeated at Tumu Fort, Ming Yingzong was captured, and the three most elite battalions of the Ming Army were almost completely destroyed. At the same time, the Flower King of Tubu invaded Liaodong, Ah Le invaded Shaanxi, and the Ming army lost in these directions. Since then, the Ming Dynasty's national strength has declined greatly, and its control and deterrence of the Mengman tribes near the border are far less than in the past. The Duoyan Sanwei and Haixi and Jianzhou Jurchens in the Liaodong region were also attacked by Ye Xian, and they no longer obeyed the Ming Dynasty, and there were frequent rebellions, and this area was in flames for several years until the Jingtai period. Only then tend to settle down.
Many leaders of the Haixi and Savage Jurchen tribes died in successive wars over the years, and the official seal books given by the imperial court were also snatched away first, and the descendants of the dead chiefs, without these certificates, could not inherit the official position, and could only pay tribute in the name of the sheren every year, but could not be called an official, could not take a special car on the road, and the emperor was not allowed to sit on the table when giving banquets, and the rewards were much less than before, so these people held grudges and brewed rebellion. The officials stationed in Liaodong were aware of the situation, but they did not deal with it in time, but let it develop.
In the second year of Chenghua, Nurhaci's fifth ancestor, Dong Shan, the governor of Jianzhou, instigated Huli Toubu and Haixi Jurchen to frequently enter the Kou Border Pass. In the "Jianyi Kao", it is recorded: "Dong Shan corrected Mao Pi, Haixi Zhuyi, and stole the border without a false moon." This means that Dong Shan tangled with the Huli Gai and Haixi Jurchen tribes, and every month they attacked.
In the second year of Chenghua to the third year of Chenghua, the Jurchens of Jianzhou committed crimes every year, and the three years of Chenghua from January to March, and even two consecutive invasions, the Ming Dynasty commanded Deng Zuo to die. Emperor Mingxianzong was furious and decided to take a tough approach to the crusade, ordering "Smash its nest, and destroy its kind!" This will is the most direct explanation of what is meant by "ploughing the court."
The imperial court ordered the eunuch Huang Shun, the chief military officer Wu Jingbo Zhao Fu, and the zuo capital Yushi Li Bing to lead a large army to the conquest, and also ordered the Joseon to send troops to cooperate with the Ming army in the attack.
After a month of encirclement and suppression, the Ming army beheaded more than 630 people and captured more than 240 people, and the father and son of Li Manzhu, the jurchen leader of Jianzhou, were beheaded by the Korean army and DongShan was captured.
On the way to escort Dong Shan and his men to the Capital Division, he still spoke wildly and was not convinced.
When they arrived in Guangning, Zhao Fu and others believed that if Dong Shan was put back, there would be endless trouble. So after they played the Ming court, they killed Dong Shan and relocated his brothers and hundreds of young and strong people to Liangguang and Fujian.
In this war, although the Ming army won and suffered heavy losses, the strong people who could fight in the Jurchen tribe were either eliminated or moved, unable to fight against the imperial court, and the border gained a long period of peace.
However, after ten years, the new generation of men of the Jianzhou Jurchens has reached adulthood again, and their combat effectiveness has gradually recovered. At this time, a dispute caused by the Ming Dynasty border generals extorting the Jurchen tribe once again triggered a border war.
In the fourteenth year of Chenghua, the Haixi Wu avant-garde commanded The Sanchiha Shangshu to the imperial court, accusing a commander surnamed Guan of Kaiyuan of asking for bribes and extracting pearls, leopard skins and other property. After receiving the report, the bingbu sent a letter to the inspector of Liaodong,The Right Deputy Capital, Yushi Chen, asking him to investigate the matter, and the commander with the surname Guan was very frightened after hearing the news. It was at this time that the Haixi Wu people were about to pay tribute to the capital, and he was the nephew of Sanchiha. Guan Command's envoys then coerced and seduced The Inspector and asked him to go to Beijing and tell the imperial court that he had not accepted bribes, and the Inspector did so.
When Sanchiha found out, he was extremely angry and claimed to bring soldiers to seek justice. The border guards hurriedly reported the situation to Chen Yu, who sent an official letter inviting Chi Ha to come to Quang Ninh to understand the situation in person. Sanchiha took more than a dozen people with him and wanted to go from FushunGuan to Quang Ninh.
At that time, the extortion of the bian generals against the indigenous tribes was a common phenomenon, and Zhou Jun and other generals who guarded Kaiyuan were worried that after Sanchi ha came, they would expose their affairs, so they tried to prevent him from going to Quang Ninh. They sent people to Quang Ninh and reported to Chen Yu that in the past, the Haixi people had never been allowed to enter from Fushun Pass, and this was to prevent them from familiarizing themselves with the terrain of this road, so as not to cause trouble, so they could not be allowed to enter this time. Chen Yu did not realize that Zhou Jun was right, so he hurriedly ordered Sanchiha to return. However, at this time, Sanchiha had already entered the customs, and he felt that he had been teased, and he was furious, and he folded his arrows and vowed to repay this humiliating hatred.
Sanchiha returned to Fushun with sorrow, and The Commander of the Imperial Capital, Luo Xiong, knew that this time he had completely angered Sanchiha, and in order to defuse the situation, he feasted and persuaded him, and then sent Sanchiha out of the customs.
Since Dong Shan was killed, Jianzhou Sanwei Nuzhen has always wanted to find an opportunity to avenge him, but her own strength is not enough, and she must rely on Haixi. When they learned of what had happened to Sanchiha, they invited him in, and the two sides agreed to form an alliance against the Ming Dynasty, and the border situation became increasingly tense.
After Chen Yu received the news, he made a gesture of preparing for a large-scale conquest of Jianzhou, and he posted a notice saying that the officers and troops were going to go out on the same side, and on the other hand, he recruited soldiers to create an atmosphere of war. However, Chen Yu only bluffed, in fact, did not want to start a war, and he himself did not rush to Liaoyang to take command.
However, the Jurchens' desire for revenge was real, and in the first month of the fourteenth year of Chenghua, the three guards of Jianzhou entangled thousands of Jurchens in Haixi, taking advantage of the fact that the Ming army was busy with the New Year, suddenly launched an attack, broke through the customs and entered the country, and plundered in the area of Fengji Fort. After the alarm reached Guangning, Chen Yu became nervous and rushed to Liaoyang to organize a defense, but the Jurchens had already returned with a full load.
Jurchen's entry into the Kou this time made Chen Yu extremely frightened, because this matter was caused by the greed of the border generals and his own improper handling, and he was afraid of being held accountable by the imperial court, so he was ready to plan a massacre of the indigenous tribes near the border pass, so that he could both cover up his responsibilities and risk his merits to receive rewards.
At that time, there were eighteen indigenous tribes near the border of Eastern Liaoning, and each of them had emissaries who had paid tribute and had not yet returned. After the outbreak of the war between Sanchiha and the Ming Dynasty, they were afraid of being mistaken by the imperial court as enemies and getting involved, and they were also worried that the tribute envoys would be detained by the imperial court, so the leaders of these tribes also took the initiative to come to Fushun to explain the situation, pointing out that the offenders were Haixi people and had nothing to do with them.
Chen Yu and Han Bin, the deputy commander-in-chief who was guarding Liaoyang, intended to annihilate these eighteen tribes as a result of the victory against Sanchiha, so they detained Ye Sangge and others in Shenyang Wei, and then went to the court and said: "Although the name of jianzhou sanwei Yifu is shielded, it is not common to rebel. If you gain profit, you will be in the middle of the battle, and if you lose, it will be the most difficult to defend if you are in direct contact with the Haixi women. If it is not a major setback to its front, the benefits will be rampant, and when will the soldiers and disasters be knotted. Mo Ruoshe obeyed the power and won by trickery. "It means that the three guards of Jianzhou are an increasingly rampant scourge, and the imperial court should do whatever it takes to eradicate it, otherwise there will be a series of disasters on the border, and there will be endless troubles."
In February, Chen Yu repeatedly reported to the imperial court that the Jurchens were about to attack, and suggested that "the generals should be dispatched to arrest them on all sides, or set up ambushes to invite them to return, or take advantage of the gap to capture their wives and children." ”
After creating a tense atmosphere of imminent jurchen invasion, Chen Yu carried out a massacre, and he led his army to attack the villages of eighteen tribes at night, killing people when they saw them, but did not rob the people and livestock. In this massacre, the elites of the tribe were not all killed, and some escaped. After Chen Yu's class returned, he killed ye sangha and others who were imprisoned in prison, and then reported to the imperial court that they had destroyed the nest of the Jurchens and won a great victory.
Ma Wensheng recorded this incident in the "Book of Appeasing Dongyi": "He led the armies to attack the villages at night, slaughtered them, and did not plunder people and animals, and the elite also fell away." Even if he returns, he will be beaten to death and the monk will be imprisoned, but he will be a good news of the nest. ”
On the fourth day of March in the fourteenth year of Chenghua, Emperor Mingxianzong summoned the eunuch Huai'en, Bingbu Shangshu Yu Zijun, the attendant Zhang Peng, Ma Wensheng and others to discuss how to pacify Jianzhou Sanwei and Haixi Jurchen. Everyone believes that there was no rebellion in the Sangha and other tribes, and that there were emissaries who paid tribute, but now they have been slaughtered and should be comforted first. The emperor agreed, so he issued a decree: "The Jianzhou Yi people were suppressed by a large army, fearing suspicion and fear, and went to Fu'an with the military attendants Ma Wensheng and Tongshi Zhan Sheng. ”
Ming Xianzong
On the fifth day of April, Ma Wensheng and Zhan Sheng, as well as Chongyang, a tribute emissary of the Singh tribe in Beijing, arrived in Fushun. Ma Wensheng first asked Chongyang to return, informed the surviving people of the will of the imperial court, and asked the leaders of the Jianzhou and Haixi Jurchen tribes to come to listen to the instructions, expressed their condolences to the innocent slaughtered tribes, and also gave cattle and sheep cloth, and finally ordered these leaders to go to Beijing to listen to the arrangements.
While Ma Wensheng was appeased, he also received intelligence: although Haixi Nuzhen ostensibly obeyed the court's solicitation, she was secretly preparing to invade the border pass. So he chose a naturalized Jurchen Zhao An in Dongning Wei, and in the name of recruitment, went deep into the hinterland of the Jurchens in Haixi to investigate the situation. A few days later, Zhao An returned and said that the Haixi Jurchen was indeed preparing for battle and had gathered thousands of cavalry. At this time, Wei Lang, the eunuch who was guarding Kaiyuan, also sent someone to tell Ma Wensheng that the Haixi Nuzhen was about to provoke a war. Ma Wensheng quickly reported the situation to the imperial court.
Marvin Rose
After Emperor Mingxianzong received the report, he ordered that the commander-in-chief Du Du Tongzhi Ouxin, the deputy commander-in-chief Han Bin, and the staff general Cui Sheng each lead their troops to the crusade, and at the same time dispatch the former general Zhou Jun to lead kaiyuan and Tieling elite troops of 3,000 to set up an ambush in the area of Fengji Fort.
Ma Wensheng rushed to Kaiyuan to sit down, he had just arrived for three days, Haixi and Jianzhou Nuzhen really divided the road into Kou. The Ming army waited for the Jurchens to enter the ambush circle and suddenly launched an attack. In this battle, the Ming army won a great victory, beheading more than 200 ranks, giving birth to dozens of people, 120 horses and many military armor. Among the Jurchens who were killed, most of them were Haixi centaurs. After receiving the good news, Ming Xianzong was very happy, and ordered the reward and promoted the Jieren to one level.
Ma Wensheng believed that for the Jurchen tribe, it should be suppressed and treated at the same time. The cause of the rebellion between Jianzhou and Haixi Jurchen was the loss of hereditary official positions, so she held a grudge. Now that the imperial court had punished them with force, they should continue to appease and restore their hereditary positions, so that the Liaodong border could be stabilized for a long time. So he went to the imperial court and asked to examine the official seals issued to the Jurchen tribes that year. On the basis of the retained records of the Cabinet, the hereditary qualifications of more than a dozen tribal chiefs were determined and restored. The Jurchens were very grateful, and the avant-garde governor of the Haixi Vultures, Such as Chancha, all submitted to the imperial court.
On the issue of dealing with the rebellion of the Jurchen tribes, the imperial court was divided into two factions, Ma Wensheng belonged to the faction advocating appeasement, and the eunuch Wang Zhi, who was deeply favored by Emperor Xianzong, advocated suppression. Wang Zhi was very dissatisfied with Ma Wensheng's solicitation.
When Ma Wensheng was ordered to rectify Liaodong in the twelfth year of Chenghua, he was offended by the greed of Chen Yu, the governor of Liaodong, in Shangshu, and Chen Yu's backstage was Wang Zhi. This time, when Ma Wensheng went to appease, Wang Zhi also wanted to send people to go with him, in order to compete for merit, but he was rejected, so he held a grudge. He then framed Ma Wensheng with Shangshu Lin Cong and others, saying that the Jurchen rebellion was provoked by Ma Wensheng's ban on the border agricultural tool trade, and put him in prison to fight Chongqing Wei in Sichuan.
Wang Zhi believed that the Jurchens could not really surrender, they "yi pod trance, Yue and Kou", the front foot to accept the stroke, the back foot to invade, blindly beckoning will make the border never peaceful, Ming Xianzong agreed with him. In the fifteenth year of Chenghua, the Jurchens of Jianzhou again vowed to attack the border, and in October, Emperor Xianzong ordered the eunuch Wang Zhi and the chief military officer Zhu Yong of Funing, and Inspector Chen Yu to lead a large army to suppress it.
By December, the Ming army had won a great victory, "capturing 695 ranks, capturing 486 people, breaking more than 450 villages, obtaining more than 1,000 cattle and horses, and armor and weapons are not counted." ”
These three military strikes during the Chenghua years severely damaged the Jianzhou and Haixi Jurchen departments, making them "strong and killed, old and naïve prisoners", "scattered, and the rest of the survivors are almost nothing." The original intention of the Ming Dynasty was to achieve "slaughter by those who can be slaughtered" until "all is destroyed". However, this goal was not achieved, and more than a hundred years later, the Jurchens of Jianzhou multiplied and grew again, and finally rebelled against the Ming Dynasty. Since the Ming Dynasty had already slaughtered the Jurchens of Jianzhou at that time, why were they able to recover and grow again? What happened in the more than a hundred years after the Ploughing Court? It's still worth exploring.