In March of the seventeenth year of Chongzhen, Li Zicheng led the Dashun army to occupy Beijing and overthrow the ming dynasty. Just as the so-called heroes of the times, the reason why Li Zicheng was able to overthrow the Ming Dynasty was actually the most important force behind it was the millions of people from Henan. That is to say, although some of the rebel generals, including Li Zicheng, were from Shaanxi, more than 90% of the soldiers of the Dashun Army were from the People of Henan. Without their support, Li Zicheng could not overthrow the Ming Dynasty at all!
First, turn to Henan
Li Zicheng joined the rebel army around the second year of Chongzhen, and then moved to Shaanxi, Shanxi, Sichuan, Hubei and other places, but he did not grow rapidly, but fought very hard. In the eleventh year of Chongzhen, Li Zicheng was surrounded by Sun Chuanting, and only eighteen people were left, let alone overthrow the Ming Dynasty, and it was even difficult to save his life. The following year, Li Zicheng walked out of the Shangluo Mountains and gathered some of his troops, but there were still only more than a thousand of his men.
In the thirteenth year of Chongzhen, Li Zicheng led more than a thousand people into the territory of Henan, but he did not expect that the strength would quickly grow, "the hungry people near and far hoes hoes, and those who responded to it were like flowing water, day and night, calling millions, and its momentum could not be extinguished." After that, Li Zicheng continued to fight in Henan, defeated the main force of the Ming army, then entered Shaanxi and then went north to occupy Beijing. If he had not entered the Henan region, Li Zicheng would not have the strength to overthrow the Ming Dynasty at all. So why did Henan become the real gravedigger of the Ming Dynasty?
2. Oppression by the king of the clan
Starting from Zhu Yuanzhang, the Ming emperors sealed the princes to various places, of which eleven were successively crowned kings in Henan, and by the end of the Ming Dynasty, there were still seven clan kings, and the number of clan members was the largest. These clan kings were very arbitrary, encroaching on the fields through various means, oppressing the people, resulting in "the land of Zhongzhou half into the clan house", so a large number of peasants lost the land on which they depended. The Zhou Dynasty Palace is located in Kaifeng, and the local people's "children of the field property have entered the public office, and the people's resentment has been extreme."
These clan kings not only occupied a large amount of land, but also received the corresponding "Feng Lu" from the imperial court. The usual standard is 10,000 stones for the prince, 2,000 stones for the king of the county, and 1,000 stones for the general of the zhenguo, which are reduced in order of the level of the title. By the middle of the Ming Dynasty, the entire Henan tax grain could not afford to support such a clan, and at that time, the annual remaining rice and wheat was 843,000 stones, and the Henan clan actually needed 1.92 million stones! These burdens were eventually passed on to the people of Henan.
Third, natural and man-made disasters
In the last years of the Ming Dynasty, natural disasters continued, but the most serious was the Henan region. From the apocalypse years, there was either a drought or a plague of locusts, and the people's lives were very difficult. Due to the continuous wars of the Ming Dynasty and financial difficulties, it was unable to help the people. Around the twelfth year of Chongzhen, a greater disaster swept through the entire territory of Henan, and the land was thousands of miles away and starvation was everywhere. However, instead of providing disaster relief, the Ming Dynasty urged money and grain, making the people unhappy.
At this time, Li Zicheng led more than a thousand people into Henan, attacked the government, and opened warehouses to help the victims, thus quickly gaining the support of the local people, and people joined Li Zicheng's rebel army. After that, Li Zicheng targeted the Ming dynasty kings in Henan, such as the Tang king of Nanyang, the Fu king of Luoyang, the Zhou king of Kaifeng, and the Chongwang of Runing. In this way, Li Zicheng not only expanded his economic strength, but also gained the support of the local people, and his power grew larger and larger, and the number of rebels reached one million.
References: 1. History of peasant wars at the end of the Ming Dynasty; 2. History of the Ming Dynasty