Yu Que vowed to die for Anqing
Anqing's strategic location since ancient times has been extremely important, known as "the throat of the Yangtze River, the first state of Wuchu's division". In the history of the Anqing Defense War, there was a loyal minister from Wuwei who was known as the first loyal minister of the Yuan Dynasty, named Yu Que.
Yu Que, zi tingxin, yizi Tianxin, Tang Wu clan (Dang Xiang Qiang) people, for generations living in Hexi Wuwei. His father, Sha Thorn Zangbu, was an official in Luzhou and became a native of Hefei, Luzhou. Yu Que lost his father at a very young age and grew up to support his mother by teaching. He was friends with Wu Cheng's disciple Zhang Heng and progressed in his studies. Later, he was admitted to the jinshi and was awarded the title of Tongzhi Si Prefecture (同知泗州, in modern Sihong, Jiangsu) affairs. Yu Que was strict in his administration, and the gentry were very afraid of him. The agricultural harvest in the state has failed, and the peasants who are short of grain dare not truthfully report the situation to their superiors. Yu Que asked Zhongshu Province for approval, and all peasants who were short of grain could reduce taxes or reduce taxes, and could use money instead of paying public grain, and the peasants were very happy. The people took the initiative to pool their money to give him gifts and express their gratitude, but he refused to accept them. Soon, he was summoned to the imperial court and became the head of the Punishment Department in order to serve the Hanlin script. He did not flatter the magnates, and wrote to the prime minister to expose the bad deeds of the magnates, who ignored them and abandoned the officials and returned to the country. Soon, the imperial court summoned him to revise the three histories of Liao, Jin, and Song, and once again entered Hanlin as a revisionist, and the official worshiped to supervise the imperial history. Later, he served as the left and right Shiro of Huguanghang Province. Guangxi's mountain roads are steep, and peasants often have to pay several times the price of public grain, so Yu Que let the peasants use cloth to pay public grain on behalf of the peasants, which greatly facilitates the peasants. Hunan Zhang Xuanwei gave Yu Que a box of Po Lu incense, and Yu Que took the incense box and swept it up, feeling very heavy, suspecting that there was something else, and insisted on not accepting it. It turned out that the box did indeed contain gold. Zhang Xuanwei sighed and said, "None of the high-ranking officials I have given gifts have ever resigned." Incorruptible as curling, only Yu Gong you are alone! Later, Yu Que was summoned to the dynasty again, and for the experience of Ji Xian, he moved to Hanlin to be in charge, and then served as the secretary of the Lian Visiting Department of Zhejiang Province. When the local corrupt officials heard that Yu Que had come to take up his post here, some people were so frightened that they automatically left their posts. The governor of Quzhou, Yan Zhijitai, had killed innocent people, and Yu Que arrested him and imprisoned him, punishing him according to law. Xingtai Yushi was implicated in Yan Zhijitai, so he tried to fabricate charges against Yu Queluo and make false accusations. When Yu Que's mother was ill, he resigned his post again and went home.
When Yu Que was in a short period of military affairs, he annotated the Zhou Yi and led the students to speak at the County Society. The soldiers all listened to the lectures outside the door, so that they could all understand the truth of honoring the king. Yu Que attached great importance to scripture and wrote about the Five Classics. Especially working on poetry, his disciples compiled his writings into five volumes of the Qingyang Shanfang Collection. At first, Wei Su was conscripted into the dynasty as a literary person. Someone asked Yu Ji, a scholar of Hanlin Zhi and Guozi, "How about the talent of Wei Su?" Yu Ji said, "I don't know what is wrong with me. If you want to talk about people who seek talented learning, Yu Que is one. The commentator asked him, "How do you know about Yu Que?" Yu Ji said, "I found him in Yu Que's article. Later, it turned out that Yu Ji's words were right.
Yu Que later acted as the deputy envoy of Huaixi Xuanwei and the capital marshal's office, and divided his troops to guard Anqing. One year, when there was a major natural disaster in the country, Yu Que took two hundred stones of grain from his salary and let people cook for the hungry every day. He also reported to the Zhongshu Province, and obtained 30,000 ingots, saving the lives of many people. In the summer of the fifteenth year (1355), the torrential rains became a disaster, and the water in the city gushed out like a spring, and Yu Que presided over the disaster relief, and the water situation subsided. In the autumn, a great harvest was obtained, and the army received 30,000 grain. Considering that the problem of feeding the soldiers had been solved, Yu Que dug deep into the moat without water, added the daughter wall of the city, built three large moats outside the city, built watchtowers on the city, and strengthened the defense facilities inside and outside the city.
At this time, some of the cities in Huaidong had fallen, and Yu Que alone guarded Anqing, becoming the guarantee of Jianghuai. Yu Que's old friend Gan Yan was entrusted by the rebel army to persuade Yu Que to surrender. Yu Que pulled Gan Yan outside, smashed his teeth and cheeks with chains, and decapitated him outside the East Gate.
Yu Que was later promoted to Zuo Cheng (左丞) and was given the crown of Erpinguan (二品官), who became more and more diligent and vowed to repay the country with his death. Once, during the course of training, he gathered his generals under the Jingzhong Ancestral Hall and said to them, "Men should be like Wei Xiaokuan when they live, and they should be like Zhang Tour when they die, and they should not submit to those evil forces." The soldiers listened and were deeply encouraged.
At the beginning of the eighteenth year of Zheng (1358), three rebel armies of Zhao Pusheng, Chen Youyi, and Zhu Kou besieged Anqing City from the east, west, and south. Yu Que was a pioneer soldier, and fought with the most powerful Chen Youyi army outside the west gate of Anqing City, killing countless enemies and suffering more than ten wounds. At this time, the enemy army attacked Anqing City from other city gates. Yu Que saw that the general trend had gone, drew the knife and killed himself, and fell into the clear water pond. He was only fifty-six years old. After that, his wife and children also committed suicide one after another. Yu Que ruled the army, gave strict orders, and was able to share weal and woe with his subordinates. When he was sick, the generals begged heaven, and hatred could not be replaced by his body. When Yu Que saw that the soldiers supported their own good intentions, they would reluctantly dress and wear a crown to come out, so that they would not worry. Every time he was at the forefront of the battle, he would use shields to cover him, and he pushed the shield open and said, "You also have a life, why do you come to protect me?" Therefore, everyone is willing to repay the country with death. Seeing Yu Que committing suicide, the subordinates followed countless people who jumped into the river and committed suicide.
After Yu Que's death, he was posthumously honored as the Duke of Fengguo ,谥名忠宣, and posterity called Yu Que the first loyal vassal of the Yuan Dynasty. The leader of the rebel army, Chen Youyi, admired Yu Que's righteousness, redeemed his body with heavy money, and buried him in a coffin outside the West Gate of Anqing. After the establishment of the Ming Dynasty, Zhu Yuanzhang built monuments and temples for Yu Que in and around Anqing City, and ordered the local government to pay tribute to important festivals. During the Jiajing Dynasty of the Ming Dynasty, a large viewing pavilion was built to commemorate Yu Que.
The article is reproduced from the "Liangzhou Cultural Research" WeChat public account