Among the Taiping Army, there were many female generals, one of whom was Qiu Erniang, a woman who not only survived in the annals of history, but also was "canonized" by posterity.
Qiu Erniang's original name is unknown, but because she was in the family line two, she was called the second lady. Qiu Erniang's father's name was Qiu Liu, and he had some local fame, proficient in medicine, calendar, and feng shui, and was known as "Liu Xian".
Although this "Willow Immortal" is loved, the family's life is not very good, still eating the last meal without eating, it is really blind to the name of "Willow Immortal". Life was difficult to continue, and Qiu Erniang was less than ten years old, so she became a child bride for someone else's family.
In the first year of Xianfeng, the adult Qiu Erniang was insulted by her in-laws and ran away from home without hesitation, relying on embroidery and practicing medicine to make a living. At that time, it was a chaotic world, there was the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom Movement inside, there were great powers outside, and the Great Qing Kingdom was difficult to take care of, showing a crumbling trend.
Qiu Erniang had a cousin named Lin Huai, who originally joined the Green Forest, and later joined the Taiping Army, and at this time was contacting people with lofty ideals in his hometown to join the Taiping Army, including Lin Jun, the martyr king of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, Hu Xiong, a good man in the Green Forest, and many other people who harbored revenge.
After Qiu Erniang heard the news, she found her cousin Lin Huai and asked to join the Taiping Army. Because there were also some female generals in the Taiping Army, Lin Huai agreed to let her join. In the third year of Xianfeng, all the good men rebelled at Beacon Hill, and then raised the banner of the Taiping Army to compete with the Qing court.
Within half a year, tens of thousands of people had joined in, the Qing court sent troops to encircle and suppress it, Lin Huai was hit in the forehead by foreign guns, and he died before he was born, and the team was also destroyed.
After the death of her cousin, Qiu Erniang called herself "Shun Tianfeng Qiu Niangniang", raised a large banner to reorganize the people and horses, and fought a major battle against the Qing army in Guanxi, Banling, Ekisaka and other places, and since then she has gained prestige and become the leader of the rebel army.
The following year, Qiu Erniang and Lin Jun met, and their sphere of influence quickly expanded to Xianyou, Putian and other places. Fujian officials played the Xianfeng Emperor and said: "Thieves rebel from Putian in the east to Hui'an in the south, stretching for hundreds of miles, all of them are thieves." There are those who claim to be Shun Tianfeng Qiu Niangniang, and they are called thieves chiefs..."
Xian Feng was furious and ordered Fujian officials to capture Qiu Erniang. Soon after, a notice was posted that read, "Whoever captures the thief ChiefTain Qiu Erniang will be rewarded with 1,500 taels of silver." ”
Under the reward, there will be brave men, and under temptation, there will be traitors. In June of the fifth year of Xianfeng, Qiu Erniang was arrested by Qing soldiers for betraying the traitor Chen Qiao and others. He was immediately escorted to Quanzhou for interrogation, and in prison, the Qing soldiers inflicted various poisonous punishments to ask them to confess to their henchmen, but Qiu Erniang, despite her lack of skin, was still unyielding and refused to confess her accomplices. Seeing that he was young and had a bit of a posture, the Qing soldiers took turns to be rude to him, leaving only a breath.
On June 14, Qiu Erniang was escorted to the court of justice and tortured by Ling Chi. Three days earlier, notices had already been posted, and people from all over the world rushed to Quanzhou to observe the execution after hearing the news. On the day of the execution, they had already been unable to get through, and they all wanted to see what Lady Qiu of Shuntian's destiny really looked like.
Poor Qiu Erniang, who only tied a piece of red cloth around her waist, and did not have an inch of clothing on her body, was carried to the high platform of the Dharma Field with a large basket, tied it to a wooden frame, ripped off the red cloth around her waist, punched her in the chest, and when she opened her mouth, she stuffed a wooden walnut into her mouth so that it could not utter a great contrarian word.
Above his left and right thighs, the executioner cut off a piece of flesh, throwing one piece into the air and one piece falling to the ground, which is "sacrificing heaven and earth". Then cut a knife across his forehead and pull it down hard, covering his eyes so that he could not look around. Then the knife begins.
When it was about to get dark, a generation of female masters was left with only sensen white bones, and the executioner ripped off a small piece of "heart flesh" in her heart to disperse the only remaining breath, and then used a large axe to take away the first rank, hung on a high pole to show the public, and the skeleton was chopped into eight pieces, which was "unloaded eight pieces".
When Qiu Erniang was killed, she was only twenty-three years old, and the good years had passed away, which could not help but make people sigh. After his death, the people of his hometown shaped a golden body for him, burned incense and prostrated, and honored him as "Fairy Girl", "Fairy Aunt", and "Lady Youlu".