Since the first year of Chongzhen (1628), there has been a great drought in northern China, the red land is thousands of miles, and there is no grass, and the "Chronicle of the Continuation of The County" of Hannan records, "In the first year of Chongzhen, the whole Shaanxi sky was as red as blood." Five years of famine, six years of water, seven years of autumn locusts, famine, eight years of September Xixiang drought, slightly yang waterlogging, all the houses are gone. Nine years of drought locusts, ten years of autumn grass, eleven years of summer flying locusts covering the sky... Thirteen years of drought... Fourteen years of drought". Since the Chongzhen Dynasty, Shaanxi has had a major drought every year, and many people have been displaced.
In May of the second year of Chongzhen, the northern Shaanxi post was officially approved, and the soldier Li Zicheng was unemployed.
In the third year of Chongzhen (1630), Shaanxi was again starving, and Ma Maocai, the inspector of Shaanxi, said in the "Beichen Great Famine" that the people competed to eat the grass in the mountains, and the grass was eaten, the bark was peeled, the bark was eaten, and only guanyin soil could be eaten, and finally bloated and died.
In the sixth year of Chongzhen (1633), "the whole Shaanxi drought locust, Yaozhou, Chengcheng County, the people died more than half."
In the seventh year of Chongzhen (1634), Lu Weiqi, a former soldier who lived in Henan, wrote to the imperial court: "For several years, the subjects and villagers have not suffered hardships, no months, no soldiers, and no days and no hardships. Gengwu (Chongzhen three years) drought; Xin Wei drought; Nongshen drought. Wild grass, ten rooms and nine empty. ...... There are no barking dogs in the village, and there are still knocks on the door of the conscription; the trees have crows, and they sprinkle the blood of the whip. Yellow and red land, the countryside is a few people; white bones and green phosphorus, night and night like smelling ghosts crying. If the poor are not turned into thieves, they cannot be obtained." Drought in turn caused a plague of locusts, which made the plague even more extensive. In the 10th, 11th, 12th, and 13th years of Chongzhen, Henan had a locust drought, "people cannibalize each other, grass and trees were exhausted, and the soil and kow rose up at the same time", and most of its starving people were from the "king of chuang" Li Zicheng. Chongzhen thirteen or fourteen years, "the great wilderness of the north and the south ... Dead people abandon their children, and the River is blocked. ”
In the thirteenth year of Chongzhen (1640), there were major epidemics in Shunde Province, Hejian Province, and Daming Province, and it was an epidemic of fierce infectious diseases, "plague infection, human death eight or nine".
In the fourteenth year of Chongzhen (1641), the epidemic further developed. In Daming Province, "there is no rain in the spring, the locusts eat all the wheat, the plague is rampant, and the people die 56 out of 10, and the years are fierce." The rate of deaths is quite high. Guangping, Shunde, Zhending and other provinces, there are quite a few similar records. Zuo Maodi urged Cao Yun, Dao Zhongchi said: "When the subject arrived in Linqing from the Jinghai, he saw three people starving the dead, three of the epidemic dead, and four thieves. Rice stone silver twenty-four two, people die to eat. But the Holy One remembers. "At this time, the provinces of North China were again plagued and died." Within a night, the people fled in horror, and the city was empty."
In July of the fourteenth year of Chongzhen (1641), the disease was transmitted from the Hebei region to Beijing, and the disease was called "knotty disease",[4] "The great plague of summer and autumn, the puppet gave birth to a fat bulge, and died immediately in a few moments, which is called the knotty plague, and all people suffer from this fourteenth five-year." In the spring, there were also vomiting blood, or several people in a family and died. "Pimple" is a term for the enlarged lymph nodes of patients with bubonic plague.
The bubonic plague that occurred in the summer and autumn of the sixteenth year of Chongzhen (1643) was transformed into pneumonic plague in the spring of the seventeenth year of Chongzhen (1644). The mortality rate of the population in Beijing is about 40% or more, and there are ten rooms and nine empty rooms. The outbreak on the outskirts of Beijing is also severe. In Tongzhou, "chongzhen sixteen years of decay before the July epidemic, known as gangrene disease, than the house infection, there are family bereaved people who have no convergence." The records of Changping Prefecture are called "pimple disease", and "those who see it die, until there are those who destroy the door". Hejian Fujing County"Chongzhen sixteen years of great epidemic, the sick vomited blood like watermelon water immediately died. ”
In August of the sixteenth year of Chongzhen (1643), there was an outbreak of pneumonic plague in Tianjin: "The plague fell from heaven, and the plague epidemic was spread from August to the present (September 15), and the infection was at its peak." There are those who die one or two days, there are those who die day and night, there are no less than hundreds of people every day, and even those who do not leave a single person in the whole family, row by door, and none of them are preserved. ”
In the seventeenth year of Chongzhen (1644), Luo Yangsheng, the military governor of Tianjin, said, "Last year, the plague in the Beijing Division was a great work, the death pillow was a pillow, ten rooms and nine empty, and even the household was exhausted, and no one converged." ”
In the autumn of the seventeenth year of Chongzhen (1644), the plague spread south to Lu'an Province, and "the sick person first produced nucleus between the underarms, or vomited light blood and died, and was not subject to medicinal bait." Although relatives and friends do not dare to ask for hanging, there are people who have died and no one has been buried."
Plague in Shanxi has also spread to neighboring provinces. During the seven or eight years of Chongzhen, the people of Xingxian County fled to avoid the epidemic, which may spread the plague to neighboring areas. Crossing the Yellow River from Xing County, is the Yan'an Province and Yulin Province in Shaanxi, Chongzhen nine to sixteen years, Yulin Province and Yan'an Province of the county successively outbreak of major epidemics, such as Chongzhen Ten Years "Great Plague,...... Thirteen years of death in the city of Mizhi, summer and great epidemic, fifteen years,...... Plague, Sixteen Years, Minoru, July County Town Plague Masterpiece".
Jiangnan was hit by great water in the thirteenth year of Chongzhen (1640), there was a drought and locust plague in the fourteenth year of Chongzhen (1641), and drought and epidemic plague continued in Chongzhen for fifteen years. Local society is in a very fragile state, bandits and displaced people rise together, and civil unrest in various places continues to break out.
According to incomplete statistics from historians, during the two plague pandemics during the Wanli and Chongzhen years of the Ming Dynasty, the death toll in the three provinces of Shaanxi, Jin, and Hebei in Northern China was at least more than 10 million. The plague epidemic and drought, locust plague and war ensued, and it was reasonable that the Ming Dynasty could not withstand the Qing army moving south.
Surprisingly, the plague that had spread for many years dissipated without a trace after the first year of the reign of Qing Shunzhi (1644), and the wind and rain in North China were smooth, and the social economy began to recover.
The sky is going to die, and the manpower is unstoppable.
In January 1644, Li Zicheng proclaimed himself emperor in Xi'an, founded the country under the name "Dashun", and began an eastern expedition to Beijing.
On the first day of March 1644, Li Zicheng was in Kening Wuguan.
In 1644, on the fifth day of the first month of March, the Chongzhen Emperor, enfeoffed Wu Sangui as Pingxi Bo, and urgently dispatched Wu Sangui, the general of Liaodong, Wang Yongji, the governor of Jiliao, Tang Tong, the general of Changping, and Liu Zeqing, the general of Shandong, to weijing. The Qing army learned that Wu Sangui led hundreds of thousands of soldiers and civilians to evacuate Ningyuan, and the compilation judgment showed that the Ming Dynasty was facing serious danger, but did not think that the Ming Dynasty would quickly perish. Dorgon ordered the repair of military weapons, the preparation of grain and horses, and was scheduled to march into the Ming Dynasty in early April.
On March 15, 1644, Li Zicheng's peasant army arrived at Juyongguan, and in the early morning of March 19, Zhang Jinyan, the shangshu of the bingbu, took the initiative to open the Zhengyang Gate, and the Chongzhen Emperor Jingshan hanged himself, and Daming perished.
On March 19, 1644, Wu Sangui led an army to Shanhaiguan, and then led his troops west into Gyeonggi. On March 22, Wu Sangui's troops went to the Yutian area, and when they learned that the Jingshi had fallen and Chongzhen hanged himself, Wu Sangui knew that it was meaningless to enter the capital, so he turned his horse's head and returned to Shishan Customs.
Since Li Zi became a concoctant of Wu Sangui, he sent the Ming Dynasty to demote officials, and with 40,000 taels of silver and gold and silver rewards given to Wu Sangui, he made Wu Sangui a marquis, and because the Wu Sangui people were still in Beijing, he led his troops to surrender to Beijing.
Unfortunately, Li Zicheng tortured and plundered the gentry in the capital and chased after the stolen money, and Wu Sangui's father Wu Xiang was also among them, and his home was raided. What made Wu Sangui even more intolerable was that Liu Zongmin took Wu Sangui's concubine Chen Yuanyuan for himself, and Wu Sangui angrily returned to Shanhaiguan with his division, and swore an oath to Li Zicheng's peasant army. Guo Yunlong and Yang Kun were sent to ask the Qing army in Shenyang for help.
On the fourth day of April 1644, the Qing army, which had no idea about the occupation of Beijing by Li Zicheng in Guannei and the destruction of the Ming Dynasty, prepared to go to the Ming Dynasty, and the Qing Han minister Fan Wencheng wrote to Dolgun to comprehensively expound the strategic thinking of advancing into the Central Plains and unifying the world, strategically making it clear that the enemy of the Qing Dynasty was no longer the Ming Dynasty, but a powerful peasant army, and it was only a matter of time before the Ming Dynasty was destroyed.
The Qing army had not yet set off, and received the news that the Ming Dynasty had perished, so that Dolgun was unexpected, dazed, and suddenly felt helpless, and urgently convened a meeting, and at the same time recalled Fan Wencheng to discuss countermeasures. In the end, Dorgon decided to enter the Central Plains and unify the world.
On the ninth day of April 1644, the regent Dolgun led the princes of the eight banners, such as the county kings Dordor and Azig, to command more than 100,000 officers and soldiers of the Manchu Andhan Dynasty, and the priests set out. "Men under seventy-one, over ten years old, all join the military, the judgment of success or failure, in this one fell swoop." The Qing army entering the customs was about 100,000-120,000, while the Mongols were the majority, and there were many Han soldiers who surrendered to the generals, and the Manchu non-commissioned officers were about 40,000.
Because Shanhaiguan was heavily guarded, easy to defend and difficult to attack, the Qing army wanted to break into Guannei from the mouth of the Great Wall near present-day Funing, Qian'an, Zunhua and other places, and did not hurry or slow down, hunting while marching.
The Qing army, which had never dealt with the peasant army, had no bottom in mind, so it consulted Hong Chengzu, who had fought with the peasant army for 10 years, and after listening to Hong Chengzu's suggestion, the Qing army advanced in the direction of Jizhou and Miyun. And restrain the army from committing any offense and strictly enforce discipline.
On April 12, 1644, Li Zicheng gathered 60,000 horse infantry and dispatched to Shanhaiguan, reaching the vicinity of Shanhaiguan on April 20.
On April 15, 1644, in the area of present-day Fuxin, Liaoning, the Qing army suddenly stopped. It turned out that they happened to meet Guo Yunlong and Yang Kun, who were sent by Wu Sangui to Shenyang to ask for help from the Qing army. (Such a coincidence)
Guo Yang carried Wu Sangui's letters, which pointed out two roads for the Qing army to enter the customs according to Wu Sangui's strategy, one from the Central Association, and Xifengkou, Longjing Pass, and other places, and the other from the Western Association, and the entrance to the Great Wall at Qiangziling and Miyun, which was the established marching route of the Qing army. At the same time, Wu Sangui sent troops from Shanhaiguan to Beijing, and then joined forces outside the capital to destroy liukou at the court.
When Dorgon received this letter, there were joys and worries, and the joy was that the Qing army was expected to enter the customs, and wu Sangui had no intention of surrendering in the letter of worry, and at the same time doubted whether Wu Sangui was deceitful. For the sake of prudence, in order to find out the truth, Yang Kun was taken hostage and sent someone to meet with Guo Yunlong to investigate the situation at Shanhaiguan.
Wu Sangui's letter also made Dolgun but Dolgun concerned, but did not follow the route pointed out by Wu Sangui, but went straight to Shanhaiguan. It was this decision that completely changed the situation at Shanhaiguan.
Road map for the Qing army to enter the customs
On April 19, 1944, he arrived in Jinzhou, and on April 20, he arrived at Lianshan Yi to meet Wu Sangui's emissary Guo Yunlong galloping to him, and presented Wu Sangui's second letter, which said: "The fortunate king quickly reorganized the tiger brigade, straight into the mountains and seas, attacked from end to end, and the thieves could be captured." ”
Dorgon led his army from Lianshan Mountain, passed through Ningyuan City without entering, and at dawn on April 21, he passed through Shahoushou City, which was only a hundred miles away from Shanhaiguan, and the Qing army was hungry and starving, and continuously passed through the cities of Zhongqiansuo, Qiantunwei, and Zhonghoushou, and in the evening, it had reached 15 miles outside Shanhaiguan, and Dolgun ordered it to stop, marching 200 miles day and night, "Closing the cannons, the night was not stopped." ”
On April 21, 1644, Li Zicheng sent the main force to launch a first attack on the west bank of the Shihe River, and at the same time sent Tang Tong to lead less cavalry, exit the pass from the ninth gate northeast of Guancheng, and go around to a stone camp outside Guanwai, with the purpose of cutting off Wu Sangui's retreat to Guandong. The Wu army was in danger several times, and the war lasted all day, and at night, Wu Sangui withdrew to Guancheng in order to preserve his strength. The two sides turned to shelling, and the explosions continued throughout the night, and the Qing troops, who were 15 miles away from the guan, were trembling and trembling.
That night, Wu Sangui's emissaries found Tang Tong encamped in a stone camp thirty or forty miles away from the Qing army outside Guanguan and reported it to Dolgun, who sent his elite troops to attack Tang Tong, who was a stone, and soon crushed Tang Tong's hundreds of cavalry and captured two people.
In the twenty-first day and one night, Wu Sangui repeatedly sent people to urge Dolgun to enter the customs as soon as possible, but the Qing army refused to enter the customs as soon as possible for fear of deception, and after 8 times, it was not until the second half of the night that Dolgun ordered the Qing army to move to Shanhaiguan.
Shanhaiguan
Early morning of the twenty-second day
The Qing army arrived at Huanxiling, four or five miles away from Shanhaiguan, and because the doubts were not removed, the Qing army did not dare to venture into the customs and further waited for Wu Sangui's news.
Wu Sangui saw that the Qing army was stationary, and immediately sent 5 people to the Qing camp to meet Dolgun, who sent Fan Wencheng to accompany 5 people into Shanhaiguan.
At dawn, Li Zicheng mobilized troops to prepare for the siege of the city, Wu Sangui was so anxious that Qin Shuai rode hundreds of elite horses, met Dolgun, and Dolgun took this opportunity to make Wu Sangui submit to the Qing Dynasty, because of the urgency of time, Wu Sangui, immediately shaved his hair and became a vassal, according to the Manchurian customs, killed the white horse to sacrifice the heavens, slaughtered the black cattle to sacrifice the ground, saluted the heavens and the earth, made an alliance with blood, and cut off his clothes and folded arrows as an oath.
Wu Sangui then led his generals to rush back to the pass, and ordered that the east gate of Shanhaiguan and the north and south water gates be opened, and the mighty Qing army was divided into two roads, straight into the gate, and the Qing army officially entered the customs.
On the 22nd day, at the Battle of Shihe, the Wuqing coalition army defeated Li Zicheng.
On the twenty-third day, Dorgon ordered a victorious pursuit and took Beijing directly. He also issued an order: "This time out of the division, so get rid of the riots and the people, and destroy the rogues to safe the world." Now enter the Kansai Expedition, do not kill innocents, do not loot property, do not burn the house. It is not as sinful as the covenanter. ”
Li Zicheng retreated to Fanjiazhuang, 20 miles from the Yongping clan, and ordered the beheading of Wu Sangui's father, Wu Xiang.
On April 26, Li Zicheng returned to Beijing,
On April 27, all 34 members of the Wu Sangui clan were executed,
On April 30, Li Zicheng threatened the crown prince and the two kings to withdraw from Beijing.
On the second day of the first month of May, Dorgon officially entered the city of Beijing and entered the Central Plains.
Just imagine, Dolgun vomited that he did not encounter Wu Sangui's envoy Guo Yunlong halfway, or Dolgun after receiving Wu Sangui's first letter, according to Wu Sangui's description, through Miyun to enter the customs, then the end of Shanhaiguan is very likely to end with Wu Sangui's fiasco, and it will be more difficult for the Qing army to enter the customs.
PS:
In 1638, the peasant rebel army was defeated, Li Zicheng's wife and daughter were separated, and only eighteen horsemen broke through the siege and fled to Hanzhong to wait for the opportunity. Zhang Xianzhong had been severely damaged by the Ming army before, and led his troops to surrender to the Ming Dynasty and accumulate strength in order to make a comeback.
In 1638, the Qing army went south in two directions, and Chongzhen was in the northwest to suppress the peasant rebellion of the hero Hong Chengyu back to Beijing.
In May 1639, Zhang Xianzhong revolted again.
In 1939, Hong Chengzu was appointed as the commander-in-chief of the Jiliao Army, commanding 130,000 elites to fight the Qing army at Songshan.
In December 1640, Li Zicheng burst into Henan, where hungry people were everywhere, and in a hundred responses, the momentum was greatly shaken, swept away fate, invincible, and the peasant rebel army entered a new stage.
In 1642, Hong Chengyu and other Jinzhou and Songshan people were captured and later surrendered.
In March 1943, Li Zicheng changed Xiangyang to Xiangjing and called him "New Shun Wang" to appease poor peasants in exile.
In May 1943, Zhang Xianzhongke Wuchang proclaimed himself "King of Daxi" and established the "Daxi" regime.
In October 1943, Li Zicheng attacked Tongguan, killed Sun Chuanting, and occupied shaanxi province.
On the ninth night of the first month of August 1943, Emperor Taiji died, and on August 14, Fu Lin, the ninth son of Emperor Taiji, who was only 63 years old, became emperor, and Dorgon was regent, and the Qing Dynasty also ended a political crisis in the struggle for the throne.
On September 11, 1643, the Qing army set out from Shenyang and headed straight for Ningyuan City.
From September 23 to the first day of October 1643, the Qing army took the three cities of Zhonghousuo, Qiantunwei and Zhongqianshou, and Wu Sangui's Ningyuan City became an isolated city.