In the process of ancient feudal development, different dynasties led to different administrative divisions. In this way, the soldiers and horses stationed in each administrative region will naturally be different.
So during the Qing Dynasty, which is closest to us, how many soldiers and horses are usually stationed in a county? What are the other administrative district plans under the county?
Number of garrisons
According to the "Du Fengzhi Diary", the soldiers and horses stationed in each county of the Qing Dynasty were different. Among all the soldiers and horses stationed, they are specifically divided into two categories, namely the Green Battalion and the Eight Flags.
Among them, the green battalion belongs to the general category of soldiers and horses, that is, all counties will basically have it. According to the Qing History Manuscript, the rulers during the Qing Dynasty demanded that the number of Green Battalion soldiers in each province should be maintained at about 600,000.
It looks very large, but it is actually distributed in each county, and there are not many of them.
Like when the Taiping Rebellion launched a rebellion, the Qing government failed to suppress it in time. On the one hand, because the development of Feng Yunshan in the area of Bauhinia Mountain has achieved a lot of results, on the other hand, the Qing government actually has insufficient armed forces in the county.
Faced with the Taiping Rebellion, which was already close to tens of thousands of soldiers and horses at that time, the Qing government's first crackdown only dispatched less than 1,000 people, which shows its ignorance and incompetence.
Not only that, even for ordinary rebellion operations, the people only need about two hundred people to be able to surround the county government. If the county wants to overcome the danger, it still has to rely on the help of the township.
Otherwise, when the army is assembled and plucked, the yellow cauliflower will be almost cold.
As for the Eight Flags soldiers, the number is even rarer. Taking the records of the garrison in Fengshun County, Guangdong Province during the Qing Dynasty as an example, there was a total of one "thousand generals", with more than 60 soldiers under his command, plus soldiers who managed various transportation hubs, the total number of people did not exceed 100.
It is indeed difficult for these people to expect how much combat effectiveness these people can exert in a thousand-strong rebellion.
Not to mention the Eight Flags garrison during the Qing Dynasty, not all counties will exist. Except for transportation hubs or counties with very good economic development, the general county town has only green camps and no eight flags.
It is no wonder that after the unrest in the county towns in remote areas, the higher-level counties may not even know anything.
Among the folk rumors, there have been cases of local armed forces directly controlling the county order and becoming a puppet. As long as the county commander was still living in the local area, he had to deal with the imperial court and local forces.
In this case, if you dare to report to your superiors, then you should really be considered loyal and patriotic.
Although many folk rumors are not credible, during the Qing Dynasty, there were not a few cases of local county orders colluding with the gentry and squeezing the people's fat and anointing.
The poor people, who were oppressed to the point of ignorance, could only be forced to accept. If the county commander is smart and can master this degree, the people will just be used to death. If the bottom line acceptable to the people is exceeded, this leads to rebellion.
Sub-county administrative divisions
So in terms of the division of administrative regions during the Qing Dynasty, what other administrative regions are under the county? According to the past situation, the official position of county order seems to be the lowest level official.
But in fact, there were at least four administrative regions below the county during the Qing Dynasty. These four formed areas and levels, layer by layer, and finally divided into townships, capitals, maps, and villages.
Due to the differences in the specific conditions of each place, there are all, soil, and dispensable, but there will be townships or villages. The squires I heard in the past were the group of people with the richest assets in a certain township.
However, the townships during the Qing Dynasty were different from the townships in modern society, and now most counties have different locations and sizes within the jurisdiction of most counties, and there is no clear fixed standard.
During the Qing Dynasty, the township administrative areas under the jurisdiction of many counties were fixed in the four directions of the county: southeast, southwest and northwest. If you want to subdivide it again, it can only be commensurate with capitals, maps, and villages.
As for the situation that there will inevitably be villages, the main reason is that the management mode of the county government is different. Taking Shandong Dingtao County as an example, the administrative region is not called a township, and the local county order directly divides the territory into 59 villages.
The advantage of this is that when the county decree wants to issue a policy, it only needs to bring together the corresponding leaders of the fifty-nine villages. The disadvantage is that after the transition and dilution of middle-level administrative institutions such as townships and capitals, the pressure on county orders has increased sharply.
When a different situation occurs in each village and the village chief cannot solve it, the prefectural order must intervene. At this time, if it is not a rebellion, rebellion and other things, the county order must handle it by itself, otherwise it will be a stain on the political performance.
Of course, it was really a rebellion, rebellion and other things, and the county order did not have a good ending, either killed by a group of good men to sacrifice the sky, or after the suppression by the official government, he was directly removed from the black hat on his head.
No matter how well the county order performs in the process of suppressing the rebellion, if there is a rebellion within the corresponding jurisdiction, it means that the county order is not managed well, and it can be regarded as a disaster without arrogance.