After the Xingyang Conference, Li Zicheng, Gao Yingxiang, Zhang Xianzhong and other leaders took joint action and set off from Xingyang and advanced southeast. With unstoppable momentum, they successively captured Mixian, Shangcai, Runing and other places, and quickly strengthened the strength of the rebel army. After the army set out for Runing, they split into two routes and prepared to attack Longxing, the land of Emperor Zhu Yuanzhang of the Ming Dynasty, and Fengyang, the capital of the Ming Dynasty.
Gao Yingxiang led an army from Xincai and Shouzhou (present-day Shou County, Anhui) to Fengyang, while Li Zicheng and Zhang Xianzhong led another army to Yingzhou (present-day Fuyang, Anhui) in the east, from where they prepared to launch an attack on Fengyang. On the 11th day of the first month of the eighth year of Chongzhen, Li Zicheng and Zhang Xianzhong led troops to surround Yingzhou. The defenders of the city, including Yin Mengao of Zhizhou and Zhao Shikuan, fought hard, and the soldiers on the city wall also paid a heavy price, but in the end could not withstand the artillery fire of the rebels, and the city was breached.
After the city of Yingzhou was destroyed, Ming officials showed perseverance, and after the rebels entered the city, they still engaged in brutal street battles with them, preferring to die. Of the seven members of Yin Mengao's family, six were brutally killed, and only one baby survived. Zhao Shikuan resolutely refused to escape, he recruited warriors, and eventually committed suicide by being seriously injured and thrown into the river, his wife also hanged himself, and his two daughters also died with their mother. Zhang Heming, a former soldier Shangshu who was over eighty years old, was brutally hung upside down on a tree after being captured, became an arrow target, covered in arrow wounds, and his eldest son was also killed under this situation. Almost all the officials and gentry in the city were beheaded, and the number of dead was as high as seventy-seven.
After the rebels captured Yingzhou, Li Zicheng, Zhang Xianzhong, and Gao Yingxiang quickly went to Shouzhou, joined Gao Yingxiang's troops, and marched together to Fengyang, the capital of the Ming Dynasty. They selected 300 astute and strong soldiers, most of them surrendered Ming troops, and let them disguise themselves as civilians, mingled in Fengyang City, scouted the situation in the city, and laid the foundation for future sieges.
Fengyang, as the land of Longxing of the Zhuming Dynasty, has always been regarded as one of the important regions, along with Nanjing and Beijing, known as the "Three Capitals". Zhu Yuanzhang's family story makes people sigh, he could not bury his parents because of poverty, and with the help of his neighbor Liu Jizu, he finally built a palatial mausoleum. Zhu Yuanzhang was grateful to Liu Jizu's family, and let his descendants become the guards of the Ming Zuling Mausoleum and pass it on.
Fengyang has always had a heavy garrison, with a Zhongdu Stay-behind Division, which manages the Eight Guards and a Thousand Households Office, and there are also inspectors of the Yamen and a town guard army served by eunuchs in the city. Yang Yipeng, the governor of Fengyang, was responsible for supervising the canal transportation. However, when the Shaanxi rebels advanced towards Henan, some Ming officials had a premonition that the rebels might attack Fengyang. Lü Weiqi, Shangshu of the Nanjing Military Department, went to Chongzhen and asked for stronger defenses. However, Chongzhen's reaction did not seem to be decisive enough, and he only issued an edict asking Fengyang Inspector to garrison troops in key places, without taking effective defensive measures.
What is puzzling is that when Li Zicheng and other rebels approached Fengyang, the people in the city did not show their recognition and loyalty to Emperor Zhu of the Ming Dynasty, but leaked information to the rebels, eagerly hoping that they could capture Fengyang City. Perhaps it was because the residents of Fengyang did not enjoy the benefits of Emperor Zhu's rule, and even suffered harassment and exploitation, that they would have made such an unusual move. This act is recorded in the History of Ming.
After Fengyang City was attacked by the rebels, the peasant army launched a frenzied destruction, especially Li Zicheng, whose family ancestral tomb had already been destroyed by order of the Ming court, so in anger, he burned the building of the Ming ancestor's mausoleum, and also burned all the pines in the mausoleum area, and the fire burned for several days. The soldiers of the peasant army burned and looted, and their behavior was extremely bad, even dissecting pregnant women alive, shooting babies, and showing no mercy to the members of the Ming Sect family. The scene is shocking.
The peasant army also stole the tomb of the Ming Emperor, seized a large number of burial treasures, and threw the remains of the ancestors of the Zhu family on the side of the road, allowing them to be trampled by horses. After this situation reached Jingshi, the Chongzhen Emperor was shocked, and he held an ancestor worship ceremony in the temple to express his repentance and sorrow for his ancestors. The mysterious events outside the city also disturbed Chongzhen, who announced the "Edict of Sin", blaming himself for his inability to quell the unrest caused by the peasant army.
This battle of Fengyang was a heavy spiritual blow to the Chongzhen Emperor, and the invasion of the peasant army destroyed the Ming Zuling Mausoleum, which was also seen as the destruction of the dragon vein of the Daming Dynasty. The Chongzhen Emperor fell into a deep self-blame and worry, so much so that he once had the idea of martyrdom with his body. This scene also infected his ministers and eunuchs, and plunged the entire court into deep mourning.
In the end, after Li Zicheng and the other peasant troops stayed in Fengyang for three days, the Ming army arrived from all sides to reinforce. Zhang Xianzhong led his troops to break through the siege and go south to Luzhou, while Li Zicheng and Gao Yingxiang returned to Shaanxi. As this chapter ends, we can't help but think about how war and human nature in history, and how they are intertwined and shaped the direction of Chinese history, deserve our in-depth discussion and reflection.