In February 1876, when the British missionary Timothy Lee was passing through Taiyuan, Shanxi Province, he saw a mountain of corpses stacked together like pigs in a slaughterhouse, and jackals everywhere were gnawing on the stumps. At the same time, horse-drawn carriages continued to enter the city, transporting leftover corpses to sinkholes outside the city, and those that were too late to be buried were burned on the spot. The corpses in the city are piled up, and the burning corpses outside the city are in flames, which is the true portrayal of Ding Wuqihuang
However, it was such a catastrophic famine that was slow to rescue, but it was beautified by the Qing court as a noble rescue operation.
Ding Wuqi famine
All living beings in the Ding Wuqi wilderness
One: Grassroots roots were sold for 3 taels, and women were sold as commodities
In the mid-to-late 70s of the 19th century, when the Westernists' "self-improvement and prosperity" activities were carried out intensively, an unprecedented drought quietly washed away the northern part of China, and lasted for four years.
However, the drought was only the first domino, and the ensuing locust plague was even more alarming. From Shaanxi to Hebei, locusts obscured the sky and the sun, and everywhere they went, they not only devoured the remaining crops, but even chewed more than half of the vegetable leaves. In the case of large-scale grain and vegetable harvests, the price of rice and wheat soared, and only one bucket of rice was needed to exchange for a beautiful courtyard.
In the face of soaring rice prices, landlords can still buy grain with their abundant assets, but ordinary people are penniless and have to turn their attention to the rest of the grain substitutes in order to survive. This has led to an increase in the price of bark and grass roots. In order to obtain grass bark, people formed gangs and grabbed land in the mountains day and night, digging grass and trees. According to the records at the time, the price of a load of grass roots was even speculated to 3 taels of silver, and it was still in short supply.
The roots of the beach were cut off, and the old bark of the elm tree was scraped dry. At the beginning, I was afraid that people would see it, but then I was desperate and who dared to stop it! The root noodles are sold directly to more than 80 yuan, and the mochi noodles are also sold for 70 yuan. "Hongdong Liang Peicai Ding Chou Great Wilderness Rice Grain Text"
When the bark of the grass roots is excavated, the people in the disaster area have lost their only source of food, and the social order has completely collapsed. In traditional agrarian societies, men were an important labor resource and were not sold as commodities unless absolutely necessary, so women and children were the first considerations.
Shandong, as the hardest-hit area of the Dingwuqi Famine, has many records about women's trade.
The people were short of food, and they were prepared for hardship, and at first they sold their property, and then they sold their wives. Yonghe County Chronicles of the Republic of China
After selling his wife to a landlord, the husband was given a large load of grain in exchange for the hope of survival for the whole family.
In addition, under the influence of the "Three Principles and Five Constants" ethic, some women could not bear to starve their husbands and fathers-in-law to death, so they would take the initiative to negotiate with traffickers to seek a good price for themselves, and through this self-sacrifice in exchange for the short-term food and clothing of the whole family.
Although these women had some foresight of what they would do, the situation was even more tragic than they had foreseen, and most of the women who were trafficked were working as prostitutes. It can be said that it is precisely because too many women were sold to other places during the famine that the gender ratio between men and women is seriously balanced, resulting in a negative population growth in North China for a long time.
Second: the wolves in Shaanxi and Shanxi gathered
Within three years after the occurrence of the Dingwuqi famine, the grassland environment in Shaanxi and northern Shanxi Province underwent major changes, and the drying up of aquatic plants brought about by drought affected the normal operation of the food chain.
At the same time, under the long-term famine, the people of Shaanxi and Shanxi provinces have long been unable to support themselves, and countless people have died of starvation, freezing and disease. Moreover, people at that time could not afford to bury the corpses, which led to the spread of dead bodies in towns and villages, which in turn led to a global plague.
The back-and-forth of famine and plague forms a complete chain of disasters: drought - grain failure - famine outbreak - population death - plague. According to statistics, during the four years of the Dingwuqi famine, a total of 4 million people died in Shaanxi and Shanxi.
As the city's population became increasingly scarce, the garrison was naturally weak, and as the human defenses continued to weaken, the wolves were able to take advantage of the situation and launch a large-scale hunt. In Quwo County, in central Shanxi, 10 wolf packs devoured thousands of unarmed people in three years.
Wild wolves are in groups, devouring people at the same rate, killing people without counting, and after killing more than 200 wolves after the bounty is offered, the wolves are in trouble. Quwo County Chronicles
In fact, wolves are very afraid of humans, and they usually do not easily step into human territory. But during a severe drought, wolves forage for food in order to survive, and when food is scarce, they are forced to find new ways to survive and use humans as feeders.
According to scientific research, when wild wolves hunt, they often form groups of three or five to launch a sure siege and annihilation war, but during the famine, the people's physical fitness is declining due to long-term hunger. As a result, the wolf plague caused by the drought has further reduced the population of the northwest region.
The Qing government considered itself immeasurably meritorious
Although the imperial court chose Zeng Guokui (Zeng Guofan's younger brother) as the new governor, Zeng Guokui knew that disaster relief was closely related to political achievements, and was afraid of being punished by Cixi, so he refused to go.
However, since the Tongzhi period, Shanxi, as an important grain-producing province, has long been accepted by the Qing court as an important province for the payment of agricultural taxes. The more Zeng Guokui delayed under the pretext, the more urgent the Qing government became.
Under the repeated urging of Zuo Zongtang, Li Hongzhang and others, Zeng Guokui had no choice but to take over this hot potato and rushed to Shanxi to serve as governor. But he knew very well in his heart that the main purpose of this trip was not to provide disaster relief, but to help the imperial court collect food and wages.
Drought
Here's a rather strange phenomenon: what would normally be a financial controversy can erupt on a special occasion like a drought. For Zeng Guokui, he was the parent official of the people of Shanxi, and dealing with the drought should be the most urgent matter, but he had to handle the tax collection task conveyed by the imperial court at the same time; In addition to disaster relief, local officials should also think about how to deal with the matter of raising salaries, and must collect sufficient salaries within a time limit. And the central government, which can make the final decision, is also mired in the bitter thinking of disaster relief and taxation, which is more important than the people's lives or the central government's finances?
Eventually, after the famine reached its worst, the Qing government still did not make up its mind to provide relief, but sent Yan Jingming to Shanxi to inspect the disaster, and if the people could withstand the pressure of the famine, they could collect taxes as usual. But when Yan Jingming passed through the Datong territory and saw the cruel scene of corpses strewn all over the field and selling children and girls, he immediately reported to the Qing court and asked for all-out relief. But it was too late, and millions of people had already lost their lives to the government's delayed rescue.
Four years later, as the climate returned to normal, the famine disappeared. Seeing that everything was back to normal, the Qing government publicized its disaster relief exploits with great fanfare, creating a prosperous scene of singing and dancing, according to the official annals of Qinzhou, Shanxi:
It is a compendium of the Constitution's benevolence, the country's benevolence, and the regeneration of the people, especially the compendium of the entitlement, for future generations. "Guangxu Qinzhou Chronicles"
It can be seen that the Ding Wu famine finally disappeared, and it was attributed to the emperor, the imperial court's heavenly grace, which can be recorded in the history books, and even the people who had just experienced a few years of miracle disasters celebrated. Let me ask, what will the souls of the 10 million refugees in heaven think?
Epilogue:
As a catastrophic famine in modern North China, the Dingwuqi Famine has a long duration, a wide range of effects, and a strong destructiveness, which are unprecedented. However, after learning of the outbreak of the famine, the Qing government did not immediately go to the relief, but because of internal financial disputes, which eventually led to more and more people being starved to death, and countless people died of famine, plague, and wolf plague. What's even more outrageous is that after the famine, in order to erase the stain, the Qing government continued to package itself in the history books as a great sage who saved the world and saved the world.