"A lifetime of career is empty, and half a lifetime of merit is in a dream." After death, there is no fear of brave generals, and the loyal soul still guards Liaodong! ”
Anti-Qing General (Yuan Chonghuan)
The last year of a dynasty is always a big era of great storms, and the bitter hatred of the nation, the shameful conspiracy of the court, and the moving drums of the battlefield are all the marks of this last era.
Yuan Chonghuan, with his armor in top, walked through the enigmatic late Ming Calendar and left a strong mark on the big stage. He was considered by many to be an out-and-out hero, while others denigrated Yuan Chonghuan as a traitor who defected to the Qing.
Why are there two different kinds of statements about a person?
Yuan Chonghuan, character (element), number free, born in Dongguan, Guangdong In the twelfth year of the Ming Dynasty (1584), was an outstanding military figure and politician of the Ming Dynasty.
Yuan Chonghuan has a high reputation in modern times, and Liang Qichao praised him as "a model of soldiers throughout the ages"
During the years of Ming Qi and Chongzhen, the Ming Dynasty was troubled internally and externally, and struggled under the bitter winds and rains of history.
Although Yuan Chonghuan was a scholar, he had a warm heart and a pure heart, he knew the military, understood the situation of the border plug, was not afraid of evil, was generous and courageous, and was known for knowing soldiers.
After Yuan Chonghuan was admitted as a jinshi, he was appointed by the imperial court as Shaowuzhi County, Fujian. Yuan Chonghuan's important deeds in shaowuzhi county have also been handed down a lot, such as his trial of unjust imprisonment, justice for the common people, recruiting talents and scholars, recruiting some people of insight for use by the imperial court, and usually helping the people to do some things, caring about the situation in the world, especially the war between the Ming and Qing dynasties in the Liaodong region, etc. Anyway, it is a remarkable political achievement.
Later, Yushi Hou was wise and discerning, did not stick to old habits, promoted Yuan Chonghuan out of the box, entrusted him with a heavy responsibility, and went to Liaodong to participate in the battle against Houjin.
After Yuan Chonghuan was ordered, he rushed all night, the jungle wilderness, the tigers and leopards haunted, the Tianming Man City, and the generals all praised his bravery and courage.
At that time, the situation in Liaodong could be described as "a mess", and the social contradictions of the Ming Dynasty intensified unprecedentedly, and they were already full of holes.
Yuan Chonghuan dared to introduce new weapons from abroad, defeated a generation of male lord Nurhaci, causing him to die of his wounds shortly after, and his son Emperor Taiji was deadlocked outside Guanwai for ten years, but there was nothing he could do.
Yuan Chonghuan has been traversing Liaodong for decades, and no one can beat him. Ningyuan, which he was defending, became a major military obstacle for Emperor Taiji to attack Shanhaiguan, and both Emperor Taiji and his late father Nurhaci had suffered defeats under Yuan Chonghuan, so Emperor Taiji hated Yuan Chonghuan to the bone and tried his best to remove this biggest obstacle.
In 1629, Emperor Taiji carried out a widespread harassment of the Ming Dynasty.
He personally commanded the army to bypass Yuan Chonghuan's defense zone and rushed through the layers of obstacles to hit Beijing directly.
Yuan Chonghuan was guarding near Shanhaiguan at this time, and when he received the military report, he traveled day and night, leading 9,000 cavalry back to Beijing to save the car.
At this time, Emperor Taiji again used a trick such as the "Jiang Gan stealing books" scheme in the Romance of the Three Kingdoms, he first designed to arrest two Ming eunuchs, imprisoned them, and then asked his two generals to "secretly" discuss the military next to the house where the eunuchs were imprisoned, saying how Huang Taiji and Yuan Chonghuan already had a secret agreement, how to attack the city of Beijing inside and outside, and also said that this matter was of great importance, and must not be leaked out. In fact, these were all said to the two imprisoned eunuchs next door.
By the next day, Emperor Taiji had released the two eunuchs.
The two eunuchs rushed back to the palace without stopping, and in a panic told the Chongzhen Emperor the news that Yuan Chonghuan intended to "rebel".
The Chongzhen Emperor was so stunned that he immediately tricked Yuan Chonghuan outside the city into the palace in the name of discussing the salary of the soldiers, and then arrested Yuan Chonghuan for treason, imprisoned him, and was scheduled to be beheaded after the autumn of the following year.
According to Ming Shi, before Yuan Chonghuan went through the dharma, the executioner cut off his flesh with one knife after another, and along the way, the people rushed to snatch Chonghuan's meat from the executioner's hands and eat it raw, and a piece of meat was often torn into several pieces by scramble, and the whole scene was directly compared to a "human flesh auction".
By the time he arrived at the Court, Chonghuan was exhausted, there was no flesh and bones left, and only one head remained, and the Chongzhen Emperor ordered it to be circulated to the nine border guards on the Great Wall to deter the border generals and set an example.
In this way, emperor Taiji did not spend a single soldier, did not need a single shot, and killed yuan Chonghuan, a major troublemaker, by the hand of the Chongzhen Emperor.
Yuan Chonghuan XingXing Scene》
In fact, from the perspective of the Chongzhen Emperor's personality, he was not as faint and absurd as the kings of the fallen countries in previous dynasties, on the contrary, the Chongzhen Emperor was dedicated to governance and diligent in government affairs, and was once praised by the government and the public as the "Bright Lord".
So, why did Chongzhen want to kill a general like Yuan Chonghuan? Is it really the reverse plan of the Emperor Taiji?
Maybe. However, Yuan Chonghuan was imprisoned in October of the second year of Chongzhen (1629), and the execution was in August of the third year of Chongzhen (1630), with nearly nine months in between to find out the ins and outs of the matter.
So, why didn't the faint but diligent Chongzhen still want to kill Yuan Chonghuan?
Yuan Chonghuan's last words
Huang Taiji's so-called "anti-plot" is actually not clever, nor is it the root cause of Yuan Chonghuan's murder, it is only the last link in the chain that captured Yuan Chonghuan, and the "anti-plot" is only the last feather that crushes the camel.
The Chongzhen Emperor should have understood that Yuan Chonghuan had been wronged, but from yuan Chonghuan's side, it seemed that he had not shared the emperor's worries, and although Liaodong was strong, the Qing army still bypassed Shanhaiguan to harass the border in a big way, and the promise of five years of Pingliao seemed to be untrue, which was intolerable to Emperor Chongzhen, who was harsh on his ministers.
After that, the Qing soldiers came to the Beijing Division, causing a shock in the government and the public, and such a great shame and humiliation must be appeased by an unforgivable scapegoat, otherwise where would the face of the Son of Heaven exist?
Soldiers are under the city
Therefore, the tragedy of Yuan Chonghuan is inevitable.
The death of Yuan Chonghuan can be said to have directly led to the final demise of the Ming Dynasty. After his death, the Ming Dynasty could no longer find a decent overseer, and there was no one on the sidelines, which was the first consequence.
As a result, the Ming generals were cold to the imperial court.
Third, once Yuan Chonghuan died, the generals of all roads were distraught, and the Shanxi and Shaanxi armies and horses collapsed back to their hometowns and became liukou, and liukou became another major threat to the Ming Dynasty, and eventually buried it.
In front of the wise old man of history, we seem so naïve and ignorant.
In the turbulent era of the late Ming Dynasty, in that era of internal and external troubles, Yuan Chonghuan, a distant general in the district, with his lonely body, was crushed to pieces for the tranquility of the Ming Dynasty and the well-being of the people, and his lifelong determination to serve the imperial court was bloodily wronged.
He fought vigorously, but every battle was a step towards an inevitable tragic end.