In the second year of Shunzhi (1645), the Qing general Duo Duo led a large army to the south, hoping to pacify Jiangnan and unify the world in one fell swoop. In the face of the Manchu Qing cavalry, which was strong in combat, the Southern Ming Hongguang regime was gradually defeated, and Xuzhou was soon lost.
Soon, the Qing army crossed the Huai River and approached the city of Yangzhou.
At that time, the town guarding Yangzhou was Shi Kefa, the overseer of The Southern Ming Dynasty and a scholar of Dongge University. Although he was in a high position, the party and government of the Southern Ming court were continuous, and the power was actually in the hands of the first assistant Ma Shiying and the military attendant Ruan Dacheng. The two had always been at odds with Shi Kefa, so secretly withholding grain, grass, and soldiers and horses made Shi Kefa miserable.
Although Shi Kefa was called an overseer, the number of soldiers and horses that could be mobilized was very limited. If only someone in the DPRK and China were to restrain them, the Huaiyang soldiers would still be able to fight a battle under the leadership of Shi Kefa. However, at the time of life and death, Nanming fought first. The Southern Ming general Zuo Liangyu, who was stationed in Wuchang, had always been very dissatisfied with the behavior of Ma Shiying and Ruan Dacheng, so he led an army of 100,000 people to attack Nanjing in the name of Qing Junfang. Ma Shiying panicked and immediately ordered Shi Kefa to transfer the troops of Jiang Fang back to guard Nanjing.
Although Shi Kefa was helpless, he could only withdraw some of the soldiers and horses guarding the Qing army.
In this way, the garrison of Yangzhou City was even weaker. After the Qing army saw the infighting in Nanming, it was overjoyed and the confidence in conquering Jiangnan was also strengthened. The Qing regent Dorgon sent a letter to Shi Kefa, intending to surrender him. The letter threatened and seduced, and did not recognize the legitimacy of the Southern Ming regime.
At the beginning, Dorgon also falsely praised his merits in defeating Li Zicheng, but at the end, he revealed his true face, and even threatened to fight with the rest of Li Zicheng. Shi Kefa saw that Nanming was already about to fall, and after a long sigh, he had put life and death aside. He wrote a letter rejecting Dorgon's abduction and decided to coexist and die with the city of Yangzhou.
On April 24, the Qing army began to attack the city. Shi Kefa led his army to resist, but he was helplessly outnumbered, and the city of Yangzhou was quickly breached.
After Shi Kefa's arrest, Dodo treated him with courtesy, and even called him "Sir". Unmoved, Shi Kefa died generously, eventually being killed. After that, there were many people who died as generously as Shi Kefa. Meng Sen wrote in "Ren Minyu": "The officials and subordinates of the dangerous city know that the liver and brain are not going to be destroyed, and a breath still exists, and they vow not to lead to avoid it, if the yangzhou prefect Ren Minyu has dozens of people below." ”
The "Huaizuo Mingdu" written by the literati and inkers was thus captured. However, due to the atrocities that followed, their deaths did not attract sufficient attention. After the Qing army occupied Yangzhou, the commander Duo Duo carried out a massacre of Yangzhou on the grounds that Yangzhou would not surrender. From May 20 to May 29, the creatures in Yangzhou Suffered a catastrophe, known in history as the "Ten Days of Yangzhou".
The tragic slaughter of the city has made the prosperous Yangzhou City of several generations turn into a place of ruins in an instant, and the prosperous fireworks ancient alley of Jiangnan Town has become a slaughterhouse full of blood for several generations.
The Qing army has always used the army of benevolence and righteousness to whitewash itself, but in front of the unarmed people, it finally revealed its vicious face. They run to the people like beasts. As soon as he saw someone, he raised the butcher knife in his hand. The Qing army was extremely ferocious, even young children and elderly people were not spared. Some people fled to the garbage heap, pretending to be dead, trying to escape the pursuit of the Qing soldiers.
Unexpectedly, the Qing soldiers had already used Yangzhou as a slaughterhouse, and they kept holding knives and guns to push corpses and garbage heaps left and right. Inside the city of Yangzhou, there was already a river of blood. The massacre lasted for ten days, with the inhabitants of Yangzhou City. Very few survived. After the Qing army stopped the massacre, well-meaning monks came to collect the remains and wanted to let the victims be buried in peace. The monks were faced with a mountain of corpses and carried them for a long time, and there were 800,000 bodies alone.
After the Qing Dynasty pacified the world, it vainly tried to conceal its evil deeds, so it wantonly destroyed the records of this period of history, and even blocked various classics through the prison of words. Therefore, the people at that time knew very little about this matter. However, justice may be late, but it will never be absent. On the eve of the Xinhai Revolution, the revolutionary party brought back the record of this history from overseas, and this history finally rose to the light and became widely known to the world.
In recent years, while lamenting the 800,000 lives in Yangzhou, some people have actually made a lot of remarks about Shi Kefa's practices. They said that if it were not for Shi Kefa's insistence on resisting, the people of Yangzhou would not have been slaughtered. In order to prove their point of view, they even gave the example of Nanjing Kaesong surrendering after Yangzhou was captured by Qing soldiers and the Qing soldiers did not slaughter the city.
What holds this view is that it is really reprehensible.
When Shi Kefa fell under siege, he remained loyal to his homeland and bravely fought against the enemy. Its affection is enough to shock the ancient and modern. Even the later Qianlong Emperor personally inscribed the words "Praise for the Faithful Soul" for him, and also posthumously called him "Loyal and Righteous".
The 800,000 lives of Yangzhou City died at the hands of the Qing army. Those who hold this view do not condemn the atrocities of the Qing army, but instead accuse Shi Kefa, which is really unclear and reversed black and white. If there is no Shi Kefa's heroism, how can the surrender of the city of Nanjing be respected by the Qing army? When those who sacrifice their lives for the country do not receive the respect they deserve, then it is only a matter of time before the entire country's values collapse.
After Shi Kefa's death, Yangzhou's bones were piled up, Shi Kefa's body was difficult to identify and his whereabouts were unknown, and a year later, his righteous son Shi Dewei and the people of Yangzhou were subsequently buried in Meihualing outside the city in Shi Kefa's clothes. Every year on May 20, the people of Yangzhou commemorate Shi Kefa in various ways. It can be said that in their hearts, Shi Kefa is an eternal national hero.
Resources:
["Ten Diaries of Yangzhou", "Yangzhou City Shou Ji Strategy", "Ming Ji Nan Luo"】