Zeng Guofan was a tumbler in the official field of the Qing Dynasty, he was well versed in the way of being an official, scheming and calculating, strict with himself, and many people regarded him as their life mentor.
Compared with his elder brother Zeng Guofan, Zeng Guoquan was far behind in this regard, whether he was an official or a man, Zeng Guoquan was controversial, especially he killed soldiers and innocent people who surrendered, which was outrageous, and peng Yulin, who was the commander of the Xiang Army, could not look down.
Among the five zeng brothers, Zeng Guoquan's achievements are second only to Zeng Guofan. Zeng Guoquan was able to make meritorious achievements thanks to the support of his brother along the way. Zeng Guoquan was thirteen years younger than Zeng Guofan, and when he entered Beijing at the age of sixteen, Zeng Guofan had already reached the age of establishment. Therefore, Zeng Guofan was both Zeng Guoquan's elder brother and Zeng Guoquan's teacher.
Zeng Guoquan is talented and has excellent results, but he also has a proud and arrogant personality and is extremely unsociable. This also laid the groundwork for Zeng Guoquan to later be controversial by the imperial court and do things extremely.
In 1856, the Xiang army was defeated by the Taiping Army at the mouth of The Lake in Jiangxi, and Zeng Guofan was killed in the evening, almost wanting to commit suicide by throwing himself into the river. Zeng Guoquan saw that his brother was in danger and recruited three thousand township braves to rescue Jiangxi. Since Zeng Guoquan was a force that appeared out of thin air, the Taiping Army did not have enough troops to deal with him, so Zeng Guoquan lianke Anfu and other places.
When it reached Ji'an, the Taiping Army was very tenacious in its defense. Zeng Guoquan saw that it was difficult to defeat the enemy during the siege, so he adopted the strategy of digging trenches and besieging the city. This tactic often appeared in Zeng Guoquan's siege of the city, and zeng Guoquan won the name of "Zeng Iron Barrel".
When Zeng Guoquan conquered Ji'an City, Zeng Guofan was suffering from no one to use and the war was unfavorable. Seeing that his younger brother Zeng Guoquan was a good talent, Zeng Guofan included Zeng Guoquan in the army and treated Zeng Guoquan's troops as his concubine and gave him more preferential treatment. With the support of Zeng Guofan, Zeng Guoquan became the number one person in the Land Division in the Xiang Army.
Zeng Guoquan's men fought bravely and fought with the enemy without death, but this was not because Zeng Guoquan was a pioneer or shared happiness and hardship with the soldiers, but because he was inspired by the fact that he could burn and loot after the city was destroyed, and did not seal the sword for several days. For each city conquered, Zeng Guoquan would allow his men to burn and loot for three days, and within those three days, no matter what crimes the soldiers committed, Zeng Guoquan did not care.
Therefore, when Zeng Guoquan's soldiers attacked the city, they would fight for their lives and not want their lives, because they knew that as long as they captured the city, the glory and wealth in the city would all be theirs.
In addition to allowing soldiers to burn and loot, Zeng Guoquan also ordered the slaughter of the city several times. For example, during the siege of Anqing, Liu Canglin, a taiping general captured by the Xiang army, was dismembered alive by the Xiang army, and the tens of thousands of Taiping troops who surrendered were all killed by the Xiang army.
This battle was fought very fiercely, and the Xiang army not only killed tens of thousands of Taiping troops on the battlefield, but also slaughtered the surrendered and captured Taiping troops en masse. Zeng Guoquan, who personally ordered the massacre, saw the scene of people rolling on the ground and pretended to say that the killing was too heavy, and after fighting this battle, he would return to his hometown to work as a farmer.
However, after attacking Anqing, Zeng Guoquan ordered the massacre of more than 16,000 Taiping troops who surrendered. Zeng Guoquan divided the Taiping Army into a group of one hundred people and let them take turns to come in and lead the way. After the Taiping army prisoners entered the house, the knife and axemen arranged by Zeng Guoquan would tie them up and send them to the back door to be beheaded.
The Xiang army cut down for a whole day and night, beheading more than 10,000 people. Because Zeng Guoquan cut off too many heads, people either feared or disgusted him and called him "Zeng Shaved Head".
After attacking Tianjing City, Zeng Guoquan once again ordered that the sword not be sealed. After the Xiang army entered the city, it bullied and insulted women, slaughtered the people, burned and plundered, and did all kinds of evil.
Zeng Guoquan's brutality was heinous, and even Peng Yulin, who was the commander of the Xiang Army, could not accept it. Zeng Guoquan slaughtered the city many times, not only surrendered to the Taiping army was killed, but the people in the city were also slaughtered by the Xiang army without military discipline. Peng Yulin, the commander of the water army, was very indignant at the situation, and disregarded zeng Guofan's brotherly relationship with zeng guofan, and wrote a letter to zeng guofan, asking him to kill zeng guoquan for the people. Of course, Zeng Guofan naturally would not kill his own brother, and he angrily questioned Peng Yulin, asking him why he wanted to stir up dissension, and said unashamedly: "What kind of soldiers Zeng Guoquan looks like, don't I know?" ”
Of course, Zeng Guofan knew, but he would not care about Zeng Guoquan, because Zeng Guoquan was an important force that could defeat the Taiping Army.
In addition to being cruel and murderous, Zeng Guoquan is also greedy and loves money. Unlike Zeng Guofan, who had been fighting in the army for several years, Zeng Guoquan would leave the army for a few days every time he attacked a city. During this time, Zeng Guoquan would return to his home, buy land and property, and transport a large amount of looted gold and silver wealth back to his hometown. This is extremely risky, but Zeng Guoquan does it every time, in order to show off in front of his father and fellow villagers, which is also the difference between Zeng Guoquan and Zeng Guofan.
The amount of wealth that Zeng Guoquan looted was staggering. Whether it was the treasures in the Palace of the British King, or the large treasures in the Vault of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom in Tianjing, or the people's fat and people's ointment that had been looted, Zeng Guoquan had all been collected. For example, when Tianjing was breached, there were hundreds of ships transporting gold and silver.
Zeng Guoquan's doing so will naturally attract criticism. Zeng Guoquan slaughtered the soldiers and civilians, making him infamous and losing the hearts of the people; he enriched himself and embezzled the treasury of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, which angered the imperial court.
At that time, the Qing court was financially tight, and it was hoping to rely on the wealth in the treasury after breaking through tianjing, but Zeng Guoquan said that there was none, and Empress Dowager Cixi and others were naturally displeased.
Zeng Guofan calculated deeply and saw that his brother was on the cusp of the storm, so after Zeng Guoquan made a great contribution to breaking the Tianjing City, he hurriedly requested that Zeng Guoquan be expelled from his hometown on the grounds that Zeng Guoquan was seriously ill.
Of course, Zeng Guoquan also did good deeds in his life. When Zeng Guoquan was serving as the governor of Shanxi, he encountered a severe drought, and he donated 13 million taels of silver and 2 million danshi of rice, saving millions of hungry people. Therefore, to this day, there are still some Shanxi people who still worship Zeng Guoquan. This may be the two sides of the same person in history.