The Tang Dynasty was the most powerful dynasty in ancient China, and during this period, many heroes emerged.
When it comes to military generals of the Tang Dynasty, many people always think of Li Jing, Guo Ziyi and the like for the first time. And there is such a figure, his fame may not be as good as the previous ones, but everything he does, it is enough to shock the world.
Faced with an enemy army dozens of times larger than his own, he held out for nearly a year by relying on a small Yongqiu City, greatly delaying the enemy's fighters. After meeting Huaiyang City, the enemy army he faced increased several times, and although he only had a few thousand people, he did not have the slightest timidity, and this person was Zhang Tour.
Originally a native of Hedong, Puzhou, Zhang Tour grew up reading a wide range of books, was well versed in the art of war, always wanted to serve the country, and often interacted with those with lofty ambitions. When Zhang Tour was young, he served as an official in the middle of the jinshi and served as a county commander several times, during his reign, Zhang Tour often received help from the poor and always helped those in need, so he also got a good name of "charity and charity".
At that time, some localities were strong and oppressive, and their voice was rampant, and many officials were afraid of their power and let it go. Later, after Zhang patrolled the area, he did not fear the mighty and powerful, and executed the criminal haoqiang according to law, and the rest of the party was indoctrinated and converted to evil. Therefore, Zhang Tour won the unanimous support and love of the people, and his reputation was prominent for a while.
Later, after the Outbreak of the Anshi Rebellion, the Taishou and County Orders of many prefectures and counties, seeing the great momentum of An Lushan, surrendered one after another, and the rest fled early. After the rebels captured the states of Song and Cao, Yang Wanshi, the taishou of Yu Commandery, also surrendered to the rebels, and he also forced Zhang Tou to go to meet the rebels as a long history. When Zhang Zhu learned of this, he was very angry, and he led the people to howl and weep in front of the zhenyuan Xuanyuan Emperor's ancestral hall.
Subsequently, he raised an army against the rebels, many people responded, and soon Zhang Tour gathered more than a thousand soldiers. Zhang Patrol went all the way out and wiped out many rebel troops, and later, he met with the Tang general Jia Ben, and after the two joined forces, there were more than 2,000 people. Later, when Jia Ben and Zhang Patrol arrived at Huaiyang City, the Huaiyang City army had already been defeated by the rebels.
At that time, it happened that the captive soldiers in Huaiyang City escaped and made a big disturbance in the city, and Jia Ben and Zhang Tour took advantage of the chaos to attack Yongqiu, causing the rebel generals to flee in a hurry.
In March of the same year, the fleeing enemy led more troops back. At that time, the enemy army had more than 40,000 soldiers, while Zhang Patrol only had more than 2,000 men, and the soldiers in the city were terrified in the face of the oppression of the army.
Zhang Tour, on the other hand, was well aware of the importance of this battle, and once the city was captured, the national fortunes of the Tang Dynasty were basically cut off. He encouraged the soldiers on the city walls every day, and analyzed the situation on the battlefield with them: "If the enemy is strong and we are weak, we will have the heart of a light enemy, and the enemy does not know the reality of the city, and if it is not prepared, it will be able to win a great victory." After the defenders listened, their morale was greatly boosted.
This time to defend the city, Zhang Tour experienced hundreds of battles of all sizes, and each time he was able to rely on his excellent command ability to inflict the greatest blow on the enemy with the smallest losses. However, at that time, the support route of the defending city was cut off, and the number of defenders was reduced, while the rebel army was constantly assembling and gaining momentum.
Zhang Patrol knew that fighting a protracted war would only be slowly consumed to death, and because of this, he made many bold attempts.
One night, While the enemy was resting, Zhang Patrol ordered the soldiers to beat drums and shout, causing the enemy troops to be frightened and hurriedly get up from their beds to remain alert. After that, every once in a while, the drums and shouts of the defenders were heard, but not a single enemy was ever seen. At that time, it was at night, the view was not good, and the enemy generals were worried that the other side would come by surprise, so they kept the soldiers waiting.
After dawn, the soldiers returned to report that the garrison was quiet, and the rebels knew what they had planned. The soldiers at that time, nervous all night, were exhausted, so that the rebel generals had to let them go back to rest.
Who knows, the soldiers were not yet covered by the nest, Zhang Patrol led the army to kill them, and in the end, the rebels were defeated.
This tactic is not very new, and there are many cases in the Romance of the Three Kingdoms. But it's one thing to know this tactic, it's another to actually use it.
You must know that at that time, Zhang Tour only had more than two thousand people under his command, and there was no army supply, and every injury was fatal to him. In the dark night with extremely poor vision, it is necessary to be able to frighten the enemy soldiers and prevent the other party from suddenly killing, and the distance is not controlled by extremely experienced people.
Although Zhang Tour successfully attacked the enemy's military camp many times, his real purpose has never been achieved, that is, to kill the enemy leader Yin Ziqi. Yin Ziqi is very cunning, and he is obviously aware that Zhang Patrol wants to kill himself. Therefore, every time he commanded a battle, he must arrange several people of similar shape, wearing the same clothes as him, to disperse, resulting in Zhang Patrol always failing to kill the real leader.
Later, Zhang Tour came up with a method, he asked his subordinates to create a batch of bows and arrows made of wild artemisia, which were generally chosen after the mountains and rivers were exhausted. During one battle, Zhang had these bows and arrows shot into the enemy army, and the rebel soldiers could not wait to report to Yin Ziqi after picking up the bows and arrows. Zhang Tour, on the other hand, took the opportunity to let Nan Jiyun, who was highly skilled in archery, shoot Yin Ziqi.
As a result, Nan Jiyun only shot Yin Ziqi in the left eye, causing him to escape.
Later, the rebels returned many times and then were killed and retreated, and after killing and retreating, they returned again, and so on, and they never captured the city.
Zhang Patrol saw that there were few defenders left, so he led his troops to abandon the city and kill many rebels along the way. For the captured booty, Zhang Patrol distributed all of them to the soldiers, and he did not take it at all. Zhang Tour's subordinates had a general named Lei Wanchun, and in the course of a battle, Lei Wanchun was shot six arrows in the face, but in order to avoid disturbing the hearts of the army, Lei Wanchun never moved, making the enemy mistakenly think that he was a straw man who "borrowed arrows".
Suiyang is the barrier of Suiyang Canal, which is of great strategic significance. After Zhang Tour arrived at Suiyang, Suiyang Taishou Xu yuan not only did not worry that Zhang Tour would seize his military power, but instead took the initiative to hand over the army to Zhang Tour, and he was only responsible for some logistical affairs, the reason was only that he felt that Zhang Tour's ability to lead troops was stronger than his own. You must know that in the chaotic world, the army is the foundation of life, and Xu Yuan's open-mindedness has finally brought a lot of hope to Zhang Tour.
After Zhang Patrol defended Suiyang, the enemy's strength grew to as many as 200,000, while Zhang Tour only had more than 3,000 people in his hands, but with this meager strength, he fought back and forth with the other side. Once, when the wheat was ripe, Zhang Patrol saw that the rebels were harvesting grain and grass, so he repeated the trick and let the troops beat drums and shout. When the enemy heard the momentum, he thought that there was a surprise attack by the enemy and took up arms one after another.
At this time, Zhang Tour let the troops rest again, and when the rebels relaxed their vigilance, Zhang Tour suddenly came out with his troops, thus killing many enemy troops. Even so, the same problem fell on Zhang Tour again, and the garrison of Suiyang City could not be replenished, and it would soon be impossible to resist.
In desperation, Zhang Tour had to let his subordinate Nan Jiyun lead dozens of light cavalry to rush out of the siege and run to borrow troops and food from the nearby Linhuai City Taishou Helan Jinming.
However, Helan Jinming was timid and afraid of things, afraid that support for Suiyang City would cause the enemy to divert their attention to himself. Therefore, he refused Nan Jiyun's request, not only that, he saw that Nan Jiyun was so brave and wanted the other party to stay in the city to serve himself. Nan Jiyun was overwhelmed with grief when he saw this, wept bitterly, and bit down one of his fingers as a testimony to his coming.
He then led his men away and went elsewhere to look for help. However, after running through more than a dozen cities, Nan Jiyun only borrowed more than three thousand soldiers. Even so, he was attacked by rebels on his way back to the city, damaging most of his army. At that time, Zhang Zhuan and others were able to defend themselves in the face of dozens of times the enemy army, but almost no one in the surrounding cities was willing to rescue them, which was really regrettable.
In the end, Suiyang City was finally defeated in the end of the road.
When the rebels invaded the city, the defenders had not eaten for several days, and at that time, the city could eat almost everything, and even the bark paper could not be found, and Zhang Tour even killed his own concubine to reward the soldiers. However, until the last moment, none of the defenders surrendered or fled. In the end, they were all martyred, and their bravery and loyalty were vividly reflected in this moment.
Later, during the brief return of the Tang army, Zhang Zhu and Xu Yuan were posthumously honored as Yushi Zhongcheng and Shi Yushi, and the imperial court even set up a shrine for the two and invited their portraits to the Ling Yan Pavilion, which has always been admired by posterity.
However, the real irony is that not long after Zhang Tour and Xu Yuan were posthumously sealed, Zhang Tour's son Zhang Went Ill and provoked an incident. It turned out that it was he who learned that after his father Zhang Tour's death, he was whipped by the rebels, and his face was completely different, and he could not bear to see it. On the other hand, Xu Yuan's corpse was unharmed, and his heart could not help but be indignant. Therefore, he wrote to xu yuan to request that xu yuan be classified as a traitor and deprived of his official title.
After Xu Yuan's descendants knew about it, they were naturally indignant, and the two groups of people immediately quarreled. However, in the face of such a situation, Emperor Tang, instead of dissuading him, added fuel to the fire. To this end, a debate tournament was organized, which can be described as absurd. Not only that, the authors of later generations have also continued to write some articles that lead to war.
For example, in his "Biography of Zhang Tour", Zhang Han vigorously praised Zhang Tour, but did not mention the merits of Xu Yuan and others; however, some people did the opposite, and even more, a group of officials began to criticize Zhang Tour Xu Yuan's cruelty, accusing him of slaughtering women and children after the grain and grass in Suiyang City were exhausted, in order to replenish military food, and even the elderly did not spare, and so on.
When Zhang Patrol was guarding Suiyang, these "patriots" disappeared, and after Emperor Tang returned, they jumped out one after another and denounced the former heroes.
I have to say that the eventual demise of the Tang Dynasty is really inseparable from its own corruption.
Resources:
[Old Book of Tang, Vol. 187, Liechuan No. 137, Zizhi Tongjian Vol. 220, Tang Dynasty 36, New Book of Tang, Vol. 192, Liechuan No. 117]