First year of Deyou (1275) – second year (1276)
Emperor Duzong died in July of the 10th year of Xianchun (1274), leaving behind three minor sons: Zhao Fu (xià), who was born to Concubine Yang Shufei, at the age of 7, Zhao (xiǎn) born to Empress Quan was 4 years old, and Zhao Fu (bǐnɡ) born to Yu Xiurong was 3 years old.
Empress Xie summoned her courtiers to discuss the establishment of an emperor, and everyone thought that Zhao Yun, who was born to Concubine Yang Shufei, was older and should be established, but both Jia Xiangdao and Empress Xie advocated the establishment of concubines, so Zhao was made emperor, in order to be Emperor Gong. Emperor Gong was still young at this time, so he was put under the supervision of the empress dowager Xie Shi, but the real power of the imperial court was actually still in the hands of the chancellor Jia Xiangdao. During the reign of Emperor Lizong and Emperor Duzong, the demise of the Song Dynasty was irreversible, and less than two years after Emperor Gong ascended the throne, the Song court surrendered to the Yuan Dynasty. The Song Dynasty was captured by Taizu Zhao Kuangyin from the hands of orphans and widows in Later Zhou, and finally lost to the hands of orphans and widows. Later generations wrote poems sarcastically:
When Chen Qiaoli was in the village, he deceived him as a widow and an orphan.
Who knows that more than three hundred years later, widows and orphans were also deceived.
Orphans and Widows: The End of the Southern Song Dynasty
When Zhao ascended the throne, the Song Dynasty was in a state of turmoil. The Mongol Iron Horse marched south, the situation was out of control, and the rule of the Song Dynasty was paralyzed.
In September of the tenth year of Xianchun, the Yuan army launched a general offensive against the Southern Song Dynasty. In December, Boyan led an army into Ezhou, defeating the E and Han defenders led by the Song general Xia Gui at Qingshanji, and Hanyang and Ezhou fell one after another. Boyan left some of his soldiers to guard Ezhou, and he led the main force himself, with the Song Dynasty general Lü Wenhuan as the front, and continued to the east. Most of the defenders along the river were the old troops of the Lü clan, and wherever the Yuan army went, these people surrendered one after another, and the Yuan army was able to successfully break through the Yangtze River defense line, and in the spring of the first year of Deyou (1275), they conquered the military towns of Anqing and Chizhou, and the soldiers were near the city of Jiankang.
After the fall of Ezhou, the Yangtze River defense line was opened, and the Southern Song Dynasty was in a big earthquake inside and outside the wilderness, all walks of life in the Beijing Division pinned their hopes on Jia Xiangdao, calling on the "shichen" to personally enlist, hoping that he could achieve the merit of "reconstruction" like the Lizong Dynasty. Jia Rudao had no choice but to set up the governor's mansion in Lin'an and prepare to go on a campaign. In the last year of Emperor Lizong's reign, Jia Xiangdao implemented the "Intention Law" among the military generals to exclude dissidents, and Liu Zhen used the "Intention Law" for his superiors to persecute and was forced to surrender to Mongolia. Jia Rudao knew liu zhen's ability very well, and because he was afraid of Liu Quan, he did not dare to send troops until the first month of the first year of Deyou, when he heard that Liu Quan had died, he said happily: "I have heaven to help." "Emperor Gong on the table, request to go on the expedition.
Jia Rudao dispatched more than 100,000 elite soldiers from all walks of life, loaded with countless gold veils, armor and supplies, and even took his wives and concubines to leave the capital, and the position stretched for more than 100 miles (about 40 kilometers today). In February, travel to Wuhu to meet Xia Gui. When Xia Gui saw Jia Xiangdao, he drew a note from his sleeve and wrote: "Three hundred and twenty years of the Song calendar." The implication is that the Song Dynasty has lasted for nearly 320 years, and the country's power has been exhausted, don't lose your life for it. Jia Xiangdao tacitly agreed, nodding his head in acquiescence.
After Jia Rudao reached the front line, he led the rear army to garrison Lugang, ordered the general Sun Huchen to lead the former army to garrison Dingjiazhou in the lower reaches of Chizhou, and Xia Gui led 3500 hundred warships across the river. Jia Rudao, well aware of the bravery of the Mongol army, did not dare to engage it head-on, and still fantasized about taking the old path of peace with Kublai Khan in the first year of The Qing Dynasty (1259), so he ordered the release of Yuan prisoners and the delivery of lychees, yellow oranges and other things to Boyan, hoping to seek peace by calling Chenna coins. However, at this time, the goal of the Yuan army was to destroy the Southern Song Dynasty, saying that the Chenna coin could no longer satisfy the greed of the Yuan people, and the request for peace was categorically rejected. The two armies fought, Boyan successively broke through the two lines of defense of Sun Huchen and Xia Gui, and reached Lugang, the Song army was defeated, countless people died, the river became red, and Jia Xiangdao fled to Yangzhou.
Jia Xiangdao was in the position of Pingzhang Junguo and the governor of Zhulu Army, duzong honored him as a "master", and the ministers regarded him as "Zhou Gong", but he was so vulnerable that people ridiculed it:
Ding Jiazhou sounded a gong, scaring away Brother Jia.
Sending a message to the Manchu pilgrims, Zhou Gong now became Zhou Po.
After Jia Rudao's defeat, he became the target of everyone's attention, and there were strong calls for Jia Rudao's execution from top to bottom. However, Empress Xie believed that Jia Rudao's industrious three dynasties could not lose the courtesy of treating the ministers because of the crime of one dynasty, and only demoted Jia Rudao to a high-state regimental training envoy, relocated him in The Prefecture, and confiscated his family property. On his way to Zhangzhou, Jia Rudao was killed by the prison officer Zheng Huchen at Mumian'an, ending his life of unauthorized power and misguided the country.
After the Battle of Lugang, the Southern Song Forces suffered heavy losses and their morale was seriously frustrated. Boyan continued to descend the river east, and in October of the first year of the Deyou Dynasty, the Yuan army marched towards Lin'an in three ways from Jiankang. Bo Yan personally led the Chinese army to attack Changzhou. Changzhou is located in the main road of transportation, guarding the Lin'an Gateway, the strategic position is very important, Boyan invested 200,000 troops here, Changzhou Zhizhou Yao (yín), Tongju Chen (zhāo) and other courageous resistance. Boyan drove the residents outside the city to transport soil to fill the moat, and even used the people to transport the soil as a pile of materials, and eventually built a embankment around the city. On November 18, the Yuan army launched a general attack, and two days later the city of Changzhou was breached, and the Yuan army carried out a barbaric massacre, killing tens of thousands of people, and only a few people survived. The Changzhou Massacre had the deterrent effect that the Mongol invaders had hoped for, and subsequently, when the Yuan army approached Pingjiang, the Pingjiang defenders surrendered the city without engagement.
With the approaching of the Mongol Iron Horse, the people in Lin'an Province were panicked, and a large number of people tried to flee the capital, especially the officials of the imperial court, taking the lead in escaping in order to save their lives. Dozens of ministers, including Zeng Yuanzi, a member of the Privy Council, fled by night. The Privy Council Secretary who signed the letter and Weng He and the Privy Council Secretary Ni Pu and others secretly instructed Yu Shitai and the Court to impeach themselves in order to leave office and escape. Empress Xie severely condemned these disloyal ministers and issued an edict saying: "In the more than three hundred years since the founding of the Great Song Dynasty, I have always treated scholars with courtesy. Now that I and the new monarch who succeeded to the throne have suffered mondo, none of you, the great and small courtiers, have called for the salvation of the country. There are bureaucrats defecting inside, there are county guards and county orders to abandon the city, the eyes and ears cannot correct for me, and the two or three rulings cannot advocate the leadership of mass workers. Reading the books of the sages on weekdays, what is promised! But at this time, he made this move, and how could he be born to face people, and how could he die to see the emperor!" However, the empress dowager's condemnation seemed so pale and weak under the threat of the Mongol Iron Horse that it could not arouse the confidence of internal and external officials to fight for the Song Dynasty. After a brief truce in the first month of the second year of the second year, only 6 officials appeared in the courtroom. The escape of officials disintegrated the hearts and minds of the military and the people, making it impossible for the Song Dynasty to organize effective resistance, and the imperial family fell into a situation of isolation and helplessness.
Jia Xiangdao, who had misused his power and mistook the country, had been deposed, and at this time, if the imperial court could cheer up and appoint sages, the situation might be reversed. But at this time, the imperial court made another serious mistake, that is, to appoint Chen Yizhong as the minister. Under the auspices of Chen Yizhong, the Song Dynasty finally fell into the abyss of unending disasters. Chen Yizhong is an arrogant, arrogant, and deceitful duplicitous faction, accustomed to making high-sounding and high-pitched remarks condemning any proposition and behavior of compromise and concession. Chen Yizhong was originally quoted by Jia Xiangdao, but after the defeat of Jia Xiangdao's army, he took the lead in proposing to execute Jia Xiangdao to enhance his own prestige, without shame. Han Zhen, the commander of the Forbidden Army, made Han Zhen propose to move the capital, and he went so far as to trick him into killing him in his own home.
Chen Yizhong has long gained power and increased his prestige through such sensational performances and rhetoric, but in fact he is an indecisive coward who pretends to resist the hero. At the turn of the spring and summer of the first year of Deyou, when the war was at its most intense, both inside and outside the government and the public demanded that he personally supervise the battle on the front line, but he hesitated and cowered and refused to go out of the city. Obviously, Chen Yizhong could not have risked his life for the Song Dynasty. In July, he left Lin'an and fled to the southern coastal area, far from the front line, and asked the imperial court to assign him a position in this area. He refused the order sent by the imperial court to invite him back to the dynasty, and the empress dowager was helpless and personally wrote a letter to his mother. With the intervention of his mother, Chen Yizhong returned to the capital. Taisheng strongly attacked Chen Yizhong's escape behavior, accusing him of being afraid of his head and tail, being timid and afraid of things, being an exaggerated duplicitous faction, and a minister of misleading the country like Jia Xiangdao.
Chen Yizhong was in charge of the country, acting erratically, hovering between peace and war, and unable to make a decision. He shouted all kinds of bold words verbally, but in fact he was cowardly and afraid of things, and did not have the courage and ability to fight with the Yuan Army to the death. At the end of the first year of the first year, the situation under his auspices was developing in a direction that was increasingly unfavorable to the Song Dynasty, and there was no room for maneuver other than a complete surrender. Wen Tianxiang and Zhang Shijie proposed to move the capital to the southeast in an attempt to fight a war, but the timid Chen Yizhong vetoed this proposal and insisted on peace. On the eighteenth day of the first month of the second year of Deyou, Empress Xie sent her chancellor Yang Yingkui to present the Yuan army with a surrender table and a jade seal to pass on the country, and to mourn Bo Yan's recitation of the virtue of heavenly good life and lenient treatment of the Song Dynasty royal family. The Yuan Dynasty demanded face-to-face talks with the chancellor, and Chen Yizhong was so frightened by this request that he once again abandoned the empress dowager and the young emperor and fled Lin'an that night.
After Chen Yizhong fled, the Mongol Iron Horse had already approached the city, and the situation was irreparable. Empress Xie appointed Wen Tianxiang as the Right Minister and Privy Counsellor to negotiate in the Mongol military camp. Wen Tianxiang was awe-inspiring and was detained by Boyan, and Empress Xie sent Jia Yuqing as an envoy.
On the fifth day of the first month of February, a ceremony was held in the imperial city of Lin'an, and Zhao announced his formal abdication. On March 2, Boyan entered Lin'an as a victor. Yuan Shizu issued an edict asking Boyan to send the Song Dynasty monarchs to Dadu as soon as possible, and Zhao and his mother Quan shi and a few attendants left Lin'an and embarked on the journey to Dadu. Empress Xie was ill and did not accompany her, but soon set out for the north under the pressure of the Yuan army. At this point, the Zhao and Song dynasties, which lasted for nearly 320 years, officially ended.
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