Zeng Guofan tried his best to suppress Taiping rebels four times, and finally he died at the hands of the Qing court.

Core Tip: This article is taken from the ninth issue of Literature and History in 2009. Author: Zeng Fanxi, original title: Zeng Guofan was in distress for four times. Zeng Guofan became the head of a military group as a scholar, suppressed the Taiping Army and saved the Qing Dynasty. Four times in distress, finally narrowly missed, made a generation of famous officials. Zeng Guofan (1811-1872) was originally named Sheng Di. 18 1 1 year 165438+1October 26th (Qing Jiaqing16 years 10/0/kloc-0. In October, Zeng Guofan was appointed as the Minister of Hunan, served as assistant minister in the Ministry of Rites, and trained the Xiang army. Since then, Zeng Guofan has become the strongest opponent of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom. Zeng Guofan changed from a scholar to the leader of a military group, commanding the Xiang army to fight everywhere, finally suppressing the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom and saving the stormy Qing Dynasty. This also made his reputation and prestige reach its peak. From Zeng Guan to Zhili Governor, he became the most dependent Han official in Qing Dynasty. After his death, he was awarded the title of Taifu and posthumous title Zheng Wen by the Qing court. Although Zeng Guofan has made brilliant personal achievements, his ten-year military career was not smooth sailing. Among them, four times of distress almost made him return in vain. For the first time, Shizuoka was defeated. 1854 In February, Zeng Guofan had developed into A Xiang Army with 10 battalion and 5,000 soldiers, and carried out the so-called "eastward expedition" with great ambition. Before he left, he also released the famous Beggars in Guangdong. However, this "eastward expedition" did not go smoothly at first. When Shi Xiangzhen, the Western Expedition Army of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, was stationed in Changsha, he had occupied Yuezhou, Xiangyin, Ningxiang and other places and arrived in Changsha. Zeng Guofan sent his troops to attack Ningxiang. As a result, he was defeated again and again and won the first battle. However, the intelligence reconnaissance of Taiping Army is unknown. Seeing that the Xiang army was menacing, they thought that the main force of the Qing army was coming and evacuated to Jinggang and other places overnight. Zeng Guofan quickly sent troops to invade Yuezhou in order to reverse the defeat in northern Hunan. It coincided with the arrival of Taiping Army reinforcements in Hubei, and laid siege to Yuezhou with Hunan Taiping Army, annihilating most of the defenders. A water and land casualties, fled to Changsha. Soon, Zeng Guofan also arrived in Changsha to save the provincial capital. At that time, the Qing army in Changsha was "more than 2,000 to 3,000, which was only used to defend the crib", and its strength was relatively weak. Moreover, due to repeated setbacks since the expedition, officers and men were terrified and demoralized. "People think they are doomed", "They are surprised by the sound of horns and flames", and they are always in fear. Later, the Jinggang vigilante came to report that there were few Taiping rebels there and no one to guard them, and they were "driven away", saying that they had set up a pontoon bridge and were willing to help the Xiang army. Therefore, Zeng Guofan decided to counterattack the Taiping Army and changed the original plan of attacking Xiangtan by land. On April 28th, he led 40 warships and 800 marines to attack Jinggang in an attempt to win by luck. However, because the Taiping Army was ready for the battle, the sky was even more unfavorable-the wind speed was too fast, and the Xiang warships could not dock at Jinggang, so they had to dock at Tongguanzhu on the other side of Jinggang. Taiping Army burned more than 0 warships of Hunan Navy 10 along the wind. Zeng Guofan was shocked to learn that the navy was defeated, and sent a land division to attack Jinggang in three ways in an attempt to save the defeat. However, "Lu Yong was frightened when he saw that the water was bravely defeated", which was also a rout. "For the pontoon bridge, the door and the bedplate were used, and the bridge was broken because of many people and died 100 people." When Zeng Guofan saw that the foot soldiers fled, he personally took a knife to supervise the array, erected a flag on the shore, and said, "Those who cross the flag will be beheaded." But the Xiang army was defeated like a mountain, and all the foot soldiers detoured from the flag. Zeng Guofan was ashamed and angry. He decided to commit suicide by diving and died. Staff and Li saw that he had held off his entourage and looked different, so they ordered Zhang Shoulin, a "junior", to sail quietly to follow, for safety. Zeng Guofan went to Tongguan. When he saw him jump into the water, he rescued him and put him on the boat, persuading him to go back to camp with Chen and Li. After the defeat of Jinggang, Zeng Guofan was disintegrated by many officials in Changsha. He was so pessimistic that he even ordered his brother to buy a coffin and prepare to commit suicide to thank him for losing his teacher. Fortunately, an expert of Xiang army, Tachibu, led a land division to defeat the Taiping Army of the Forest Department in Xiangtan, and won a great victory, which made Xianfeng Emperor sit up and take notice of Xiang army and saved Zeng Guofan's life. Because of this, Zeng Guofan stood firm among the gentry officials in Hunan. The second time, Hukou suffered a fiasco. After Zeng Guofan fled from Jinggang to Changsha, he carried out a severe counter-revolutionaries, cut off all the camps that broke up in the battle, leaving only those who dared to fight and fight, even his younger brother Zeng. The army reorganization in Changsha has greatly improved the fighting capacity of the Xiang army. After a series of rest and supplements, such as recruiting new brave soldiers and repairing warships, the Xiang army launched another attack. After two wars, Chenglingji, Yuezhou and Wuchang, it caused a devastating blow to Taiping Navy and won the upstream town of Wuhan. Emperor Xianfeng was carried away by the sudden victory, awarded Zeng Guofan the title of assistant minister of the Ministry of War, and ordered him to quickly go downstream and attack the Taiping Army in Jiangxi and Anhui. After a fierce battle, Xiang needed to rest, but under the strict orders of Emperor Xianfeng, Zeng Guofan had to bite the bullet and continue to attack. After World War I in Tianjiazhen, the Xiang army dealt a heavy blow to the Taiping Navy, which basically collapsed. The land division of the Xiang army pursued the victory, captured Guangji and Huangmei in Hubei, and arrived at the gates of Jiujiang in Jiangxi. As for the Taiping Army, due to the deterioration of the upstream war situation, Shi Dakai was ordered to preside over the military affairs of Anqing in the Western Expedition again, and commanded the battle of Jiujiang and Hukou to fight the fierce battle with the outline of Luo. The lines of defense of Taiping Army in Jiujiang and Hukou are deep and high, so it is difficult for Xiang Army to move. On February 8th, 1854, 1854, the land division of Xiang army attacked Jiujiang, which opened the curtain, but the attack failed to break the city for many days, forming a stalemate. 1855 65438+1October 3, the Xiang navy division arrived in Balijiang, Hukou, and the Taiping Army was already ready. After several days of fighting, both armies suffered heavy casualties. Mu Shuicheng, which was used by Taiping Army to defend Hukou, was destroyed. Shi Dakai immediately rebuilt the Hukou defense line and ordered the ship to sink into the river. "The sand and gravel are used, and only one pass is left in the west bank." However, the Xiang army was also exhausted by the "surprise attack camp" tactics of the Taiping Army, arrogant and impatient, and eager for World War I. Soon, the war resumed. On the 29th, the Xiang navy rushed into the hukou water card and cut off the bamboo rope used to intercept the hukou. More than 20 canoes, such as long queues and sampans, rushed into Poyang Lake, rampaging and burning a large number of Taiping warships. Shi Dakai seized the opportunity to make the soldiers set up checkpoints at the mouth of the lake again, build two pontoons, fill the soil under the bridges, build forts, cut off the enemy's retreat, cut off the contact between the inner lake navy and the outer Jiang Xiangjun, and prepare to divide and rule. At the same time, he sent more than 20 small boats to besiege Xiang Junjun's fast crab warship outside the Yangtze River. In the naval battle, fast crabs, long dragons, sampans and other warships must cooperate with each other. The fast crab and the long dragon have fierce firepower, the sampan has strong maneuverability, the size depends on each other, and the combination of firepower and maneuverability makes the navy division more effective. However, the long dragon and the sampan were trapped in the inner lake. "There are many heavy ships in the outer river, and it is not easy to transport them, such as birds losing their wings and insects losing their feet. I really feel that I can't stand on my own feet. " The fast crab ship was unable to cope with the flexible attack tactics of Taiping Army and retreated to Jiujiang Camp. Shi Dakai decided to attack the Xiang navy outside Jiujiang for the second time, and completely solved the siege of Jiujiang. 1 1 February, Shi Dakai ordered more than 30 oars filled with kindling to attack the Xiang navy, and sent more than 30 oars to besiege Zeng Guofan by boat, and found Zeng Guofan's letters, memorials, maps and imperial edicts given to him by Emperor Xianfeng. In critical condition, Zeng Guofan committed suicide by drowning again and was rescued by aides. Get off the boat and sail into Luo Zenan camp. He looked at the successive navy divisions in the river and thought that the navy division he had been running for several years was over. He was ashamed, resentful and heartbroken. He wanted to learn from Xian Zhen, the general of the State of Jin in the Spring and Autumn Period, and rode to his death. Luo Zenan and Liu Rong grabbed the reins in panic, and all the staff didn't leave. After many times of pulling and persuasion, they gave up. The third time, I was trapped in Nanchang. After the victory of Jiujiang and Hukou, the Taiping Army took advantage of the victory and went straight to the rear of the Xiang Army, striving for the upper reaches and recovering Wuhan. Hu Linyi, another leader of Xiang, acted as the governor of Hubei at this moment, asking Zeng Guofan to withdraw the main force of Xiang in Jiangxi and rescue Wuhan. For political reasons, Zeng Guofan was afraid of being disintegrated by his political opponents, and even more afraid of being blamed by the Qing court, and insisted on sticking to Jiangxi. He was stationed in Nankang County and was interdependent with the Neihu Navy. He continued to command the Xiang army to besiege Jiujiang, and only sent expert Luo Zenan to save Wuhan. In the early days of Xiang Army, the two generals were Taqibu of Manchu and Luo Zenan of Han nationality. At this point, Taqibu vomited blood and died because he could not attack Jiujiang for a long time. Luo Zenan, Zeng Guofan's men, has no right-hand man. During this period, it mainly relied on the Neihu Navy trapped in Nankang and the old army of Taqibu in Jiangxi (led by Zhou Fengshan, the assistant of Ta). 1April, 855, Taiping Army took three grams from Wuchang. After stabilizing the military situation in Hubei, Shi Dakai led his troops back to Jiangxi, and took advantage of Luo Zenan's aid to Hubei to launch a powerful offensive in Jiangxi. From 1855 and 1 1, Shi Dakai got in touch with the Guangdong Heaven and Earth Society Rebel Army, and connected with Jiangxi Ruizhou, Linjiang and Yuanzhou to besiege Ji 'an Fucheng. Zeng Guofan had to withdraw from Jiujiang and transfer Zhou Fengshan's land division to Zhangshu Town, a strategic place, in order to go south for rescue. However, Zeng Guofan was not sure whether Ji 'an could be saved, and worried about the safety of Nanchang, the provincial capital, so he ordered Zhou Fengshan to stay in Zhangshu Town and wait and see the situation. Shi Dakai took advantage of Zhou Fengshan's indecision to conquer Ji 'an in February 1856 and attacked Xiang's camp in Zhangshu Town. The defeated troops poured into Nanchang, and Zeng Guofan had to enter Nanchang to clean up the mess. By April of 1856, the Taiping Army of the Western Expedition had occupied 46 counties in 8 provinces of Jiangxi 13, and Zeng Guofan lamented: "From southern Hubei to Meiling, thieves have traced hundreds of miles, with hundreds of thousands of names." In order to save the crisis in Jiangxi, Zeng Guofan urgently called for Luo Zenan, who was attacking outside Wuchang. Luo Zenan stepped up his siege in order to quickly break through Wuchang City to save his master, but he was killed by Taiping Army. In this way, Zeng Guofan's two Xiang touts were both killed and the situation became more and more difficult. Zeng Guofan was trapped in Nanchang, his newspaper office was blocked and his contact was interrupted. Even when he sent a letter home, he had to disguise himself with argot wax pills. Even so, the emissary was often seen through by the Taiping rebels, and more than 0/00 people were killed. Zeng Guofan later described the situation at that time and said: "When I heard the howl of the spring breeze, my heart was broken. I hesitated around the house when I saw a thief boat sailing above me. " "When I was in the war, the cannon shook my flesh and flew, and my blood fell on the cliff. If the soldiers are hungry and embarrassed, they will be detained, humiliated by the public, and tears will rise to the river, which will make me unable. " "I was trapped in Peng Li for a long time." Visible zeng guofan's situation is how mess. After Shi Dakai defeated Zhou Fengshan's army in Zhangshu Town, he could attack Nanchang and capture Zeng Guofan alive. Unfortunately, just as Zeng Guofan was in danger in Nanchang, Wang Yang, the East King of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, transferred Shi Dakai back to Tianjing to take part in the battle to break the Jiangnan camp of the Qing army, and took away a large number of Taiping rebels, enabling Zeng Guofan to survive. 1857 In March, Zeng Guofan received the news of his father's death, so he invited Ding Fu to return to his hometown and left Jiangxi to get out of trouble without waiting for the imperial edict. For the fourth time, Qimen was besieged. 1in July, 858, Zeng Guofan came out of the mountain again under the command of the Qing emperor, and successively ordered reinforcements to Zhejiang and Fujian to drive Shi Dakai to Gannan and southern Hunan, far away from the main battlefield. In August, at the request of Hu Linyi, the Qing court wrote to Zeng Guofan and Hu Linyi to draw a map of Anhui. Zeng Guofan put forward the general strategic policy of "Tu Wan": ... We must first break the nest of Chen rebellion around Anqing, and at the same time smash Luzhou to attack Chen rebellion. "According to the general strategic policy of" cutting off branches and leaves, beating the nest ",Zeng Guofan decided to launch the battle of Anqing and fight with Chen Yucheng in northern Anhui to seize the initiative of the war. To this end, Zeng Guofan made a concrete plan for the four-way invasion and always carried it out. Even because the Soviet Union and Chang were not saved, the criticism of the Qing court was unmoved, and Anqing was finally surrounded in June 1860. In order to facilitate the command, Zeng Guofan moved the camp to Qimen, an important town in southern Anhui. As for the Taiping Army, after the second attack on the Qing army's Jiangnan camp, the leaders made a plan to take Wuhan in two ways to solve the siege of Anqing, which was called "the second western expedition" in history. According to this military deployment, the Taiping Army decided to divide the troops into five ways to aid Jiangxi, one of which was to attack Zeng Guofan's Qimen camp. 65438+65438 0860+65438 February +0, 20,000 people in Li Xiucheng "broke into Yangzhanling, claiming the siege of Xiuning, and cut off the road between Bao and Zhang", but they were defeated by Xiang experts Bao Chao and Zhang, and were forced to quit Yangzhanling. Li Xiucheng's attack this time dealt a great blow to Zeng Guofan, because Yang Zhanling was only 60 miles away from the Qimen camp of Zeng Guofan. Qimen's defensive forces are thin, with only more than 3,000 people around, and the Taiping Army is outnumbered. At that time, Zeng Guofan knew that it was difficult to survive, and even wrote his will, making proper arrangements for his brother and Zeng's affairs. But the purpose of Li Xiucheng's invasion was "not to fight for this place, but actually to recruit soldiers in Hubei". More importantly, he was never interested in the "Second Western Expedition" and paid more attention to preserving his own strength. After the defeat, he withdrew from Yang Zhanling, which led to the loss of outstanding soldiers who attacked Qimen and saved Zeng Guofan's life in vain. However, Zeng Guofan did not get rid of the predicament fundamentally, and the strength of Taiping Army in southern Anhui was superior to that of Xiang Army. 1860 65438+In mid-February, Taiping soldiers attacked Qimen area in three ways again, and Zeng Guofan was attacked on all sides and fell into panic again. In his letter to his family, he said, "Since 1 1 month, many strange dangers and storms have occurred. If you can't get through the newspaper for five days, you can't get through for more than 20 days. " It can be seen that the situation was very critical. Later, Zeng Guofan rushed to rescue expert Bao Chao, defeated Taiping rebels, restored route for providing foodstuff, and survived the crisis temporarily. However, a more serious situation happened soon after. 186 1 since March, Taiping rebels have continuously attacked Qimen camp, repelled the resistance of Xiang army many times, and entered a place only twenty miles away from Qimen, which made Zeng Guofan unable to report for duty, and his reimbursement was interrupted and he was in a desperate situation. At this time, he was extremely pessimistic, and wrote in his diary: "I was so worried that I couldn't sleep at night, my mouth was dry and my heart was on fire, but I didn't know that I was born with coke, and I died very sad." In his will to his son Ceng Jize, he wrote, "The situation here is critical and difficult to support", "When the situation is extremely tense, all aspects of assistance are cut off, and the morale of the army is particularly shaken by this setback", "When you grow up, you must not get involved in military affairs. It is difficult to see the right and wrong clearly, it is easy to commit crimes, and it is especially easy to make excuses. For a long time, I sat on the needle carpet every day. " It can be seen how gloomy and depressed he was. At this moment, another leader of the Xiang army, Zuo, defeated the Taiping rebels in Jingdezhen, Jiangxi Province, threatening the Taiping rebels' posterior road in Qimen area, forcing them to retreat, and Zeng Guofan once again recovered his life. At this point, the Taiping Army's five-way aid to Jiangxi strategic plan was completely shattered. After Zeng Guofan arrived in Qimen, life was not easy. The twists and turns of war make him afraid, and he is often in a situation of several surprises a day. He quickly left Qimen while the Taiping Army was evacuated. 186 1 On May 6th, Zeng Guofan set out from Qimen and arrived in Liu Dong on May 6th, 10. He camped on a big ship moored on the river bank and was guarded by the navy. So you don't have to worry about being surrounded by Taiping rebels. These four crises did not kill Zeng Guofan, but he was finally able to command the Xiang army to suppress the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom and establish "great achievements". However, like many heroes, Zeng Guofan, as the "master of Gao Zhen", has not escaped the fate of "the rabbit is dead and the dog is cooked". From the day it seized Tianjing, the Qing court actively suppressed him, promoted and trained his subordinates to make them equal to their own status, so as to compete with him and achieve the goal of divide and rule. The most prominent example is that after Zeng Guofan's strategy of "defending the river" was frustrated, the Qing court replaced him with Li Hongzhang and ordered him to return to his original post as governor of Liangjiang. However, after Li Hongzhang took over the "suppression" affairs, he still pursued Zeng Guofan's "river defense" strategy and achieved success. For this practice of the Qing court, the discerning person can know the reason at a glance. 1in September, 868, Zeng Guofan was appointed as the governor of Zhili. 1June, 870, the famous "Tianjin religious plan" happened. Patriots in Tianjin killed more than 20 French colonists and burned some foreign buildings. When dealing with this incident, Zeng Guofan kowtowed to the French invaders and accepted the demands of the French under extremely humiliating conditions, which greatly damaged the dignity and interests of the Chinese nation. At that time, the ruling and opposition parties were full of reprimands, and patriotic officials and gentry scolded him endlessly. Some people even compared him to Qin Gui's face and labeled him a "traitor". Zeng Guofan suffered a great mental blow. Zeng Guofan's practice was originally adhering to the will of the Qing court, but under the strong pressure of national public opinion, the Qing court had to take Zeng Guofan as a scapegoat. Moreover, the Qing court took this opportunity to suppress him again and sent Li Hongzhang to take over the "Tianjin Religious Plan". Li Hongzhang's previous treatment of Zeng Guofan did not change much, but it was affirmed by the Qing court. 1August 870, the Qing court transferred Zeng Guofan back to the post of former governor of Liangjiang. 1March, 872 12, Zeng Guofan died in a "censure" and was appointed Governor of Liangjiang at the age of 6 1.