In the late Qing Dynasty, there were Li Hongzhang, Zuo Zongtang, Zeng Guofan, and Zhang Zhidong, as the four famous ministers of the late Qing Dynasty, who were about to fall in the Great Qing Dynasty. Painstaking efforts were made to prolong the life of the faltering Qing Dynasty. Among them, Zeng Guofan was even more to quell civil strife, organize diplomacy, and bow down as a pillar of the Qing Dynasty.
Zeng Guofan's "Zeng Guofan Family Book" is well-known, which is enough to see the success of Zeng's tutoring and has extremely powerful arguments. Zeng Guofan's younger brother Zeng Guoquan was a famous general in the late Qing Dynasty and the leader of the Famous Xiang Army.
Zeng Guoquan attacked Tianjing, defeated the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, and established enough great achievements, why after entering Tianjing, after opening the treasury of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, he should have been very happy, and could have asked for merit and rewards, why did Zeng Guoquan return to his face like ashes, saying: My life is over?
The political corruption of the late Qing Dynasty, countless great powers of capitalism joined the ranks of aggression and partition of China, with the threat of force, forced China to sign a series of unequal land-cutting indemnity treaties, in the face of huge reparations, the Qing government can do nothing, can only step up the looting and oppression of peasants.
Under the endless oppression, the common people were miserable, and finally broke out, and the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom Movement in Jintian, Guangxi, intensified throughout the country, and even occupied Nanjing and established its own political power.
The Qing government, which was greatly threatened by its rule, urgently needed to quell the rebels, but its own regular army, due to internal corruption and training, had no combat effectiveness to speak of, and could not fight with the Taiping Army.
So the Xianfeng Emperor ordered the recruitment of local township heroes, the formation of their own army, and after strict training, the suppression of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom. In this way, under the organization of Zeng Guofan, the prestigious Xiang Army was formally established.
At this time, Zeng Guoquan had already been admitted as a Yougongsheng, but he saw that the war was raging and the lives were ruined, so he threw his pen from Rong and joined the ranks of the Xiang Army to suppress the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom.
Zeng Guoquan was talented and intelligent since childhood, and Zeng Guofan once praised Zeng Guoquan: Chen Junping, Noon Junqi, and Lao Yuanzhen White Eyebrow. Zeng Guohuang was born Gengchen, Zeng Guohua was born at noon, and Zeng Guoquan was born in Yuanfu. Zeng Guofan wrote that Zeng Guoquan's talent was the best of his brothers.
After Zeng Guoquan joined the Xiang Army, he showed his military talent beyond ordinary people. In the sixth year of Xianfeng, the wing king Shi Dakai's troops invaded Jiangxi, Zeng Guofan was unfavorable in battle, and was surrounded by Shi Dakai, Zeng Guoquan strategized, and 3,000 soldiers recruited bravely went to support.
Instead of sending troops directly to the front, he surrounded Wei to save Zhao, successfully relieving the pressure on Zeng Guofan. Because of his bravery in battle, he became a concubine of Zeng Guofan.
In the seventh year of Xianfeng, Zhou Fengshan's troops were defeated by the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, and their morale was low, and they had no ability to fight back. Zeng Guoquan was ordered to fight three battles and win three victories, which greatly improved morale. In the ten years of Xianfeng, he encircled the point to provide reinforcements, repelled Chen Yucheng's reinforcements, and then captured Anqing and seized the granary stronghold of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom.
Although Zeng Guoquan has made great achievements and is worn by officials to a pint, there are also many negative rumors. During the siege of Anqing, Zeng Guoquan fought an unprecedented fierce battle, and in the battle that lasted more than twenty years ago, Chen Yucheng's four thousand troops were completely destroyed.
The surrendered Taiping army was all beheaded, their leaders were even dismembered, and then the Jixian Pass was breached, and the Xiang army annihilated more than 8,000 Taiping troops. This war was extremely fierce, in just one month, not only the Taiping Army was slaughtered on the battlefield, but even all the captives who surrendered were killed, and Zeng Guoquan, who had a wild personality and was known for his fierceness, felt that his legs were paralyzed.
After the capture of Anqing, Zeng Guoquan ordered the surrendered Taiping army to be divided into batches, falsely claimed zero road fees, brought them into the house, and the knife and axe hand tied it up, beheaded it directly from the back door, and killed more than 10,000 people, cutting for a whole day and a night.
Therefore, Zeng Guoquan also had the nickname of "shaving head". Later, Zeng Guoquan took all the gold and silver treasures of the British royal palace for himself.
Zeng Guoquan's murderous nature and greed were known to the imperial court, and he was dismissed from office. This is also the place where Zeng Guoquan was slandered and criticized by the officials of the imperial court. However, Zeng Guoquan was not a cruel person, he treated the enemy cruelly and fiercely, and he was also sympathetic to the people as an official.
When he was an official in Shanxi, Zeng Guoquan himself funded the sensational Ding Pengqi famine at that time, released grain for the disaster relief of the common people, and did his best to provide disaster relief, which received a good review.
When he was in Hubei, he was an assistant military officer and suppressed the rebels. When he was the governor of Liangjiang, he also loved the common people, who lived and worked in peace and contentment, were very stable under the rule of Zeng Guoquan, and made the military and the people harmonious.
In this way, Zeng Guoquan repeatedly advanced and retreated in the course of meritorious deeds, and the eunuch sea was ups and downs.
The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom collapsed under the continuous suppression of the Xiang Army, coupled with the partial split in the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, and Hong Xiuquan was addicted to the throne and extravagant and lascivious, so he deviated from Germany. Yi Wang Shi Da drove away, and Li Xiucheng and others were killed. Since then, the rivers of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom have gone down day by day.
Under the organization of Zeng Guofan and Zeng Guoquan, the Taiping Army was already at a disadvantage. In the first year of Tongzhi, when the plague was prevalent, Zeng Guoquan was in such an unfavorable situation, with an outnumbered enemy, resisted the repeated attacks of the rebels, and killed Hong Chunyuan, Tang Rirong and other generals.
Since then, the balance army has been in a slump. Two years later, Zeng Guoquan led an army to capture Tianjing, but after the capture of Tianjing, Zeng Guoquan did not restrain his subordinates, but allowed them to indulge, and the arsonists burned and plundered for seven days and seven nights, washing the whole city in blood, and mourning everywhere.
When the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom was in power, it also plundered and plundered the peasants, and gathered all the gold, silver and treasures obtained in the treasury of Tianjing. At that time, Hong Xiuquan's crown was made of pure gold, and it is conceivable that there must be a lot of gold and silver jewelry in the treasury of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom. At that time, the Qing government, which was in financial shortages, also hoped to rely on the finances in the Tianjing treasury to alleviate the finances.
However, Zeng Guoquan lacked thinking, saying that there was no gold and silver in Hong Xiuquan's holy treasury, plus he reported that Hong Xiuquan was dead, and Hong Xiuquan's son also died in the fire, and there was no proof of death. But how could the emperor easily let go of Zeng Guoquan? That's why there is a saying that "my life is over".
After experiencing this incident, Zeng Guoquan deeply realized that the rabbit was cooked by dead dogs, coupled with the countless killings he had killed, and he also gave people a handle, so with the help of Zeng Guofan, he returned home from illness. It is in this way that we can withdraw from the official arena and stay away from danger.
After Zeng Guoquan's death, the Qing court gave him the title of Crown Prince Taifu, gave him gold to treat his funeral, and allowed him to enter the Zhaozhong Ancestral Hall and the Xianliang Ancestral Hall in Beijing, and also built ancestral halls for him in many places in Jiangxi, with outstanding merits.
Zeng Guoquan was quite accomplished militarily and politically, and was good at using strategic tactics in the campaign against the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, and looked at the overall situation in each battle and won by surprise. Politically, he sympathized with the people's feelings, restrained his subordinates, was honest and wise, and all of his subordinates praised the leadership of Zeng Guofan.