Among the important generals of the Taiping Army who luckily escaped the disaster, Hong Xiuquan's righteous sister, Hong Xuanjiao, the Princess of the West, was the most famous.
Many scholars believe that Hong Xuanjiao is not Hong Xiuquan's younger sister, but Yang Xiuqing's younger sister. Hong Xuanjiao's original name was Yang Yunjiao, and it was Hong Xiuquan who recognized Yang Yunjiao as a righteous sister in order to worship the unity within the God Society.
Speaking of many people, many people do not believe it, and the reason why Hong Xiuquan's "Worship God Society" is deeply believed by the vast number of believers is mainly due to Hong Xuanjiao.
When Hong Xiuquan first began to preach at Zijing Mountain, many people did not believe his set and thought that Hong Xiuquan was talking nonsense. Therefore, a few months have passed, and Hong Xiuquan's congregation is still less than a hundred people. At this time, Hong Xuanjiao claimed that in a dream someone told her that "someone came here to teach people to worship God, and Rudang obeyed", and whether her dream was true or not was a matter of first, but it was of great help to Hong Xiuquan's mission. As a result, Hong Xuanjiao became the core figure of the Worship of God Society, especially among female believers.
Hong Xuanjiao is a strong woman with high martial arts and full of energy, and is the well-deserved number one of the Heavenly Kingdom Women.
After the Jintian Rebellion, when Yong'an was crowned king, Hong Xiuquan proclaimed himself the King of Heaven, with Yang Xiuqing as the Eastern King, Xiao Chaogui as the Western King, Feng Yunshan as the Southern King, Wei Changhui as the Northern King, and Shi Dakai as the Wing King. Although Hong Xuanjiao did not have the title of king, she was the sister of the Eastern King, the heavenly king's righteous sister, and the western princess, and naturally a member of the core leadership of the heavenly kingdom.
The marriage between Hong Xuanjiao and Xiao Chaogui is recorded in the "Li Xiucheng Self-Description". Li Xiucheng's handwritten confession contains the sentence "The heavenly king's sister married him (Xiao Chaogui)", which is enough to prove Hong Xuanjiao's identity as the Western Princess.
According to the notes of many Manchu literati, after the death of Xiao Chaogui, Many of the upper echelons of the Kingdom of Heaven had some meaning, which was obviously that the literati deliberately slandered the heroine, and there was no evidence to prove that Hong Xuanjiao was such a woman.
After Hong Xiuquan entered Nanjing, he vigorously engaged in "men returning to men and women to women", men and women were isolated for several years, and it was not easy for Hong Xuanjiao to see men.
In the leadership of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, Feng Yunshan and Hong Xuanjiao have a good reputation, and there are sayings in the Heavenly Kingdom that "men learn From Feng Yunshan and women learn from Hong Xuanjiao", which shows Hong Xuanjiao's personality charm.
In the "Tianjing Incident", Wei Changhui, who had killed the red-eyed, originally wanted to kill even Shi Dakai, but it was Hong Xuanjiao who sent someone to report to Shi Dakai, and Shi Dakai escaped the disaster. Moreover, in the process of Wei Changhui's indiscriminate killing, Hong Xuanjiao used her special identity to save many brothers, which is also one of the reasons why she is loved.
Although Hong Xuanjiao was a female general, she was brave and good at war, and she was powerful in the three armies, and the army called her Xiao Wangniang. According to the Qing Dynasty Wang Yun's "Tale of the Chieftain of the Thief in the Miscellaneous Talks of the Thief":
"Xiao Wangniang and female soldiers are all born in Guangxi, deeply follow the Xiuquan Teachings, and worship the Heavenly Emperor first in every battle. Light makeup out of the lineup, swinging a double knife, sharp and cold snow. Riding on a horse, the saddle waist cage is white, the body is white, and the dress is blue and colorful. Linfeng Yang Su wrist, command the female army, shirts and voices are mixed, looking forward to the heavens. Female soldiers are all pennant silver shields. In the middle of the war, Xiao Wangniang undressed and rode in and out of the Manchu Qing army. The inner clothes are wrapped in apricot yellow silk, the knife skills are wonderful, the color of the clothes is illusory, and the army is shocking. "
Because Hong Xiuquan was really addicted to wine in the later period and did not pay attention to political affairs, the pillars of the Heavenly Kingdom fell one by one. After the death of King Chen Yucheng, Hong Xuanjiao knew that the defeat of the Kingdom of Heaven was a foregone conclusion, and she was anxious, but there was nothing she could do, because at this time, Hong Xiuquan did not trust any of the old brothers at all.
After the fall of Tianjing, Hong Xuanjiao, under the protection of her uncle Lai Hanying, desperately escaped from Nanjing and fled to Hong Kong by sea, where her son Xiao Youhe was separated from her during the breakout and later died in Huzhou.
Hong Xuanjiao, who arrived in Hong Kong, under the patronage of Nanyang overseas Chinese Lin Mou, crossed the ocean and came to the United States, opening a medical center in San Francisco's Chinatown to practice medicine for overseas Chinese.
Hong Xuanjiao lived in the United States for nearly a decade, but has never remarried. Her heart must not have forgotten Xiao Chaogui, the hero of the Kingdom of Heaven.
Around 1872, Hong Xuanjiao died in San Francisco, and it was the local overseas Chinese who funded her to buy a cemetery and bury her in a foreign country.
More than a hundred years have passed, the cemetery of this heavenly goddess has long disappeared, and her story has been circulated in the folk along with the heroes of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom.