Chapter 57 assassination, uprising

Revolutionaries like to engage in assassinations, but also like to make uprisings.Ordinarily, there should be a relatively strict boundary between uprising and assassination. However, in the summer of the 33rd year of Guangxu (1907), Xu Xilin's incident in Anqing, the capital of Anhui, was said to be an uprising in textbooks, but the Chinese and foreign media at the time said that It was assassination.Xu Xilin assassinated Anhui governor Enming.Lu Xun, who was studying in Japan at the time, learned of the news from Japanese newspapers, and the name of the assassin was still in pinyin.Others know who they don't know, but as fellow villagers and comrades of the Restoration Association, Zhejiang people know who they are at a glance.

Of course, Xu Xilin and Qiu Jin were indeed planning to launch a large-scale uprising back then.This uprising has been planned and prepared for a long time in Zhejiang, and there are many parties.It is a pity that the scale of the uprising was too large, and the party members of the participants were too undisciplined. Without waiting for orders, they acted without authorization one after another, and then failed one after another.On the Anhui side, Xu Xilin seems to be too weak.He works as the general office of the Anhui Patrol Department (deputy director of the Police Headquarters) and the supervisor (principal) of the Patrol Academy. I don’t know if it’s because the time is too short, or because he speaks Shaoxing dialect that no one can understand, or maybe it’s both. In short, anyway, until the uprising started, none of the locals seemed to follow it sincerely.Perhaps, he simply did not develop members locally.If it was an uprising, it was launched hastily.Before the incident, Xu Xilin did give an impassioned speech to more than 280 students of the Patrol Academy. , everyone can't figure it out together, there is no other effect.

The day when Xu Xilin got into trouble was also the day when En Ming died.Speaking of which, this day was decided by En Ming himself.Originally, the graduation ceremony of the Patrol Academy was scheduled for May 28th of that year (lunar calendar), but that day was the 80th birthday of one of En Ming’s mothers, and he promised to attend, so the ceremony was moved forward to the 26th. .In an uprising, only Xu Xilin and the two people he brought with him, Chen Boping and Ma Zonghan, were the only ones who really knew about the uprising, and they were the three who had guns.At the time of the attack, the guns of the three people were put on En Ming's body. En Ming was shot eight times in total and was beaten into a sieve. , are also discounted).The other two guards died and the other was injured, and the accompanying Daotai and Zhifu were also slightly injured.According to the plan, Xu Xilin planned to let Ma Zonghan close the gate, trap all the students, and let no one leave.It seems that it was originally expected that once he made a move, the students would follow.As a result, when the gun was fired, people couldn't be restrained at all, and most of them ran away.The remaining 30 to 40 were huddled together, and Xu Xilin lied to them that someone had assassinated the governor, and as a policeman, they should come out to maintain law and order.These students may have been frightened and stupid, and they did not see clearly what happened at that time, so they were half coaxed, half deceived, and half threatened (forced with guns), led out of the school, and ran to the armory.When I arrived at the arsenal, I found that the guns inside had no bolts, and the guns and bullets did not match up, so they were useless at all.When the Qing army surrounded them, more than half of the students ran away, and the rest did not do anything.Those who really resisted were Xu Xilin and Chen Boping, and even Ma Zonghan flinched.The final result can be imagined, Chen Boping died in battle, and Xu Xilin was captured.Later, the governor of Liangjiang handled the case properly, quite rationally and peacefully.After detailed interrogation, it was verified that the students involved in the Patrol Academy had no revolutionary party or involvement in the uprising, and they were all released in the end.Xu Xilin's father surrendered to the police, and after investigation, he was found to have nothing to do with his son's activities, so he was also released, and only Xu Xilin's younger brother was imprisoned (thanks to the reform of the Qing Dynasty's criminal law, otherwise he would be punished by the family).Later, when Xu Xilin's residence was searched, the letters he had communicated with his comrades, and even the affidavits of his comrades were still there, which shows that the uprising was launched hastily.

In fact, although Xu Xilin was the head of the Anhui police and the principal of the Patrol Academy, with high positions and powers, the other revolutionary parties in Anqing, the capital, had no contact with them due to geographical differences.His party members are only him and two followers.Xu Xilin's energy that was so popular when he was in Shaoxing did not show at all in Anqing.He came to Anhui for the face of Hunan governor Yu Liansan. He was originally Yu's cousin, and he was responsible for making money. As a result, Yu strongly recommended him to his student Enming.Firstly, the teacher’s recommendation was strong, and he was a relative of the teacher; secondly, Xu Xilin was really capable, and he spoke clearly about the New Deal (the police belonged to the New Deal).Therefore, Xu Zai Enming is very popular here. It is said that the Patrol Office will handle it. In fact, the general office did not take office until the uprising broke out. All police affairs in Anhui are under Xu Xilin's management.After Xu Xilin was arrested, the interrogating officials were very dissatisfied with this, and asked Xu Xilin that Enming had treated him well, why did he still do this?Xu Xilin admits that "the platform favors me", but he believes that it is a "personal personal favor", and the murder of Enming belongs to the "principle of exhaustion", and one cannot abolish the public because of selfishness.En Ming, who was shot to the brink of death, obviously couldn't be so calm.In his will to the queen mother and the emperor (he was still sober at the time), he deliberately revealed Yu Liansan, which was tantamount to exposing his teacher's mistakes.I was fooled by myself and hired the wrong person, and I regretted it very much. In the end, I specially reminded the court to pay attention to foreign students.If he does not die, this Manchu man who is keen on the New Deal will definitely become a conservative.

An uprising with only three people participating, of course, in the eyes of the outside world, was just an assassination.Xu Xilin has been in Anqing for more than two months. Because he has no foundation in the local area and the time is too short, he doesn't even have acquaintances. In addition, he speaks Shaoxing dialect, which no one can understand, so it is difficult to pull up a team.Despite being the head of the police, he did not develop a single partisan in the police.The so-called capital of the revolution, apart from a dozen pistols, is three Shaoxing people.Such an uprising can kill a governor, which is already considered quite an achievement.Xu Xilin's confession clearly stated that he wanted to kill several Manchus, one was Enming, the other was Duanfang, and the other was Tieliang and Liangbi.Therefore, if the uprising in Anqing can temporarily stir up some people, cause major troubles, and occupy the city wall, it is an uprising. If it fails, it can only be counted as an assassination.