Chapter 13 Chapter 12 Enemy on both sides

Debts owed always have to be repaid, plus interest!In the spring of 1645, the Hongguang court of Nanming finally realized the profound connotation of this sentence. Comrade Dorgon, the party in power in the Qing Dynasty, originally wanted to fight with two hands-he wanted to send Azig to fight the "farmer brother" Li Zicheng in the west, and he wanted to send Duoduo to fight the "landlord buddy" Zhu Yousong in the south.This plan was originally finalized in early October 1644. But just when Comrade Dorgon had found out all the three major crimes of his "brother" Zhu Yousong, and was about to go south to "catch the criminal" and bring him to justice, "farmer brother" Li Zicheng suddenly jumped out first, and gave him the crime in Henan first. A blow to the head.After being beaten, Dorgon came to his senses and immediately understood who was the main enemy and who was the secondary enemy, so a new plan of "first west and then east" was introduced.

He turned on the defensive against Zhu Yousong, who had been convicted by himself, and took an offensive against Li Zicheng. He sent two armies of his half-brother Duduo and his elder brother Azig to attack Shaanxi from the north and the south at the same time. Li Zicheng. Li Zicheng was jointly defeated by the two brothers, and he withdrew from Xi'an, the capital of the country, and returned to Xiangjing, Hubei, his hometown of Longxing, via Shangzhou. Because Azige was late for joining forces, he was punished to immediately lead his troops to pursue Li Zicheng, and he was authorized to attack Zuo Liangyu, the Ming general stationed in Wuchang, after he eliminated Li Zicheng.

Duoduo and his subordinates were rewarded with a one-month rest in Xi'an. During this period, Comrade Dorgon appointed Meng Qiaofang, a Han official, as the three-sided governor of Shaanxi, with full power to handle the military affairs of the Northwest. A month later, Duduo, who had ended his "vacation", led his troops to set off from Xi'an and secretly arrived near Luoyang, Henan via Tongguan.Here, he recruited Liu Zhong, Ping Nanbo of the Dashun Dynasty, and stationed here, collecting food and grass, waiting for Brother Dorgon to send him another batch of Eight Banners cavalry from Mongolia and Manchuria.

On the seventh day of February, when everything was ready, Duoduo officially unfurled the banner of "going south to conquer Ming", divided his troops into three groups, and headed straight to Guide.Among them, the middle route is led by himself, the right route is led by Han Dai, Shangshu of the Ministry of War, and the left route is led by Gushan Ezhen Baiyintu.The targets of the battle are mainly Huang Degong and Liu Liangzuo, and the old fox Xu Dingguo also joined his team. At the same time, Dorgon, who has more eyes, has done his best in one battle to ensure the success of the attack.Another division was sent in Shandong, led by Gushan E Zhenzhunta who was originally stationed in Shandong, and led his troops along the Grand Canal to Xuzhou, and cooperated with Duoduo in the middle to contain Li Chengdong and Liu Zeqing.

In this way, Azige, Duoduo, and Zhunta had a total of three armies, with the Manchurian Eight Banners as the main force, and the Ming soldiers who surrendered after entering the customs as supplementary forces. About 150,000 people went straight to Nanming, and the late war finally came. it has started! Duduo's army took the lead and invaded Guide, but was stubbornly resisted by the defender Ling Zongbing.On March 22, the city was broken, and Ling Zongbing hanged himself to death. The loss of Guide opened the door to the north of Anhui. The Qing army then easily occupied Yingzhou, Taihe, Haozhou, Sizhou, etc., crossed the Huaihe River smoothly, and approached the city of Yangzhou at an unusual speed. Shi Kefa, the governor of the Southern Ming Dynasty, surrounded the city.

Readers will be very surprised when they see this. Didn’t the Nanming Dynasty raise a large number of "National Defense Forces"?Where are Huang Degong and Liu Liangzuo stationed here now? You might be surprised to say this, because Huang and Liu are now transferred to fight the "civil war". The target is the biggest warlord in Nanming - Zuo Liangyu. The reason for fighting with Zuo Liangyu in front of the enemy is very simple, because Comrade Zuo Liangyu rebelled, and under the political slogan of "Qing King's side, save the prince", he is marching from the middle reaches of the Yangtze River to the lower reaches.

Comrade Zuo Liangwang came to this point, objectively speaking, it was Li Zicheng who forced him out (actually Azige forced him); subjectively speaking, it was another "evil result" of the struggle between the Maruan Group and Donglin Fushe ! As a soldier, Zuo Liangyu did not have a clear partisan position.But in his "growth history", it is inseparable from the great sponsorship of a "Donglin party benefactor" - Hou Xun. As early as when Comrade Zuo Liangyu was still a "platoon-level cadre", he was "ordered to be discharged from the army" because he was implicated by his subordinates.After retiring from the army and being unemployed, he drifted to Changping, where he was selected by Xun Xiang, and then recruited into the army, and his official position soared all the way under his "care".

"Don't forget the well digger when you drink water", when Hou Fangyu, Hou Xun's son, one of the four sons of Fushe, offended the Ma Ruan Group and went to Zuoying to seek "political asylum", Zuo Liangyu also gave this The young master took great care of me. With these two layers of relationship, Zuo was "metaphysically" classified into the camp of Donglin Fushe. In line with the principle of "those who are not my faction, their hearts must be different", Lao Ma treats Comrade Zuo Liangyu as well. Suppression by many parties, especially in terms of military pay, is often delayed again and again, which makes Comrade Zuo full of resentment.

Also, in the election of the emperor, Comrade Zuo Liangyu, who held the main military power, was excluded from the "electors" by the old horse, which made him lose the good opportunity to "make contributions".This made him very unhappy for a period of time, and he once refused to recognize Hongguang as the "central government". Later, Emperor Hongguang, who understood this, hurriedly made a high hat of "Ningnanhou" and put it on for him, which gave Zuo Liangyu some comfort in his heart.The two sides temporarily maintained a fragile peace in this state of "looking at each other and hating each other".

However, this kind of life was suspended by Li Zicheng, who came to ask for the "bonus for being brave and brave". In addition, Huang Shu, a fighter in Donglin, provided a "true" news that the prince had arrived in Nanjing, but he was killed by Emperor Hongguang and Ma Ruan. He was sent to prison on the charge of "fake prince".He suggested that Zuo Liangyu go east to get rid of the traitor and save the prince, so that he can not only avoid confrontation with Li Zicheng, but also take advantage of the current situation to create a world of his own, why not do it!

Zuo Liangyu, who has been "forgive" many times by Emperor Chongzhen and lured by bright prospects, "hit it off" with Huang Doushi. On March 23, 1645, Comrade Zuo Liangyu mobilized his 800,000 troops (actually 200,000) to move eastward along the Yangtze River under the pretext of receiving a secret order from the prince in prison. Just when the Qing army had already occupied Guide , kicked off the last "fighting in the nest" of Nanming Hongguang Dynasty. When Comrade Zuo Liangyu rebelled, in order to build momentum for himself, he successively "kidnapped" Governor He Tengjiao of Hunan, and Yuan Jixian, the right servant of the Ministry of War and the censor of Youqian capital, went east together. On the one hand, the left soldiers went east, and on the other hand, the Qing soldiers came from the north. This presented a life-and-death proposition for the Hongguang court: should we defend against the "Left" or the "Qing" first?The impatient Emperor Hongguang quickly summoned a group of ministers to discuss countermeasures. Emperor Hongguang's opening opinion was: "If the soldiers of the left are in a hurry, they should defend against the left first, and if the soldiers of the Qing are in a hurry, they should defend against the Qing first." This is extremely correct, but it is impossible to operate at all. The battlefields of defending the left and defending the Qing are more than two hundred miles apart. With Nanming's troops, if they defend the left, they cannot defend the Qing, and if they defend the Qing, they cannot defend the Left. The speeches of Yao Sixiao, Yushi Qiao Kepin, and Cheng Youqian, the servants of the Ministry of punishment, are: the Ming and Qing Dynasties are the contradiction between the enemy and ourselves, and the Ming and the Left are internal contradictions.The first priority should be to prevent Qing Dynasty, and not to promise Zuo Liangyu some conditions, so as to stabilize his heart and stop going east. Seeing that Emperor Hongguang was seduced by this group of people, Ma Shiyingge became a "victim" of compromise with Zuo again, and suddenly became angry in desperation. "Didn't you Donglin Party do this to help Zuo Liangyu go east under the pretext of preventing the Qing Dynasty? Your Majesty, the Qing soldiers have come, and we can negotiate peace with them. The Zuo soldiers have come. These Donglin Party members Senior officials can still sit, but His Majesty and I will die without a place to die!" Comrade Ma roared and roared wildly. The decision-making was one-sided, and Emperor Hongguang issued an order to withdraw the Huang Liu Corps from Shi Kefa to defend Zuo Liangyu. On the first day of April, Shi Kefa, who received the troop transfer order, objected to it, suggesting that defense against the Qing should come first, and that he was willing to serve as a "peace ambassador" and go to Zuoying alone to negotiate. But Shangshu was severely reprimanded by Emperor Hongguang. As a last resort, Shi Kefa had to order Huang and Liu to rush westward. In this way, within hundreds of miles of Anhui and northern Jiangsu, there were no Ming soldiers stationed one by one. At this time, after conquering Jiujiang, the left side that continued to go east also had a new change-coach Zuo Liangyu died on the fourth day of April! Although Zuo Liangyu died, Zuo Bu was still under the leadership of his son Zuo Menggeng, and he was still determined to kill Nanjing. A tiger father may not have tiger sons!Under the command of Zuo Menggeng, the left part's combat effectiveness declined greatly. On April 11, in Tongling, it was defeated for the first time by Huang Binqing, the Jiangbei general. Although the Zuo Division was defeated, its strength was still there, and it could go east again at any time. The Huang and Liu Divisions had not been able to return to defend against the Qing soldiers. At this time, Qing soldiers have already begun to prepare to attack Yangzhou, and the real test of Shi Kefa's life has begun!