Chapter 10 On the Social and Historical Background of the Gelaohui's Rise (2)
Li Hongzhang and Zhang Zhidong also did not take it seriously when "replenishing the number of troops in the green battalion" and restoring the old system of the green battalion.During the Tongzhi period, Liu Kunyi, who served as the governor of Jiangxi Province, "had a lot of military personnel because of robbery cases, and he once offered to accept bids for salaries." Since this approach was in line with the Qing government's intention to restore the old system of the green camp, it was quickly agreed by the Qing government.
This time, Liu Kunyi wanted to extend his bidding method to Hunan and Hubei provinces where there were many stragglers.
In this regard, the Qing court ordered the governors of all provinces to discuss the restoration.As a result, except for Liu Bingzhang, the governor of Jiangxi, who followed Liu Kunyi's intention and expressed his approval on the second day of March in the second year of Guangxu (1876) in the "Strictly Handling Bandits, and the Regulations on the Acceptance of Military Bids Are No Fraud". The factions expressed their opposition.Li Hanzhang, governor of Huguang, first expressed his opinion: Regarding the withdrawal of Yong Ding, "I was worried that he would be a bandit, so I planned to support him. This move is specious... Such bandits have retained their official positions, and some belong to civilians. It is hard to say. If I accept the bid, I will give you a salary, so how can you make a treacherous ambition. If you give half a salary according to Jiangxi's method, it will be difficult to continue, and even the good and the bad will not be distinguished. The gangsters were originally scattered, but they were ordered to gather in the provincial capital. The relationship is not superficial. Jiangxi's constitution is not a good law. If it is extended to all provinces, it will be imitated, and it will grow treacherous ambitions, which is different from the political system. " .On March 22, Anhui Governor Yu Lu also expressed his opposition to the "Proposed Military Job Bidders Still Going Through the Old Handling without Discussing the Regulations".On March 27th, Li Peijing, the governor of Guizhou, compromised in his "Regulations on Handling the Bandit Situation in Compliance with the Proposal" and agreed with Li Hanzhang's proposal, "There is no need to discuss another constitution."On July 25, Wen Ge, the temporary governor of Sichuan and the governor of Yunnan, pointed out: "There are many gangsters who are addicted to chaos. If the generals who are abolished will bear their brutal nature and are willing to work together, they will only be half-paid. Can you restrain your ambitions? The bidders only accept the bids themselves, but the members still join the club and recruit one place, which will lead to serious mistakes and waste of funds..."
In the spring of the second year of Guangxu, Shen Baozhen, the new governor of Liangjiang, objected to the bid after accepting the bid because it was "difficult to raise huge sums of money". The bandit is not a bandit" to punish the "leader" and scatter the "coercion".
The proposal of "receiving bids" was rejected due to widespread opposition, and the local governors still repeated Zeng Guofan's old tunes of "lenient outside and strict inside" and "combining rigidity and softness" when dealing with the issue of valor and party association.On the surface, this controversy was aimed at solving the problem of a large number of stragglers flooding the society, but in essence it involved whether to restore or abolish the decadent green battalion system, a major issue related to the fate of the Qing government's rule.The Qing government wanted to use the "receipt of bids" to rebuild the green battalion to replace the Hunan and Huai armies that were not the "economic system" of the state, so as to regain absolute control over the army.As we all know, after the rise of the Hunan and Huai armies, although it temporarily saved the Qing Dynasty from demise, it also dug up the military foundation of the central government of the Qing Dynasty, so that the military and political power was transferred from the hands of the Manchu nobles headed by the royal family to the places of the Hunan and Huai families. In the hands of the powerful faction of governors and governors, a unique pattern of "soldiers as generals and governors and governors dictatorship" was formed in the political and military life of the late Qing Dynasty.The dispute over "receiving bids" this time was just a concrete manifestation of the domineering local governors and the weakening of the centralization of the Qing government.
The "contest for receiving bids" ended with no results, and stragglers are still a serious social problem.
Although the central government of the Qing Dynasty and the local governors have their own interests and intrigues on this issue, in order to maintain the feudal rule of the Qing Dynasty and the social operation can be carried out reluctantly, they are indeed trying their best to solve it properly in terms of ideology and action. this problem.But at that time, China had already stepped into the abyss of a semi-colonial and semi-feudal society. Years of wars, a weak country and poor people made it difficult to fundamentally eradicate the social soil created by stragglers. At the same time, there was no social environment and social conditions to solve the deteriorating problem of stragglers.
Salt owls have filled the Yangtze River and Huaihe River regions since ancient times.For example, in the late Kangxi period, "in the Huaiyang area, there are Shandong and Henan Liuguns. There are many people who gather and sell private salt. Each of them has a leader, or leads a party of dozens, or leads a party of one or two hundred people, and runs rampant during the day."The reason why they are called "salt lords" by officials is because "the smugglers are called smugglers because of their smugglers and their plagiarism."In modern times, the social erosion caused by salt lords became more and more serious, and under the new historical conditions, their activity scale, organizational form, and activity methods all showed some new characteristics.
First, Yan Xiao strengthened his own strength in the cracks of the military and political struggle between the Taiping Army and the Qing Army.
The Peasant Uprising of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom broke out in 1851, which lasted for 14 years and fought in most of China.In Huguang, Jiangxi, Anhui, Jiangsu and other Huaiyan diversion areas in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River, the Qingxiang and Huai armies competed with the Taiping Army and the Nian Army for a long time, fought fiercely or confronted each other, resulting in the obstruction of the Huaiyan transportation channel, the loss of the diversion bank, and the separation of merchants.Due to the poor sales of salt, salt piled up in the field, and some stove households were forced to stop frying, and a large number of operators and stoves began to lose their jobs.At the same time, the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River were the important places for water transportation of the Qing government. This area became a military competition field, and the water transportation of grain and rivers could not be carried out. Like Ding, he also lost his livelihood.Some of them joined the Taiping Army or Nian Army.
; "Guangdong invaders broke through Wuchang, and came down from the east of Chu. The salt lords uncovered poles and cut trees, and the unemployed responded to howls, and they spread all over the southeast"; there were also some salt lords who "followed Zeng Guofan's army and made great achievements." People and the Taiping Army are enemies, "Salt dealers and water transport sailors can be recruited for my use." "Salt bundlers, traders, grain ship sailors, no matter who they are, there are those who can snatch the thief ship...all the assets and goods on board , and give all the rewards to those who take it."However, the actual situation later showed that not all of these unemployed water transporters, salt transport sailors, stoves, and trackers were involved in this military and political competition, but a considerable part of them gathered in the Lianghuai Salt Field to form the "Anqing Daoyou" (Green Gang) was at the end of the sixth year of Tongzhi (1862) when the Taiping Army and the Hunan Army fought desperately. He is a vagrant from Anton and Qinghe, and secretly forms a clique, known as a master and apprentice.At first hundreds of people pretended to be brave soldiers and controlled the villages and cities in the area of Lixia River. The party is full of tens of thousands, the more it spreads, and it is protected by Li Shizhong's battalion.
After the "Anqing Daoyou" who made a living by smuggling and plundering came out, the activities of salt owls entered a new era of unprecedented rampantness. Their ranks expanded rapidly, and tens of thousands of unemployed sailors, trackers, bandits, etc. Salt land, as well as the canal and the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River are engaged in the activities of selling smuggled salt and looting. The activities are more parasitic, and the social erosion caused is becoming more and more serious.
Second, Yanxiao has joined forces with "the gangs of the Green and the Red, the Association, and the Piao" and "like a tiger with wings on its wings, don't dare to do anything."Yanxiao, Qinggang, and Gelaohui (Red Gang) colluded with each other, and became entangled.
In the later stage of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom and after its failure, that is, during the 7 years when Li Zhaoshou's Yusheng camp was in Huaiyang and northern Anhui, the forces of Yanxiao and the Green Gang were able to grow. After the disbandment of the camp, the Lianghuai salt field was still their world. For example, in the third year of Guangxu (1877), "the small people in Haizhou, Huaibei, paid homage to Anqing Taoist friends, and still used smuggling salt as a business."
On October 15th in the eighteenth year of Guangxu (1892), the imperial edict said: "The gangsters in the south of the Yangtze River are rampant... Huaibei and Huainan have a lot of private places, and they invade and irrigate the Anhui Bank. Chi, cases of robbery and robbery are emerging one after another."
Order Liangjiang Governor Liu Kunyi to report the situation.Liu Kun admitted in his reply: "Fengyang and Shouzhou people in Anhui are the most tyrannical bandits. They all live in Jiangdu and Ganquan County in Jiangning. Dare to report the case."
The scope of activities of Lianghuai salt owls is not limited to the Lixia River area, but also extends along the Yangtze River to Anhui, the hinterland of Huguang and the Taihu Lake area in southern Jiangsu.In the twenty-sixth year of Guangxu (1900), Deng Huaxi, the governor of Anhui, said: "On the north bank of the Yangtze River and the counties of Wuwei and Hanshan under Hezhou, and in the villages and towns of Xuancheng County on the south bank, suddenly there were smugglers who smuggled with maces. Display murder weapons on the Internet, openly sell them, and force people to buy them."
On June 15th of the same year, Han Qingyun, an alternate road in Jiangsu, passed by Sanguantang in Changzhou by boat due to an accident. At daybreak, he met the owl boat and fought for the towpath. Later, Shi Peilin, the magistrate of Wujin County, led the courageous recovery.The arrogance of the salt owls can be seen.While the scope of activities is expanding and the team is expanding day by day, the organization of some salt lords is also becoming more and more perfect.
The head of the owls is named Dazhantou, and its sub-name is Deputy Zhantou, and the lower ones are weighers and calligraphers, collectively called Qingpi, and they stand at the wharf.If private salt passes through its land, you will lose money, so it is called Yanguan; because private salt is weighed and traded, it is also called Salt Bank.Competing for the wharf, fighting is more than battle formation, there are those who lead all the thieves to kill at night, which is called putting black swords;Giant owls must guard against black knives, so they often gather hundreds of people, build soil and open trenches, set up artillery positions on all sides, shotguns, spears, broadswords, whips and hammers... Everyone often brings five or six hundred people, and the small ones also have two Three hundred generations, all strong and skilled.
This is just as some scholars pointed out: "This is really a portrayal of a complete underworld in the late feudal society."
The growth of the Yanxiao team, the gradual improvement of the organizational structure, and the intensification of activities have a lot to do with the integration of gangs and traffic integration with the Green and Red Gangs (Gelaohui) at this stage.Although, driven by the interests of their respective groups, there are also scrambles and vendettas between them. For example, in the twenty-sixth year of Guangxu (1900), someone found out: "There have always been two types of hawkers, the Qing Gang and the Encirclement Gang: Qing means Anqing Taoist friends. , half of Dongwan, Xu, and Haiqing are bachelors; the Wei Gang is commonly known as the Red Gang, that is, the elders will bandit, and most of them are scattered braves in two lakes and three rivers. The two gangs compete for the wharf, and they often kill each other."
However, in order to deal with the suppression by the Qing government and seek their own survival, the dominant aspect of the relationship between the Yanxiao, the Green Gang, and the Red Gang tended to be more cooperative and integrated.This situation was fully reflected as early as the 17th year of Guangxu (1891) in the Changjiang Religious Case where the Gelaohui was the main force of the struggle.Zhang Zhidong once said that this year "the ports along the river are full of bandits... from Jingyue to Wuhan, they are all united as one, moving around everywhere, responding everywhere", the "bandits" here refers to The most important ones are Yanxiao, Qinggang and Gelaohui.Some of the leaders arrested in this teaching case were both members of the Gelaohui and the members of the Qing Gang, such as Su Song, Taidao, and Nie Jigui, who sent people to arrest "Chen Jinlong, that is, Chen Diankui, belonging to the Honghui (gang)" in Shanghai. Yangzhou Baojia Bureau in conjunction with Yingxun captured "Zeng Tong is Zeng's fifth... confessed to joining the Anqing Gang first, worshiping Zhang Wuscazi as his teacher, ranked Tongzi, and then joined Gao Dehua's brother Laohui".Later, in the process of smuggling and smuggling, this kind of cooperation and integration became more obvious, especially after the famous salt lord Xu Baoshan appeared on the stage and became the "bandit leader".Xu Baoshan (1862-1913), courtesy name Huaili, was born in Dantu, Jiangsu, nicknamed Xu Tiger.He "was restless in his duties since he was a child, colluded with rogues outside, and committed various crimes." In the 19th year of Guangxu (1893), he committed a robbery in Jiangdu Fairy Temple and was exiled to Gansu. .Later, after several fires and collusion with salt lords who were active in some famous wharves along the Yangtze River in northern Jiangsu, such as Qihao and Koukou, they established a firm foothold and led the private salt fleet to "go to and from the port, Sanjiangkou, Xi (hissing) horse, Daqiao, Qihao, Shierwei, etc." and "up to Datong, Wuhu, Hankou, Jiangxi, down to Jiangyin, etc., the Yangtze River is more than a thousand miles away, and this bandit salt boat haunts it from time to time." The private salt boat he owns There are more than 700 teams and more than 10,000 members of the party. The two banks of the Huaihe River and the front line along the river are all within its sphere of influence.On May 13th in the 25th year of Guangxu (1899), Xu Baoshan, a salt lord, imitated the organization of the Gelaohui's mountain hall and the system of loosely selling floating cloth, and performed plays at "Qihaokou" for several days. Slogans were written on the "tickets", monitored for three days, and then burned to destroy the traces.Due to Xu Baoshan's many roles as a salt lord, green gang, and red gang, plus "his wolfish nature and cunning talent are enough to deter the gangsters, pretending to be benevolent and righteous, instigating people's hearts, helping the poor, and accepting the dead", in his Within their sphere of influence, the Yanxiao, the Green Gang, and the Red Gang not only turned hostility into friendship, but also became more integrated or cooperative in terms of organization and action.After Xu Baoshan accepted Liu Kunyi's consolation, this fusion and cooperation did not stop there.
On the 13th day of the first lunar month in the twenty-sixth year of Guangxu's reign, Governor of Anhui Deng Huaxi played a film: "The gangsters along the river will be gangsters, and the party is powerful. Most of them use the name of smuggling to commit crimes. Cloth, send money to join the gang, in the city, they forcibly seize goods, and use knives to fight fiercely;
Guangxu twenty-seventh year (1901) March 16th Liu Kun, governor of Liangjiang, called the Military Aircraft Office: "Received a letter from the British Consul: I have recently heard that the ticket bandits, salt bandits, wandering warriors and various associations plan to form partnerships in the Yangtze River and start regular incidents, etc. language."
In the twenty-ninth year of Guangxu (1903), Wei Guangtao, governor of the Liangjiang River, stated that "the area of the Jianghuai area is full of ambush, and the salt lords and bandits collude with each other, often taking advantage of the opportunity to steal and do harm to the local area" and instructed his subordinates to arrest the famous salt lord Zeng Guozhang , Xiong Mantang.Zeng and Xiong are not only the leaders of the salt owls, but also open the "Tianmu Mountain Gathering Hall" and "rectify people to join the association".In the area around Wujinyang Lake in Wujin, southern Jiangsu, "since the northern boxer incident in the 26th year of Guangxu, the scoundrels everywhere have heard the news, and there are bandit boats from outside, loaded with private salt, and carrying arms, connected by Wujin Xiaohe and others. Entering, selling secretly. At first, they dared not make troubles, and then they gathered to gamble, and opened the hall to let go. Those who joined the meeting were full of hypocrisy and fraud, and they were omnipresent...there were red gangs and green gangs. Smuggling, red gangs also plundering."By the end of the Qing Dynasty, due to the consistency of actions and interests, the infiltration and entanglement of salt lords, green gangs, and red gangs in the Lianghuai area, the canal, and the Taihu Lake area became more common.Guangxu 30th year (1904) August Chen Kuilong, governor of Jiangsu Province, said: "Jiangsu Province's bandits and bandits, "inland rivers are headed by Dong Daofu, and coastal areas are headed by Fan Gaotou." Dong was hunted down by the Qing soldiers and killed. , acting as a leader, peddling smugglers and robbing, and being the leader of Qinglong Mountain... He died in exile, and the coastal areas are full of minions"
.In the 33rd year of Guangxu (1907), Cai Naihuang, You Cheng of the Department of Postal Communications, pointed out: the Green Gang and Red Gang in the west of Zhejiang, the congregation bandits and lord bandits in the east of Zhejiang, and the pirates in Ning, Shao, and Taiwan, Feng, Pei, Xiao, and Dang. Knife bandits, salt dealers in Taihu Lake, and green-skinned bare eggs in the Su and Song areas have "formed alliances for a long time and acted recklessly."It must be pointed out that during this period, "the lords along the river will be gangsters, and the party members are powerful. Most of them use the name of smuggling to commit crimes.Yanxiao and Qingbang also opened Lishantang on their own.Not only that, they also imitated and copied the Gelaohui's meeting book "Hidden Book", combined with some knowledge of water transportation, and fabricated "Cheats of the Green Gang" such as "San'an Baojian", "Family Ritual Questions and Answers", "Anqing Cucheng" and so on. "It makes it difficult for people to accurately distinguish who is the Yanxiao, the Green Gang, and who is the Gelaohui (Red Gang). Of course, modern salt owls also have other new features, such as the intensified armed confrontation with the Qing government, which is more socially parasitic and destructive. Many places appear as gangsters and are increasingly used by foreign aggressive forces. Since these aspects have little to do with the theme of this book, they will not be discussed in detail.
To sum up, the rapid rise of the Gelaohui in the Yangtze River Basin and becoming the most powerful and influential secret society in modern China is closely related to the formation of semi-colonial and semi-feudal society in China, especially the modern social and economic restructuring in this area.After the Second Opium War, the imperialist forces of aggression penetrated into the hinterland of the Yangtze River in my country, and the continuous import of foreign goods bankrupted a large number of farmers and handicraftsmen; the voyage of foreign ships on the coast and inland rivers dealt a heavy blow to the ancient sand ship industry. and the inland river shipping industry; the Qing government abolished grain and river transportation, threatening the livelihood of hundreds of thousands of people.Against the background of rapid social and economic changes in modern China, a large number of social members have dissociated from the traditional social structure and become "surplus population" who do not work, do not farm, do not do business, and do not work. Living in poverty, suffering from poverty and oppression, and finally having to live in the rivers and lakes, this is the main social source of the rapid development of the Yangtze River Brothers Association in the late Qing Dynasty.
The two forces of roaming warriors and salt lords that are flooding the society play an important role that cannot be ignored in the development and growth of the Gelaohui.
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