Chapter 72 253 Li Dingguo moved to Southwest

After the fall of the two Southern Ming regimes, Longwu and King Lu, the Qing army divided into three routes to attack the southwest. Qu Shisi (sound si), an official of the Ming Dynasty who was stationed in Guangdong and Guangxi, supported the King of Gui, Zhu Youlang, as the throne in Zhaoqing, with the reign name Yongli. He was called Emperor Yongli in history.In November 1647 AD, He Tengjiao, a general of the Ming Dynasty, relied on the strength of the rest of the Dashun Army to defeat the Qing Army in Quanzhou; Qu Shixu also repelled the Qing Army's attack in Guilin.The Nanming army gained momentum.However, due to disunity within the King Gui regime, Huguang and Guangxi were again occupied by the Qing army.Two years later, He Tengjiao was captured and killed in Xiangtan, and Qu Shixu also died after the city of Guilin was captured by the Qing soldiers.When the King Gui regime was facing collapse, the Daxi Peasant Army led by Li Dingguo took on the heavy responsibility of resisting the Qing Dynasty and continued to fight in the southwest for more than ten years.

Li Dingguo is one of Zhang Xianzhong's four brave generals, and he is also his adopted son. The eldest is Sun Kewang, and Li Dingguo is the second child. After Zhang Xianzhong died, 50,000 to 60,000 rebels were left behind, led by Sun Kewang and Li Dingguo, and went south to Guizhou and Yunnan.They sent people to suggest to Emperor Yongli that they were willing to join forces with them to fight against the Qing Dynasty.After some twists and turns, Emperor Yongli saw that the situation was critical, so he had to rely on the Daxi Army, and made his grandson Kewang the King of Qin. Sun Kewang was an ambitious man. He controlled Emperor Yongli and acted as a tyrant in Guiyang. Thirty thousand elite soldiers stepped up to manufacture weapons and armor; he also found a group of elephant trainers to form an elephant team.After making preparations, he decided to send troops to attack the Qing army.

The morale of the army led by Li Dingguo is high and the military discipline is strict.They fought all the way from Yunnan and Guizhou to Hunan, winning consecutive battles and regaining several important towns. Then, they attacked Guilin three times.Kong Youde, the commander of the Qing army stationed in Guilin, sent troops to fight several times, but fled without fighting soldiers.Kong Youde had to personally lead troops to Yanguan to confront the Ming army.As soon as Li Dingguo's army arrived, there were tall elephants in front and valiant soldiers in the back.The elephant roared as soon as it entered the battle, and the horses of the Qing army ran around in fright when they heard the roar of the elephant.At that time, it rained heavily suddenly, thunder and lightning flashed, and the elephant herd took advantage of the situation to charge. The Qing army was defeated, and the Ming army pursued bravely, killing the Qing army.

Kong Youde hurriedly withdrew his soldiers into Guilin City and closed the city gate.Li Dingguo surrounded Guilin City tightly and attacked day and night.Kong Youde went to the city to defend himself, and the random arrows of the Ming army shot at Kong Youde's forehead.At this time, he got the news that the mountain in the north of the city had been captured by Li Dingguo, so he set a fire, threw himself into the fire and committed suicide. Li Dingguo attacked Guilin, divided his troops and continued to eliminate the remnants of the enemy, and at the same time stabilized the people, and took the Nanming officials who had fled to the mountains back to the city.One day, Li Dingguo held a banquet for the officials by Qixingyan. He said to the officials: "The current situation is like the end of the Southern Song Dynasty. Don't you admire Wen Tianxiang, Lu Xiufu, and Zhang Shijie? Their loyalty and heroism are of course It’s a name left in history, but we are loyal to the country, after all, we don’t want such an ending.”

After hearing this, everyone deeply admired Li Dingguo's heroic spirit. Emperor Yongli received the good news and named Li Dingguo the king of Xining. Then Li Dingguo led troops to conquer Yongzhou, Hengyang and Changsha, and approached Yuezhou.The Qing court was greatly shocked, and quickly sent Prince Nikan with 100,000 troops to counterattack Changsha.Li Dingguo got the news and knew that the enemy was coming very fiercely, so he took the initiative to withdraw from Changsha, but set up an ambush on the way to Hengyang.Nikan personally led his troops in pursuit, and was ambushed by the Ming army. Nikan was hacked to death on the spot.

Li Dingguo's victory aroused the jealousy of King Sun Kewang of Qin. Sun Kewang pretended to invite Li Dingguo to discuss state affairs in order to assassinate Li Dingguo. When Li Dingguo discovered his trick, he had to lead his troops to leave Hunan and return to Yunnan.Sun Kewang wanted to improve his prestige, so he personally went to Hunan to attack the Qing army, but he was defeated. Sun Kewang was ambitious and wanted to force Emperor Yongli to abdicate.He knew that to achieve this goal, Li Dingguo must be eliminated, so he personally led 140,000 troops to attack Yunnan.Unexpectedly, his soldiers hated his separatist activities. When the two sides were fighting, they all defected and rushed to Li Dingguo's side, and Sun Jun collapsed.Sun Kewang fled back to Guiyang in embarrassment, but was opposed by the soldiers who stayed in Guiyang.Sun Kewang was desperate, so he fled to Changsha and surrendered to the Qing army.

It is stated that the power of the regime has been weakened after Sun Kewang's rebellion.In 1658 A.D., led by surrendered generals Wu Sangui and Hong Chengchou, the Qing soldiers attacked Yunnan and Guizhou in three ways.Li Dingguo attacked in three ways, all of which failed, and had to return to Kunming.Emperor Yongli and several of his trusted officials panicked and fled to Burma. After Emperor Yongli fled to Burma, Li Dingguo continued to collect troops on the border of Yunnan to attack the Qing army and prepare for recovery.He sent people to take Emperor Yongli back to the country thirteen times in a row, but Emperor Yongli did not dare to come back.

In December 1661 AD, Wu Sangui led 100,000 Qing soldiers into Burma, forcing Burma to surrender Emperor Yongli and bring him back to Kunming.As soon as he arrived in Kunming, Emperor Yongli was strangled to death by Wu Sangui, and the last declared regime was completely destroyed by this time. Li Dingguo fought hard against the Qing Dynasty for more than ten years, but his wish was not realized. He felt sad and angry, and finally fell ill and died.When he was dying, he said to his son and general: "I would rather die in the wilderness than surrender!"