Chapter 45 Ding Ding Half Wall: The Fall of Xiao Liang (Part 2)

After Li Xiaogong and Li Jing led the army to besiege Jiangling, they quickly cut off all connections between it and the outside world.Liang Emperor Xiao Mian knew that the general situation was over, so he said to the civil and military officials with a sad expression: "Heaven does not bless Liang, and the situation cannot be supported. If we try our best to fight to the death, we will die. How can we make the people suffer because of me alone? We should take advantage of the city. If you are trapped, you should come out first, so as not to harm the soldiers and common people. If everyone loses me, why worry about having no king!"

On October 21st of this year, Xiao Xian offered sacrifices to the Ancestral Temple for the last time, and then ordered the gates to be opened to surrender. The defenders on the city couldn't help crying.Wearing sackcloth and wrapping his head in a cloth scarf, he brought all the officials to the gate of the Tang army camp, and said to Li Xiaogong: "The dead are the only ears, and the people are innocent. Please don't kill and loot!" Xiao Xian hoped to exchange his voluntary surrender in exchange for the safety of the people in the city, but the generals of the Tang army did not buy his account.

After the Tang army entered Jiangling, the soldiers looked at this prosperous and affluent Liang Dynasty imperial capital, and everyone's eyes glowed green at the same time. They plan to plunder. Just before they started, Cen Wenwen, the secretary of the Liang Dynasty, risked his beheading and came to the account of Li Xiaogong, the commander of the Tang army, and said something like this: "The people in the south of the Yangtze River have been trapped in tyranny since the end of the Sui Dynasty. Afterwards, they suffered from conflicts among the heroes. The survivors today all survived the sword, and they all looked forward to their true destiny. Therefore, the Xiao family's monarchs and Jiangling fathers and elders decided to return to their fate, and only hope that the swords and soldiers will rest forever. Disappoint the scholars and the people, and fear that the scholars south of Jiangling will not have the heart to return!"

Li Xiaogong had to admit that what Cen Wenwen said made sense.Although he captured Xiao Liang's capital, there is still a large area of ​​Liang Dynasty land and a large number of Liang Dynasty troops south of Jiangling. If he can't use this to buy Xiao Liang's hearts, what awaits him is a protracted war. Li Xiaogong immediately issued an order-soldiers are strictly prohibited from looting.The generals were greatly disappointed, so they had to settle for the next best thing, demanding that the property of the Liang Dynasty generals who died fighting against the Tang army be confiscated, so as to reward the soldiers.Li Jing immediately objected. He said: "The king's division should spread the voice of justice before fighting. Those generals who died fighting for their monarch are loyal ministers. How can they be regarded as rebellious and confiscated their property?"

With the stop of Cen Wenwen and Li Jing, Jiangling City avoided a catastrophe.After Tang Jun entered the city, he strictly abided by the ban and did not offend the common people.When the counties and states in the south heard about it, they all fell in anticipation.A few days after Xiao Xian surrendered, the hundreds of thousands of Liang Dynasty troops who were running on Qinwang Road heard the news of Jiangling's fall, and all of them dropped their weapons and surrendered to the Tang army. So far, the Xiaoliang Dynasty, the largest separatist regime in the south and established for five years, was completely suppressed.Li Yuan was overjoyed, and immediately promoted Li Xiaogong to be the governor of Jingzhou, and granted Li Jing the title of Yongkang County Duke and Shangzhu Kingdom, and ordered them to further explore Lingnan.

Xiao Xian was sent to Chang'an, and Li Yuan counted his crimes.Xiao Mian said calmly: "Sui lost its deer, and heroes competed. Mian has no destiny, so this is the end. If this is also a crime, then I am willing to die!" In the winter of the fourth year of Wude, a north wind howled In the afternoon of the same year, Xiao Xian died generously and was beheaded in the downtown area of ​​Chang'an at the age of thirty-nine. Among the heroes in the troubled times at the end of the Sui Dynasty and the beginning of the Tang Dynasty, Xiao Xian was not an outstanding hero and emperor, and his ability may be far inferior to others.

In terms of ruling ability and personal charm, he is not as good as Dou Jiande; in terms of military ability, he is not as good as Li Mi and Wang Shichong; At that moment, Xiao Mian's political and military inaction made people feel that he was an out-and-out mediocre emperor. But what about making a difference? Even if Xiao Xian led Jiangling army and civilians to fight to the end with the Tang army, what else could he do besides turning Jiangling into the second Luoyang, and creating a hell on earth full of hungry people (piao) like Wang Shichong?Can he save the fate of the dynasty's downfall?

Obviously not. He may survive for a few more days, but the outcome of defeat is absolutely irreversible. That being the case, Xiao Mian's performance at the last moment is not only sympathetic, but also admirable.As an emperor, on the eve of the fall of the dynasty, what he considered was not how to preserve his own power and life, but how to avoid the slaughter and looting of the civil and military forces of the Manchu Dynasty and the people under his rule. Even if such an emperor lost everything in his world, , and will still leave a touch of light in the bloody and gloomy annals of history—a touch of light related to humanity and conscience.

For this alone, Xiao Mian deserves our admiration. In the early years of Wude, in addition to Xiao Xian and Lin Shihong, the main separatist regimes in the south also had multiple separatist forces in the Jianghuai area: Shen Faxing ruled Piling (now Changzhou City, Jiangsu Province), Du Fuwei ruled Liyang (now Hexian County, Anhui Province) ), Li Zitong was based in Hailing (now Taizhou City, Jiangsu Province), and Chen Leng was based in Jiangdu.These heroes attacked each other, and they all had the ambition to dominate Jiangbiao (now Taihu Lake and Qiantang River Basin).In September of the second year of Wude, when Li Tang Dynasty and Liu Wuzhou were fighting fiercely in Hedong, the struggle between these separatist forces also entered a fierce state...

At the beginning of September, Li Zitong of Hailing attacked Jiangdu, which was defended by Chen Leng.Chen Leng asked Du Fuwei and Shen Faxing for help. Shen Faxing ordered his son Shen Lun to lead an army of tens of thousands, and together with Du Fuwei rushed to rescue Jiangdu. ) camp. In order to break the opponent's alliance, Li Zitong adopted Mao Wenshen's divorce plan and recruited Jiangnan warriors disguised as Shen Lun's army to attack Du Fuwei's camp in the middle of the night.Du Fuwei was furious and sent troops to fight back against Shen Lun. The alliance between the two sides broke down, so they stood still, and no one wanted to attack Li Zitong first.Li Zitong took advantage of the situation to gather elites and captured Jiangdu in one fell swoop.Chen Leng escaped with his life and defected to Du Fuwei.After Li Zitong occupied Jiangdu, he immediately sent troops to defeat Shen Lun. Du Fuwei was weak and had no choice but to lead his troops back.Li Zitong immediately ascended the throne in Jiangdu, proclaimed himself Emperor Wu, and changed the government of Yuan and Ming Dynasties.A few days later, Le Botong, the leader of the Danyang (now Nanjing City, Jiangsu) mob, led more than 10,000 people to join Li Zitong.

Li Zitong's power grew rapidly, and Du Fuwei was always worried about being annexed. After hesitating several times, he finally led his troops to surrender to the Tang Dynasty.On September 12, Du Fuwei was appointed by the Li Tang court as the appeasement ambassador of Huainan and the general manager of Hezhou (reformed in Liyang County). In December of the third year of Wude, when Li Shimin and Wang Shichong fought in the eastern capital, Li Zitong also crossed the Yangtze River to attack Shen Faxing on a large scale and occupied Jingkou (now Zhenjiang City, Jiangsu Province).Shen Faxing ordered his servant to shoot Jiang Yuanchao to block Li Zitong in Qiting (now northwest of Changzhou City, Jiangsu Province), but he was defeated and killed in battle.Shen Faxing then abandoned Piling and fled to Wu County (now Suzhou City, Jiangsu Province).Since then, Danyang, Piling and other counties were all occupied by Li Zitong. At that time, Du Fuwei had been enshrined by the Tang Dynasty as Shang Shuling of Dongnan Dao Xingtai, Shangzhu Kingdom, and King of Wu, and he was given the surname Li.In order to curb Li Zitong's expansion momentum, Du Fuwei ordered the left servant of Xingtai Shefu Gong Er, the generals Kan Leng, and Wang Xiongdan to lead thousands of elites across the Yangtze River, conquered Danyang, and conquered Danyang in Lishui (now Jiangsu Province). Lishui County) started a battle with Li Zitong.Tang Jun gained an advantage at first, but was counterattacked by Li Zitong during the pursuit, and lost.That night, the brave general Wang Xiongdan led hundreds of soldiers to attack the Wu army camp, smashing Li Zitong and taking thousands of prisoners; Li Zitong fled back to Jiangdu in embarrassment. Soon, Li Zitong ran out of food and grass, so he had to abandon Jiangdu and retreat to Jingkou.So all the west of Hezhou was occupied by Du Fuwei.Du Fuwei moved his headquarters to Danyang, pushing Li Zitong step by step.Li Zitong gave up Jingkou again, and turned to attack Shen Faxing who was retreating to Wujun, and completely defeated him.Shen Faxing fled with only a few hundred people, and finally fell into a desperate situation and died by throwing himself into the river. After Shen Faxing was eliminated, Wu Emperor Li Zitong regained his momentum, so he moved his capital to Yuhang (now Hangzhou, Zhejiang) and annexed all of Shen Faxing's original territory. City), west to Xuancheng (now Xuanzhou City, Anhui), and became one of the three major separatist regimes in the south, standing on a tripod with Liang Emperor Xiao Mian and Chu Emperor Lin Shihong. At the beginning of November in the fourth year of Wude, that is, half a month after Li Xiaogong and Li Jing defeated Xiao Liang, Du Fuwei sent his fierce general Wang Xiongdan to attack Yuhang, and Li Zitong led his elite troops to garrison Dusongling (now Anji County, Zhejiang Province) South).Wang Xiongsheng ordered his subordinates to plant Tang army flags all over Dusong Ridge, and at night they lit a large number of torches and tied them to the trees; so no matter day or night, as long as Li Zitong looked out from the camp, it seemed that there were Tang troops all over the mountains and plains.Li Zitong was terrified, so he burned his camp and retreated to Yuhang.Wang Xiongdan pursued with his troops and defeated Li Zitong at Yuhang City. On November 7th, desperate Li Zitong had to surrender to the Tang army.Afterwards, Wang Xiongdan forced the local rebel leaders Wang Hua, Wenren Suian and others to surrender one after another, thus completely pacifying Jiangbiao.Because of his meritorious service, Wang Xiongdan was promoted by the Li Tang court to be the general manager of She (she) Prefecture (now She County, Anhui Province), and he was named Yichun County Duke. So far, in the south of the empire, only Lin Shihong, the emperor of Chu who guarded Yugan (now Yugan County, Jiangxi Province) and several nearby counties (about most of Jiangxi Province today) remained. In the face of the invincible Tang army, how long can this last separatist regime survive? The answer can be imagined. In October of the fifth year of Wude (AD 622), Lin Shihong ordered his younger brother Lin Yaoshi to attack Xunzhou (now Huizhou City, Guangdong Province), but he was defeated and died.Then Lin Shihong's general Wang Rong descended to Tang Dynasty in Nanchang Prefecture (now Yongxiu County, Jiangxi).Lin Shihong gave up Yu Gan under the strong pressure of the Tang army on all sides, and fled to a cave in Ancheng (now Anfu County, Jiangxi) with the remnants, and was finally defeated by the Tang army.Lin Shihong died in fear, and his tribe scattered like birds and beasts. So far, Lin Shihong's separatist regime has died for six years, and half of the southern part of the empire has been declared pacified.