The Qing Dynasty is about to end

Chapter 102 The loyal hero of the Qing Dynasty is in pain! (Subscribe)
"I am so proud that I laugh at the waves, my blood is hotter than the sun, my courage is like iron, my bones are like steel, my mind is as broad as a thousand miles, my vision is as far as a thousand miles, I vow to work hard and become a good man"

The high-pitched song of "A Man Should Be Self-reliant" suddenly sounded outside the city of Chenzhou on the west bank of the Chenjiang River at this moment!

However, this time "A Man Should Be Self-reliant" was not sung in Cantonese, but was sung by tens of thousands of people in Xianghu accent and Hakka dialect!

The city of Chenzhou has been surrounded on all sides: the west, north, and south. Also, inside, there are Taiping troops or brothers from the Tiandihui who worship God!

And from the perspective of Prefect Sun Enbao, who was standing on the city wall at the west gate of Chenzhou City, it was already a sea of ​​red!
Outside the city of Chenzhou, there was a vast crowd of "red-headed men", whose number was probably as many as 30,000 or 40,000. There were so many of them that the Green Camp soldiers of the Chenzhou City Defense Camp and the local militia standing on the city wall were all terrified.

Sun Enbao, the defender of Chenzhou, looked ashen and desperate, and said with trembling lips: "How could there be so many? How could there be so many? Tens of thousands of people, where did they come from?"

The number of Taiping troops was much greater than he had imagined!
As early as three months ago, after Daozhou fell, he carefully collected intelligence on the Taiping Army. At that time, the Taiping Army coming from Lingling only had a few thousand people. Even if the Taiping Army that attacked Lingling was included, the number could not exceed 30,000.

The Taiping Army was still besieging Lianzhou in Guangdong, heading north along Guanjiang River to Quanzhou to seek revenge on the Imperial Commissioner Sai Shang'a, and starting from Lingling. Another group was starting from Lanshan County in Guiyang Prefecture, conquering cities and heading towards Chenzhou.

This means the troops are divided into four groups!

Even if the Taiping Army expanded its forces in Daozhou and increased the number of soldiers to 50,000 or 60,000, after dividing it by four, each route would only have a maximum of 10,000 soldiers, and this was the case without leaving a single soldier in Daozhou.

But now there are 30,000 to 40,000 red-headed men outside the city of Chenzhou alone, with red flags flying and red scarves everywhere, and they are singing war songs together. Although Sun Enbao can't understand the lyrics, he still feels terrified.

This is going to be decent!
Thinking of "dignity", Sun Enbao almost cried.

Like Wang Kuiyi of Daozhou, he was a Jinshi graduate and owed a lot of debts in rent and loans to become the prefect of Chenzhou - the prefecture was much more expensive than the prefect of a scattered state. In order to buy this position, he owed a huge debt in Beijing, and the "lease period" of this prefect was only three years.

The so-called "three years as a clean magistrate, 100,000 silver coins" does not take into account the cost. If the cost is taken into account, he must be very careful in his greed and avoid disasters such as mourning for his father or civil unrest in order to earn 10,000 or 20,000 silver coins.

Usually, those Han scholars who did not rank high in the metropolitan and palace examinations would experience ups and downs in officialdom for twenty or thirty years, and would be considered extremely successful if they could finally make a few tens of thousands of taels of silver, settle down safely, retire and return home.

What Sun Enbao is facing now is not an ordinary natural disaster or civil unrest, but tens of thousands of deadly Taiping troops.
"Master Sun, this won't work. If you can't hold on, just run away. As long as you have the green mountains, you will never run out of firewood!"

The man who came close to Sun Enbao's ear and spoke tremblingly was the most powerful "Mr. Huang" in Chenzhou, named Chen Qishu. Like Huang Shijie, he was also a militia leader who was loyal to the Qing Dynasty and read the "Anti-Scripture".

Sun Enbao turned around and glared at Chen Qishu. "You are the one who is not afraid of running out of firewood, right? You are not a minister who defends the land, and you still have 800 militiamen under your command. If you run to Sai Zhongtang, you will definitely be a deputy county magistrate! And I can only be escorted to the capital like Wang Kuiyi and handed over to the Ministry for discussion!"

"Not really, not really." Chen Qishu didn't know how to comfort Sun Enbao and could only respond with a few words.

Because Wang Kuiyi’s fate is already clear!

He was a defender who lost his place of duty and had no real army of his own, so what good would he do? Although Huang Shijie was appointed as the deputy magistrate and Zhang Dingxiang was appointed as the guerrilla commander, their superior Wang Kuiyi was taken as the blame by Sai Shang'a, and a memorial of impeachment was sent to Emperor Xianfeng. Sai Shang'a was kind-hearted and thought that sending Wang Kuiyi to Xinjiang as a soldier would be enough, so he wrote a polite memorial of impeachment and did not add insult to injury.

But when Emperor Xianfeng saw that after Daozhou fell, he also lost Ningyuan, Jianghua, Yongming, Xintian, Lanshan, Guanyang and other counties, and the Taiping Army invaded Guangdong and besieged Lianzhou City, he was furious and directly sent an order to Wang Kuiyi to "bring him to Beijing and hand him over to the Ministry for discussion and punishment"!
In the current situation where we have lost troops and territory, can we hand it over to the Ministry for discussion and come up with a good solution?

That's definitely a severe punishment, it's like going to Caishikou!
Daozhou is called "zhou", but it is actually a scattered state, that is, a state under the jurisdiction of a prefecture or a direct-controlled state, which is slightly larger than a county. Chenzhou City is the prefectural capital! After the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom rose up, the Qing Dynasty had never lost the prefectural capital!
The Yong'an Prefecture City, Quanzhou City, and Daozhou City that had fallen before were all prefecture capitals of scattered prefectures. The prefecture capital of Guiyang Prefecture might have been lost, but it was only the prefecture capital of a direct-controlled prefecture, while Chenzhou City was a prefectural capital.

As the first official to lose the city, shouldn't Sun Enbao have gone to Caishikou with Wang Kuiyi?
Thinking of this, Sun Enbao sighed, "Forget it. I am already old, and I still have to hand it over to the Ministry for discussion and punishment, and I still have to be arrested and brought to Beijing. I still have to deal with extortion from all sides, and I still have to sell my property and borrow money everywhere to raise money to repay the debts of those Eight Banners children! Why bother? It's nothing more than a death! I will die in the face of danger to report to the king. When I die, the court must give me a grand funeral, and the creditors can only blame themselves for their bad luck. They can't force the family of the loyal martyrs to pay their debts, right?

As for me, once I die, all is over. All is over."

As he spoke, Sun Enbao turned around and staggered towards the bottom of the city wall.

Chen Qishu hurriedly followed, two tears running down his round yellow face: "My lord, my lord, please don't forget to submit a will to the emperor! You will be a hero soon, you can ask for grace for your descendants. And, and..."

"I understand, I understand." Sun Enbao nodded, "Bo Wen, I know the rules. I will speak for you in the will!" When he said this, he suddenly gritted his teeth and said hatefully, "You have to do something for me too! My old servant Sun Fugui is a servant of Prince Zheng's Mansion in the capital. He is a piece of shit. Kill him!"

"Okay!" Chen Qishu nodded and agreed readily.

Of course he understood what was going on?
The creditors of the Beijing loans were all the Eight Banners dignitaries. In order to ensure that they could collect the Beijing loans, they would usually send slaves from their mansions to follow the "official vacancies" and teach them to be greedy and help them be greedy. Of course, these dog slaves were even greedier and dared to take any money! Once something went wrong, the ones who took the blame were the "official vacancies", no, it should be the "official vacancies".

Sun Fugui, who followed Sun Enbao, was particularly greedy. Not only did he teach Sun Enbao how to be greedy, but he also used the name of Mr. Sun's family to stretch out his money everywhere and dared to take any money. Sun Enbao was made miserable.

It's so disgusting that a "rented official" has such a thing around him. I hate him to death!

Sun Enbao wanted to get rid of this maggot countless times, but he never dared to do it in the past. But now, he has nothing to fear. He has already died to report to the king, so can't he just do something to get rid of the harm for the people?

Although he himself is also an official who harms the people!
As he walked down the city wall, he was still muttering, "I really want to be a good official, I really want to be a good official, but they won't let me, they won't let me."

Chen Qishu followed behind the corrupt official Sun Enbao, looking at his back and listening to his mumbling. He felt a little dazed for a moment, as if that person was not Sun Enbao, but him, Chen Qishu. No, he would not end up like this, because he had soldiers!

Chen Qishu suddenly touched the "Anti-Scripture" in his arms, and then the roar of artillery fire suddenly sounded in his ears!

"Boom boom boom boom."

The Taiping Army’s cannons opened fire, and Chen Qishu knew that Chenzhou City was about to fall!

(End of this chapter)