The Taiping rebels moved from Yangzhou to Taizhou step by step, intending to block the Xiang army at different levels, while sturm und drang broke more than 100 Taiping rebels’ camps in a month, squeezing the Taiping rebels to Taizhou and Hai ‘an. At this time, the status quo is that Xiang attacked Taizhou Taiping rebels and Taiping rebels attacked Hai ‘an. Both sides of Xiang attacked from west to east, and the situation was to attack east and defend west.
In the end, the Tseng brothers in Taizhou were prepared by the Xiang army to attack the fortified city. Perhaps Yangzhou was prepared at the beginning, and they may have prepared for the fall of Yangzhou. Now, more than a dozen doors in Taizhou have shelled the walls of Taizhou, and a hand-to-hand battle broke out between Xiang and Taiping rebels, which is exactly what Xiang is good at. Finally, Taiping rebels were driven out of Taizhou by Xiang army and further squeezed.
Taiping rebels also spared no effort. Li Xiucheng and his two sons marched north from Rugao to attack Haian and Taizhou, and the Taiping rebels finally attacked this town. Ten thousand Xiang troops were annihilated here, but on the other side, the Taiping rebels in Taizhou retreated from the second place and were squeezed by Xiang to become a rout. There should be multiple lines of defense that were not established, and each line of defense was squeezed into one and collapsed as soon as it was completed.
Wandering and routed to Hai ‘an, the Li brothers gathered in Hai ‘an and marched westward. A large number of Taiping rebels were chased by Xiang prisoners and finally successfully fled to Hai ‘an Taiping rebels, but more than 20 thousand people and 50 thousand people became Xiang prisoners.
On the contrary, the real frontal battle did not cost much. The Taiping rebels lost less than 30 thousand people from surrounding Yangzhou to retreating. On the contrary, they have been storming the Xiang army and paid more than 50 thousand people. The biggest losses in the war are often in the rout.
After the first world war, although Li Xiucheng rescued the army and fled back to a total of more than 30,000 people, the Taiping rebels’ spirit was completely destroyed, and Xiang made a great contribution again. In the joint persecution of the famine and the Taiping rebels’ northern expedition powers, a large number of Qing literati suddenly saw hope again, pushing Zeng Guofan’s fame to the peak again, and Zeng Guofan was recognized as saving the Qing Dynasty once again.
And the Taiping Army? Although Li Xiucheng is still the most powerful king of the Taiping Military Department, after the first world war, his power contrast with Yang Fuqing and Wang Haiyang has undergone subtle changes, and his prestige has been hit too hard. The court’s disrespect for him is getting louder and louder, and his dissatisfaction with Li Xiucheng is jumping out. The day is as difficult as Li Xiucheng imagined.
In this war, Da finally maintained a neutral posture and did not help both sides, let alone weapons. Not even a grain of rice was sold to both sides, and all the grain was sent to the north to help the victims.
However, the victims’ day is still not so good, because after entering June, the famine in Shanxi became serious before, and serious disasters broke out everywhere.
Li Motai, a priest, entered Shanxi in July. He stayed in the northeast for more than a month and saw where the situation was relatively good, so he took a fire car from Qinhuangdao and entered Shanxi.
Along the way, Mrs. Li Motai saw many hungry people marching in droves. Some people fell to the ground when they were walking, and they couldn’t get up any more. When they saw a mother carrying a child and the child had already died, the mother was actually a child coffin bearer looking for a place to bury his child. He also saw that he was dying, and some men were blindly trying to survive with their weak mothers on their backs.
Wild dogs and foxes are following the crowd. These beasts look fat. Crows are circling in groups in the sky, and the sight of hell is almost gloomy and cold.
The situation of starving people has been widespread, but Li Mo was too surprised to find that there was no such phenomenon as eating too much in Shanxi as he saw in Shandong.
He followed the disaster relief team into a disaster-stricken village and found that there were few people in the village who either starved to death or were rescued by the disaster relief team. It was in the village that he saw many government posts announcing that the governor had dared to commit robbery and that the heads of villages and towns had punished the robbers on the spot. Li Mo thought it was this reason that led to surprisingly few crimes
Mrs. Li Mo-tai didn’t know that the root cause didn’t stop there. The main reason was that the landlord’s family didn’t have any surplus food to make it unnecessary for the people to rob it. The root cause was opium, which was forcibly brought into China by the British and became a nightmare that China could not erase in modern history.
The law prevented the British from selling opium. In 159, the Qing government promulgated the Regulations on Levying Taxes on Local Drugs, which legalized the cultivation of opium in China. In just over ten years, farmers in Shanxi "abandoned their fields and planted half kinds of poppies" and made money by planting poppies instead of growing grain. Before the disaster, Shanxi became an important opium-producing area. Liu Enpu, the imperial adviser of the Qing Dynasty, said that the situation in Shanxi was "hundreds of thousands of hectares" It is estimated by local people that "there are not 13 poppies planted in every county since poppies prevailed, and the farmland in Sihe Province should account for 150,000 hectares". Zhang Dong, governor of Shanxi Province, found that opium was planted everywhere in Shanxi "several counties"
Most of the land, and the most fertile land, has been planted with opium and smoky soil, and the grain output is not enough, especially in the surrounding provinces. It is strange that Shanxi people don’t starve to death.
Especially in neighboring provinces, because of panic, the local government banned food from entering Shanxi, which made the famine in Shanxi as serious as that in Shanxi. Henan is also an important opium producing area like Shanxi, and the number of opium planted in Hebei and Shandong is quite large. It can be said that the more opium is planted, the more serious the famine will be.
The whole of Shanxi Province can really find out the food, leaving only those rich families, such as the rich family and the Shanxi merchants, but at this time, they are more than self-protection and less than relief.
For example, Rishengchang, Dashengkui and other Shanxi merchants are hiding behind the high walls of their own compound. They are as strong as fortresses, hungry, and unable to break the roots without organizing the people.
In the past, these wealthy businessmen have been dealing with various gangs in the grassland, and they have strong emergency experience. Together with the famine, they hired armed men to do business with them. At this time, a large number of escort agencies entered their courtyard to protect their kin, and the local villagers also organized themselves to enter their bunkers to protect them and protect their hometown from being destroyed by refugees.
Of course, they are not finished. At this time, most Shanxi merchants’ families are helping the victims in porridge sheds outside their own compound. This is also considered to be the unification of Shanxi rich businessmen. They will always help the victims in every major disaster year, which has alleviated the hatred of the hungry people to some extent and protected themselves.
As a result, a large number of hungry people habitually gather at the famous local Shanxi merchants’ compound, where we all know that we can eat a little food.
So the Shanxi merchants’ compound became a relief, but the conditions of relief workers were greatly improved.
The governor of Shanxi is Zhang Dong. Although he is not pleasing to the eye, it is always better to save people when the court has orders. Compared with other places, he is still active in cooperating with the disaster relief operation. He not only sent people to post notices to guide the victims to move near the railway, but also informed the families of Shanxi merchants to let them work together with the disaster relief team of the railway company to try their best to live more Sanjinmin.
After the local government, Shanxi merchants and Haozu Railway Company joined forces for three months, the famine momentum was contained and the phenomenon of dead people decreased.
The most important reason is that the large railway line extends from north to south and runs through Shanxi Province, and even the hinterland can get supplies.
What makes Li Mo feel sorry is that although the railway has miraculously played its main role in this disaster relief, the local government is still full of resistance to the railway.
Recently, there has been a lot of opposition. Because of the construction of the second railway, it is a line parallel to the disaster relief railway. Although it is still under the banner of disaster relief, it is a permanent railway. It adopts a formal way to build subgrade and build bridges.
This situation makes some people who know more or less about railways alert, and they think that the generals will control the Qing Dynasty through railways.
This statement is very popular, not only in the countryside, but also in the Qing Dynasty.
Section six hundred and thirteen Anti-railway movement
The first two railways built in the disaster area are laid directly on the flat ground. It is suggested that the railways be laid directly on the ground or simply leveled. This kind of railway is often used to transport materials to the railway line when building the railway. Now it is for disaster relief, but it can still support the construction of new roads after being connected.
Of course, at present, this road is still the main transportation of disaster relief materials, that is, food, food, and other materials can be sent as little as possible, or not.
In this way, it is necessary to make this disaster relief railway transport building materials, that is, rails and steel beams, even sleepers, from the disaster-stricken areas as far as possible, regardless of the distance from the victims to the barren hills for logging. At this time, manpower is a kind of charity.
Laying subgrade materials is even more local. Sediment, rocks and rocks in the river have become subgrade materials in the simple tools of victims.
There is no mechanical equipment in the construction body. Most of the workers are victims who make simple tools, even ordinary stone mills are not enough. Most of the rammers are victims’ wood and stones, which are self-made tools. When big stones and logs are lifted and smashed, they are tamping equipment.
Even with such a simple tool, the speed of railway construction is not slow, mainly because there are too many people, and the railway company has organized more than one million people to carry out the construction. This is still because the engineering layout is not good, otherwise there will be more people. Another reason is that the railway company is almost a flower along the disaster relief railway, and I don’t know how many sections are divided at the same time. Later, it was found that many sections were wrongly repaired, causing great waves, but the speed was not delayed at all.
The railway company estimates that this method can complete the track laying of the flat road section in one year, but it will take three years for the technicians such as tunnels and bridges to complete. However, it is not a problem to be able to repair the flat road section. At that time, the famine will not be a problem. Before that, I did borrow enough money to make the image of Daxie very good in the international community at all costs.
In the Qing dynasty, the opposition to the railway was launched at the same time, but there was no splash. The local government was reluctant to oppose the railway at this time because it had already tasted the sweetness of railway disaster relief. If the railway was demolished at this time, no matter how big the attitude was, the victims would be the first to come out and destroy the government.
Therefore, this anti-railway wave is simply a slap in the face, and there is no substantive action to cooperate.