There is no such thing as the Kangxi and Qianlong eras

Chapter 424 Zunyi Prefecture

Zunyi.

He Shunan, leading his "Sichuan Army (First Division)" troops, had just captured Tongzi County.

He Shunan looked around and said, "This is Zunyi. It's quite different from the mountains of Guizhou that we remember! There are many mountains, but there's still plenty of land to cultivate, and it's all pretty good land."

The Tongzi County Magistrate, who had already surrendered swiftly, hurriedly explained, "General, you may not know this, but although Guizhou is mostly mountainous and the land is barren, Zunyi Prefecture is an exception. Since the fifth year of the reign of Emperor Yongzheng of the Qing Dynasty, when Zunyi Prefecture was transferred to Guizhou via Sichuan, it has rapidly transformed into the granary of southwestern Guizhou with its fertile fields along the Chishui River Valley."

"Moreover, Zunyi Prefecture controlled the salt and tea trade with the southwest, and its tax revenue alone accounted for one-third of the province's total. It can be said that it was thanks to Zunyi that Guizhou was able to escape the predicament of being unable to support its own finances."

Upon hearing this, He Shunan suddenly realized: "So that's how it is! No wonder the staff officers in the Governor's Office told me to head south and attack Zunyi Prefecture first. It seems that Zunyi Prefecture is the lifeline of Guizhou's granary!"

He Shunan did not linger in Tongzi County. Now that he knew the importance of Zunyi Prefecture to Guizhou, he knew that speed was of the essence and he would take Zunyi as quickly as possible.

As the Han army marching south from Chongqing, the First Division's timing was not ideal, so they couldn't conscript enough laborers and provisions. The laborers they were using were all local chieftain soldiers recruited from Youyang and Shizhu. Even the military supplies and provisions were first requisitioned from civilian boats in Chongqing Prefecture, then transported south via the Qijiang River, and had to be transported by land when they reached Tongzi County.

Loushan Pass.

This is a mountain pass between Tongzi County and Zunyi Prefecture. Although Tongzi County is under the jurisdiction of Zunyi Prefecture, it is separated from Zunyi Prefecture by the Dalou Mountain.

If the Han army wanted to get through, they had to cross mountains and pass through the Loushan Pass outpost.

Liu Rongfu, the puppet Qing prefect of Zunyi, was unaware of the First Division's southward strategy, but he was concerned that Sichuan rebels might invade Zunyi from the south. Therefore, he specially left some Qing troops and laborers to guard Loushan Pass.

Of course, only a few were left; there really were only a few.

The Qing army stationed in Zunyi Prefecture was not large, consisting of only two auxiliary battalions, totaling about a thousand Green Standard Army soldiers.

They also needed to control Zunyi Prefecture to prevent any unrest within the city. That left very few troops to spare for the garrison at Loushan Pass; even with the temporary conscription of laborers, the total number wouldn't exceed a thousand.

What can a thousand-strong garrison do?

As soon as the Han army appeared in front of Loushan Pass, the guards at Loushan Pass reacted quickly and immediately notified their allies inside the pass.

then……

"Run!"

"The rebels from Sichuan are marching south!"

After a few shouts, the thousand garrison soldiers at Loushan Pass all fled.

Ninety percent of these so-called garrison troops were actually laborers, conscripted from nearby villages at the foot of the mountain. If it weren't for a few bags of rations, no one would want to risk their lives for the government.

Now, as soon as they see the "rebels" from Sichuan actually attacking, no matter how much food they are given, they won't do it. They'll just shout and run away.

The more than one hundred Green Standard Army soldiers responsible for guarding the area initially tried to stop them, but found that they were all running away and they couldn't stop them at all.

The mountain people were fierce, and the Green Standard Army was just a bunch of lousy soldiers left over from the suppression of the Miao people in western Hunan. They didn't dare to fight these mountain people.

Seeing that all the mountain people had fled, these guys gritted their teeth and ran after them. They couldn't run back to the village, so they could only hurry south back to the prefectural city to bring the news to the prefect that the "rebels" from Sichuan had attacked.

Within a few days, more than a hundred deserters returned to Zunyi Prefecture ahead of the Han army.

"What? The Sichuan rebels have really attacked?" Liu Rongfu was greatly shocked upon hearing the news brought back by the deserter.

He only made some preparations, who could have imagined that the rebels would actually come!

Liu Rongfu immediately pressed, "How many rebels have come?"

"What banner are they flying, and how many laborers have they brought? Have you seen clearly?"

The deserters exchanged bewildered glances. They'd run so fast, who could have seen them clearly? They could only vaguely reply, "There should be around twenty or thirty thousand..."

"Bullshit!" Liu Rongfu couldn't help but curse. "Not to mention how treacherous the Dalou Mountains are, how much food and supplies would it take to stop 30,000 people from crossing them? Have the rebels lost their minds to send so many troops south?"

Zhang Fengzhi, the Assistant Magistrate of Zunyi, asked, "What banner are those rebels using? You should be able to see it clearly by now, shouldn't you?"

The deserter replied, "It seems to be a red flag with Chinese characters."

Red flag with Chinese characters, the Han Army of Chongqing!
Liu Rongfu and Zhang Fengzhi exchanged a glance, both seeing fear in each other's eyes.

He waved for the deserters to leave, and the two sat facing each other in the yamen, with a map of Zunyi Prefecture on the table.

After a moment of awkward silence, Zhang Fengzhi asked, "Lord Liu, what should we do now? It's the puppet Han rebels from Chongqing. They might not number 30,000, but there's a high probability they'll have at least 10,000. Rumors in Jiangnan say that if the Han rebels have less than 10,000, they're invincible..."

Liu Rongfu shook his head: "Nonsense. There's no such thing as a bandit with less than ten thousand men being invincible. It's just that those defeated officers and generals spread rumors."

“Even if it’s just hearsay, if the pseudo-Han really had 10,000 troops marching south, or even fewer than 10,000, but only a few thousand, how could Zunyi Prefecture possibly stop them?” Zhang Fengzhi asked with a bitter expression.

With the Han and Qing armies locked in such a fierce battle, even the most ignorant officials like Liu Rongfu, who were essentially puppets of the Qing dynasty, had gained a relatively clear understanding of the Han army's fighting capabilities.

Let alone those useless laborers, even ordinary Green Standard Army soldiers would probably have a hard time defeating the Han army.

Zunyi Prefecture currently has 1,000 Green Standard Army soldiers and another 2,000 conscripted laborers. It's not that they can't have more, but Liu Rongfu doesn't have that authority. He's only a prefect, not a governor, and doesn't have the power to recruit soldiers privately.

It's worth noting that even Lin Zexu, later the imperial commissioner in charge of the Humen Opium Destruction, was impeached by his colleagues for overstepping his authority when he recruited militias in Guangdong to resist the British. The two thousand militiamen in Zunyi Prefecture were only allowed to recruit soldiers to defend the city after Liu Rongfu wrote a letter to the Guizhou governor, Yisang'a, explaining the advantages and disadvantages, and the governor privately "guaranteed" their permission.

Of course, if something goes wrong, this "guarantee" will definitely be abandoned by Ethanah immediately, taking advantage of the situation.

After all, this governor of Guizhou was a rare genius. He not only claimed military merits but also fled without a fight. He was largely responsible for the rise of Zhong Miao in Guizhou.

Liu Rongfu and Zhang Fengzhi discussed the matter back and forth for a long time, but they still couldn't come up with a solution.

In the end, all they could do was call on the people of the city to unite and do their best to defend the city, while at the same time frantically writing letters to the governor of Guizhou, Yisang'a, asking him to send troops to rescue them.

Zunyi Prefecture cannot be lost; if it is lost, Guizhou will be at least half ruined.

About seven days after the Han army vanguard had been preparing to defend Zunyi Prefecture, the vanguard slowly arrived at Zunyi Prefecture.

They had to slow down; the mountain roads were too difficult to traverse, and the transport of cannons and supplies alone took up a lot of the Han army's time.

Fortunately, the Han army's laborers were all local chieftains from Shizhu and Youyang, and they were used to climbing the mountains and rivers of eastern Kui, so they were able to walk the mountain roads.

Upon receiving the news, Liu Rongfu and Zhang Fengzhi immediately went to the city wall to check the enemy's situation.

"Red Chinese characters on the flag, they really are the traitorous Han army. There are so many of them, at least tens of thousands!"

Liu Rongfu said, "Not necessarily. Look, many of those on the outer perimeter are dressed differently from the bandits in the middle. They should be civilian laborers of the bandits. The bandits' regular soldiers, at most, number no more than five thousand."

If it's less than five thousand, then it's not going to be easy to beat!

Their regular soldiers numbered no more than a thousand, and their combat effectiveness was far inferior.

Zhang Fengzhi said with a wry smile, "There's no other way but to defend the city. Zunyi has strong walls and thick bulwark, and its food supplies are still quite plentiful. As long as we can hold out, we can wait for the governor to arrive..."

In the end, he dared not say any more. As for that governor of Guiyang, it was hard to say whether he would even come to rescue them or run away at the mere mention of the thieves.

"Boom boom boom!"

Before the two could have any more time to think or discuss, the Han army had already set up the cannons and started firing.

Because the mountain roads in Guizhou are too difficult to travel, only small-sized red-coated cannons were transported, and even that took a lot of effort. Only ten cannons were transported.

Ten red-coated cannons fired wildly, and luckily, three shells hit their targets in the first salvo.

One of the cannonballs hit the Zunyi city gate tower squarely, but it didn't collapse.

This scene still gave Liu Rongfu and Zhang Fengzhi, who were watching from inside the city gate tower, quite a fright.

These two men claimed to be defending Zunyi Prefecture to the death, putting on the act of loyal slaves to the Qing Dynasty. However, faced with the true range of the cannons, they still ran down the city wall without hesitation.

Seeing that the prefect and the assistant prefect had both slipped away, the Qing soldiers guarding the city walls were completely at a loss as to how to fight.

They didn't have cannons.

Even if they did, no one would dare to fire them. These southwestern cannons are too old, and many are relics from the Ming Dynasty.

The former prefect of Zunyi, on a whim, test-fired two cannons. One failed to fire, while the other fired loudly, resulting in one Qing soldier being killed and another wounded.

Since then, no one has dared to use cannons.

Now, the Qing army garrison has no cannons and can only be bombarded by the Han army's artillery. Some people peeked out to see the Han army's movements and saw that Han laborers were already carrying sandbags to fill the moat, while other laborers were systematically digging tunnels and cutting down trees.

After a day of work, several moats were filled in, and several siege engines were completed.

During this period, neither Liu Rongfu nor Zhang Fengzhi dared to come up. At most, a county magistrate from Zunyi was forced to come over to appease the troops, and after that, he immediately fled back down.

Later that day, a riot suddenly broke out on the city wall of Zunyi Prefecture.

A few soldiers who didn't want to risk their lives for the government, and who dared not collude with their colleagues to surrender, actually dared to secretly set fire to the gunpowder piled up in the old fort.

"boom!"

The gunpowder ignited and exploded violently, instantly killing two unfortunate guards.

The rest of them quickly threw down their torches and ran, shouting as they went, "The rebels are attacking the city! The rebels are attacking the city!"

Not long after, at the government office in the city.

"Your Excellency, it's terrible! Fire! The city wall is on fire!"

"What? How did the city wall catch fire?"

Liu Rongfu was stunned. He had considered that if too much time passed, the wealthy and powerful families in the city might set fire to create chaos and surrender the city, but he never expected that the city walls could catch fire.

Not only was he stunned, but the gentry in Zunyi were also stunned. They had just begun to secretly make arrangements to see if they should take the opportunity to surrender the city.

(End of this chapter)