The Last Emperor of Ming
Having controlled the strategic region between northwestern China and Beijing, Li Zicheng’s troops were moving toward Ming’s capital at the beginning of 1644.
The Beijing garrison was manned by the old and weak. A plague in the previous year had taken the lives of half of the troops, and the remaining able-bodied men had been recruited by eunuchs as their personal bodyguards. Even the upkeep of such a garrison was hard. The soldiers had not received pay for a year, for the treasury had almost run out of money.
The emperor appealed to the residents of Beijing to do whatever they could to defend the capital. Donations were collected from business communities and private citizens. Prisoners were pardoned in return for financial contributions. Militia was organized. But all these last-minute measures were too weak and too late.
The defense of the city being hopeless, the emperor was inclined to move to Nanjing, a major city on the southern bank of the Yangtze River, to establish a southern Ming regime. But abandoning the capital would bring disgrace upon him. It would be better if his ministers would make such a recommendation and then he reluctantly follow it.
To his disappointment, his ministers were divided on the issue. Wranglings went on for months between those in favor of such a move and those claiming it was the sacred duty of the emperor to stay in the capital. Finally on April 10, 1644, Emperor Chongzhen made the fateful decision not to leave Beijing. That day, officials of the Royal Observatory reported that the pole star, the symbol of the emperor, had slipped from the sky.
The only remaining fighting force of Ming that could stand up against the insurgents was the elite troops stationed in the strategically important Shanhaiguan under the command of General Wu Sangui. So far General Wu Sangui had successfully beaten back the Manchus despite their victories in other parts of the northeast. Now the emperor decided to recall these troops for the defense of the capital.
End of a Great Enterprise
As Li Zicheng’s troops advanced, they met with only token resistance. On April 22, the emperor was having a meeting with his ministers. A courier rushed in with an urgent message: Li Zicheng had overrun the vital stronghold, the Juyung Pass, 60 li from the Forbidden City. The government forces had surrendered without a fight. Obviously General Wu Sangui’s troops were delayed.
The following morning Chongzhen held his last audience. As he entered the hall, he was in tears. All those present burst into tears, too. The emperor gave his permission for the ministers to commit suicide if they chose to.
The capital was within easy reach, but Li Zicheng was hesitant to storm it by force. He offered the emperor a peaceful settlement. He proposed that he be given an aristocratic title, one million ounces of silver and northwestern China to rule. In return, he would help the emperor defeat other insurgents and fight the Manchus.
Chongzhen was tempted, but knew if he accepted Li’s proposal, he might be stigmatized as a coward who made expedient concessions to bandits and his reputation in history would be tarnished.
“What do you think of the proposal?” he asked the prime minister, hoping to get his support before he committed himself. “We are facing a crisis.
”
Unwilling to share the burden of such a momentous decision, the prime minister chose not to respond.
“What do you think?” the emperor demanded again.
The prime minister kept his silence. Trembling with fury, Chongzhen knocked over the throne and rejected Li Zicheng’s peace overture.
The next day, April 24, Li Zicheng’s army broke through the south gate of the city. “The great enterprise is over,” Chongzhen wailed when he heard the news.
He hastened to send the crown prince and his two other sons into hiding.
“Today you are princes,” he said to them after helping them change into civilian clothes, “tomorrow you’ll become commoners. I’m going to die. But you should try to live on. Remember when you see an official, call him Lord if he is elderly, call him Master if he is young; when you see a commoner, call him Uncle if he is elderly, call him Brother if he is young. Call a civilian Mister, and call an army man Officer. Take care and don’t forget your parents.”
Thereupon he and the empress wept; all those around them wept, too. After kissing farewell to her three sons, the empress dragged herself into her own room and hanged herself. Chongzhen’s other consort tried to hang herself, but the cord broke, and she fell to the floor. Chongzhen struck her three times with his sword, but she survived, nevertheless.
Chongzhen then walked into his daughters’ chamber. His eldest daughter had just turned fifteen.
“Why were you born into such an unfortunate family?” the emperor wailed.
He was going to strike her with his sword, but could not bring himself to do so. After a long pause, he suddenly raised his sword and struck, covering his face with his left hand. The princess tried to ward off the blow with her hand; her right arm got cut off. She fell to the floor unconscious, but miraculously survived. Chongzhen killed another princess, who was only six years old, and ordered his own mother, the empress dowager, to kill herself.
Toward midnight, the emperor, disguised as a eunuch, tried to flee the palace, only to be shot at by the guards who failed to recognize him. He was compelled to return to the palace. There he changed back to his royal robe, bit his finger and wrote his last words with his blood.
Seventeen years ago, I ascended the throne. I am an unworthy ruler. Now I have met with Heaven’s punishment. My ministers have deceived me and the rebels are about to seize the capital. When I die, my soul will be too ashamed to face my ancestors. So I have removed my crown. Let the rebels dismember my body, but I entreat them not to harm the people.
In the early hours of April 25, 1644, Emperor Chongzhen walked to the nearby Coal Hill and hanged himself on a pine tree. He was thirty-three years old, wearing a blue silk robe; his hair disheveled; his right foot had a red shoe on and his left foot bare.
After 277 years, the Ming dynasty came to an ignominious end.
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