Hong Chengchou, courtesy name Yanyan, was a native of Quanzhou, Fujian, and a successful candidate in the imperial examinations of the forty-fourth year of the Wanli reign. After entering government service, he was highly regarded by the Imperial Court and the Emperor, receiving frequent promotions. In the third year of the Chongzhen reign, Hong Chengchou served as the Governor-General of Yansui, where he began his campaign to suppress the rebel bandits. He did not agree with the Imperial Court’s prevailing strategy of combining suppression with appeasement, favoring instead a policy of total eradication: crushing them completely first, and using military force to solidify any subsequent pacification. For several years thereafter, he was either busy suppressing rebels or on the move to do so.
In the eleventh year of the Chongzhen reign, Hong Chengchou first defeated Li Zicheng in Guanzhong, and subsequently ordered Cao Bianjiao and Sun Chuanting to set an ambush at Tongguan Plain, defeating him once more. Li Zicheng, with only eighteen cavalrymen, fled into the Zhongnan Mountains to lie low. In the twelfth year of the Chongzhen reign, Hong Chengchou was appointed Governor-General of the Jiliao military region. In the fourteenth year of the Chongzhen reign, Hong Chengchou was defeated at the Battle of Songjin and fled into Songshan City. By the second month of the following year, the city fell, and Hong Chengchou surrendered.
The Battle of Songjin in history can be said to b…
Chapter 640