While Li Zicheng and Liu Zongmin led the main force of the Dashun Army via Taiyuan, Ningwu, Datong and Juyongguan, mopping up the frontier troops in the towns along the border of Xuanda, and marching towards Beijing from the north, Liu Fangliang led the Shun Army's left camp and also deployed in accordance with the deployment. fought on the southern front.
Liu Fangliang crossed the Yellow River from Puban in February and marched eastward along the north bank of the Yellow River.
In the latter half of the year, he arrived in Huaiqing, Henan, and the deputy general Chen De who was guarding Huaiqing surrendered.
Zhu Changzi, the king of Lu who was entrusted to Weihui, was so frightened that he carried his belongings and family members across the river under the protection of the general Bu Congshan and was unable to escape.
Nearby prefectures and counties followed suit, and all the officials fled.
The army along the southern route captured dozens of prefectures and counties without any bloodshed.
Liu Fangliang assigned his generals to each lead a small number of troops to sweep away the various prefectures in Hebei.
There was no resistance wherever they passed.
On March 10, the Dashun Army entered Guangping Prefecture, then set off from Guangping and continued northward to collect Xingtai Hejian and other places.
On March 21, they arrived at Baoding, an important town in the capital, and encountered resistance from the army led by Ming Governor Li Jiantai.
On the 26th of the first lunar month, Li Jiantai led 20,000 soldiers and horses to set off to Shanxi to resist the intruders.
He was ready to destroy his family and build a country, use his family property as military pay, and recruit more dead soldiers to defend Shanxi.
Unexpectedly, before entering Shanxi, his hometown Quwo had already fallen into the hands of intruders, and there was no point in going to Shanxi anymore.
Li Jiantai led the army southward, preparing to garrison Baoding.
Although Li Jiantai didn't know much about military affairs, he might not be a good person even if he was a bachelor.
He analyzed that if the Dashun Army wanted to attack Beijing, it would only have two routes: the north and the south.
The north route was through Datong, Xuanfu, where there were several frontier troops guarding the Ming Dynasty.
There are hundreds of thousands of people, so there should be no problem in resisting the Shun army.
Then there is the South Road, which is a plain area south of Beijing.
If the intruder chooses to enter Hebei from Shanxi and then attack from the north, it will be easier than from the Datong area.
Baoding is an important town in the south of the capital, where intruders must pass through to attack the capital.
Therefore, Li Jiantai analyzed that the imperial court was worried about Baoding and not Xuanda, so he sent his troops to Baoding.
Li Jiantai commanded a patchwork army with low combat effectiveness and extremely low morale.
Soldiers fled from time to time along the way.
The local officials of the Ming Dynasty were well aware of the nature of the imperial army.
In order to prevent the people in the city from being harassed, they adopted a closed-door attitude towards Li Jiantai's army passing by.
According to the system of the Ming Dynasty, when the army marched within the territory, the local government provided food and grass.
However, Li Jiantai brought so many people, and the local government could not afford the supply.
This was also an important reason why the counties closed their city gates.
Along the way, the soldiers of the Ming army were short of clothes and pay, and they kept fleeing.
When they arrived in Dingxing County, the army was extremely exhausted.
Wherever Dingxing County could block the attack of the soldiers, it was quickly breached.
The soldiers swarmed in and looted wildly.
Military discipline has been extremely corrupted since then.
Although Li Jiantai was the commander-in-chief, he could not control the disorganized and unwarranted army.
By the time Baoding arrived, only half of the army had fled.
At this time, Liu Fangliang commanded the army and was attacking the city in the south.
When news of the fall of Taiyuan reached the capital, the Chongzhen court fell into panic.
Because no minister was willing to take the initiative to propose the move south, and Guang Shiheng and others disrupted the situation, Chongzhen's plan to abandon Beijing and move the capital to Nanjing could not be carried out.
He was too proud to propose it himself, and the matter was delayed.
As some soldiers from the Beijing camp were taken away by Li Jiantai, Beijing's military strength was extremely weak, and there were not many troops that could be mobilized around Beijing at this moment.
Xuanda's army has to resist the invaders, and several troops in the south have to resist the attack from the south of the invaders.
The only ones that can be mobilized at this moment are Tang Tong, who has been transferred to the post of Commander-in-Chief of Jizhen, and Wu Sangui, who is stationed in Ningyuan and is the Commander-in-Chief of Liaodong.
Oh, and there is also Chen Yue's department, the governor of Tianjin.
However, Chen Yue's department only has a few thousand people and its troops are weak. into the eyes of the courtiers.
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At this moment, the intruders are coming to attack, so it will definitely not work without mobilizing the army.
When Wu Sangui was mobilized, the court had different opinions, because Ningyuan was the only remaining city of the Ming Dynasty outside the Pass, directly facing the Manchus in Liaodong.
In Ningyuan, although there are tens of thousands of troops, the real elite among them are Wu Sangui's five thousand Guan Ning cavalry.
Once Wu Sangui retreats, the remaining Ming army will not be able to resist the Mantar attack, which means that all outside the pass will be completely abandoned.
From then on, the Ming Dynasty had only one Shanhaiguan to defend the land.
Chongzhen's unwillingness to take responsibility emerged again.
He hoped that the ministers would take the initiative to abandon Ningyuan and transfer Wu Sangui to Beijing.
And with the murders of Yuan Chonghuan and Chen Xinjia, the ministers had already learned the lesson, and no one wanted to bear the blame for losing the land, for fear that Chongzhen would settle accounts later and cause death.
Therefore, from the first assistant Wei Zaode to the following, they all opposed the transfer of Wu Sangui's tribe.
Zhang Jinyan, the Secretary of the Ministry of War, even made the problem clear, "The difference between Sangui and Ningyuan depends on whether Ningyuan abandons or not."
Chongzhen's plan to shirk responsibility failed, so he had to decide to give up Ningyuan on his own.
However, the Chongzhen court's habit of wrangling appeared again.
In order to completely shirk the responsibility, the first assistant Wei Zaode once again convened the ministers for a collegial meeting with the intention of sharing the responsibilities.
After the court meeting was passed, he still tried every means to delay time.
In this way, the matter was postponed for a month, and until the end of February, Wu Sangui's proposal to enter the customs was still not implemented.
Tang Tong was transferred to Beijing.
Not long after, news came of the fall of Ningwu and the surrender of the Datong garrison.
Datong fell, leaving only Juyongguan pass north of the capital.
So the imperial court hurriedly sent him to Juyongguan, hoping that he could hold on to this last line of defense.
However, on March 15, the Dashun army arrived at Juyong Pass, but Tang Tong and the eunuch Du Zhizhi led the army to surrender.
Xiongguan, known as the "key to the north gate" of the capital, fell.
When the news reached the capital, the entire city fell into despair.
The ministers discussed countermeasures in the court room, but they all cared about each other without saying a word.
Everyone knew that the Ming Dynasty was exhausted and could not be restored by human power.
Chongzhen sat on the throne blankly.
Although he looked calm as usual, he was actually very upset.
At this moment, he once again had the idea of escape to Nanjing.
However, news of southern invaders attacking various places in Hebei has spread, and it is impossible to go south by land.
It seemed that the only option was to take the sea route.
Fortunately, I sent Chen Yue to Tianjin and was already prepared.
Therefore, Chongzhen secretly ordered Wu Mengming, the commander of Jinyiwei, to send people to Tianjin quickly and mobilize Chen Yue to enter Beijing quickly.
Chen Yue still had thousands of troops there, all of them elite soldiers who could stand up to the Manchus.
With the protection of this army, Chongzhen could escape with peace of mind
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