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Manchu Conquest of China

The Kin Tatars, or Manchus, were a branch of the great Tatar family. They had their original home on the banks of the Sungari River. They made their first appearance upon the field of history in the 10th and 11th Centuries, when they followed the Khitan Tatars into the northern part of China. The Khitans had adopted the name of Liao, or Iron, as the title of their dynasty, and transmitted it to the peninsula which they wrested from the Chinese and which has ever since borne the name of Liaotung. On their heels came the ancestors of the Manchus, then called Nuchihs, and with a fling at their rivals, took the name Kin, or gold, for, said they, "Iron rusts, gold keeps its color." The name Manchu, or Pure, was given to the tribe by Aisin Gioro, who was miraculously born to a heavenly maiden in the Chang Pai mountains, and consolidated the Manchu power.

The Manchu leader Nurhachu is said to have given early indications of his future greatness. The chroniclers naively say that he was a thirteen months child, had the dragon face and the phoenix eye, an enormous chest, big ears and a voice like the tone of the largest bell. Not content with this, his descendants claim a miraculous ancestry for him, as is the manner for all Eastern great men. They say that a maiden of unsullied purity gave birth to the original progenitor of the race from which Nurhachu sprang, and the site indicated as the one in which the immaculate conception took place, is a spot called Odoli, in the middle of the Ever-White-Mountains.

When Nurhachu was but twenty-eight years old, he built his first small capital, a tiny town surrounded by a small mud wall, whose outline may be traced even to-day. At forty-four years of age, a second and larger town-Hsing Ching-was constructed, and the subjugation of surrounding tribes undertaken on a far more extensive scale. Successes everywhere crowned Nurhachu's efforts, and by 1625, when he was sixty-six years old, he was practically overlord of all Manchuria. In 1617, Nurhachu had declared war against the Ming Emperor of China. In 1627 he died, and was succeeded by his fourth son, Tai-tsung, who had greatly distinguished himself in he previous campaigns. The Manchu Empire, controlling a great portion of Manchuria, was now firmly established, and the Manchus considered themselves the equals of the Mings.

As the Manchus were conciliatory in their treatment of the Chinese in the Capital, the people of the North submitted readily to their conquerors; but at Nanking and in the Provinces south of the Yangtsze an attempt was made to set up a successor of Chuang Lieh Ti and to continue the Ming Dynasty. Fuh Wan, a grandson of Wan Li, had the best claim to the throne, and was proclaimed Emperor, but the selection proved an unfortunate one, for he was lacking in wisdom, courage, and energy, and was incapable of waging a successful contest for the Empire. He was supported by an able and patriotic scholar named Shih K'o-fa, who, although not a military magistrate, was appointed to the command of the army. The Manchus after an unsuccessful attempt to arrange terms with Shih K'o-fa, advanced in great numbers toward the South, and captured with but little difficulty the cities they passed through on their march, The Seizure of Yangchou.

Shih K'o-fa made a determined stand at the city of Yangchou, situated on the lower waters of the Yangtsze, in the Province of Kiangsu, close to the junction of the Grand Canal with that river. It was suggested to Shih K'o-fa that he could gain a material advantage over the enemy if he would flood the country, but he refused to do this on the ground that it might cause greater loss of life to the Chinese than to the Manchus, and defended his policy by saying " First the people and next the Dynasty." The fighting lasted seven days, until finally the Manchus were able to force an entrance into the doomed city. Then followed an awful scene of bloodshed and destruction, the inhabitants being brutally massacred and the buildings razed to the ground. Shih K'o-fa himself was either killed while attempting to make his escape, or, as is more likely, ended his life by committing suicide. The Rout of the Mings. The Manchus after capturing Yangchou advanced upon Nanking. The worthless Emperor I"uh Wan, aroused from a drunken debauch, hurried off towards Wuhu, but was pursued by a body of horsemen, captured, and taken a prisoner to Nanking, where he was executed.

Three other Ming Emperors successively attempted to occupy the throne; the first, Chang Wang, reigned only for three days in Hangchow, and then submitted to the Manchus; the second, T'ang Wang, with the help of a pirate chief named Clung Chih-liang, continued the contest for a longer period, but was gradually driven to the South and was finally captured at the city of Tingchou and executed. Ningpo, Shanghai, Wenchovv, and T'aichow rapidly fell into the hands of the Manchus, and as each city was taken the inhabitants were forced to shave the front of their heads and to adopt the queue as a badge of servitude. The third to aspire to the throne was Kuei Wang, a great-grandson of Wan Li. At first he met with considerable success, and was able to make himself acknowledged in the Provinces of Kiangsi and Kuangtune:. His success was, however, temporary, and before long the Manchus by their energy and vigor regained these Provinces and drove the would-be Emperor into Burmah. The Burmese upon the appearance of the army in pursuit delivered him up into the hands of his enemy. According to one account, desparing of life, and realizing that he could expect no mercy at the hands of those he had opposed, Kuei Wang committed suicide by strangling himself with a silken scarf.