The reason why I call Zhu Houzhao of Ming Wuzong the last British lord of the Ming Dynasty is because Zhu Houzhao is the last emperor of the 16 emperors of the Ming Dynasty with the heroic atmosphere of Taizu and Taizong, and he is also the last emperor of the Ming Dynasty to conquer Mongolia and achieve victory.
Due to the Hongji period (During the reign of Ming Xiaozong Zhu YoujiaoThe abolition of the northern frontier defense of the Ming Dynasty, the little Mongolian prince Dayan Khan (The fifteenth grandson of Genghis Khan, he is known as the lord of Zhongxing in MongoliaAfter the rise, he continued to raise troops to invade the south, and went to Zhengde (During the reign of Ming Wuzong Zhu Houzhao), the Mongols had returned to the Hetao.
Faced with this situation, Zhu Houzhao decided to follow Taizong's example after taking power through the three-step strategy of eunuchs, Jinyi guards, and the army (the process of taking power also showed the emperor's eloquence, but I will not describe it too much here, and will write a separate article later), decided to follow Taizong's (Ming Chengzu Zhu DiThe royal driver personally conquered Mongolia and revived the heroic style of the Ming Dynasty.
However, Zhu Houzhao also knew that his idea would definitely be vigorously opposed by the civilian clique.
So in the 12th year of Zhengde, Zhu Houzhao deceived the Manchu Dynasty civil and military, left the capital without permission, passed through Juyong Pass, and arrived at Xuanfu on August 28, 1517 A.DXuanhua area of Zhangjiakou City, Hebei Province today
After coming to Xuanfu, Zhu Houzhao appointed himself the governor of military affairs, the mighty general and the chief military officer, and then sent someone to inform Wang Xun, the chief soldier of Datong. Wang Xun was taken aback, and quickly verified that the emperor's visit to Xuanfu was indeed true.
Although Wang Xun didn't understand why the emperor suddenly came to Xuanfu, he thought that Zhu Houzhao, who did not play cards according to common sense, might just be a whim and came to the border pass to experience the life of the border army.
However, what Wang Xun didn't expect was that after Zhu Baobao settled down in Xuanfu, he ordered that he, a mighty general, be renamed Zhu Shou, and crowned himself the title of Duke of Zhenguo, and began to build Zhenguo Mansion in Xuanfu.
At this point, Wang Xun finally knew that Emperor Zhu Houzhao was planning to stay in Xuanfu and not leave.
At this time, the civil official group in the capital also got the news, and they immediately began to persuade Zhu Houzhao to return to Beijing, and even brought out the "Emperor Ming Zuxun" (Ming Dynasty classics compiled by Zhu Yuanzhang, Taizu of the Ming Dynasty. The content is a reprimand to the descendants of Zhu Ming in order to consolidate the imperial power of Zhu Mingto warn Zhu Houzhao not to be greedy for merit and raise troops.
He pointed out that the 15 non-conscripted countries in the Emperor's ancestral training not only did not include Mongolia, but on the contrary, Zhu Yuanzhang also clearly told future generations in the Emperor's ancestral training that it is necessary to select generals to train troops and prepare them in practice.
The civilian-official group was speechless by Zhu Houzhao's rebuttal, and Zhu Houzhao settled down in Xuanfu. Although he was far away in Xuanfu, Zhu Houzhao did not abandon political affairs, he ordered all the important pieces of the Jingshi to be sent to the Zhenguo Mansion, which he personally approved, and still held the power firmly in his hands.
After staying in Xuanfu for a while, Zhu Houzhao saw that the Mongols had not yet moved south to plunder, so he set off for Yanghe, which was closer to the borderThe county seat of Yanggao County, Datong City, Shanxi Province, was an important border town in the Ming DynastyDrill the soldiers and horses.
Finally, in September, Dayan Khan, the little Mongol prince, led 50,000 Mongol cavalry to the Great Wall outside the Shahu Pass, preparing to launch a large-scale raid on the Ming Dynasty.
In the face of the menacing Mongols, Wang Xun hurriedly sent a letter to Zhu Houzhao in Yanghe, asking him to return to Beijing immediately in case of accidents. However, Zhu Houzhao came out this time for the purpose of fighting a battle with the Mongols in person, so of course he would not leave, but immediately summoned the generals for combat deployment.
Zhu Houzhao's tactics were to take Datong as the center, deploy troops around to form a pocket array, and then use Datong as a bait to introduce the Mongols into the pocket array and encircle and annihilate them. After the tactical arrangements were completed, Zhu Baobao demanded that the whole army must complete the operational deployment by 25 September.
When the soldiers of the Ming army received Zhu Houzhao's order, they all had a feeling of being like yesterday, as if the Yongle Emperor who had conquered Mobei for the five expeditions had returned to northern Xinjiang at this time.
At the beginning of October, Zhu Houzhao personally led the army into the Datong theater of operations, and only after the Mongols got into the pocket formation, he ordered the whole army to attack. However, Zhu Houzhao still underestimated his opponent in the end, Zhu Houzhao's opponent was the rare male lord in Mongolian history, the little Mongolian prince Dayan Khan, who was a cunning enemy for the Ming Dynasty, but for the Mongols, he was a master of Zhongxing reform.
Dayan Khan, who had been on the battlefield for a long time, did not attack Datong as Zhu Houzhao expected, but bypassed the pocket formation set up by Zhu Houzhao on October 15. The soldiers attacked Pingyuwei and Weiyuanwei in two ways.
Because Pingyuwei and Weiyuanwei were far away from Datong, Zhu Houzhao's troops in these two places were relatively small.
If the Mongols defeated Pingyuwei and Weiyuanwei, they could move south from Yingzhou, southwest of Datong, and then break through the Great Wall between Yanmen Pass and Ningwu Pass, and drive straight into the Fenhe Plain, the main grain-producing area of Shanxi.
Dayan Khan's plan was perfect, and if nothing else, the odds of success were very high. However, he also did not know that his opponent was Zhu Houzhao.
Zhu Houzhao saw that the Mongols did not enter the trap, so he decisively changed the battle plan.
He first sent two armies to aid Pingluwei and Weiyuanwei respectively, and at the same time ordered Wang Xun's troops to go out of Datong, asking him to intercept the main force of the Mongolian army in Yingzhou. Then, Zhu Houzhao hurriedly dispatched the defenders to assemble near Yanghe, and he personally commanded the south to meet Dayan Khan.
In this way, the battle line of the Ming army was pulled into a straight line from the original pocket shape.
And Zhu Houzhao is about 260 miles away from Yingzhou, the end of this straight line, and even if it is a rapid march, it will take at least two to three days to arrive. Therefore, before Zhu Houzhao arrived in Yingzhou, Wang Xun had to hold back the main force of the Mongolian army.
On October 18, Wang Xun led his army to contact the main force of the Mongolian army at Wulizhai in the north of Yingzhou and engaged in a fierce battle. Although the Ming army fought very bravely, due to the outnumbered enemy, it was eventually divided and surrounded by the Mongolian army.
Seeing that the Ming army was about to be wiped out, suddenly heavy fog fell from the sky, and the visibility could not reach three feet. When the Mengjun waited until the fog cleared and was ready to attack, they found that Wang Xun had taken advantage of the dense fog to lead the Ming army back to Yingzhou City.
Seeing that the boiled duck actually flew, Dayan Khan was furious and planned to order the siege of the city. However, the Mongolian army had not yet begun to act, and Wang Xun actually took the initiative to lead his troops out of the city to meet the battle. Because Wang Xun got the news, the reinforcements from Xuanfu and Liaodong dispatched by Zhu Houzhao were about to arrive. When the time comes, the three-way men will attack back and forth, and they will not worry that the Mongolian army will not be broken.
However, in the face of Wang Xun's abnormality, Dayan Khan also quickly made the right judgment, he immediately divided his troops to block the reinforcements of Xuanfu and Liaodong, and then concentrated his forces against Wang Xun. In this way, Wang Xun once again fell into the siege of the Mongolian army.
This time, Wang Xun was completely desperate, he personally dismounted to supervise the army, and ordered the infantry to form a formation and prepare for the final onslaught of the Mongol cavalry. Just when Wang Xun was ready to die for his country, he saw smoke and dust rising behind the Mongolian army, and the new Ming army was like a god general. Wang Xun knew that the main force of the Ming army led by Zhu Houzhao had arrived.
The result of this battle was that after two days of fighting, the little prince Dayan Khan saw that he could not take advantage, so he withdrew from the border on the fifth day of October. And Zhu Houzhao led the army in pursuit, killing countless Mongolian troops along the way.
Since then, although a small group of Mongols will come to the border every year to raid, there has been no large-scale invasion. It's a pity that in the end, Zhu Houzhao died unclear, which is a pity.