Hong Tianguifu
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Hong Tianguifu (23 November 1849 – 18 November 1864) was the second and last
king King is the title given to a male monarch in a variety of contexts. The female equivalent is queen, which title is also given to the consort of a king. *In the context of prehistory, antiquity and contemporary indigenous peoples, the tit ...
of the
Taiping Heavenly Kingdom The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, later shortened to the Heavenly Kingdom or Heavenly Dynasty, was an unrecognised rebel kingdom in China and a Chinese Christian theocratic absolute monarchy from 1851 to 1864, supporting the overthrow of the Qi ...
. He is popularly referred to as the Junior Lord (). Officially, like his father
Hong Xiuquan Hong Xiuquan (1 January 1814 – 1 June 1864), born Hong Huoxiu and with the courtesy name Renkun, was a Chinese revolutionary who was the leader of the Taiping Rebellion against the Qing dynasty. He established the Taiping Heavenly Kingdo ...
, he was the King of Heaven (). To differentiate, he is also called the Junior King of Heaven ().


History

Hong succeeded his father at fourteen and was not respected like his father by the princes, and he was spoken of poorly.
Li Xiucheng Li Xiucheng (; 1823 – August 7, 1864) was a military rebel commander opposing the Qing dynasty during the Taiping Rebellion. He was born to a peasant family. In 1864, he was captured and interrogated following the third and final Battle of ...
wrote in his autobiography, which was written shortly before Li's
execution Capital punishment, also known as the death penalty, is the State (polity), state-sanctioned practice of deliberately killing a person as a punishment for an actual or supposed crime, usually following an authorized, rule-governed process to ...
, Hong Tianguifu was described as "inexperienced", "spoiled" and "incapable". Also, Hong Tianguifu never rode a horse, which was essential for leaders and commanders in wars. Four months after his coronation,
Tianjing Tianjing (京), romanized at the time as Tienking, was the name given to Nanjing when it served as the capital of Hong Xiuquan's Heavenly Kingdom from 1853 to 1864, amid the Qing Empire's Taiping Rebellion. History Nanjing, was taken by the ...
, the capital of the Taiping rebels, was captured by the
Qing dynasty The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing,, was a Manchu-led imperial dynasty of China and the last orthodox dynasty in Chinese history. It emerged from the Later Jin dynasty founded by the Jianzhou Jurchens, a Tungusic-speak ...
. Hong Tianguifu escaped to Dongba (),
Jiangsu Jiangsu (; ; pinyin: Jiāngsū, Postal romanization, alternatively romanized as Kiangsu or Chiangsu) is an Eastern China, eastern coastal Provinces of the People's Republic of China, province of the China, People's Republic of China. It is o ...
in July 1864, rendezvoused with his uncle,
Hong Rengan Hong Rengan (; 18 February 1822 – 23 November 1864) was an important leader of the Taiping Rebellion. He was a distant cousin of the movement's founder and spiritual leader Hong Xiuquan. His position as the Gan Wang (干王, lit. "the Shield Ki ...
. After going to
Guangde County Guangde is a county-level city in the southeast of Anhui Province, People's Republic of China, bordering the provinces of Jiangsu to the north and Zhejiang to the east. It is the easternmost county-level division of Anhui and is under the jurisdic ...
, Anhui first, they went to the town of
Huzhou Huzhou (, ; Huzhounese: ''ghou² cieu¹'') is a prefecture-level city in northern Zhejiang province (Hangzhou–Jiaxing–Huzhou Plain, China). Lying south of the Lake Tai, it borders Jiaxing to the east, Hangzhou to the south, and the provinc ...
,
Zhejiang Zhejiang ( or , ; , also romanized as Chekiang) is an eastern, coastal province of the People's Republic of China. Its capital and largest city is Hangzhou, and other notable cities include Ningbo and Wenzhou. Zhejiang is bordered by Jiang ...
on 13 August 1864 to rendezvous with the local Taiping Army commander Huang Wenjin (). The Qing dynasty sent
Zuo Zongtang Zuo Zongtang, Marquis Kejing ( also spelled Tso Tsung-t'ang; ; November 10, 1812 – September 5, 1885), sometimes referred to as General Tso, was a Chinese statesman and military leader of the late Qing dynasty. Born in Xiangyin County ...
and
Li Hongzhang Li Hongzhang, Marquess Suyi ( zh, t=李鴻章; also Li Hung-chang; 15 February 1823 – 7 November 1901) was a Chinese politician, general and diplomat of the late Qing dynasty. He quelled several major rebellions and served in important ...
to attack the city, and Chen Xueming (), the Taiping army commander in charge of defending the southern gate of the town, surrendered on 26 August 1864. Hong Tianguifu, Hong Rengan and Huang Wenjin were forced to flee from the town next day, under the cover of night, and Huang Wenjin soon died of his wounds. The rest of the survivors attempted to escape to the border region of
Jiangxi Jiangxi (; ; formerly romanized as Kiangsi or Chianghsi) is a landlocked province in the east of the People's Republic of China. Its major cities include Nanchang and Jiujiang. Spanning from the banks of the Yangtze river in the north int ...
, Guangdong and
Fujian Fujian (; alternately romanized as Fukien or Hokkien) is a province on the southeastern coast of China. Fujian is bordered by Zhejiang to the north, Jiangxi to the west, Guangdong to the south, and the Taiwan Strait to the east. Its capi ...
to join the remnant Taiping forces led by
Li Shixian Li Shixian (; 1834 – 23 August 1865) was a pre-eminent military leader of the late Taiping Rebellion. He was the cousin of military leader Li Xiucheng and was known for being very tall for a native of Guangxi province, standing at tall. Dur ...
, but on 9 October 1864, they were ambushed by the Qing army at Shicheng. Hong Rengan was captured and subsequently executed on 23 November 1864 at
Nanchang Nanchang (, ; ) is the capital of Jiangxi Province, People's Republic of China. Located in the north-central part of the province and in the hinterland of Poyang Lake Plain, it is bounded on the west by the Jiuling Mountains, and on the east ...
, Jiangxi. Hong Tianguifu escaped to the mountains near Shicheng after his token force was wiped out, but he was caught on 25 October 1864 by Qing soldiers searching for him. On the way to the escort, Hong Tianguifu and a Qing army soldier named Tang Jiatong had a conversation. Hong Tianguifu first talked about his relationship with his father Hong Xiuquan and others. He said that the old things of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom were done by his father and Hong Renxuan. "It has nothing to do with me, even after stepping on the road, I did nothing that is unfavorable to the Qing dynasty, those who resisted the Qing Empire were shattered by the king, Zhongwang and others." However, after the second day of writing a poem of praise to the Qing dynasty, he was subsequently executed by
slow slicing ''Lingchi'' (; ), translated variously as the slow process, the lingering death, or slow slicing, and also known as death by a thousand cuts, was a form of torture and execution used in China from roughly 900 CE up until the practice ended aro ...
on 18 November 1864 at the age of 14. A glimpse of Hong Tianguifu's character can be seen by his remarks before his execution: "
Guangdong Guangdong (, ), alternatively romanized as Canton or Kwangtung, is a coastal province in South China on the north shore of the South China Sea. The capital of the province is Guangzhou. With a population of 126.01 million (as of 2020) ...
is not a nice place, I do not want to go back in. I just want to study with Old Master Tang in
Hunan Hunan (, ; ) is a landlocked province of the People's Republic of China, part of the South Central China region. Located in the middle reaches of the Yangtze watershed, it borders the province-level divisions of Hubei to the north, Jiangxi to ...
, and I should be a great scholar, I want to be a good scholar". ("廣東地方不好,我也不愿回去了,我衹愿跟唐老爺到湖南讀書,想進秀才") This apparently innocent, pointless and irrelevant comment was considered by some as a desperate and futile attempt to avoid death by confusing the executioner of his identity. It may also have reflected his utter lack of understanding of what was happening to him, and to his lost kingdom. Despite the short time he was a king, he was issued an official
jade Jade is a mineral used as jewellery or for ornaments. It is typically green, although may be yellow or white. Jade can refer to either of two different silicate minerals: nephrite (a silicate of calcium and magnesium in the amphibole group of ...
seal Seal may refer to any of the following: Common uses * Pinniped, a diverse group of semi-aquatic marine mammals, many of which are commonly called seals, particularly: ** Earless seal, or "true seal" ** Fur seal * Seal (emblem), a device to impr ...
(玉璽 yù xǐ), which is an exhibit in the Hong Kong Museum of History (). Hong Tianguifu's name is unusual in that it contains a three-
character Character or Characters may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Literature * ''Character'' (novel), a 1936 Dutch novel by Ferdinand Bordewijk * ''Characters'' (Theophrastus), a classical Greek set of character sketches attributed to The ...
given name A given name (also known as a forename or first name) is the part of a personal name quoted in that identifies a person, potentially with a middle name as well, and differentiates that person from the other members of a group (typically a fa ...
whereas almost all
Chinese given names Chinese given names () are the given names adopted by speakers of the Chinese language, both in majority-Sinophone countries and among the Chinese diaspora. Description Chinese given names are almost always made up of one or - usually - two charact ...
have just one or two characters.


Bibliography

*Mark Juergensmeye & Wade Clark Roof, Taiping Rebellion, in Encyclopedia of Global Religion, Volume 1, SAGE, 2012, pp. 1257. *Nick Shepley, Sun Yat Sen and the birth of modern China: 20th Century China: Volume One, AUK Academic, 2013. *James Z. Gao, Taiping Rebellion, in Historical Dictionary of Modern China (1800–1949), Scarecrow Press, 209, pp. 350–352.


Notes


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Hong, Tianguifu Heavenly kings of Taiping People from Huadu District 1849 births 1864 deaths Executed people from Guangdong People executed by the Qing dynasty People executed by flaying Hakka people Executed Taiping Heavenly Kingdom people Child soldiers Executed children