The Western Expedition () was a campaign by 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 Q ...

against 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-spea ...

during the

Taiping Rebellion The Taiping Rebellion, also known as the Taiping Civil War or the Taiping Revolution, was a massive rebellion and civil war that was waged in China between the Manchu-led Qing dynasty and the Han, Hakka-led Taiping Heavenly Kingdom. It laste ...

Planning

The Western Expedition was conceived by

Yang Xiuqing Yang Xiuqing () (died September 2/3, 1856), was an organizer and commander-in-chief of the Taiping Rebellion. Early life Yang Xiuqing's family were farmers from Xincun near Jintian, Guangxi, but he lost his parents at a young age. According ...

shortly after the fall of Nanjing. It was intended to march along the

Yangtze River The Yangtze or Yangzi ( or ; ) is the longest list of rivers of Asia, river in Asia, the list of rivers by length, third-longest in the world, and the longest in the world to flow entirely within one country. It rises at Jari Hill in th ...

and ultimately meet with the concurrent

Northern Expedition The Northern Expedition was a military campaign launched by the National Revolutionary Army (NRA) of the Kuomintang (KMT), also known as the "Chinese Nationalist Party", against the Beiyang government and other regional warlords in 1926. The ...

Sichuan Sichuan (; zh, c=, labels=no, ; zh, p=Sìchuān; alternatively romanized as Szechuan or Szechwan; formerly also referred to as "West China" or "Western China" by Protestant missions) is a province in Southwest China occupying most of the ...

. The Taiping believed that such a pincer movement could capture all of western and northern China. It was also intended to, in conjunction with the Northern Expedition, relieve pressure on the Taiping's holdings caused by the Qing's formation of the Northern and Southern Fronts.

Execution

The Western Expedition left

Nanjing Nanjing (; , Mandarin pronunciation: ), alternately romanized as Nanking, is the capital of Jiangsu province of the People's Republic of China. It is a sub-provincial city, a megacity, and the second largest city in the East China region. T ...

on May 19, 1853. Less than a month later, it recaptured the city of Anqing on June 10, 1853. At that point, the expedition split into three separate armies. The first army, led by Hu Yiguang, traveled north to conquer

Anhui Anhui , (; formerly romanized as Anhwei) is a landlocked province of the People's Republic of China, part of the East China region. Its provincial capital and largest city is Hefei. The province is located across the basins of the Yangtze River ...

. The second, led by Lai Hanying, traveled south to conquer

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 ...

. The third, led by Zeng Tianyang, attacked a number of cities south of the Yangtze. Hu Yinguang successfully captured Luzhou, the government's new capital of Anhui, on January 14, 1854. In doing so, Hu defeated a small force led by Jiang Zhongyuan, who subsequently committed suicide. Lai was less successful, as he was unable to take

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's capital. Lai was replaced by Wei Jun and Shi Zhenxiang, who moved into

Hubei Hubei (; ; alternately Hupeh) is a landlocked province of the People's Republic of China, and is part of the Central China region. The name of the province means "north of the lake", referring to its position north of Dongting Lake. The ...

and

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 ...

, ultimately capturing

Xiangtan Xiangtan () is a prefecture-level city in east-central Hunan province, south-central China. The hometowns of several founding leaders of the Chinese Communist Party, including Chairman Mao Zedong, President Liu Shaoqi, and Marshal Peng Dehuai, a ...

on April 24, 1854. The Western Expedition succeeded in capturing Pengze,

Hukou ''Hukou'' () is a system of household registration used in mainland China. The system itself is more properly called "''huji''" (), and has origins in ancient China; ''hukou'' is the registration of an individual in the system (''kou'' li ...

, and

Jiujiang Jiujiang (), formerly transliterated Kiukiang or Kew Keang, is a prefecture-level city located on the southern shores of the Yangtze River in northwest Jiangxi Province, People's Republic of China. It is the second-largest prefecture-level city ...

. It also defeated

Zeng Guofan Zeng Guofan, Marquis Yiyong (; 26 November 1811 – 12 March 1872), birth name Zeng Zicheng, courtesy name Bohan, was a Chinese statesman and military general of the late Qing dynasty. He is best known for raising and organizing the Xiang ...

in battle, leading him to attempt suicide on two separate occasions. The Western Expedition ended in March 1856 when it was recalled to Nanjing to reinforce the besieged city.

Analysis

The Western Expedition had limited success. Although a number of key cities within a fertile recruiting ground had fallen, the Western Expedition was ultimately unable to capture the whole of western China or the upper Yangtze. The Taiping's original, rapid drive transformed into a push-and-pull struggle, which provided the Qing with time to recover and build-up new armies with new leaders who ultimately doomed the rebellion.Franz H. Michael, The Taiping Rebellion: History 95 (1966) In 1856

Shi Dakai Shi Dakai (1 March 1831 – 25 June 1863; ), born in Guigang, Guangxi, also known as Wing King () or phonetically translated as Yi-Wang, was one of the most highly acclaimed leaders in the Taiping Rebellion and a poet. Early life Shi Dakai wa ...

launches a second western expedition destined for

. This other campaign also fails when he surrenders in 1863.

References

{{Reflist, 30em Taiping Rebellion 19th century in China