Zuo Zongtang

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Zuo Zongtang
Zuo Zongtang.jpg
Portrait of General Tso, by Piassetsky, 1875
Viceroy of Liangjiang
In office
1881–1884
Preceded by Peng Yulin
Succeeded by Yulu
Governor General of Shaanxi and Gansu
In office
1866–1878
Governor General of Fujian, Taiwan, and Zhejiang
In office
1862–1866
Succeeded by Ma Xinyi
Governor of Zhejiang
In office
1863 – ----
Personal details
Born (1812-11-10)November 10, 1812
Xiangyin County, Hunan
Died Script error: The function "death_date_and_age" does not exist.
Fuzhou, Fujian
Occupation Statesman, military leader
Military service
Allegiance Flag of the Qing dynasty Qing dynasty
Rank General
Unit Xiang Army
Commands Commander of the Xiang Army
Battles/wars Taiping Rebellion, Nian Rebellion, Dungan revolt (1862–1877)

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Zuo Zongtang (Chinese: 左宗棠; pinyin: Zuǒ Zōngtáng, pronounced [tswɔ̀ tsʊ́ŋtʰɑ̌ŋ]; Courtesy name: Chinese: 季高; pinyin: Jìgāo) (November 10, 1812 – September 5, 1885), spelled Tso Tsung-t'ang in Wade-Giles and known simply as General Tso in the West, was a Chinese statesman and military leader in the late Qing Dynasty. Zuo was a Marquis of the Second Rank.[1]

He was born in Xiangyin County, north of Changsha in Hunan province. He served in China's northwestern regions, quelling the Dungan revolt and various other disturbances. He served with distinction during the Qing Empire's civil war against the Taiping Rebellion, in which it is estimated 20 million people died.

While he is best known in the West for his military exploits, Zuo also made contributions to Chinese agricultural science and education. In particular, he promoted cotton cultivation to the Northwest as a replacement for cash opium and established a large-scale modern press in the Qing Provinces of Shaan (modern-day Shaanxi) and Gan (modern-day Gansu) which published Confucian Classics and newer works on the science of agriculture. [2]

Biography

Early life

Zuo Zongtang was born on November 10, 1812, into a land-holding family in Xiangyin County, Hunan.[3] His family paid for him to attend a local private school (塾) starting from the age of five, where he mastered the Chinese Classics. At 20 he qualified to attend the Imperial Academy,

Zuo's career got an inauspicious start when, as a young man, he failed the official court exams seven times (ca. 1822–1835). He decided to abandon his plans to become a civil servant and returned to his home by the Xiang River in Hunan to farm silkworms, read, and drink tea. It was during this period that he first directed his attention to the study of Western sciences and political economy.

Taiping Rebellion

When the Taiping Rebellion broke out in 1850, Zuo, then 38 years old, was hired as an advisor to Zeng Guofan, the governor of Hunan. In 1856, he was formally offered a position in the provincial government of Hunan. In 1860, Zuo was given command of a force of 5,000 volunteers, the Xiang Army (later known as "Chu Army"), and by September of that year, he drove the Taiping rebels out of Hunan and Guangxi provinces, into coastal Zhejiang. Zuo captured the city of Shaoxing and, from there, pushed south into Fujian and Guangdong provinces, where the revolt had first begun. In 1863, Zuo was appointed Governor of Zhejiang and an Undersecretary of War.

In August 1864, Zuo, together with Zeng Guofan, dethroned the Taiping teenage king, Hong Tianguifu, and brought an end to the rebellion. He was created Earl Kejing of the 1st Class for his part in suppressing the rebellion. He, Zeng Guofan and Li Hongzhang were called Zeng, Zuo, Li, the leaders in suppressing the rebellion.

In 1865, Zuo was appointed Viceroy and Governor-General of Fujian and Zhejiang. As Commissioner of Naval Industries, Zuo founded China's first modern shipyard and naval academy in Fuzhou the following year.

Success and appointments

Zuo Zongtang in 1875
As Governor-General of Shaanxi and Gansu in Lanzhou, Zuo Zongtang posed for a Russian photographer. On the left, wearing civilian dress with a peacock feather in his hat. On the right, wearing court dress with long court beads.

Zuo's successes would continue. In 1867, he became Viceroy and Governor General of Shaanxi and Gansu and Imperial Commissioner of the Army in Shaanxi. In 1884, his fellow Xiang army officer, Liu Jintang (Liu Chin-t'ang), was appointed as the first Governor of Xinjiang province. The Governor of Xinjiang was the subordinate to the Governor General of Shaanxi and Gansu.

In these capacities, he succeeded in putting down another uprising, the Nian Rebellion (捻軍起義), in 1868.

After this military success, he marched west with his army of 120,000 people, winning many victories with advanced Western weapons in the Dungan revolt of Northwestern China, including today's Shaanxi, Ningxia, Gansu and Qinghai provinces and Xinjiang, in the 1870s.

Several Muslim generals, such as Ma Zhan'ao, Ma Anliang, Ma Qianling, Dong Fuxiang, and Ma Haiyan from Hezhou, who had defected to General Zuo's army, helped him crush the "Muslim rebels".[4][5][6] General Zuo rewarded them by relocating the Han Chinese from the suburbs of Hezhou to another place and allowing their troops to stay in the Hezhou suburbs as long as they did not live in the city itself.

In 1878, he successfully suppressed the Yakub Beg's uprising and helped to negotiate an end to Russian occupation of the border city of Ili. He was vocal in the debate at the Qing Imperial court over what to do with the Xinjiang situation, advocating for Xinjiang to become a province, in opposition to Li Hongzhang, who wanted to abandon what he called "Useless Xinjiang" and concentrate on defending China's coastal areas. However, Zuo won the debate, Xinjiang was made a province, and many administrative functions were staffed by his Hunan officers.

Zuo was outspoken in calling for war against Russia, hoping to settle the matter by attacking Russian forces in Xinjiang with his Xiang army. In 1878, when tension increased in Xinjiang, Zuo massed Chinese troops toward the Russian-occupied Kuldja. The Canadian Spectator stated in 1878, "News from Turkestan says the Chinese are concentrating against Kuldja, a post in Kashgar occupied by the Russians.... It is reported that a Russian expedition from Yart Vernaic has been fired upon by Chinese troops and forced to return."[7] The Russians were afraid of the Chinese forces, thousands of whom were armed with modern weapons and trained by European officers, because the Russian forces near the Chinese border were under-manned and under-equipped, so they agreed to negotiate.

Zuo's Xiang Army troops were armed with modern German Dreyse needle rifles and Krupp artillery, as well as a few experimental weapons.

For all his contributions to his nation and monarch, Zuo was appointed a Grand Secretary to the Grand Secretariat in 1874 and elevated to a Marquessate in 1878.

Later life and death

Zuo was appointed to the Grand Council, the cabinet of the Qing Empire at the time, in 1880. Uneasy with bureaucratic politics, Zuo asked to be relieved of his duties and was appointed Viceroy of Liangjiang in 1881. In 1884, upon the outbreak of the Sino-French War, Zuo received his fourth and last commission as commander-in-chief and Imperial Commissioner of the Army and Inspector General overseeing coastal defense in Fujian. He died of natural causes shortly after a truce was signed between the two nations, in Fuzhou in 1885.

Legacy

Zuo Zongtang was admired by many generals who came after him. The Nationalist General Bai Chongxi wanted to reconquer Xinjiang for the Kuomintang central government, in Zuo Zongtang's style, and expelled Russian influence from the area.[8] Zuo Zongtang was also referred to by Nationalist General Ma Zhongying (a descendant of a Salar noble) as one of his models, as Ma led the KMT 36th Division (National Revolutionary Army) to reconquer Xinjiang for the Kuomintang from the pro-Soviet governor Jin Shuren during the Kumul Rebellion.[9]

While Zuo is best known for his military acumen, he believed that the key to peace and stability lay in an educated, prosperous citizenry. He sometimes referred to himself as "A Farmer from the Banks of the Xiang" (湘上农民) and was keenly interested in agriculture. He advocated the scientific reform of commercial agriculture both as a way to strengthen China's economic self-suffiency (自强) and also as a way to manage civilian populations by improving their standard of living and controlling the kinds of crops they grew. During the twelve years he spent in the northwest, he undertook extensive agricultural research on different crops and methods. Comparing the benefits and indications of two ancient agricultural methods, the more established long field, crop rotation method (代田法) and the less common intensive, small-field method (区田法), Zuo believed that the latter method, cultivating small fields of densely-planted monocultures, was more suitable to the dry, extreme climate of the northwest region. To promote this method, he authored two pamphlets explaining the method which were then distributed freely to local farming communities. Zuo also recognized the threat of opium to the nation's stability and economic health and advocated replacing opium poppies with cotton as the major cash crop in Gansu and Shaanxi Provinces. He authorized the large scale distribution of cotton seeds and published pamphlets on its cultivation and processing. In 1878, he also oversaw the establishment of a large weaving factory in today's Mulan County, Gansu Province with the aim of creating a new textile industry in the region and providing socially-acceptable employment to women. [2]

In addition to managing the peasantry by improving their economic circumstances, Zuo also believed that increasing access to traditional Chinese philosophy would help to pacify areas experiencing unrest and ultimately create a more contented and unified populace. To this end, Zuo set up an printing press in Northwest China which printed classic texts, as well as agricultural pamphlets. When Zuo first arrived in the region, a decade of constant warfare had virtually stopped all publishing in the region. Zuo prioritized re-establishing the printing industry a priority and thousands of copies of the publications he authorized were distributed in places like Ningxia, Qinghai, Gansu, Shaanxi, and Xinjiang. Printing appears to have stopped when Zuo returned to Beijing, but the endeavor is credited with inspiring later printing presses. [2]

General Tso's chicken

General Tso's chicken was introduced in New York in the 1970s, inspired by the dish originally prepared by Chef Peng in Taiwan.[10] Peng named the dish in honor of the historic figure.[11][12]

See also

Notes

  1. http://www.dartmouth.edu/~qing/WEB/TSO_TSUNG-T'ANG.html
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  11. Coe, Andrew. Chop Suey: A Cultural History of Chinese Food in the United States (New York: Oxford University Press, 2009), 241-242
  12. The Search for General Tso. Cheney, Ian. Documentary, 2014

References

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External links

Government offices
Preceded by
Viceroy of MinZhe
1865–1866
Succeeded by
Ma Xinyi
Preceded by
Viceroy of ShaanGan
1866–1876
Succeeded by
Preceded by Viceroy of Liangjiang
1881–1884
Succeeded by
Yulu