Third Battle of Nanjing

Third Battle of Nanjing
	Part of the Qing China
Result	Qing victory Mass scale wartime rape, looting and arson; End of the Taiping Rebellion;

Belligerents

Qing Dynasty

Taiping Heavenly KingdomCommanders and leaders

Zeng Guofan

Zeng Guoquan

Zhu Hongzhang

#
Li Xiucheng

Strength 500,000+ Xiang Army 370,000 defendersCasualties and losses 10,000+ died of illness
9,000+ killed Zeng Guofan allege 100,000 Taiping soldier casualties
200,000+ surrendered 200,000–300,000 civilians massacred^[1]

The Third Battle of Nanjing in 1864 was the last major engagement of the

wartime rape, looting and arson against the civilians of Nanjing, seen as "rebels".^[2]^[3]

200,000–300,000 "rebels" were reported dead by Zeng Guofan, the commander-in-chief of the Hunan Army.

Prelude

In June 1863 Qing Gen.

Ming Xiaoling

. The only links to the outside left were the Shence and Taiping Gates.

On December 20, Li Xiucheng returned to Nanjing from Danyang and urged Hong Xiuquan to abandon the Taiping capital the next day. However, this suggestion was not accepted by Hong, who took overall command of the operation. He declared that anyone who disobeyed him and God would be immediately executed. This doomed the Taiping army and Nanjing by creating widespread discontent and, coupled with other factors, eventually over 200,000 Taiping troops went out of Nanjing and surrendered to the Imperial Chinese army during the course of the battle. Those who refused to surrender but were also upset by Hong's decisions chose to break out while they still could, when the siege was still incomplete. Hong, Li and others were unable to stop such acts. On February 28, 1864, Tianbao (天保) Castle at the highest peak of the Purple Mountain fell under the Qing army's control. On March 2, Zeng Guoquan deployed his troops to Shence and Taiping Gates. The investment of Nanjing was completed.

The battle

On March 14, Zeng Guoquan attempted his first attack on Nanjing using ladders, but this was beaten back by the defenders. The imperial army then changed tactics, digging a total of ten tunnels at Chaoyang (朝阳), Shence and Jinchuan (金川) Gates, and the defenders in turn countered by digging tunnels of their own and building a secondary wall behind the first. Five days after the death of Hong Xiuquan on June 1, 1864, Li Xiucheng was finally put in charge of all military and political affairs, but it was already too late—the fate of the city and its defenders was sealed.

On July 3, Dibao Castle (地保城, nicknamed Dragon's Neck 龙脖子) on the Purple Mountain fell into the Qing army's hands. This strategic location enabled the Qing to build several dozen artillery positions to bombard the entire city, thus suppressing the defenders' firepower and providing cover for other preparations to take the city. One tactic of the attackers was to fill the space between the city wall and the mountain ridge at the Dragon's Neck with earth, sand, logs, rocks and grass, so the land surface was raised to the height of the city wall, thus paving the way to attack the city. Another was to dig tunnels just 200 feet away from the city wall so that they could be filled with explosives to blow up the wall. Operations within such close proximity of enemy fire were possible due to sufficient covering fire, thanks to the taking of Dibao Castle. The defenders' attempts to disrupt the preparations were continuously beaten back with heavy losses due to withering fire from the attackers. Two weeks later the preparation was complete.

Realizing the final attack was coming, on the night of July 18, Li Xiucheng ordered more than 1000 defenders to disguise themselves as attackers to sneak out of the city to destroy the tunnel, but the attackers were not fooled and beat back the thousand-man formation. The following afternoon at 1:00 the attackers detonated the explosives in the tunnel under Taiping Gate, the wall breaking and flying 2–10 km far down, killing several hundred people and collapsing a large section of the city wall. The defenders put up a fierce fight, but were unable to drive back the attacking force of 60,000. The attackers divided into four fronts after entering Nanjing as previously planned:

The central front led by imperial Gen. Li Chendian attacked toward Hong Xiuquan's palace
The right front led by imperial Gen. 刘连捷 (Liu Lianjie) pushed toward Shence gate to link up with imperial Gen. Zhu Nangui (朱南桂)'s force, which entered the gate via ladders; after the two teams had joined forces, they would attack westward toward Lion Mountain (Shizishan 狮子山) to take Yifeng (仪凤) Gate.
The central-left front led by imperial Gen. Peng Yuju (彭毓橘) attacked toward Tongji (通济) Gate.
The left front led by imperial Gen. Xiao Fusi (萧孚泗) attacked toward Chaoyang and Hongwu gates.

The street fights were fierce and bloody and the resistance was much tougher than expected. The attackers' artillery cover had to stop for fear of injuring their own. The defenders were very stubborn and expected to inflict heavy casualties on the attackers and hoped to drive them back outside the city.

After the fall of Chaoyang Gate, the defenders' morale collapsed and imperial Gen. Luo Fengyuan (罗逢源) was able to break his force into the city from Jubao (聚宝) Gate, while imperial Gen. Li Jinzhou (李金洲) was able to break into the city from Tongji (通济) Gate, linking up with forces led by imperial Gen. Peng Yuju (彭毓橘). At the same time, imperial Adm. Huang Yisheng (黄翼升) led the imperial navy in taking Zhongguan (中关) and then took the remaining fortresses still in the defenders' hands at the river banks, and helped imperial Gen. Chen Ti (陈湜) take two Shuixi (水西) and Hanxi (旱西) gates. By the evening every gate of the city was firmly in the hands of Qing forces.

Ming Xiaoling Mausoleum

via the section of collapsed city wall because the Qing troops were busy looting and did not bother to stop them. After massive looting the city was set on fire, which lasted until July 26, 1864.

Massacre

"The vaunted discipline of the

Hunan Army broke down completely when Nanjing fell. The militia soldiers were unpaid and barely fed, and with this total victory in their final objective—after years of bitter campaign away from their families and their homes, [...] younger women were dragged off and the remaining able-bodied men were forced into service as porters to carry away huge loads of loot from the city—gold, silver, silks, furs, jade. Even some of Zeng Guoquan’s own aides who entered the city to investigate the looting were robbed and beaten by roving gangs of Hunan soldiers. First the soldiers set fire to the palaces; then they burned the homes."^[2]

Aftermath

Nien Rebellion

, during which he continued to fight for another four years.

The success of the Qing Army was partially due to the advanced weaponry adopted, namely firearms. The first Chinese indigenously built

bolt-action single-shot rifle appeared in 1864, and although they were few in number, proved themselves over other firearms and certainly over ancient weapons such as swords, sabres, spears and lances

. The Third Battle of Nanjing was a testing ground for the first modern Chinese firearms used in battle.

References

^ 郭廷以 (1979). 近代中國史綱. CUHK Press. pp. 159–160. 湘军'贪掠夺，颇乱伍。中军各勇留营者皆去搜括'，……'沿街死尸十之九皆老者。其幼孩未满二、三岁者亦被戳以为戏，匍匐道上。妇女四十岁以下者一人俱无（均被虏），老者负伤或十余刀，数十刀，哀号之声达于四方。'凡此均为曾国荃幕友赵烈文目睹所记，总计死者约二、三十万人。
^ ^a ^b Platt, Stephen R. (2012). Autumn in the Heavenly Kingdom: China, the West, and the Epic Story of the Taiping Civil War. pp. 350–351.
^ 郭廷以 (1979). 近代中國史綱. CUHK Press. pp. 159–160. 湘军'贪掠夺，颇乱伍。中军各勇留营者皆去搜括'，……'沿街死尸十之九皆老者。其幼孩未满二、三岁者亦被戳以为戏，匍匐道上。妇女四十岁以下者一人俱无（均被虏），老者负伤或十余刀，数十刀，哀号之声达于四方。'凡此均为曾国荃幕友赵烈文目睹所记，总计死者约二、三十万人。

Franz H. Michael, ed.The Taiping Rebellion: History and Documents (Seattle,: University of Washington Press, 1966). 3 vols. Volumes two and three select and translate basic documents.
ISBN 0300015429
. Translated and condensed from the author's publications in Chinese; especially strong on the military campaigns, based on the author's wide travels in China in the 1920s and 1930s.

[1] 郭廷以 (1979). 近代中國史綱. CUHK Press. pp. 159–160. 湘军'贪掠夺，颇乱伍。中军各勇留营者皆去搜括'，……'沿街死尸十之九皆老者。其幼孩未满二、三岁者亦被戳以为戏，匍匐道上。妇女四十岁以下者一人俱无（均被虏），老者负伤或十余刀，数十刀，哀号之声达于四方。'凡此均为曾国荃幕友赵烈文目睹所记，总计死者约二、三十万人。

[platt-2] Platt, Stephen R. (2012). Autumn in the Heavenly Kingdom: China, the West, and the Epic Story of the Taiping Civil War. pp. 350–351.

[3] 郭廷以 (1979). 近代中國史綱. CUHK Press. pp. 159–160. 湘军'贪掠夺，颇乱伍。中军各勇留营者皆去搜括'，……'沿街死尸十之九皆老者。其幼孩未满二、三岁者亦被戳以为戏，匍匐道上。妇女四十岁以下者一人俱无（均被虏），老者负伤或十余刀，数十刀，哀号之声达于四方。'凡此均为曾国荃幕友赵烈文目睹所记，总计死者约二、三十万人。

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