Zhang Lian (張璉), Flying Dragon Emperor (Patreon)

Note: I came across Zhang Lian's rebellion while researching and revising my blog posts about Wokou. A very interesting figure, Zhang Lian was not a Wokou but a mountain bandit through and through, although he was often conflated and lumped together with other Wokou, especially by later historians, in part due to the unfortunate timing of his rebellion (happened around the same time as Jia Jing Da Wo Kou), and in part due to the legends that arose after his death. In any case, Zhang Lian's rebellion (and many rebellions like it), is an interesting case study of the drastic difference in scale and behavior between Chinese-initiated outlawry and Japanese-initiated Wokou raids, which adds to the reason as to why Jia Jing Da Wo Kou should not be viewed as a Chinese phenomenon.

Zhang Lian was born in Guangdong's Raoping County the early 16th century and worked as a government storehouse keeper in his early days. A shrewd and cunning person, Zhang Lian's life took a drastic turn in 1557, during the height of Jia Jing Da Wo Kou (嘉靖大倭寇), as Raoping County also fell prey to the Japanese pirates. The corrupt local government not only failed to protect the populace from Wokou predation, but used bolstering defence as an excuse to milk the people dry. Widespread discontent and grievance caused many people to turn to banditry or rise up in rebellion, Zhang Lian among them.

Rise to notoriety

There are several versions of story about how Zhang Lian became an outlaw. In one version of the story, Zhang Lian came from a well-to-do family, but used sorcery tricks to amass a group of several thousands unruly followers. In other versions, he either became a fugitive after his embezzlement of government fund was discovered or due to beating his own clan patriarch to death. In any case, he fled Raoping to the adjacent Dabu County and joined the mountain bandits led by Zheng Ba (鄭八) as his second-in-command, and soon succeeded him after a botched raid on Yongding County resulted in Zheng Ba's death. Zhang Lian shrewdly led the bandits to raid many defenceless towns and villages, but intentionally avoided direct engagement with Ming army sent to defend those places. Moreover, since Zhang Lian's bandit lair sit at the tri-junction border of Guangzhou, Fujian and Jiangxi, none of the provincial governments were willing to take the risk of rooting out the bandits alone and take the brunt of damage. Instead they hoped that a neighbouring province would tackle the problem for them. This led to a game of buck-passing that allowed the problem to fester unchecked. Before long, Zhang Lian grew in influence and established connection with various outlaw and rebel groups in the surrounding counties, in particular Xiao Xue Feng/Xiao Wan (蕭雪峰/蕭晚), Luo Pao (羅袍) and Yan Xun (楊舜) of Dabu County, as well as Zhang Gong You (張公佑), Lai Ci (賴賜), Bai Tu (白兔) and Bei Dong Jin (孛東津) of Xiaojing County, becoming a leader of a large coalition that openly defiant against Ming Dynasty.

Founding of a kingdom

In March-April 1560, Zhang Lian raided Pinghe County in southern Fujian with his subordinate Xiao Xue Feng, although the attack was met with stiff resistance from Ming army, forcing them to retreat to Chengkeng and raid the nearby Dachengsuo (大城所城) instead. Not one to let a setback deter him, around May-June 1560 Zhang Lian formally declared secession from the Ming Dynasty and founded Fei Long Guo (飛龍國, lit. 'Flying Dragon Kingdom') at Baisongguan, proclaiming himself sovereign bearing the title of Fei Long Ren Zhu (飛龍人主), or “Flying Dragon Master of Mankind”. He shrewdly fabricated and planted a fake heirloom seal of Fei Long Guo in various lakes in the region, then “rediscovered” the seals to improve his legitimacy and garner support, as well as proclaiming a new era name, even forming his own court with appointed nobles and ministers and hosting his own Imperial examination. As the new sovereign, Zhang Lian designated his home village Wushixiang as imperial city of the newfound rebel kingdom, built a palace at Baisongguan, erected more than eighty forts and strongholds at the surrounding mountains to defend his wannabe kingdom, and even reclaimed the hills bordering Raoping, Pinghe and Dabu County for large scale yam farming in order to feed his vast army. Outlaws, rebels and disenfranchised folks alike flocked to his banner, quickly swelling the rebel kingdom to more than one hundred thousands people.

Massive rebellion

Wielding such massive power, Zhang Lian quickly put his ambition of overthrowing Ming Dynasty into motion. The massive rebel armies of Fei Long Guo struck out in multiple directions, with Zhang Lian himself quickly capturing Yunxiao and Zhao'an County by May-June 1560, followed by Nanjing Country and Zhenhaiwei in the next year, reaching as far as Longquan County in Zhejiang. At the same time, Zhang Lian also further expanded his power by forming an alliance with Lin Chao Xi (林朝曦), an equally powerful bandit/rebel leader from Chengxiang County at the north of Zhang Lian's domain (with Lin Chao Xi nominally joining Fei Long Guo but still operated independently), while also ordered his subordinate Wang Bo Xuan (王伯宣) to recruit several thousand Wokou from Japan to raid the coasts of Haifeng County to create more chaos. As the rebellion gained momentum, more and more local outlaws and rebels rose up in support of Fei Long Guo, and dozens more towns and counties fell to its armies.

The sheer scale and impetus of the rebellion plunged the three affected provinces into shock, finally prompting Ming Dynasty to take action. Grand coordinator of Fujian You Zhen De (遊震得) mobilised Ming troops from three whole Weisuo garrisons along with local militia to suppress the rebellion, although unsurprisingly they were easily defeated, and soon paralysed by internal feuds as Ming troops and militia tried to shift the blame of the defeat on each other. Seeing that Weisuo troops were too inept to oppose the rebels, Ming court transferred scores of fierce Lang Bing (狼兵) auxiliary from Guangxi, but they too were defeated by the rebels. To make the matter worse, the unruly Lang Bing created as much disruption as the rebels if not more so, causing even more people to join Fei Long Guo, nearly doubling its size.

Downfall

Naturally, Ming emperor Jia Jing (嘉靖) would not tolerate someone who so openly defile his authority for long. A far larger and better-trained army was mustered, consisted of 7,600 Ming troops from three provinces under competent leadership, namely famous Ming general Liu Xian (劉顯) and Yu Da You (俞大猷), as well as 11,000 Lang Bing auxiliary under viceroy of Liangguang Zhang Nie (張臬).

In May 1562, Ming army commenced attack and quickly liberated Nanjing County and several other towns, then began to converge on the rebel headquarters at Baisongguan while Zhang Lian himself was away attacking Zhangzhou. As the most experienced and competent commander, Yu Da You's battle-hardened contingent was the first to arrive at Baisongguang and could have easily capture the lightly defended headquarters to make a name for himself. Nevertheless, rather than personal glory, Yu Da You was more concerned that early destruction of rebel headquarters could force a cornered Zhang Liang into an uncontrolled rampage, causing even more suffering to the common folk, so he decided to withhold attack and waited for Zhang Lian to return to defend his holdings, opting to destroy Fei Long Guo in one fell swoop. Just as he envisioned, as more and more Ming troops arrived and took advantageous positions surrounding rebel headquarters, an alarmed Zhang Lian rushed back with all the rebels he could bring to defend his headquarters. It was only then that Ming army pressed the attack. Ming troops put nearly all forts and strongholds surrounding the so-called “imperial city” of Fei Long Guo to the torch, killing or capturing thousands of panicked rebels amid the chaos. The rest of the rebels retreated into their last holdout, the so-called “imperial city”.

Surrounded on all sides with no chance of escape, morale of the rebels plummeted and Fei Long Guo began to fracture from the inside. Yu Da You cleverly exploited this weakness by secretly engaging with rebels that tried to sneak away during the night, inciting them to betray Zhang Lian on the condition of pardoning of past offenses. The ploy worked wonderfully. On June 13, 1562, Zhang Lian launched an attack against Ming army in an attempt to break out of the encirclement. However, during the height of battle scores of former rebels that secretly surrendered to Ming army beforehand suddenly turned against Zhang Lian, attacking his army from the rear. Caught by surprise of this sudden betrayal, the rebel army quickly disintegrated. Zhang Lian and Xiao Xue Feng were captured alive, then killed in a public execution in June 1562.

Aftermath

After Zhang Lian's capture, his subordinate Wang Bo Xuan attempted to rescue him by feigning surrender. Unfortunately for him, the ploy was leaked and Wang Bo Xuan was captured and executed by He Tang (何鏜), governor of Chaozhou. The Wokou he recruited from Japan would later be annihilated by Yu Da You in 1564.

Lin Chao Xi, ally of Zhang Lian in the north, escaped the destruction of Fei Long Guo relatively unscathed, and continued to resist Ming Dynasty for another four months. Nevertheless, his rebellion was eventually put down as well, and he was either killed or surrendered then executed.

As peace gradually returned to the three provinces, Ming court also realised that the root cause of so many rebellions breaking out was due to widespread poverty caused by poor governance and oppressive taxation. Thus a series of reforms were implemented, including tax cuts and the opening of Mount Pingyuan iron ore mine to the public. A new county—Pingyuan County—was also founded in the area to streamline administration.

Surprisingly, the story of the Flying Dragon Emperor and Fei Long Guo did not end here. Soon after his demise, rumors and legends began to spread that both Zhang Lian and Lin Chao Xi managed to escape alive by bribing Liu Xian to let them go, which were recorded down and eventually found their way into official historical records such as History of Ming. Though completely unfounded, according to some legends Zhang Lian allegedly escaped to Southeast Asia, conquered then re-established his kingdom on the island of Sumatra.