Outside the south gate of Guangzhou City, the broad Pearl River flows into the sea.
On the river there are large ships of foreigners, red single ships of Guangdong merchants, and single-masted sampans that can only sail in inland rivers.
Some ragged fishermen paddled boats on the river.
They maneuvered the boat carefully, and if they were knocked over by one of their own ships, they might be able to pay a few taels of silver as compensation.
But there is no excuse for being hit by a foreign ship.
Recently, the Guangzhou government has become more tolerant of foreigners.
Liu Ahui's family lives outside Yongxingmen, Fucheng, Guangzhou, where they have lived for generations.
When Liu Ahui arrived, all he had left in his family were two acres of vegetable land and three mud houses.
However, Liu Ahui learned to grow vegetables from his parents since he was a child, and his vegetable growing skills are first-rate.
Relying on two acres of land to grow vegetables and deliver them to the city for sale every day, Liu Ahui can barely feed his wife and three children.
These two acres of land might not seem like much in many places, but in Liu Ahui's hands it was everything his family owned.
Every day at two or three o'clock in the morning, Liu Ahui and his wife would go to the fields to pick out the big vegetables that had grown.
Vegetables grow very fast and grow old easily. Therefore, Liu Ahui and his wife would rather spend more time picking larger vegetables, so that no vegetables that grow too fast will become old.
Green vegetables cannot be washed when pulled out, and green vegetables that have been soaked in water are not easy to fry. Liu Ahui and his wife shook off the soil from the roots of the green vegetables and tied the roots into handfuls. A handful of such vegetables could be sold for a penny.
Most of the people who buy vegetables are from decent families in the city. Those who don't have enough to eat will not spend money to buy vegetables.
Liu Ahui was waiting at the city gate at five o'clock in the morning, and hurried into the city as soon as the city gate opened.
The gatekeeper knew Liu Ahui well and knew how much money he could make selling vegetables in a day, so he only charged an entrance fee of 20 yuan each time.
They know that if they collect too much, this person will not be able to survive, and he will lose this income in the future. They, the gatekeepers, generally will not catch all the benefits.
Pushing a wheelbarrow to the food market in the south of the city, he had a relatively fixed stall, making it easier for regular customers to find him.
However, there is a price to pay for a fixed stall.
Not long after, a big man with big shoulders, round waist and fierce face came over.
This person is a small leader of the Chengnan Gang.
"Ah Fai, is it open? It's time to pay your bills today."
This person is responsible for collecting protection fees in this area. Ah Hui has to pay him 20 cents every day, and this person doesn't get it for free. He will ensure that Ah Hui's stall is not occupied by others.
"Brother Dagang, why don't you go around for a while? I just arrived today."
The big man didn't continue to embarrass him, but went to the stall at the back first.
Ah Hui and his wife worked for three hours today and harvested 500 handfuls of vegetables. Now they have handed over 40 cash.
After a while, the county tax collector will come to collect one-tenth of the tax. He has a total of 500 handfuls of vegetables, worth 500 cents, so he has to pay 140 cents in advance. The remaining 300 cents
Sixty cents plus money for seeds and fertilizers.
The night incense in the city is contracted by gangs. Farmers' manure must be used to grow vegetables, otherwise the quality of the vegetables will not improve. If you want to use the night incense, you have to buy it from others.
After a while, people buying food came one after another, most of them were servants of wealthy families.
Who among the poor would spend money to buy vegetables?
People who buy vegetables usually do so in the morning. Ah Fai has several regular customers, so all the vegetables are sold within an hour.
I paid brother Dagang's protection fee, and then the county government tax.
Ah Hui pushed the empty wheelbarrow home. Passing by a stall selling candied haws, Ah Hui hesitated and bought a bunch of candied haws for three children.
There are six pieces on the bamboo stick, and each of the three siblings can get two pieces.
Ah Hui quickened his pace. After returning, he would have to work in the fields in the morning.
Growing vegetables is a delicate job, but now there are no pesticides. People have to catch bugs in the vegetable fields every day, and the three children in the family will also help catch bugs.
This is both a job and a play time for Liu Ahui's family.
"Catch bugs, feed the hen, and the hen will lay eggs for me to eat." Every time she works, the little daughter of Ah Hui's family will sing this nursery rhyme.
Walk a few hundred meters further and you'll reach home.
Ah Hui saw many people gathered in front of his house.
Most of them are the surrounding neighbors.
"Ah Hui, it's not good. Go and see. The foreign devils are going to demolish your house."
"What, foreign devil?" Ah Fai let go of the car and ran towards home.
I saw a group of foreign devils in blue uniforms holding rifles in their hands, pointing at the surrounding people.
On the other side, a strong Chinese man and a group of his men held wooden stakes and crashed into the wall of Ah Fai's house.
Ah Hui saw his wife kneeling at the door of the hall from a distance.
She seemed to be begging these people not to demolish the house. The three little children were hiding behind her and crying, looking pitiful.
Maybe she wanted to hold on until she got home.
The land outside Yongxing Gate was allocated to the Americans to build a concession. Mailian sent a subordinate to be responsible for the preliminary construction of the concession.
This American named Michael Williamson was very hostile to the Chinese. He brought a company of Marines to carry out this mission.
This company had all been prisoners of the Chinese in Japan, and they also hated the Chinese.
After Williamson landed in the southeast of Guangzhou, the Guangzhou prefecture's Yamen sent an official named Li Shi to receive him.
Li Shigu didn't want to deal with these foreigners, but this matter was pushed down from the governor's office, and finally it fell on him.
The reason is that Li Shigu worked as an interpreter before and could speak English.
The people in Guangzhou are actually very hostile to foreigners. More than ten years ago, a group of people in Sanyuanli dared to confront the British infantry. This was something that even many Qing troops could not do.
Li Shigu knew that if he worked with foreigners now, he would be stabbed in the back.
But for the sake of his own errand, he had to obey his orders, and no one above him wanted to show his face.
They are all face-conscious people.
"Damn it, don't I want my face anymore?" Li Shigu complained in his heart.
Williamson led the soldiers to the concession land assigned to them by the governor of Guangdong and Guangxi, only to find that many people still lived here.
Williamson felt that since it was a concession assigned to the Americans in exchange, the Guangdong government should help them clear it.
Williamson told Li Shigu his thoughts.
As an official, Li Shigu didn't know what those big shots were talking about.
He could only pretend that he wanted to report it.
No one is willing to take care of this matter. We need to report this matter to get an explanation. I don’t know if it will be delayed until the Year of the Monkey.
Williamson was just a clerk under the minister. A few years ago, he was an American gangster in the Shanghai Concession. He only studied a little before being recruited by Mailian to become a clerk.
He has no right to meet the Chinese bigwigs in Guangzhou.
So Williamson decided to clear the place himself.
He knew that if you want to get things done here in the Qing Dynasty, it's best to go to gangs, especially dirty jobs that may require violence. This may also be because of his experience in Shanghai.
So Williamson found a gang hanging out on the dock to help him clear the place.
This gang is not local to Guangzhou, so its sphere of influence is outside the city, and it does not have the same bottom line as the locals in doing things.
When they saw that the price offered by the Americans was acceptable, they took the job.
There are dozens of families living on this land and some vegetable fields. The situation of these families is similar to that of Ah Hui's family.
Under the coercion of American soldiers and gangs, most of them gave up resistance. The Americans' current intention is very simple, which is to knock down these houses.
Then build a wall around it to enclose the land next to the river, and then build a pier.
At that time, as long as the land is sold to those American businessmen, people will naturally build houses and roads.
Ah Fai's wife is not very smart. When gang members and Americans came to tear down her home, she refused to leave the house.
To prevent others from moving her out, she also held a pair of scissors in her hand.
She would stab anyone who came near her, or she would stab herself.
Williamson had lost his patience with this woman, and he wasted a quarter of an hour here with so many people.
"Tian, stop worrying about this crazy woman and knock down the house quickly. You will have completed your mission. This is already American land, and we have the final say."
The young gang leader seemed to be hesitant. This woman plus her three children meant four lives.
"Tian, didn't you hear what I said clearly? This is American land and it belongs to us. It is illegal for them to stay here. Just push them and don't care about anything else." Williamson said angrily.
said.
Williamson signaled to the soldiers around him, and several soldiers pointed their guns at the gang members.
Between life and death and taking money, they decisively chose to take money to do things.
It’s no wonder that this woman is looking for death. What kind of good intentions can the thugs in the gang have?
With a roar, the wall made of earth collapsed, and then a chain effect occurred and the entire house collapsed to the ground.
Dust flew in all directions.
The gang thugs quickly retreated.
The cries of the woman and the child in the room were immediately interrupted by the rumble of the house collapsing, and then there was no more.
Ah Hui was still a hundred meters away from the door of his home. His brain seemed to have been hit and suddenly went blank.
His body was frozen in place uncontrollably.
The dark face seemed to be trying hard to turn pale, but could only turn into light gray.
The candied haws that was still in his hand fell to the ground. The sticky rock candy on it was instantly coated with a layer of soil, turning from bright red and translucent to gray and black, just like Ah Hui's heart.
He glanced at the candied haws dropped to the ground and instantly remembered something.
He stood up, rushed towards his collapsed house at a speed he had never seen in his life, and found the location of the original main house.
His calloused hands peeled away pieces of soil and moved away the beams. His nails were scraped off, but he barely noticed.
The people around him ignored the American soldiers with guns and rushed to help Ah Fai.
Finally they saw the bloody back of a woman, and the blood soaked the mud on her back into mud.
Blood red mud.
Everyone's eyes were wet with tears.
There were three children pressed under her body, and her arms were stretched forward.
It seems that he wants to hold up a protective umbrella for the child.
But her body was too thin and could not withstand the strong pressure of the thick earth wall.
The woman who was still alive working with him in the morning has lost her life now. Although she is a bit silly and not pretty, she is very hardworking and she gave birth to three lovely children.
The three children, who were still sleeping soundly when they left home in the early morning, still seemed to be asleep at this time, but they could not be woken up no matter what.
Ah Hui's eyes were red, and the capillaries on his eyeballs swelled as if they were about to burst.
"Ah, you beasts, I'm going to fight you." Ah Hui picked up a broken wooden stick more than one meter long and rushed towards the gangs and foreigners.
And those foreigners were preparing to collect their troops and go back. All they had to do was demolish all the houses, and the task had been completed. As for other things, it seemed that they had nothing to do with them.
The gang members had already run away, and they felt a little guilty.
"Fight these foreign devils!" I don't know who shouted. Although Guangzhou is located in the south, the people in Guangzhou are not desperate at all. Otherwise, there would not have been the heroic deeds of the people in Sanyuanli in resisting the British.
The men present picked up the wooden sticks around them. The house collapsed, and the wooden sticks used for supporting the beams were scattered everywhere.
There were hundreds of men present.
And those American soldiers were filing away.
They did not expect why the people who just stood outside and watched the excitement suddenly became like hungry wolves and attacked them.
As regular troops, they skillfully raised their guns at this group of people and still rushed forward when they saw these people.
The company commander shouted without hesitation: "fire!"
"Bang bang bang..." The people in the front row burst out with blood on their chests and fell to the ground holding wooden sticks high.
There were some old, weak, women and children standing beside the house. Several people were hit by stray bullets and fell to the ground.
There were screams of terror from the crowd.
The U.S. military was only a few dozen meters away from the crowd, and they only had time to fire one round.
At this time, civilians holding wooden sticks had already rushed to the U.S. military.
Some of them took turns with wooden sticks and slashed downwards, and some used the broken tips of the wooden sticks to poke at the American soldiers.
These people have no fighting skills and do not know how to cooperate with each other. They just follow their instincts and vent their anger.
Ah Fai hit an American on the head with a stick, but the enemy's bayonet also penetrated his chest.
The American soldier had a trail of blood on his head, but he was not dead.
A look of relief appeared on Ah Hui's face, and he remembered the nursery rhyme that his little daughter liked to hum: "Catch bugs, feed the hens, and the hens will lay eggs for me to eat."
…
More than a hundred civilians were killed by US troops outside the city gate.
However, the officers and soldiers from Guangzhou did not appear for a long time.
The Americans who caused this tragedy returned safely to their warship with several wounded people.
Soon the incident spread around Guangzhou.
The people seemed to respond faster than the government.
Tens of thousands of young people spontaneously gathered outside Yongxing Gate and demanded that the government arrest the foreigners responsible.
At this time, the Qing army moved out extremely fast.
Muskets were set up one after another at the crenellations on the city wall. The muzzles of the black holes were pointed at the people outside the wall.
The Governor's Yamen and officials from Guangzhou rushed over quickly.
In the meeting hall of the Governor's Mansion, Ye Mingchen was furious at the officials below.
If this matter spreads, Ye Mingchen's lifelong reputation will be ruined.
"Can any of you tell me what's going on? Ah? Why do foreigners kill so many people?"
"Master Wu, tell me, you are responsible for contacting the Americans."
Wu Jianzhang's heart flashed with 10,000 Niang Xipi. The governor was about to take the blame.
Ye Mingchen agreed to go find the foreigner in the first place, but now he seems not to want to admit it.
"Going back to the Governor, it seems that some people in the American concession were unwilling to move. A woman and three children were crushed to death under the house, so the people attacked the Americans. The US military said they were just self-defense."
"Not a single American has died, so they can't defend themselves." Ye Mingchen seemed to be speaking on the side of the Qing people.
In fact, he understood that if this matter was left in the history books, he, the governor, would be scolded no matter what. Now, driven by this mentality, he began to try his best to shirk the matter.
"Sir Governor, the cause of this matter is that the local people are unwilling to relocate without receiving compensation, and the Americans feel that they should not be compensated. The land has been leased to them and it belongs to them. Those people are illegally occupying their land. Also,
Yes, sir, the prefect of Guangzhou is responsible for the land transfer."
Wu Jianzhang made a perfect turn and shot, and the ball landed perfectly at the feet of the Guangzhou prefect.
The prefect of Guangzhou looked up and found that there was no one in front of him. The little official who was sent out could not get on the stage at all. At this time, the goal was in front of him. How could he pass the ball? He had to bite the bullet and go on.
"When I get back to the Governor, the compensation plan for the relocated residents has been announced. The prefect's Yamen is preparing to send people to discuss with the people. Who knows that those foreigners are so unreasonable that they have hired the dock gang to forcibly demolish the houses, causing loss of lives and the people being unhappy.
I stepped forward to judge whether the foreigners were barbarians after all, and they shot and killed the people without saying a word."
"I would like to ask the Governor to send someone to apprehend the foreign soldiers involved."
Stop pretending, the prefect of Guangzhou will directly increase his tactics. They are all old scheming, whoever is afraid of whom. If you have the ability, go find trouble for foreigners.
Okay, I stopped talking now, even Ye Mingchen was silent.
As expected, he looked at Wu Jianzhang again. Wu Jianzhang lowered his head and said nothing, pretending not to see it.
He knew that the Governor wanted him to show up again.
If this kind of thing is not handled well, the Americans will not hand over their own people. Previously, the Americans even proposed that the governors of Guangdong and Guangxi come forward to punish the mob.
He didn't even say this request of the Americans just now.
ps: It’s a 5,000-word chapter, don’t forget to vote after reading it.