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Liu Liangzuo
Late Ming general known as Flower-Horse Liu, one of the four Jiangbei commanders of the Hongguang court, who went over to the Qing in 1645 and besieged Jiangyin
At dusk on a hilltop, a large tent stands open with a table holding a map marked with small stones inside, a saddled horse tethered outside, and fire stands burning; campfires dot the river plain below, and one tiny sentry stands on the slope.
Also known as Zi Mingfu
- Roles
- Commanders
Liu Liangzuo, courtesy name Mingfu, was known in the army as Flower-Horse Liu and began as a mobile corps commander under the Fengyang governor Zhu Dadian. In 1641, when Zhang Xianzhong besieged Tongcheng, he joined Huang Degong to rout Zhang's army at Baojialing. When the Hongguang emperor took the throne at Nanjing in 1644, Liu was made Earl of Guangchang and became one of the four commanders north of the Yangtze. As Qing armies advanced in 1645 he surrendered to Prince Dodo with a hundred thousand men and stood on the riverbank near Wuhu calling on Huang Degong to submit, shortly before Huang was struck by an arrow and killed himself. That year Liu led Qing troops against Jiangyin and wrote songs urging the town to give up, but its defenders under Yan Yingyuan held out for more than eighty days before the city fell and was massacred. He was enrolled in the Chinese Bordered Yellow Banner and rose to provincial commander of Zhili.
Life and times
Dates Birth unknown–c. 1667 CE