Ministers › Remonstrators
Zhang Peilun
Outspoken censor of the Pure Stream group whose career ended when the Fujian fleet was destroyed at Mawei in 1884, later Li Hongzhang's son-in-law
At dawn in a palace courtyard, a large drum hangs in a small roofed frame beside a red pillar, with a bound bundle of scrolls on a low stand in front; a stone balustrade leads toward a large hall in the mist, and a row of tiny people stands far away.
Also known as Zi Youqiao · Zi Shengan · Hao Kuizhai
- Roles
- Remonstrators
Zhang Peilun, courtesy name Youqiao, styled Kuizhai, came from Fengrun in Zhili and passed the metropolitan examination in 1871. As a Hanlin official in the early Guangxu years he repeatedly impeached senior ministers and was known with Zhang Zhidong and Baoting as a voice of the Pure Stream faction. During the war with France in 1884 he was sent to help direct the coastal defence of Fujian, and when the French squadron struck at Mawei that August the Fujian fleet was almost wiped out; he was dismissed and exiled to the Chahar frontier. Released in 1888, he joined Li Hongzhang's staff and married Li's daughter Li Jingshu as his second wife. He died in Nanjing in 1903; the novelist Eileen Chang (Zhang Ailing) was his granddaughter.
Life and times
Dates 1848 CE–1903 CE