Scenes from many years ago were spinning in Gordon's mind like a revolving lantern. In 1862, just before Wall was killed in battle, Li Hongzhang led the Huai army to settle in Shanghai.
From that moment on, the Ever Victorious Army was incorporated into the Huai Army by the imperial court, and Li Hongzhang became the direct superior of these three European and American adventurers!
The initial cooperation was very pleasant, because the leader of the Ever Victorious Army was Hua Er, and although this man was greedy, he was very slippery. At least he gave Qing officials face.
This made Li Hongzhang and the others very happy. These officials of the Qing Dynasty were afraid that the foreign devils would be difficult to manage, but Hua Er only wanted money but knew how to give face to the officials of the Qing Dynasty. This was a sign of superiority.
However, the good cooperation did not last long. At the end of 1862, Hua Er was killed in battle. The Ever Victorious Army cooperated with the Huai Army to attack Cixi. In this battle, Hua Er was shot and wounded and eventually died!
Li Hongzhang was also very sad about Hua Er's death. Finally, according to Hua Er's request before his death, he was buried in Chinese clothes and buried in Shanghai, and a temple was built to offer sacrifices!
With Wall dead, Bai Qiwen naturally became the leader, and Gordon became the deputy. This is when conflicts began to accumulate!
Holding Bai Qiwen's pistol relic, Gordon's palms were all sweaty. Cheng Beile had already asked his servants to move a few chairs and even the Eight Immortals table, and sat in the courtyard looking at Gordon's complicated expression meaningfully.
Gordon didn't say a word. He had been silent for almost half an hour!
The scenes of the funeral after Hua Er died were all in front of us, and of course there was also the conversation between Bai Qiwen and him after the funeral when they were drinking alone!
Gordon is so sorry! After Wall's death, Gordon and Bai Qiwen actually embezzled the 180,000 taels of silver he left in the military camp!
Wall is a native of Massachusetts, USA. He studied at a military academy in his youth but fled overseas before graduating due to a crime!
Gordon didn't know what crime Wall had committed, and Wall didn't tell them, but the crime must be serious, because there was no place for him in the United States, and he could only live in exile in Europe.
Wall smuggled to Mexico, where he joined the French army as a mercenary and began to fight for Napoleon III!
He was a member of the French army during the Mexican War and the early days of the Crimean War. After the war, he moved to the Qing Dynasty.
Bai Qiwen and Gordon didn't know the situation of Wall's family very well. He had a Chinese daughter-in-law who was the daughter of Daotai Yangfang. It seemed that there were sisters and nephews in the United States. Logically speaking, given Wall's reputation at the time, it would be better to ask the American government to help find relatives. Very simple!
You must know that when Hua Er was first hired by Wu Xi of Songjiang Daotai, Wu Xi worked hard to win over Hua Er out of love for his talent, so he made a request to the U.S. consul in the name of a Qing emperor, asking the United States to pardon Hua Er. Your sin!
Out of interest considerations, the United States actually agreed to Wu Xi's request. Wall was pardoned by the United States and became an innocent person!
Now that Wall is dead, as long as Bai Qiwen and Gordon make a request to the American consul to contact their relatives, the American government will never stand in the way!
The 180,000 taels of silver collected by Hua Er from the Qing Dynasty should be left for his wife and sister!
But who is Bai Qiwen? That is a ruthless man who is 10,000 times more ruthless than Wall! Can money escape if it gets into his eyes?
Bai Qiwen threatened Gordon not to talk nonsense, and half of the 180,000 taels of silver were stolen by the two of them!
This thing was done in such an unethical manner and it was very heartbreaking. Gordon was also very upset about it, but after all, he was not a purely moral gentleman. He was also greedy and ruthless in his heart, and he didn't know how to compete with money!
The friendship between Bai Qiwen and Gordon is actually just an alliance of interests!
This story after 180,000 taels has something to do with Li Hongzhang!
Bai Qiwen was born in North Carolina, USA. His father was a French immigrant. Even after immigrating to the United States, Bai Qiwen's father still served in the French army and participated in the Crimean War.
Young Bai Qiwen fought in Crimea with his father!
It is worth mentioning that when Hual was recruiting foreign soldiers in Shanghai, Bai Qiwen was only 24 years old when he joined the Hual Foreign Gun Team!
Only 24 years old, and he had been fighting for the French with his father in Crimea!
What does this mean? This shows that Bai Qiwen has never received a formal school education at all. He is not even as good as that dropout from Hua Er!
He is young, has not received higher education, and his family influence makes him very arrogant and adventurous. Such a young man is too dangerous. How can he not be arrogant as long as he is given a little power?
When Bai Qiwen officially became the leader of the Ever Victorious Army in 1862, he was only 26 years old!
A 26-year-old young man who had not received any moral education, had no Western aristocratic spirit, and was full of rogue and adventurer ideas... ended up becoming the commander of a five thousand-man army!
How can it not expand? How can you not be arrogant? In the following years, Bai Qiwen could be said to have offended everyone in the official circles of the Qing Dynasty in Jiangnan.
Loot Jiading, plunder Qingpu, and beat Daotai Yangfang!
This guy is so arrogant. When they robbed Jiading, their foreign gun team was the first to break through the city and rush in. When Li Hongzhang's Huai army saw that Chang Sheng's army started to rob, how could they fall behind?
As a result, as soon as these friendly forces started to attack, Bai Qiwen beat them!
The arrogant Bai Qiwen even shouted in front of the public: "Your emperor of the Qing Dynasty allowed our victorious army to plunder the city after the victory! We are not allowed to attack anyone until we have finished robbing!"
Come on, this is proper eating alone! You make a fortune but don't leave any for your allies!
Not only did he rob, but when he asked Daotai Yangfang for military pay, once he lost the respect of his subordinates for his superiors, when he got excited, he went up and gave Daotai Yangfang a good beating!
Some foreign soldiers in the Ever Victorious Army couldn't stand this incident!
Although Daotai Yangfang was an official of the Qing Dynasty, his daughter was promised to Hua Er as his wife. She is the father-in-law of your old boss Hua Er!
You have no human feelings at all. Aren't you an ungrateful wolf?
How do they know that Bai Qiwen even embezzled the money left by his old boss to support the family, so he still cares about a father-in-law from the Qing Dynasty?
The photo is correct!
Bai Qiwen, who made people angry and angry, was eventually dismissed by Li Hongzhang and investigated!
Bai Qiwen was so angry that he ran to Beijing to make trouble and joined forces with the British and American ministers to put pressure on the Prime Minister's Yamen. However, Li Hongzhang already hated this guy and refused to agree despite the pressure!
The imperial court could not afford to offend these powerful Han warlords at the moment. In addition, the imperial court was more afraid of the foreign devils leading troops to expand, so it could not defeat Bai Qiwen's blackmail!
In the end, Bai Qiwen actually did something earth-shattering!
He and a dozen of his die-hard subordinates actually robbed the ship 'Takahashi' of the Ever Victorious Army!
With a shipload of arms, he went straight to Suzhou and joined the Taiping Army!
From that time on, Gordon became the third commander of the Ever Victorious Army, and he learned from the experiences and lessons of the previous two commanders, and finally managed to get along like a fish in the officialdom of the Qing Dynasty!
