What's going on here? We should also start with the huge wealth of Zheng Chenggong that they plundered.
After his father was removed, Zheng Chenggong led his cronies to Nan 'ao Island to recruit soldiers, and then vigorously developed foreign trade, accumulating huge wealth in a few years.
Zheng Chenggong, with a small territory, took Xiamen as a base in Li Yong's four years from Cai Zheng and Zheng Lian brothers, and then transferred most of his wealth to Xiamen to attract anti-Qing forces from all over the coast.
After the rapid growth of strength, there is a shortage of food and grass. In order to solve this problem, Zheng Chenggong sent his uncle Zheng Hongkui to Chaozhou, Guangdong Province to collect food and grass.
Due to a large collection, the local people were dissatisfied and rebelled. More importantly, the Qing army occupying Guangdong also took the opportunity to attack. At that time, Zheng Hongkui was caught between the two parties and had to send someone to Zheng Chenggong for help.
After receiving the distress message, Zheng Chenggong left his uncle Zheng Zhi to guard Xiamen, and led the main force south to Guangdong to support Zheng Hongkui.
In March of five years in Li Yong, Zheng Chenggong conquered Daxing and other places and seized grain and grass.
The news that Zheng Chenggong's main force left reached Fujian. Zhang Xuesheng, Governor of Fujian Province in Qing Dynasty, Huang Zhu, Governor of Fujian Province, and General Manager of Fujian Youdao were overjoyed and decided to take advantage of this godsend opportunity to surprise Xiamen.
These three men attacked Xiamen so actively, not because they were loyal to the Qing court, but because they had their own small plans: they had long heard that Zheng Chenggong had gained huge wealth through trade, and the money had been shipped to Xiamen.
By attacking Xiamen, they can not only show their loyalty to the Qing court to increase their ranking, but also take Zheng Chenggong's wealth as their own, killing two birds with one stone.
After the three men discussed, Ma De led the Qing army across the sea and attacked Xiamen on February 27th.
Zheng, who is guarding Xiamen, is an idiot, drinking and having fun all day, and he has no defense at all, which leads to Xiamen garrison and navy being easily defeated by the Qing army.
What is even more hateful is that Zheng Zhiguan immediately boarded the ship and fled after knowing the attack of the Qing army, without even taking Zheng Chenggong's wife Dong Shi and Prince Zheng Jing.
When the Qing army in the city was busy robbing, Dong Shi escaped from Xiamen by boat with Zheng Jing and boarded Zheng Zhiguan's warship.
After the fall of Xiamen, almost all the wealth that Zheng Chenggong transferred to this city fell into Ma Degong's hands, and a small amount was taken away by Qing soldiers.
After Ma Degong succeeded to the throne, he wrote to Zhang Xuesheng and Huang Shu, inviting them to come to Xiamen to discuss the aftermath. In fact, the three men shared the spoils.
How much did the three people share? According to Zheng Chenggong's later letter to his father, "I was robbed of more than 900,000 gold, hundreds of jewels and hundreds of thousands of meters and millet. The wealth of the rest of the soldiers and the money valley of the people, how can we win it? "
While the three men divided Zheng Chenggong's property, the Qing soldiers were not idle. They robbed from house to house and robbed Xiamen people.
Afterwards, Zhang Xuesheng and Huang Shu returned to Fujian with their belongings, leaving Ma Degong to guard Xiamen.
When the news of the fall of Xiamen reached Guangdong, Zheng Chenggong was greatly shocked. His soldiers were worried about the fate of their relatives and urged Zheng Chenggong to return to his post immediately.