The Taiping Rebellion: The Chinese Civil War

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The Taiping Rebellion was a radical and religious civil war, that was during the mid 19th century in China. The revolution started in 1850 with a newly converted Christian named Hong Xiuquan, and he claimed that he was the younger brother of Jesus Christ, thus the son of god. He had wanted to gain the support of the people to fight against the Qing Dynasty. Hong was able to gain support quickly from the people after claiming that he had the power to fix poverty, and ensure that the Qing Government was destroyed so that power went to the people. The Taiping Rebellion started from a general hate for the Qing Dynasty from the Chinese people. The current dynasty was ruled by corrupt officials who didn’t want change, they refused to move forward and gain help from the foreign devils as they were called. The Chinese people believed that China was being ruled poorly and change was necessary for the well being of the Chinese people. Hong’s following was quickly gained because it “attracted many famine-stricken peasants, workers, and miners, and his propaganda against the foreign Manchu rulers of China”.
After a strong following was gained, Hong began the civil war’s fighting in the southwestern province of …show more content…

He tried to regain his strength once again in 1860 by making a large leap and leading his remaining army into Shanghai but was no longer a match for the Qing Dynasty, if he still had his whole army, he could have done this properly, but he failed without it. In the end of the 14 years, Qing Dynasty officials decided that they wanted to completely finish off the remaining Taiping soldiers. So under the leadership of Zeng Guofan in 1862, Zeng surrounded Nanjing, cutting off all supply and any way for the taiping army to survive. After Hong realized no escape was possible, he gave up and committed suicide which meant the end of the

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