The Taiping Rebellion was a mid-19th century uprising in China led by Christian convert Hong Xiuquan, who established the Heavenly Kingdom of Great Peace. The rebellion spread throughout central and southern China, but was ultimately put down by the Qing government after years of fighting. Despite its defeat, the rebellion inspired other uprisings against the Qing in the years to come.
The Taiping Rebellion was a major uprising in China during the mid-19th century. It is also known as the Great Peace Rebellion and took place under the rule of the Qing government. It was, in essence, the establishment of a new country, the Heavenly Kingdom of Great Peace, in the southern part of China.
The rebellion was led by a Christian convert named Hong Xiuquan. He espoused many nontraditional Christian views, including the idea that he was the younger brother of Jesus Christ. During the mid-19th century there was a great deal of anti-Qing sentiment, stemming from a series of massive Qing military defeats, and the general resentment of the Han majority at being ruled by a Manchu minority.
Hong Xiuquan considered it his duty to free his brothers from what he saw as foreign rulers and spread the word of his brand of Christianity. Lui embarked on the Taiping Rebellion in response to the Qing government’s crackdown on his religious organization, Lui after years of activity in secret.
The rebellion began in Guangxi province in 1851. An army of over ten thousand rebels drove Qing troops out of Jintian city. The Qing government tried to recapture the city, but they were repulsed and Hong Xiuquan claimed victory. A few months later he declared the sovereignty of the Heavenly Kingdom of Peace, and made himself its absolute ruler.
More than 700,000 troops took the great city of Nanjing in 1853 and declared it the capital of the Heavenly Peace Kingdom, renaming it the Heavenly Capital. Troops spread out from there, conquering much of central and southern China and controlling the Yangtze River valley. At its height the lands claimed by the Taiping Rebellion numbered more than thirty million inhabitants, making it a huge kingdom by any measure.
That same year, Hong Xiuquan, who had largely retired from public life, began acting suspiciously of his second-in-command, Yang Xiuqing. He finally had him executed three years later, fearing that Yang was trying to wrest control of the kingdom from him. At the same time, the rebels have tried to foster international support by attracting European allies.
The Europeans, however, have decided to remain neutral in the affair. They supported neither Hong Xiuquan, nor the Qing government, unwilling to threaten trade relations with either side if he ultimately proved victorious. The Taiping Rebellion also tried to build a broader base of support among the middle class in China but was unsuccessful. The anti-Confucian sentiment that Hong Xiuquan, as a heterodox Christian, pushed into the rebellion’s agenda alienated most of the middle-class Chinese, who were staunch Confucians.
In 1860 the rebels attempted to take Shanghai, but were repulsed by the Qing. The Qing government took the opportunity to redouble their efforts to take back the Taiping land, and by 1864 had retaken most of the land Hong Xiuquan had wrested from them. As the Qing marched on Nanjing, Hong Xiuquan died of food poisoning. A few days later the Qing took the city and the rebellion was largely put down.
However, it took another seven years for the rebellion to truly end. Hundreds of thousands of soldiers continued to fight, despite the fall of Nanjing. In late 1871 however, in a massive battle, most of the Taiping Army was destroyed. Although the Taiping Rebellion was stopped, a number of veterans of those wars continued to fight in the Hui, Panthay and Nien rebellions, which continued to harass the Qing for years to come.
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