Public opinion generally believes that the funds of Yuanmingyuan come from the collusion between Cixi and Yi Xuan, the prince of alcohol. Therefore, Cixi specially ordered the establishment of a naval yamen, which was in charge of Yi Xuan, the prince of alcohol, and appropriated the funds of Beiyang Navy to build the Summer Palace, which was costly. This is not in line with the historical truth.
In fact, Beiyang navy has little to do with the establishment of naval yamen. The time when the Qing court set up the naval yamen was Guangxu ten years 1885, which was also the famous Shenjia Yishu in the history of the late Qing Dynasty. At that time, the Qing court was defeated in the Sino-French War. Li Hongzhang suggested to the court to learn from the practices of international naval powers, vigorously develop the navy, set up a navy department, and uniformly control and dispatch the naval forces throughout the country.
Prior to this, the Beiyang Navy had built an army, and almost all warships were in service. Almost all the warships of Beiyang Navy were purchased from European shipyards. 1876, 165438+ 10, four warships such as Long Xiang entered the ranks, 188 1 year, Yang Wei and Chaoyong entered the ranks, 1888, the main force of Beiyang Navy.
There are rumors that Cixi embezzled huge sums of money from Beiyang, mainly because Kang Youwei smeared Cixi. In his letter to Timothy Richard, he said that Cixi had appropriated 62 million taels of silver from the navy and railway funds to build the Summer Palace.
This is actually bullshit. At that time, if Cixi really embezzled 60 million taels of silver, not to mention the Summer Palace, it would be more than enough to rebuild the entire Yuanmingyuan. The Summer Palace is the restoration of the old site of the Spring Festival in Yuanmingyuan. A few hundred thousand taels of silver is enough, and there is no need for huge sums.
Actually, it is. Cixi was then the governor of the provinces? Serve? , equivalent to the provinces take the initiative to raise funds, raised 2.6 million taels of silver. Of course, the money did not come from the private pockets of the governors, but from the fat cream of the people. Cixi attaches great importance to this money. She reminded her cronies several times that this money is hard-won and must not be squandered casually. She also specifically asked Yi Xuan, the Prince of Alcohol, to find a reliable time deposit in a foreign bank and use only the annual income to repair the Summer Palace.
According to the division of labor and practice of the Qing court, the construction of the Summer Palace should be undertaken by the Construction Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. However, in view of the consistent corruption and embarrassment of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, Cixi specially appointed the naval yamen to be in charge and publicly expressed her distrust of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.
Because the money was raised in the name of the navy, and the project was undertaken by the naval yamen, Cixi specially ordered the establishment of the Kunming Lake Navy School on Kunming Lake, indicating the meaning of drinking water. Kunming Lake Naval Academy, as a school for training senior naval officers in the Qing court, specially recruited the children of the Eight Banners nobles, and Yi Xuan, the Prince of Alcohol, personally served as the principal.
However, Yi Xuan, the drunken king, has always been ambitious but has no talent, so he can't take on such a big responsibility. He used to run Ji Shen camp at the Naval Academy, and none of his relatives and children in Beijing succeeded, so the school ended up with nothing but a lot of money and no graduates. Finally, it ended in an anticlimactic way.