From ancient times to the present, no matter where it is, no matter which country it is, as long as the political power is established, financial affairs will naturally arise. In order to perform state functions, the rulers must levy taxes or other matters from the people. To pay tribute, therefore, a warehouse to store wealth for the country came into being, that is, the "national treasury".
In 1853, the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom captured Nanjing, changed its name to "Tianjing", designated it as the capital, and promulgated the "holy treasury" system: all Taiping Heavenly Kingdom subjects must hand over their money to " In the "holy treasury", anyone who secretly hides more than 5 and two pieces of silver will be punished as a crime, and serious cases will be sentenced to death.
During the 14 years of the existence of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, tens of thousands of people of the Kingdom of Heaven participated in it. One can imagine the wealth accumulated in the "Holy Treasury"!
The Holy Treasury of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom is the national treasury of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom. There are traces of the amount of wealth in the "Holy Treasury" in historical materials.
In September 1853, Zhang Jigeng, the magistrate of Baojing County, Hunan, saw the Taiping Army conquering the city and occupying Nanjing. He was determined to take revenge. He was willing to become a spy for the Qing Army and sneak into the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom to secretly communicate with the Qing Dynasty. The army should cooperate with the outside world and vow to destroy the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom.
Zhang Jigeng changed his name to Ye Zhifa. He first mingled in the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom's machine shop, and then infiltrated into Wei Changhui's Dianyu Hall as a teacher, secretly gathering accomplices and forming an alliance to rebel.
He repeatedly contacted Xiang Rong, the leader of the Qing army, and sent 36 secret letters one after another. One of them wrote: After the Taiping Army occupied Nanjing, they transported a batch of silver hidden in " There are more than 18 million taels in the "Holy Treasury", and the "Holy Treasury" is located in Lantern Lane at Shuiximen in Nanjing City.
The Heavenly King Hong Xiuquan claimed that the "Holy Treasury" was publicly owned, but in fact, Hong Xiuquan and the Taiping kings all directly drew their food and clothing expenses from the "Holy Treasury". The so-called "Holy Treasury" In fact, it became the personal treasure trove of Hong Xiuquan, the king of heaven.
After possessing huge wealth, Hong Xiuquan, the king of heaven, began to build luxurious mansions with other kings, and with the purpose of using money, he spent large sums of money from the holy treasury to satisfy his selfish desires.
Li Hongzhang once mentioned in a letter from home: Prince Zhong’s Mansion (the residence of Prince Zhong Li Xiucheng) has beautiful buildings and jade rooms, a bridal chamber with curved columns, and is really like a fairy cave house, with three or four gardens and two or three stages. , a situation I have never seen in my life.
The Qing army discovered a golden crown in Prince Zhong’s palace. The amount of workmanship used to make it was comparable to the Queen of England’s crown. Such luxury was only the simplest among the palaces of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom princes. existence, then the level of luxury in the lives of other kings is simply unimaginable.
It is recorded in "Brahma Lu Cong Lu" that when Zeng Guoquan captured the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom and walked into the main hall of the Heavenly King's Mansion, he saw everything he could see was resplendent with splendor and splendor. Four big lamps hung in front of the hall. They are all made of "wind-rubbed copper" which is more precious than gold; under the floor tiles of the side hall are all the gold ornaments wrapped around women's arms; in one room are some rare orbs and gems stored.
In 1872, the vigorous Taiping Rebellion came to an end with the defeat of the last Taiping Army in Guizhou, but the architectural remains of the Taiping Rebellion and legends about the treasures of the Holy Treasury were left behind.
As for the exact size of the treasures in the holy treasury, and whether they were taken away or hidden somewhere, there is only a popular mystery poem about the treasures "Taiping Heavenly Kingdom Treasure Poem", which has attracted endless speculation from the world. The content of the poem It is like this: Two rivers sandwich one river, and the river has eighteen baskets. One foot to the left, one foot to the right, one foot to the front, and one foot to the back. Jump, give way, kick out a gold ingot jar.
Since then, everyone in the world has been eager to find the treasure left by the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, but so far, no one has found this so-called treasure.
In 1864, Tianjing, which had been besieged by the Hunan Army for several years, finally fell. Zeng Guoquan immediately led his Hunan Army troops to loot and loot the city of Tianjing, focusing on the Tianwang Mansion and Zhuge Liang. The royal residence and the residences of heavenly officials.
In the months before the attack on Tianjing, Zeng Guofan had been hinting to the Hunan army who was defending the city and preparing for war, saying that as long as Tianjing was captured and the "holy treasury" was captured, countless treasures would be left to the soldiers of the Hunan army. Take it for yourself.
The words and deeds of Zeng Guofan and Zeng Guoquan do not mean that they encouraged the soldiers of the Hunan Army to become robbers and bandits. Looking at the history of the Qing Dynasty, we can know that at the end of the Qing Dynasty, the Qing court was corrupt and the national treasury was in short supply. Cixi only cared about her own life. She was extravagant and worry-free, but she never allocated a cent of food and salary to the loyal and brave Hunan army who worked hard for her and the Qing court.
Although Zeng Guofan single-handedly formed the elite Hunan Army, it was not easy to feed such a large army. In order to maintain the Hunan Army, Zeng Guofan could only make a silent promise while "drawing a big pie" for the soldiers, promising that after they captured Tianjing City, they could take whatever property there was. When Zeng Guoquan led the Hunan army into the city, he did indeed get all the free money in the city by ransacking the streets, but he couldn't find it in search of the "holy treasury".
The Hunan Army did not give up, demolishing houses, digging land, digging ponds, and setting fire to Hong Xiuquan's Tianwang Mansion, but they did not find the so-called holy treasure.
On July 23, 1864, the loyal king Li Xiucheng failed to escape and was captured in a mountain forest on the outskirts of Nanjing. Five days later, Zeng Guofan decided to interrogate Li Xiucheng personally. Before Li Xiucheng was killed, he spent 16 days in prison and wrote a confession of more than 50,000 words, which touched on many aspects of the Taiping Rebellion.
Li Xiucheng was interested in leaving authentic and unabashed historical records for the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, while Zeng Guofan and Zeng Guoquan were more concerned about the treasures in the holy treasury, so they asked Li Xiucheng: What are the treasures in the city? Can you point out a few points about gold and silver? The loyal king Li Xiucheng's answer was: There is no silver or rice in the treasury, and there is no gold or silver in the house.
Zeng Guoquan had no choice but to personally interrogate Dong Jinquan, the Dream King who was in charge of internal affairs in the Tianwang Mansion. Unfortunately, even though he was severely punished, Dong Jinquan always chose to bite the bullet and did not confess anything about the treasures of the Holy Treasury. information.
Based on the historical records, it can be almost inferred that except for some frivolous wealth and the three seals of the Heavenly King and the Young Heavenly King, the Hunan Army did not obtain much treasure, and Zeng Guoquan and Zeng Guofan did not obtain much treasure because of their capture of Tianwang. There are two main historical data supporting the fact that he made a fortune in the capital.
When the Hunan army captured Tianjing, Li Xiucheng was ordered to protect the young King Tian as he fled, but they were both captured. In order to save his life, the young king gave a detailed explanation of everything he knew, but said nothing about the treasure in the holy treasury.
On the other hand, if Zeng Guoquan knew the whereabouts of the treasure through the mouth of the Young Heavenly King and found the treasure, the relevant people who knew about it would have to be silenced.
In fact, Li Xiucheng and the Young Heavenly King were later safely escorted to Beijing, which is the most powerful proof that Zeng Guofan and Zeng Guoquan "did not swallow up the holy treasury and were innocent".
After Zeng Guofan's death, the Zeng family lost its main source of income, and their life became increasingly difficult. Once, Zeng Guofan's grandson got diphtheria, but he had no money for treatment, and Zeng Guoquan could not scrape together enough money. He had no choice but to ask Zuo Zongtang to borrow 300 taels of silver before he could get medical treatment.
This historical fact can also reflect Zeng Guofan and Zeng Guoquan’s self-restraint and honest official character.
The Taiping Heavenly Kingdom has existed for 14 years. It is impossible for the Tianwang Mansion and the Holy Treasury to leave nothing, and Zeng Guoquan, who captured Tianjing City, cannot leave nothing.
It is conceivable that when the Hunan army entered each prince's palace, they were still able to plunder a lot of valuable artifacts and treasures, but they were not as large in quantity as rumored by the outside world.