As Zhu Yuanzhang had been a monk, shaved his head and worked as a thief, he was extremely taboo about "fate" (with the same pronunciation as a monk), "light", "ze" (with the same pronunciation as a thief) and "Tao" (with the same pronunciation as a thief), and secretly sent a Royal Guards to spy around the streets to detect whether anyone touched these taboo words behind his back and curse them. Some officials in the imperial court inadvertently wrote some congratulatory messages, such as "If you do something, you will respect the Constitution", "If you do something, you will be the son", "If you do something, you will be the world", and "If you do something, you will be virtuous", etc. Zhu Yuanzhang thought that you were called a thief, which killed the Royal Guards' "Imperial aides" on the spot. In a congratulatory table, there is a passage praising Zhu Yuanzhang: "Under the skylight, a natural saint is the rule of the world." Zhu Yuanzhang was furious after reading it: "A living monk also calls me a monk. Just shaved my hair and called me bald. " Then the voice approached the thief and called me a thief. "Order the Royal Guard to put the above-mentioned personnel on death row. Another veteran wrote in his statement that "there is a way in the world." Zhu Yuanzhang said angrily, "This damn old man still calls me a robber! "
It is because of such a suspicious and violent emperor that the Royal Guards are even more unscrupulous.
Zhu Yuanzhang gave Royal Guards the privilege of "imperial aide", which was extremely cruel. Zhu Yuanzhang once ordered the Royal Guards to kill his nephew Zhu Wenzheng with a club. Ming Wuzong and Ming Shizong also asked the Royal Guards to "pay attention to hundreds of people" and killed dozens of people on the spot. It became the biggest "Zhang Ting" case in the history of the Ming Dynasty. There are many kinds of torture in Royal Guards, including "full punishment", that is, five kinds of torture, such as mechanical torture, fetters, sticks, slaps and clamps, are applied to prisoners; There is a "pipa punishment" that makes "all bones fall off"; There is a "cangue punishment" weighing more than 300 kilograms; There are also broken spine, heart stab wounds, finger falling, nose watering, finger nailing, branding, sticking sticks, flying swallows, horse-stopping sticks and a terrible torture of boiling asphalt peeling human skin. "History of Criminal Law in Ming Dynasty" said: "There were some criminals in ancient times, and it goes without saying that they were indifferent to criminal law, such as Zhang Ting, Emperor of the East and West, Wei Jinyi and Zhen Fu. Killing people to death is not beautiful in law, but doing it on the heel until it is done. "
Jin Yiwei's behavior angered the ruling and opposition parties. Zhu Yuanzhang himself found that the Royal Guards became increasingly powerful by virtue of his own privileges, so in the twentieth year of Hongwu (1387), he decided to withdraw the Royal Guards and ordered the burning of instruments of torture. But not long after, after Zhu Di, the emperor of Ming Dynasty, ascended the throne, in order to suppress the courtiers of Emperor Wen Jian, he restored the Royal Guards and trusted them to command Ji Gang. Ji Gang once again engaged in espionage activities, spreading spies' eyes and ears everywhere, constantly spying or spying, and even planting frames, which revived the rule of terrorists in the Royal Guards. After the restoration of Ming Yingzong, he even indulged the Royal Guards, saying, "If you want to know foreign affairs, you should rely on the official knowledge of the Royal Guards for your eyes and ears.". Until the demise of the Ming Dynasty (1644), the spy agency Royal Guards also perished, which lasted for 260 years.
In the Ming Dynasty, besides Royal Guards, there were East Factory, West Factory and Inner Factory, which were also called "Three Factories".
After the Ming Emperor Judy seized the throne, he abolished the imperial edict of Hongwu and restored the imperial edict of Royal Guards. On the other hand, in the 18th year of Yongle (1420), a special agency was set up outside Dong 'anmen in Beijing, namely Dongchang. Its main duties are to "arrest and visit the rebels, say evil words, etc." And appointed a trusted eunuch as the prefect of the East Factory. People refer to the Royal Guards and the East Factory as "Factory Guards". The employees of the East Factory select the most cunning and vicious agents from the Royal Guards as agents. There are several captains (also called "guards") and thousands of "fans" (also called detective spies), who are assigned to various officials, offices and places to engage in surveillance and detective work.
It is worth pointing out that Judy has his unique means in controlling and controlling spy agencies. On the one hand, he transferred the security personnel to the East Factory, on the other hand, he secretly asked the East Factory Prefect to monitor the security, so that the factory and the security company restricted each other and could not seize power, and both of them reported directly to Judy, thus enabling Judy to control and mobilize the factory and the security company and serve them conveniently.
In the 13th year of Ming Chenghua (1477), Ming Xianzong set up a secret service agency named Xichang, which was led by Wang Zhi, a trusted eunuch, and its scale was twice that of Dongchang. Wang Zhi "ordered schools to criticize widely, major issues, dialects and dialects, pick and smell." Shortly after Wang Zhi came to power, all walks of life in the ruling and opposition circles were monitored, falsely accused and tortured by agents from the West Factory. Shang Lu, a college student, risked his life to go on stage: "Recently, the service is too complicated, the decree is too urgent, the punishment network is too dense, and people are in panic. Your Majesty's Committee listened to Wang Zhi's words, but it was straightforward to send the eyes and ears to the small group. "It is so exciting at home and abroad, and nothing unexpected happened to it!" On the surface, Ming Xianzong lost his temper with Shang Lu, but deep down, he began to be wary of Wang Zhi's power. As Shang Ming, the eunuch of the East Factory, refused to obey Wang Zhi's orders, he decided to strike first. From time to time, he sent "Fan Zi" to secretly track and detect some illegal activities in Wang Zhi, then immediately notified Ming Xianzong, and finally recovered the West Factory and Wang Zhi in the eighteenth year of Chenghua (1482).
In the early years of Zheng Dechu (1506), Liu Jin, the eunuch, resumed the West Factory and took control of the Royal Guards while controlling the East Factory. "The factory and the guards are in harmony." 1508, Liu Jin secretly set up another spy agency-the office factory (hereinafter referred to as the office factory), and personally served as the prefect, with power above all institutions in the court. Royal Guards and Dongxi Factory are also under the supervision of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. The secret service of the Ming Dynasty reached its peak, so Liu Jin was called "the emperor of the site", which shows its great power.
Liu Jin manipulated "three factories and one health care" and carried out large-scale espionage activities in the ruling and opposition parties. "Mao Ju's palace aides are meticulous, scattering a captain (that is, a spy), waiting for him from far and near, saving people's expectations." Spy agents are all over the country, such as mercury pouring down, and tens of thousands of officials and people have been falsely accused of abnormal deaths. For example, Wang Shouren, a senior minister of the Ministry of War who made great contributions to the Ming Dynasty, was dragged into the water on the spot because he offended Liu Jin, hit 50 boards and was exiled to remote areas. Liu Jin, who is narrow-minded, still won't let him go. He secretly sent his factory fan to track and monitor Wang Shouren on the road, hoping to assassinate him. In desperation, Wang Shouren had to pretend to commit suicide and threw himself into the river in the middle of the night, leaving a poem and floating his hat and shoes on the water. I got rid of the pestering of "Fanzi" and found my own life. At that time, when people heard the word "factory", their hair stood on end and they were terrified.
In the fifth year of Zheng De in Ming Dynasty (15 10), the contradiction between Liu Jin and the minister of civil and military affairs in the imperial court became heated up. Zhang Yongcheng was drunk and reported Liu Jin's rebellion plot alone, prompting Ming Wuzong to order the arrest of Liu Jin and his henchmen. When Ming Wuzong learned that millions of gold and silver jewels, a fake seal, clothes, jade belts, weapons and other prohibited items were found in Liu Jin's home, especially when Liu Jin was found hiding two miniature daggers in the fan he had been holding in his hand, Ming Wuzong flew into a rage and ordered him to be sent to prison for trial. Soon, Liu Jin, his 15 family members, Zhang Cai, the party official department official, and Jin Yiwei ordered Yu Yang to be executed. Both the west factory and the inner factory have been cancelled.
The following year (162 1~ 1627), eunuch Wei Zhongxian ruled by the ruling party, and the disaster of spy terror rule followed. Wei Zhongxian sent cronies to control the Royal Guards and the East Factory, sent more than a thousand "Fanzi" detectives around him, named "Wholesale and Retail", and colluded with Beijing hooligans to instigate informers, named "Fighting Incident". Anyone who reports an incident will get a certain reward, which is called "buying a number" or "buying an incident". In every yamen of the imperial court, there is a supervisor from Dongchang named "Zuo Ji". When interrogating recidivists, there must be a "fan Zi" present to supervise the interrogation, which is called "listening". If the Record of Hearing has not arrived, no court session shall be held. The officials were miserable and complained, "The guards in the factory are extremely poisonous."
The spy reconnaissance mission of the East Factory is allocated by lottery on the first day of each month. Hundreds of "Fanzi" draw lots in turn, and when an object is drawn, it is necessary to monitor and spy for a month. The information obtained can be directly put into the palace gate in the middle of the night, and then presented directly to the emperor by the eunuch, so the emperor always knows everything in the country. Wei Zhongxian was so favored that he was nicknamed "nine years old". He has five tigers, five tigers, ten dogs, ten sons and forty grandsons and other notorious eunuchs. They hold the imperial power and do whatever they want. Yang Lian, deputy governor of the Imperial Capital, once pointed out sharply: "There is no disloyalty to the monarch and virtue in big and small matters in the palace, but he thinks that the emperor is famous and loyal to the monarch is real." Yang Lian was falsely accused by Wei Zhongxian as the "Fanzi" of the East Factory, and was tortured to death. From then on, courtiers were either snobbish or silent, and foreign ministers also flattered them. Pan Ruzhen, Governor of Zhejiang Province, built the Wei Zhongxian Temple-Pude Temple for Wei Zhongxian on the bank of the West Lake in Hangzhou. It is magnificent in scale and exquisite in architecture, just like a palace. The statue of Wei Zhongxian in the temple is made of pure gold, and even the insides in the stomach are made of jewelry and agate, which is almost as gorgeous as the emperor. 1627, Emperor Chongzhen ascended the throne, and Wei Zhongxian lost his backer. Officials and people in the ruling and opposition parties have been playing illegally. Emperor Chongzhen asked Pan Ruzhen to build Pude Temple in the same scale as the emperor for Wei Zhongxian, and Jiaxing Gong Shengqian wrote to list ten crimes committed by Wei Zhongxian by using the factory guards, demanding the removal of Weimen traitors. Wei Zhongxian was terrified and hanged himself for fear of sin. Emperor Chongzhen wrote a letter to dismember the body and hung his head for public display. However, Emperor Chongzhen sent a trusted eunuch to prefect the East Factory, saying that "it is very beneficial to rely on the factory to defend the country until the country perishes". By the end of the Ming dynasty 1644, the factory disaster, like the health disaster, would die at the same time.
The secret service of the Ming Dynasty was unprecedented and the darkest in China's ancient feudal society. The spy agency of "Three Factories and One Guard" not only failed to strengthen the rule of the Ming Dynasty and the stability of the country, but also caused the disintegration of the ruling group, seriously hindered the development of productive forces, weakened the ruling power of the central group, and greatly deepened class contradictions and ethnic contradictions, which was a deformed development state of the spy agency and its activities. The various settings and unclear responsibilities of spy agencies have also led to the chaotic situation in which various agencies conflict with each other, undermine each other and take credit for each other, distorting spy reconnaissance activities into framing and spreading rumors, and turning interrogation into torture of coercion, confession and nonsense. The authenticity is greatly reduced, the authenticity is mixed, and it is difficult to distinguish the authenticity, which leads to its final decline.