Where is Gu Ning Baota? Why is it called a hell on earth?

Ningguta, in Mudanjiang City, Heilongjiang Province today, is called Ningguta on the east and west banks of Wusuli River north of Tumen River. Ningguta is a Manchu transliteration, which has nothing to do with Buddhist temples. Once Qing Taizu Nurhachi stationed troops here, and later became an important town in the northwest. In the Qing Dynasty, whenever Russian Cossacks harassed them, the imperial court would send troops from there to suppress them. Batu was appointed the first general here. Every June, this place undertakes the task of delivering tribute mink to the court.

Of course, the dignitaries of the Qing dynasty not only enjoyed the warmth of this mink, but also were scared into a cold sweat by the word "Ningguta" in the middle of the night. Since the Shunzhi period, Ningguta has become a place to exile prisoners. About 60 miles from the capital to this place, the prisoner was escorted all the way and walked here. It's freezing in the cold, and only heating and eating are the primary problems for exiles. Among them, lucky people may go to Ningguta to pick up wild vegetables, collect horse manure, burn lime and charcoal. If they are unlucky, they may die on the way.

In ancient times, when traffic was not perfect, exile was only a suspended sentence. "Bring it to Beijing and punish it in detail." The emperor shunzhi, who was sitting high in the dragon chair, gave the order, and a group of top scholars were exiled from now on. At first, Fang Fang, the son of Fang's family in Jiangnan, was accused of cheating in the imperial examination because he was suspected of being involved in the imperial examination examiner of the dynasty. Emperors of all dynasties attached great importance to the imperial examination, and cheating in the imperial examination was unacceptable to his Majesty. At that time, Zhu Yuanzhang was furious, because the imperial examinations were all from the south, which angered dozens of people. Since then, the imperial examination has been divided into two lists. Ding Younian was falsely accused of fame and fortune in the imperial examination. Later the truth was clarified. Fang is from Anhui and the examiner is from Zhejiang, which has nothing to do with this. But the emperor shunzhi didn't believe it. In the final judgment, the examiner was beheaded, and the remaining 18 examiners were hanged before being disqualified as jurors. The remaining candidates should be given 40 boards. All the property of the people, including their unrelated sons, was confiscated, and all their parents, brothers and wives were exiled to Ningguta. Fang's father, Fang Gong, was originally a famous Fang family in the south of the Yangtze River. Once he fell, he looked around and found bodies everywhere.

Suffered from grievances and no one complained, Fang Gonggan resigned himself to the road of Ningguta. Later, groups of intellectuals came here for various reasons. Beasts are everywhere, and the bitter and cold places where people eat people in famine years have been changed little by little by them. Someone came here and silently wrote four books on birch bark to educate people and bring culture; Someone came here to inspect the local customs, mountains and landforms, and wrote "Scenery of Ningguta" with Xu Xiake's passion in suffering. Others have the mercy of Princess Wencheng. They brought more advanced farming methods and more solid building methods. People can live and work in peace.

Finally, the successors of General Batu, who was guarding this place, were pleasantly surprised to find that this bitter and cold land was completely out of slash and burn, gradually out of hunger and cold, and was being changed by a group of exiles.

Later, hardworking people enthusiastically lived in the so-called bitter and cold land, generation after generation.